Partnerships with over 60 food banks, including Feeding America, help us continue learning about top priorities, roadblocks, and new ideas. This informs us on how to shape our technology to support these nonprofits’ ambitious goals best. 

Most recently, Classy joined RKD Group, Capital Area Food Bank, and Food Bank for New York City for a timely conversation with over 40 organizations. Our representatives, ranging from vice presidents of fundraising initiatives and executive directors to senior vice presidents of marketing, discussed what defines successful donor engagement, connections, and stewardship in the modern social landscape. We used the time to explore ways modern organizations evolve to meet growing demands. Below, you’ll hear the most significant takeaways from hunger-relief nonprofits to bring back to your organization. 

The Top Takeaways From Our Food Bank Roundtable

1. There’s Potential Ahead in Acquiring Next-Gen Donors

Alongside the common priority of finding new ways to reach supporters who could make a long-lasting impact on food banks, the newest generation of donors was a hot topic. The impending great wealth transfer will affect Gen Z and Millennial donors in the next two decades, making now the most opportune time to build strong relationships.¹

Younger generations must decide which nonprofits resonate most deeply with their passions. That includes choosing whether they’ll seek new causes or remain loyal to those they know. These are also the individuals with more digital acuity across various channels than other generations. From the wide array of social media platforms that now include the latest Threads app to online media outlets they engage with daily, online engagement is ubiquitous in their lives. 

Our roundtable of attendees discussed the delicate balance between being on the right channels and standing out on those channels to make a meaningful first impression. It’s critical to craft appealing copy that speaks to the tangible impact of each donation to capture a person’s attention and inspire action. Tapping into the personal side of video content and tailoring messages to local communities can do a lot to attract the right people to your food bank.

Converting Curiosity Into a Donation

With multiple touchpoints at a food bank’s disposal to create a memorable first impression, it’s vital to understand how each plays a key role in the greater donor experience. 

The introduction should detail who a food bank serves and help potential donors begin to envision the value they can make with a single gift. From there, the donation page is where organizations guide decisions around how much someone can give to make the biggest impact in that moment. Aspects like suggested gift amounts and impact blocks that tie outcomes to monetary value offer this clarity.

Once food banks establish the initial connection with younger donors, elements like a mobile-friendly design, modern payment options, and a simple flow on the donation site tie a nice bow on the overall first impression. When you attract donors from modern channels like social apps, the donation process should feel consistent to the experience they received on the previous channel for the best chance at seeing a gift come to completion.

2. The Power of Thoughtful Engagement Fuels Loyalty

On the topic of helping donors see the value of their gift, our roundtable talked about how to continue that sentiment as part of a donor retention strategy. To ensure every engagement point is memorable, it’s critical to reiterate the impact of someone’s investment in your organization as a reminder of their value to your mission. 

Shining a Spotlight on Increased Need 

As hunger-stricken populations expand, there’s an even greater need for ongoing support. We heard a few ways organizations directly aligned aspects like food, number of families, and total individuals fed with specific dollar amounts to create more detailed repeat donation appeals. When people see an opportunity to help five families eat dinner next week, instead of prompting a vague dollar amount, it’s more likely their bond strengthens and their giving patterns become more reliable.

We loved hearing from David Jones, the Vice President for Fundraising Operations from Food Bank for New York City, about some ways his nonprofit calls on supporters for increased generosity after their initial gift. One that stood out was adding real-life examples of rising food costs in direct mail solicitations to emphasize community needs across the five boroughs. Retention appeals can also help you showcase the beneficiaries whose lives change with every donation decision and offer an easy way for donors to stretch their support through a monthly donation that fuels ongoing demand.

3. Unprecedented Financial Times Call for Courageous Asks

Over the past few years, the growth in support for food banks led to conversations about maintaining increased generosity in uncertain economic times. Inflation continues to impact the price of food, heightening the demand for food banks and associated programs. It also means gift amounts received one year ago cannot produce as much supply or impact this year. 

The room agreed that it’s more important than ever to be confident and courageous in asking for more from donors who can contribute to match the growing need. It’s also an opportune time to test new things and share new ideas at your food bank that respond to the current state of the economy. 

