Campaign Ideas for #GivingTuesday Fundraising

Do you have your campaign ideas ready for GivingTuesday?  

Is it just about fundraising to see how much money can be raised? Absolutely not! According to the GivingTuesday website, “GivingTuesday is a global generosity movement unleashing the power of radical generosity.” And that generosity comes in different forms:

• Making someone smile
• Helping out a neighbor
• Show up for an issue or people you care about
• Share some of what you have with others in need

But we’re not going to imply that fundraising isn’t key for GivingTuesday either. In fact, here are some incredible statistics around GivingTuesday fundraising in 2021:

• Despite an ongoing pandemic, donors gave almost $3 billion
• It has grown into a worldwide movement with over 80 countries participating
• 50% of those who participated gave money
• 17.8 million people donated money and 10.2 million gave goods
• GivingTuesday revenue grew, while Black Friday and Cyber Monday revenue fell

Before we go right into campaign ideas, let’s look back and see where GivingTuesday started.

What is GivingTuesday?

GivingTuesday was created in 2012 as a day that encourages people to do good. It was born in New York City and started at the 92nd Street Y and its Belfer Center for Innovation & Social Impact. Over the last decade it has grown into an independent nonprofit and global movement.

Source: Home - GivingTuesday

Why is GivingTuesday Successful for Nonprofits?

Nonprofits are charitable organizations. And GivingTuesday is all about people being charitable. So, it really is an opportunity for your nonprofit to leverage peoples’ eagerness to give and show their support for the causes they care about. Whether your nonprofit helps kids, families, animals, the environment, or more, GivingTuesday has proven itself to be a successful day for nonprofits to appeal to donors with creative campaigns.

What are Some Examples of GivingTuesday Campaigns?

We’re getting toward the end of a long year that you’ve been working hard on marketing, communicating, and fundraising. Sometimes it’s difficult to know where to start when planning a new campaign. In fact, you might even be experiencing a fundraising block (similar to writer’s block) and you just need a little nudge to spark that creativity. Well, we’ve done the research for you and found some fun examples!

• Treehouse For Kids: They are all about social media audience engagement. They played Treehouse Bingo where the bingo items were activities that supported their cause. As the audience carried out different actions, they could check them off the bingo card until they got a bingo.
• World Vision: They run a matching gift campaign in partnership with Thirty-One Gifts. For every gift from a donor to World Vision, Thirty-One Gifts matches it  with products of equal value, meaning the donation’s impact is doubled.
• Goodwill: They used a simple way to kick off their campaign with a “Save The Date” to introduce their social media audience to how to participate.
• ASPCA: They facilitated a Facebook Live-a-Thon where they streamed live to highlight their mission, feature notable animal lovers, and showcased celebrity animals. 

Fun campaign ideas, right? Well if your nonprofit is ready to get started planning for your GivingTuesday campaign, here are a few things to remember:

• Register Online - Here you can get ideas for how your nonprofit can participate and download helpful resources like guides and toolkits.
• Set And Promote Your Goal - Donors want to know what the target is. Let them know! It gives them a sense of urgency and helps them feel informed.
• Set Up Your Social Media Outreach - Make sure you create your assets, write your posts ahead of time, schedule them to publish, track their performance, and engage with your audience.
• Keep Your Messaging Simple And Focused - People don’t want to read long, drawn out, and detailed social posts. Get to the point. Let donors know what you need, why you need it, and the impact they can make.

Wrapping It Up

We trust this information has provided you with a good start on setting up your GivingTuesday campaign! If you’d like to learn more tips and best practices, we have a webinar coming up on Thursday, October 20. Register today - we’ll see you there!