In Part One of this series, we went over content ideas for January-June, as well as rules of thumb to consider as you plan out your year.
Below is a helpful calendar for July-December to give you some ideas of how you can utilize your marketing to close out your fundraising year strong.
Celebrate your mid-year fundraising goals by sharing an exclusive video with your donors. Start designing a mini-site for your end-of-year campaign and promote it on all of your channels. Invite non-donors to sign up for your newsletter to get updates on how they can help.
Start planning your year-end fundraising campaign. We know it's several months away, but having a well thought out fundraising strategy will help you achieve your goals.
Pro Tip: Set a goal for your campaign and how you plan to achieve it. Think of utilizing a theme or narrative that you can use across all channels: online, offline, and on social media.
As you ease into the kickoff of your end-of-year campaign, think about sending out personalized messages to your donors. Craft letters that can be personalized and thank each of your donors for their previous contributions. People like to feel their gifts are appreciated.
Pro Tip: When sending out a thank you letter, make sure you don't include an ask. Thank you messaging should be all about the donor, not how they can continue to support your mission.
Start working on content to promote your year-end campaign. Update your donation page, and include features such as tell-a-friend and ways to make donating more straightforward, such as recurring donations.
Launch your mini-site with new content that fits your messaging. Work on A/B content that stays consistent with your email and social media efforts. Create blog content that shows the impact donations have made throughout the year.
Send out a direct mail campaign that offers messaging that is consistent with your year-end language. Make it easy for donors to pledge via mail when you send out this appeal.
Start engaging your lists with your A/B content. When it comes to your email newsletters, start changing your schedule to include a new email every other week to ramp up for the end of the year.
Pro Tip: Keep an eye out for #GivingTuesday—one of the biggest donation days of the year. You'll want to ramp up your efforts that day by publishing multiple times on your social channels, and send out a couple of emails that day reminding people to donate.
Start the last month of the year out by giving your donors an update on where you are with your campaign and how far you still need to go.
You can encourage engagement with a postcard appeal campaign. Craft language and visuals that showcase the impact their contributions have made throughout the year.
Send a few more emails during the middle of the month, and send a final appeal message between Christmas Day and New Year's Eve.
Pro Tip: Don't forget to note that donations are tax-deductible.
Using these tips, you should be able to:
• design a content calendar that will encourage donations
• grow your donor base
• achieve your fundraising goals
Looking for more information on how to effectively market your nonprofit? You can download a FREE copy of "Nonprofit Marketing: How to Enhance Your Fundraising Efforts" and request to have a printed version mailed to you.