You’re not alone if asking people to increase their generosity feels a bit nerve-racking when you don’t know exactly how the economy impacts each donor. Our food bank participants talked about the ease they felt when pairing those appeals with a strong reason why donations matter at that time.

Be Willing to Test

Part of growing a relationship with donors is establishing nonprofit transparency about where the organization is and what it needs to make the most significant impact. Food banks can start with something as simple yet effective as offering donors the option to cover transaction fees. For example, Mary Beth Healy, the Chief Revenue and Marketing Officer from Capital Area Food Bank shared that her organization increased the fees that donors can cover to 13%, the percent increase in the food bank’s food budget. Being willing to test small elements with your donors can unlock new avenues to raise more that you might never have thought of while requiring far less effort than an entirely reimagined fundraising strategy.

Specificity Matters

Appealing to donors to give more means being highly specific about the gift amount that will make an impact. It’s worth adding an array of dollar amounts that are higher than usual on donation pages or specific campaigns to see what can come from it. Many food bank leaders shared the benefit they saw from increasing their individual fundraising page goals on peer-to-peer campaigns and saw their average donation total rise significantly. 

As we head into Giving Tuesday 2023 and the year-end giving season, it’s a good time to strip away any preconceived limits to your fundraising goals to fuel your essential programs. One way food banks actively practice those more courageous appeals is by bringing fund drives back for monetary gifts through a donation page, crowdfunding, or other dedicated campaign. While put on halt during the COVID-19 pandemic, organizations are reintegrating virtual fundraising into strategies to invite increased giving online. Fund drives also allow organizations to be more agile to achieve larger goals.

4. Trust and Transparency Are Everything

Millennials and particularly Gen Z are more inclined to give to organizations they trust. Still, we talked about how that trust is declining. To combat this, it’s critical to share the correct information with donors to bring clarity about how money translates to impact.

The group agreed that transparency and competence are the key drivers of trust. Every email, text, and phone reply is a chance to show a donor that your organization cares, understands them and their giving history, and provides them with the answers to any curiosities they may have to establish that trust.

Stand Apart By Knowing What Matters to Donors

People come across 10,000 ads on average daily. Those ads include nonprofits’ fundraising appeals. Part of standing out in a sea of other messages is establishing a unique bond with individuals. That doesn’t necessarily mean trying to be their best friend but rather showing up as an investor in your mutual goal of hunger relief. It also may involve communicating when you’re wrong or practicing transparency when you need urgent support. Breaking out of the highlight reel and sharing the vulnerability of being an organization in this specific cause sector means a lot to people.

Moving Food Banks Forward through Modern Fundraising

Food banks take on incredibly impactful work that changes many lives. As fundraising evolves in response to a shifting economy, generational giving patterns, and more ways to give than ever before, Classy will be here to support you. 

Our mission to mobilize and empower the world for good starts with each of your missions to advance change through food access. By learning firsthand about what will make a difference for modern food banks, we can continue innovating our fundraising platform to help you deliver a seamless giving experience that leads to greater lifetime value.

Copy Editor: Ayanna Julien

Article Source

1. “The Great Wealth Transfer From Baby Boomers to Millennials Will Impact the Job Market and Economy,” Forbes, accessed August 30, 2023, https://www.forbes.com/sites/jackkelly/2023/08/09/the-great-wealth-transfer-from-baby-boomers-to-millennials-will-impact-the-job-market-and-economy.

Below, we’ll help you get started with Threads by covering what it is and why it’s a valuable tool for nonprofits. We’ll also give an overview of how to use it, including examples from nonprofits already leading conversations on Threads.

What Is Threads for Nonprofits?

Threads is the latest addition to Meta’s suite of social media tools, which also includes Facebook and Instagram. It’s Meta’s version of X Corp. (formerly known as Twitter). The platform focuses on bite-sized, text-focused content that facilitates public dialogue.

Threads posts can include:

• Up to 500 characters of text
• Up to 10 photos
• Videos up to five minutes long
• Links

You can also repost, like, and comment on your and others’ Threads, plus share your Threads to Instagram stories or as a post.

