The 4 Questions You Need To Answer When Raising Money Online

Raising money online seems to confound many nonprofits, especially smaller ones.

The three main challenges that nonprofits face with raising money online are 1) how to find new donors willing to give online, 2) convincing “traditional” donors to give online and 3) using social media to raise money.

As with any kind of fundraising campaign or appeal, you are putting the cart before the horse if you worry about the tools before figuring out the message and the strategy.

Online fundraising campaigns have a start, middle and end. Preparation before the campaign is just as important as the implementation. Also vital to successful fundraising efforts is the follow up and measurement at the conclusion of the campaign to evaluate what happened and make improvements for next time.

In order to reach donors and compel them to give online, your nonprofit needs to answer these 4 questions:

1) Why are we fundraising, and why right now?

2) What is the timeline – when do we need to reach our fundraising goal?

3) How much do we need? The more specific and manageable the goal, the better.

4) What impact will this money make on our nonprofit, our programs and our clients?

As you can see, it won’t work to simply say “we need money to keep our doors open.” That is not a clear, concise and compelling reason to give.

You also cannot use a generic approach to raise “general operating” funds. While these discretionary funds are certainly important, online donors want more specifics.

Online donors (and traditional, off-line donors!) want to know exactly what the money is going to, who it will help and why it’s needed right now.

With all the noise and competing information in the online space, what ideas do you have to make your nonprofit stand out with a gripping, interesting and emotionally-appealing fundraising campaign?

photo credit: origami_potato via photopin cc