NONPROFIT TECHNOLOGY
OneCause | June 29, 2022
OneCause, a leader in online and event fundraising, released findings from its latest research, The Giving Experience Study. Findings provide insights from social donors who gave to fundraising events and peer-to-peer campaigns over the past year and include what motivates their giving, when and how they will be comfortable returning to in-person events, and what influences repeat donations. The new study compares the latest survey data with findings from 2018 and 2021, examining how donor expectations have changed across generations, demographics, and by type of event involvement.
Donor expectations and patterns of generosity have never been static, but the radical and sudden change brought about by the pandemic was unlike anything the world of philanthropy had seen before. After a dramatic shift to virtual events in 2020, donors came to expect on-demand, easy event and giving experiences. To unlock generosity as the nonprofit world moves toward recovery, it's imperative to understand how giving motivators and donor desires have evolved."
Steve Johns, chief executive officer for OneCause
Key findings include:
Social giving continues to grow. As the general population looks for ways to reconnect with friends, family, and colleagues after long periods of pandemic isolation, social giving continues to increase. In the last 12 months, 3 in 10 U.S. adults gave through auction events, peer-to-peer fundraising, or occasion/giving day campaigns. This reflects a five-year trend of steady growth in social giving.
Trust emerges as a key motivator; personal connection grows in importance. This year's research revealed new rising motivators influencing the attention and behavior of today's donors. While ease, mission, and impact remain key drivers of social giving, trust, personal connection, and immediacy emerged as key motivators for the first time in 2022.
Donors are excited about the return to in-person events but want nonprofits to offer virtual options. A quarter of social donors said they prefer to only engage in person with organizations they donate to or mostly in person with some virtual engagement. But donors want options – 43% of social donors still prefer to engage exclusively or mostly virtually. Choice is powerful; offering multiple options for engagement personalizes the giving experience.
Social giving continues to unlock generosity in younger, more diverse donors through expanded access to philanthropy. Social giving and virtual engagement continue to boost access for donors who have been historically underrepresented in or excluded from philanthropy. Gen Z, Millennial, Black, and Hispanic social donors reported giving more money than last year and that they gave to more organizations.
Opportunities to steward social donors for retention and recurring giving. A social donor's first gift shows they value a nonprofit's work. Nonprofits have a great opportunity to cultivate lasting relationships and convert more social donors to recurring givers. Feeling like a donation makes a difference continues to be the number one reason to give again across generations.
"It's clear from five years of data that the influence of social donors on the world of philanthropy is growing," added Johns. "We're excited to be able to connect nonprofits with self-reported insights into the evolution of how this increasingly diverse group of donors prefers to give to and engage with the organizations they support."
About the Survey
The online survey of 1,029 social donors was conducted by Edge Research between April 26-May 12, 2022. Social donors are defined as anyone who self-reports giving to at least one charitable organization by attending a fundraising event; participating or sponsoring someone in a fundraising activity like a run, walk or ride; or donating or requesting donations for an occasion, challenge, or giving month or day within in the last 12 months. Data is self-reported, not transactional. Edge Research worked with an established industry sampling partner, consisting of opt-in research participants. This is a non-probability/convenience sample. Quotas were set to ensure incoming data (prior to screening for charitable donations) was census representative in terms of age and gender, region, and race/ethnicity.
About OneCause
OneCause is driving the future of fundraising with easy-to-use event and online fundraising solutions that help nonprofits improve the giving experience and raise more money. OneCause builds technology that optimizes everyday generosity, making it easier for nonprofit organizations to fundraise and for nonprofit supporters to give. Since 2008, OneCause has helped over 10,000 nonprofits raise more than $4 billion for their missions. Headquartered in Indianapolis, OneCause is committed to driving innovation in the charitable sector, bringing together nonprofit professionals across the world for the annual Raise Conference to exchange ideas that further fundraising.
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NONPROFIT TECHNOLOGY
Bloomerang | June 27, 2022
Bloomerang, the complete donor management solution for thousands of small and medium-sized nonprofits, announced the availability of a new user-centric dashboard to improve fundraisers' day-to-day productivity and monitor fundraising campaign performance and overall organizational health. In addition to the refreshed dashboard, Bloomerang's user interface (UI) updates seek to enhance accessibility via improved screen reader support, reduced animated movements, increased readability and scannability, revised colors and visualizations to compensate for red-green colorblindness, and more. Fundraisers can rely on Bloomerang to provide the information they need to take the next best actions and have a full picture of their organization's data and fundraising health–all from one easily accessible location.