However, Threads does have some limitations. It currently doesn’t support clickable hashtags like other social media platforms, although this will likely change over time. Other features currently unavailable but that may be added in the future include:

• Direct messaging
• Pinning posts to the top of your feed
• Bookmarking posts
• Sharing user polls
• Creating ads

Instagram’s fundraising tools are also not currently available for Threads.

Why Should Nonprofits Use Threads?

Being an early adopter of Threads comes with several benefits for nonprofits. First, you can grow your audience by connecting with other early adopters and being established and ready to connect when more supporters join the app. Since Threads is part of Meta, it’s also worth taking advantage of the built-in audience the company has created through its other social media tools.

As an early adopter, you’ll also see the platform’s new features as the app rolls them out. This provides time to test different strategies to see what works best. By the time Threads is a more established social media platform, you’ll be one of its experts.

App Trends to Note

Threads launched its app in early July 2023 and saw 10 million users sign up within the first seven hours. By late July, that figure jumped to 100 million active users. To put that growth into perspective, it took Twitter 780 days to register its first 10 million users.¹

The momentum and excitement users have around Threads make it a great new place for nonprofits to share stories and create authentic connections with supporters. However, with every new platform comes a novelty phase, followed by growth numbers leveling out. Since its launch, Threads has experienced a lull in engagement, an increase in spam, and a few other issues with the app. This is common for new platforms, and Threads plans to resolve these concerns.

While we don’t know what the future of the app will look like, now is the perfect time to experiment with it. The worst-case scenario is the app doesn’t grow to be as influential as others. However, the best case is that it explodes, and you’ve already established yourself on the platform.

What Should Nonprofits Know About Getting Started on Threads?

To sign up for Threads, you’ll need an Instagram account. Your username will be the same for both accounts. Since Threads is connected to Instagram, if you’ve verified your nonprofit on that platform, it will transfer to Threads.

Once you’ve launched your Threads account, add a profile photo, brief biography, and a link to your nonprofit website like you would on Instagram. After this initial setup, post your first message to welcome your new community of followers.

Additionally, you can mass follow everyone you do on Instagram with the click of a button. Since many of your Instagram followers will likely use this easy integration, too, they’ll quickly start following you on Threads as well.

Note that if you later decide to delete your Threads account, you can’t do so without also deleting your Instagram account. However, you can choose to deactivate your Threads account without impacting your Instagram content.

5 Examples of Nonprofits Using Threads to Connect With Donors

Being an early adopter of Threads gives your nonprofit a chance to stand out in the platform’s early days. With playfulness, interaction, and timeliness, you can create posts that engage and delight your supporters. Here are ways five nonprofits already leverage Threads.

1. Offer a Welcome Message That Restates Your Mission

Your first Threads content should orient your followers to the new platform and let them know what they can expect from you there. This is a great time to reiterate your mission.

To Write Love On Her Arms (a nonprofit dedicated to presenting hope and finding help for people struggling with depression, addiction, self-injury, and suicide) kept its message simple: “New platform, same goal of connecting people with hope + help.”

The nonprofit also shared an image of this initial Threads content to its Instagram feed, commenting about the fun, positive, and encouraging energy its community created on the new platform. This continues to build momentum, showing supporters why they should join them on Threads.

2. Use the Newness of Threads to Be Playful

Everyone is learning Threads together. You can use this novelty to sprinkle humor into your posts and share in community dialogue about the platform.

Legacy Youth Leadership (a nonprofit that works to build a socially conscious and active generation of young people) was an early adopter of Threads. Shortly after the app’s launch, the nonprofit posted playful messages wondering when celebrity favorites Rihanna and Beyoncé would join. It did this through posting on Threads and sharing the content of other organizations.

3. Interact With Other Accounts to Build Community

One way to increase engagement with your Threads content is to interact with similar organizations. You can like posts or re-share them and add your comments.

Thirst Project (a nonprofit that works to bring safe drinking water to communities around the world) reshared Threads content from US Water Alliance about the crucial roles water plays in everyday life. The nonprofit added emojis to the repost to show its agreement with the message.

