#38—5 next-level tactics to grow your monthly giving program, with Erica Waasdorp

06/30/21 • 50 min

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You already know that growing your monthly giving program, mid-level donor program, and legacy giving program are among the most lucrative fundraising activities your nonprofit can pursue.
And chances are, you're already working on building all of them—but you're wondering if could be doing better. So if you already have a monthly giving program in place, today's show is going to be especially valuable for you.
We're talking to Erica Waasdorp, author of Monthly Giving: The Sleeping Giant and a brand new book called Monthly Giving Made Easy.
Erica is fellow direct response fundraising nerd, and in today's podcast she is going to share 5 tactics to level-up your existing monthly giving program.

Today we’ll cover:

[4:05] - Monthly Donor Monday

[5:47] - #1 Putting someone in charge of the program

[12:36] - #2 Growing your monthly donor file

[23:55] - #3 Cultivation and stewardship

[33:15] - #4 Create a Donor Retention Day

[38:10] - #5 Asking monthly donors to upgrade

[46:02] - Erica's encouragement for nonprofits leaders and fundraisers
Get connected:

Erica would love to connect with you. You can find her book Monthly Giving Made Easy and follow her blog at her website: adirectsolution.com

Please consider subscribing to, rating, or sharing the BuildGood Podcast on your preferred platform. You can do that by clicking here.

To take advantage of our free resources and get your 5-minute fundraising fix, visit: fiveminutefundraisingfix.com

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Today we’ll cover:

[4:05] - Monthly Donor Monday

[5:47] - #1 Putting someone in charge of the program

[12:36] - #2 Growing your monthly donor file

[23:55] - #3 Cultivation and stewardship

[33:15] - #4 Create a Donor Retention Day

[38:10] - #5 Asking monthly donors to upgrade

[46:02] - Erica's encouragement for nonprofits leaders and fundraisers
Get connected:

Erica would love to connect with you. You can find her book Monthly Giving Made Easy and follow her blog at her website: adirectsolution.com

Please consider subscribing to, rating, or sharing the BuildGood Podcast on your preferred platform. You can do that by clicking here.

To take advantage of our free resources and get your 5-minute fundraising fix, visit: fiveminutefundraisingfix.com

Previous Episode

#37—How Amnesty built a succesful legacy program by doing things nonprofits of all sizes and budgets can implement, with Hala Al-Madi

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For many donors, the largest gift they will ever make to charity is the one they leave in their will. Carrying on their legacy and keeping alive the values that were important to your donors in their lifetime is a tremendous responsibility.
It's also a tremendous opportunity for you to increase your organization's impact in the world.
Most donors only include charities in their will that have done a great job of communicating shared values, stewarding them, and building the kinds of relationships that are mutually uplifting and significant.

That's why the state of your legacy giving program is also a great indicator of the overall health of your fundraising operations—because valuable donor relationships don't happen overnight.

If you are ready to launch, build, or improve your legacy giving program, today's show is for you.

We are talking to Hala Al-Madi from Amnesty International. Hala has been the Legacy Giving Marketing Officer at Amnesty International in Ottawa Canada since 2013. She has helped lead the program's growth from $600,000 to just over 1.4 million, and she's also grown the number of expectancies by 75%. And over the last few years, she's doubled the number of self identifying prospects.
Hala introduced a range of marketing approaches to achieve this growth, including trickle email marketing, direct mail marketing, sharing testimonials of supporters, launching donor surveys, and creating high-touch supporter outreach points.

Today on the podcast, Hala is going to share how Amnesty grew their program specifically by doing things that charities of all sizes and budgets can do.

Today we’ll cover:

[5:40] - Unpacking the Legacy Giving mindset

[10:17] - Donor stories, donor response, and donor love

[16:43] - How to market your legacy program

[23:20] - Using communications from other departments

[24:41] - Using donor surveys

[31:50] - Responding to the donor you survey

[34:36] - Legacy giving during a pandemic

[37:51] - Stewarding legacy donors

[39:44] - Hala's encouragement for nonprofit leaders, fundraisers, and marketers

Please consider subscribing to, rating, or sharing the BuildGood Podcast on your preferred platform. You can do that by clicking here.

Next Episode

#39: You've measured the data—now what? with Kirk Schmidt

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You've heard it on this podcast. You've heard it at conferences, in books, and from consultants and other fundraisers: You should be using your data to make better decisions about your fundraising.
And you've likely tracked the data like retention rates, average gift, and lifetime value. But now you're looking at some numbers asking, “What do they mean and what are the next steps?”
Well, we've got some answers for you on today's podcast.
Our guest this week is both a mathematician and a fundraiser. Kirk Schmidt is the outgoing director of operations for STARS, a helicopter EMS nonprofit in Canada, where he oversees the fundraising and revenue team.
Kirk is going to go over some of the key metrics you're likely already measuring and then go further into how you can use those metrics in a more meaningful way. This is a very valuable episode if you're just getting started with data or if you've been measuring some of these numbers for a while.

Today we’ll cover:

[4:12] - Getting in the right mindset

[7:42] - Understanding retention rates

[9:34] - 3 Important retention rates

[12:20] - Understanding second gift conversion rate

[21:06] - Understanding reactivation rate and who is considered as lapsed

[28:50] - Understanding donor lifetime value

[35:54] - Avoiding lifetime value pitfalls

[40:35] - Understanding average gift numbers

[44:02] - Kirk's encouragement for nonprofit leaders and fundraisers

Get connected:

Kirk would love to connect with you. You can find him on Linkedin where he’s always sharing new things he’s learning about understanding data and nonprofit organizations.

Please consider subscribing to, rating, or sharing the BuildGood Podcast on your preferred platform. You can do that by clicking here.