These latest updates help customers make the most of their precious resources–so they can spend more time on their mission and fundraising programs. We're excited to deliver a more intuitive information hierarchy, simplified data access and management, and improved accessibility. Our goal is to continuously drive innovation and lay the groundwork for more customization in the future, while staying focused on ease of use and simplicity of experience for the nonprofits we have the privilege to serve."
Tammy Hammond, Bloomerang's Chief Product Officer
The new dashboard in Bloomerang includes visual snapshots of:
Recent constituents with a new constituent quick-add button
Amount raised by week, month, and fiscal year
Donor retention rate with customization capabilities
Recommended first-time donor call list
Most recent reports
Fundraising campaign goals and progress tracking, including customizable date ranges
Active tasks assigned to you and your team
In addition to the new fundraising dashboard, Bloomerang's UI accessibility updates include:
Logo and font update to match Bloomerang's new visual identity
Less scrolling and a brighter look with a full-screen width and white background
Better iconography with red-green colorblind accessible icons, improved labels and wording, and highlighted navigation tabs
Search functionality for information stored in the database is accessible on any page
Fewer clicks to access needed information and fundraising functionality save time and improve productivity for fundraisers
Michelle Gorham, Chief Advancement Officer for YMCA of Rock River Valley has benefited from clearer insights into their donor data through the use of Bloomerang's fundraising dashboard, UI updates, and functionality. The availability and organization of this data has directly improved their productivity and communication segmentation. "Most importantly we know our donor retention which is not something we knew before. I also now have information about key interests of our most generous donors and have the ability to create reports that can show me all the donors who have said they care about 'academic programs' or 'camp' or 'disease prevention programming' so that we can engage in important conversations with them."
This latest release supports Bloomerang's vision to deliver the donor management and fundraising platform of the future. Earlier this year, Bloomerang was named a "Best Place to Work in Indiana" in 2022, and launched a new brand identity to better articulate the value and services offered to the nonprofit community. Bloomerang's suite of online fundraising tools also strengthens nonprofits' ability to cultivate deeper relationships with their donors and increase the impact of their fundraising campaigns.
About Bloomerang
Indianapolis-based Bloomerang is the complete donor management solution that helps thousands of small and medium-sized nonprofits deliver a better giving experience and create stable, thriving organizations. Combining robust, simple-to-use technology with people-powered support and training, Bloomerang empowers nonprofits to work efficiently, improve their donor relationships and grow their donor bases. With Bloomerang, nonprofit professionals love their work and have another teammate in the cause.
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NONPROFIT MANAGEMENT
ezCater | June 24, 2022
ezCater, the most trusted provider of corporate food solutions, announced a new tax-exempt ordering platform for nonprofit organizations. With ezCater, organizations set their tax-exempt status once and it automatically applies to catering orders from over 95,000 restaurants on the ezCater platform, saving them time and money.
Ensuring catering orders are tax-exempt is complicated and time-consuming for nonprofits, requiring each person to file a tax certificate with every restaurant that they order from. This is even more complicated for organizations that order food across multiple states.
We've taken something that should be simple and made it simple. Nonprofits have many important things to worry about, and this solution allows them to put time back into their missions, instead of wasting it on unnecessary paperwork."
Diane Swint, Chief Demand Officer at ezCater
"ezCater makes handling the tax-exemption process for my team an easy feat," said Matthew Boone, Head Coach of Track and Field at Jacksonville State University. "Keeping track of paper receipts and creating multiple expense reports was such a headache. Not only do I have peace of mind that ezCater is storing the information for me, but my team has easy access to high-quality meals on the road."
The Children's Inn at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) is a nonprofit that supports children, teens, and young adults with rare and serious diseases by providing a free 'place like home' for them to stay while participating in clinical research trials. The Inn has selected ezCater to order meals for the families. However, meeting various dietary restrictions and avoiding food waste becomes complicated. With ezCater, meals arrive individually selected, packaged and labeled, and The Inn's tax-exempt status is automatically applied to every order.
"Our job is to serve and provide support to families during some of the most difficult times of their lives," said Emily Johnson, Family Program Operations Manager for The Children's Inn at NIH. "ezCater's ability to automate tasks like ordering each meal and researching restaurants that accept our tax exemption allows my team to focus on what really matters."
With an ezCater Corporate Account, businesses have easy access to all products within ezCater's suite of corporate solutions. This includes features like invoicing, custom checkout and reporting, organization-wide tax-exempt ordering, recurring employee meals, and concierge food ordering.
About ezCater
ezCater is the most trusted provider of corporate food solutions. With a network of 95,000 restaurants across the US, ezCater provides flexible and scalable food solutions for everything from daily employee meals to sales meetings. ezCater is purpose-built for business and supported by best-in-class customer service, enabling companies to centralize and manage their food spend in a single, customizable platform.
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