4. Focus on Current Events to Gain Traction

Threads provides quick updates relevant to a moment in time. As the platform continues to add functions like searchable hashtags, posting content that taps into trending topics will get more eyes on your work. Consider what current events relate to your cause and talk about them on Threads.

Arbor Day Foundation (a nonprofit dedicated to planting trees) used the recent heat wave across the United States to champion its cause. It shared Threads content from The Weather Channel about being hot, adding that it knows something that can help, along with tree emojis.

5. Showcase Ways to Get Involved With Your Nonprofit

Once you’ve welcomed new followers to Threads and been playful with your content, include periodic messages about how your supporters can help your cause. These can be updates about your next virtual fundraising event or volunteer opportunities.

Second Harvest of Silicon Valley (a food bank in California) shared a photo of a volunteer at the nonprofit and added an inspiring message: “If you needed a sign to volunteer at your local food bank this summer, this is it!” The post offers a fun call to action for followers.

Leverage Threads to Expand Your Nonprofit’s Audience

Threads, the latest app on the social media scene, offers an integration with Instagram that makes uptake of the platform easy for nonprofits. With a few clicks, you can be an early adopter of the new app and connect with supporters excited to explore it, laying the foundation for building and strengthening donor relationships.

Copy Editor: Ayanna Julien

Article Source

1. “Threads for Nonprofits: 5 Tips for the Early Adoption Phase,” Nonprofit Tech for Good, last modified July 21, 2023, https://www.nptechforgood.com/2023/07/07/threads-for-nonprofits-5-tips-for-the-early-adoption-phase.

TikTok is where information travels fast and effectively. So it’s OK to feel slight intimidation and content creation fatigue from the video-heavy social platform adding more capabilities for text and image posts. We’re here to help you turn that hesitation into confidence in a steady presence proven to engage donors worldwide.

Let’s hit the play button on TikTok for nonprofits, the 2023 edition.

High-Touch Engagement for Modern Fundraising

A rich community of active supporters who donate, participate, and share to support your mission—that’s the ultimate goal. The evolving digital landscape adds new layers of complexity, with more social platforms that shape donor expectations for engagement that didn’t exist decades ago. Modern engagement is about connecting with donors on the channels they spend their time with frequent touchpoints that feel personal.

Authenticity Shines on TikTok

How a nonprofit uses technology and creates a social media presence is crucial to its strategic operations and fundraising potential. Email and paid marketing channels will always have a place, but social media is where that authentic and real-time engagement can thrive. Because TikTok is primarily about less-curated content, you can show up as you are, stay true to your values as an organization, and be accessible to more people.

Our latest report, The State of Modern Philanthropy, explored the state of social media fundraising and, more importantly, the opportunities forward-thinking nonprofits can take advantage of to build relationships.

Let’s take a look at the impact TikTok has:

• 8.8% of TikTokers convert, but many nonprofits aren’t taking advantage of the traffic TikTok captures on a daily basis
• 45% of TikTokers feel more connected to brands that teach them something new or offer information about themselves 
• Millennial TikTokers are 2.3x more likely to create a post and tag a brand than other platform users 
• 76% of TikTokers agree brands that post or reply to comments on TikTok feel like part of the community

Our report showed a low percentage of total traffic to Classy campaigns from TikTok, showcasing the opportunity gap for nonprofits. That tells us nonprofits are slow adopters of the platform due to potential unfamiliarity with TikTok’s best practices or a lack of resources to dedicate to building their TikTok presence. We know when organizations connect with donors through authentic storytelling, they can activate support in widespread, meaningful ways. TikTok’s storytelling capabilities can help you reach your activation goals more efficiently, from driving people to a donation site to establishing long-term relationships with each interaction.

TikTok and Generation Z

If you’ve considered how to engage Gen Z, TikTok is the social platform to focus on. Gen Z’s diversity and values around charity and community involvement show up as giving potential, and we only expect that to increase. 

Here’s a glimpse at the trends in Gen Z social giving behaviors from The Nonprofit’s Guide to Engaging Gen Z:

• 79% of Gen Z donors find out about new causes through social media
• 18% of Gen Z donors check out an organization’s social platforms before they donate
• 14% of Gen Z donors prefer to receive updates from charitable organizations on social media

While older generations are still adjusting to the idea of social media communities, Gen Z grew up with this as the norm. Similarly to how they may watch someone they admire complete their morning routine to get product recommendations, they observe who their friends and networks are supporting through donations and volunteer time to make their donation decisions. Once they’ve been activated, they’re the most likely demographic to share their experience in a 30-second video and potentially inspire their extended circles to do the same. 

Outside of Gen Z, you’re sure to reach millions of millennials, Gen X, and even baby boomers on TikTok as well. Over time, as the adoption of the social media platform increases, people will increasingly rely on TikTok as a learning and engagement platform. In fact, TikTok is becoming the search engine for younger generations.² Understanding how your organization can benefit from the search and discoverability potential of the platform, now is the time to take action. 

Turn Common TikTok Hesitations Into Confidence

TikTok may feel foreign if you’re not a regular user, especially when you encounter a TikTok video in the making or catch a headline about a new trend influencing people in a big way. What’s crucial to remember is that there’s so much good TikTok can offer because of its ability to spread information to the masses quickly. This makes it great for sharing the incredible work you do to better the lives of anyone who engages with your organization.

Let’s explore the common hesitations around TikTok to help you feel good about going all in without giving up the values that matter to your nonprofit.

1. TikTok Is Different From Other Social Platforms

TikTok entered the scene and shook up the world. It has a different approach to calculating its algorithm and elevating content than other platforms we know and love. TikTok videos also have fewer barriers and competition, giving them a higher chance of being seen. 

We see everyday people go viral on TikTok, so what makes your organization any different? While crossing the million-views mark on your next video may be a lofty goal to start with, your nonprofit can gain incredible exposure from moments of engagement on the platform if you put the time into defining a strategy. Plus, followers matter far less on TikTok, so it’s less about building a massive following and more about trusting the algorithm will feed your content to people interacting with similar content. 

Get in front of passionate individuals who may be ready to take action. This is not to say stop engaging on other social media platforms but don’t let TikTok’s unique nature scare you from testing the waters.

2. Video-First Content Feels Challenging to Create

We get it: videos take more work. The good news is that you don’t have to reinvent your process to get your nonprofit on TikTok. One dedicated day of filming content to use within the many helpful video editing apps can result in a month’s worth of posts. Plus, user-generated content performs extremely well online, so tapping on your community is another workaround.  

Each video you share on TikTok may reach entirely different audiences or show up in someone’s feed at different times. Your TikTok followers will care far less about you wearing the same outfit or sitting in the same room in your videos than the message you share. When you take the pressure off the quality visuals to tap into the relevance of your mission to your donor base, you’ll find organic moments to create or re-share content without ample budgetary requirements. And if video isn’t your thing, check out TikTok’s new text posts to help round out your posting plans.

3. There Are a Lot of Trends to Keep Up With

TikTok trends pop up constantly, so instead of trying to get involved with every single one, focus on your unique voice and how you can leverage that to stand out on the platform. Your nonprofit mission will remain constant as trends come and go. And with more and more people turning to TikTok to speak openly about challenges they face, from mental health to financial strains, this makes it a place where storytelling emerges. 

It’s also easier to engage with new trends when they’re relevant to your work or stories. Ultimately, you know the “why” behind your organization’s founding, the reason your programs exist, the experiences that draw in new supporters, and the stories of beneficiaries. That type of conversation will always have its place on TikTok, so don’t feel you need to squeeze yourself into a particular box to engage donors.

4. It’s New to the Fundraising World

TikTok is newer, but nonprofits see excellent results when embracing the platform for fundraising. And while it’s rare to see a TikTok account with multiple viral posts, it only takes one to pick up the momentum that brings thousands to millions of individuals to your page. Remember, the goal of your TikTok presence is to build relationships, whether through many followers and likes or visibility on your profile that leads people to donate. 

Here are a few nonprofits that showcase the potential of TikTok for fundraising:

NAMI | 51.3K followers | 1281.K likes

Kansas City Pet Project |  1.3M followers | 28M likes

Broadway Cares | 48.9K followers | 1.9M likes

Go From Passive to Viral

As you can see, there’s a big difference between having a TikTok account for your nonprofit and seizing the opportunity to make TikTok an engagement engine. Sometimes, all it takes is the confidence to see hesitations as opportunities to make your presence known. And as more nonprofits enter the TikTok scene, it’s likely people will look to TikTok as the primary platform to connect with organizations they want to support. 

Get ready to showcase your creativity and meet the donors waiting to hear about what you’re doing to make the world a better place.

Copy Editor: Ayanna Julien

Article Sources

1. “The Incredible Rise of TikTok – [TikTok Growth Visualization],” Influencer Marketing Hub, last accessed July 27, 2023, https://influencermarketinghub.com/tiktok-growth/.

2. “For Gen Z, TikTok Is the New Search Engine,” The New York Times, last modified September 17, 2022, https://www.nytimes.com/2022/09/16/technology/gen-z-tiktok-search-engine.html.

This article was written by marketing specialist Maria Sadusky of Community Boost. Maria has broad experience running social media and email marketing campaigns.

TikTok is one of the most used social media platforms among nonprofits, for-profits, and individuals seeking ways to stay connected. The platform allows users to generate up to 10-minute videos and host live streams, just like Meta and LinkedIn.

After launching in the United States in 2016, the number of active TikTok users climbed to more than 1.4 billion worldwide.¹ At first, the social media platform centered around teen influencers creating and sharing short videos in an attempt to “go viral.” Companies quickly recognized the platform’s prominence and wanted in on the action.

Now, nonprofits utilize TikTok regularly to connect with younger audiences in a more personal and immediate way. If you’re considering introducing TikTok into your nonprofit’s social media strategy—which we highly suggest—it’s crucial to understand the unique ways the app functions and the best way to leverage it for your mission.

Below, we’ll give you a look at what this platform is and how it can be beneficial to your nonprofit marketing strategy.

How Do I Create a TikTok Account?

All right, let’s get started on TikTok!

The first thing you have to do is create an account.

Step 1: Download the TikTok App for Free

You might not need explaining on this part, but if you do, we have you covered.

Download TikTok for free from the Apple Store (for iOS users) and Google Play Store (for Android users). All you have to do is search for TikTok, then select the Download or Install button to begin downloading.

Step 2: Sign Up for an Account

To move to this step, you need your email, phone number, or log-in information for your social media accounts. If you use your email, make sure it’s the one linked to your nonprofit’s account.

Step 3: Set Up Your Profile

Once you create an account, you can set up your profile. Here’s where you add a profile picture and a brief description of your nonprofit organization.

If you already have an account with 1,000 followers, you can add your donation site hyperlink to your bio. Also, be sure to link your Instagram and YouTube accounts to TikTok.

How Can Nonprofits Use TikTok?

It’s vital to keep up with the latest trends and create TikTok content that connects with your audience. Here are a few ways to use TikTok for good to promote your nonprofit:

Stay Up to Date With the TikTok Trends for Nonprofits

Authenticity Is Valuable

Creating authentic TikTok content is a key factor in building a strong online presence and standing out in a crowded digital space. It makes your nonprofit brand more relatable to viewers and helps establish trust with your audience who will be more likely to support your brand over time.

By opting for organic content over edited and produced content, you can show your audience that you value nonprofit transparency. This, in turn, can lead to better results and a more committed following.

For example, here are two performance analytics reports from posts on Community Boost’s TikTok. The first was a produced and edited video created by a videographer, and the second was a 15-minute, in-app creation on the TikTok platform.

As you can see, the more organic content featured in the second video received longer total play times—and average watch time per user. It had a higher retention rate and gained eight new followers.

Educational Content Is Key

Another popular way to use TikTok is to post educational content and informational videos. The Sacramento Museum TikTok account, for example, talks about particular moments in history and uses trending sounds to bring in tourism.

Nonprofits can create educational video content on TikTok by sharing interesting, mission-related facts, statistics, or insights. You can also create how-to tutorial videos demonstrating your work, such as how to plant a tree or care for animals.

Sharing behind-the-scenes footage of your nonprofit’s operations is another strategic way to attract Generation Z donors and other new audiences, giving viewers a glimpse into your daily activities and their impact.

Get in on Campaigns or Launch One

TikTok campaigns provide a chance for nonprofits to build brand awareness and raise funds for a good cause. The “#PetBFF” campaign, for instance, encourages users to post videos with their pets and donate to a nonprofit organization that works with animals.

Individuals can participate in these campaigns by posting a photo and adding the appropriate hashtag associated with the hashtag challenge or launching a campaign by creating a hashtag and encouraging users to participate.

Create Content That Corresponds With the Algorithm

There are certain things you can do when creating content to cater to the TikTok algorithm. Our top tips are:

Find Trending Sounds to Implement Into Your TikTok Content Strategy

You can do this by going to the search bar in the top right of your screen and typing in “viral sounds.” Then, head to the sounds tab and look for sounds used over 10,000 times.

Post at Least Every Weekday

This might sound excessive, but considering your content should only be about 11 seconds, it’s possible to produce daily videos if you have the right strategy. This could be repurposed content you already used on Instagram or Facebook or quick clips of daily life at your nonprofit.

Use Trending Hashtags in Your Captions

It’s critical to use trending hashtags that correspond with the content you post and are specific to your niche. For example, say your nonprofit creates a caption for a post about rescuing dogs. The hashtags #animalrescue, #dogmemes, and #cutedogs are trending with millions to billions of views, so these would be great to use.

When you type the “#” symbol into the caption, trending TikTok hashtags will show. You can use the provided suggestions to inspire your hashtag choices, like #viraltiktok, #viralvideo, or others specific to your video and niche.

How Do Nonprofits Raise Money on TikTok?

Nonprofits can raise money on TikTok by using donation stickers, which allow users to donate directly from the app. Verified nonprofit accounts can add these stickers to videos to encourage donations.

Additionally, TikTok has added a feature that allows users to display a nonprofit on their profile, making it easier for viewers to support that organization. Nonprofits can also participate in existing campaigns or launch new ones to spread awareness and raise funds. And don’t forget to experiment with TikTok ads to target the right users at the right time.

Display a Fundraiser on Your Profile

The newest feature TikTok has added to encourage donations on the platform is the ability for users to display a nonprofit on their profile.

Underneath the follow button and bio on the profile page, users can add a link to an organization they’d like to support. This feature is available to every user on the platform, including official nonprofit brand accounts.

Examples of Nonprofits Using TikTok For Good

1. Aquarium of the Pacific (2.8M followers)

This Long Beach, California-based nonprofit uses the cuteness of its animals to the full effect in its TikTok videos. The nonprofit implements a good mixture of trending hashtags and niche hashtags, which has helped elevate its video content to larger audiences. Today, most of its hashtags have over 1 million views.

The social team does a great job of posting various content. On its profile, you’ll find content such as fun facts about aquatic animals, a day in the life of the staff members, and tours of different aquarium exhibits.

KeyTakeaway: Show the true nature behind the work that you do. Also, use trending hashtags.

2. V Foundation: (49 followers)

Although the V Foundation doesn’t have as many followers as some larger accounts, it shows that even as a nonprofit with a smaller audience, you can still deliver great content.

The nonprofit recently joined TikTok and has utilized it to inform and educate its supporter base. It appears the V Foundation has a small social team yet continues to post by repurposing content from events and using trending sounds and voice-overs.

KeyTakeaway: It’s never too late to join Tiktok. Stay consistent and you’ll see the rewards.

3. St. Jude’s Children’s Research Hospital (633.2K followers)

With seemingly endless content on St. Jude’s TikTok, the nonprofit leverages its channel for mostly storytelling.

The social team brings in childhood cancer survivors, showcases the daily behind-the-scenes of what happens at St. Jude, and offers comedic TikTok videos purely for entertainment.

The videos are in the right format, offer strong hooks to pull the audience in, and have relatable content. The social team often uses captions as well for accessibility.

KeyTakeaway: Mix up your content and make it relatable. It doesn’t all have to be educational. Find a common point to connect with your audience and help them connect to your cause with storytelling. For example, there are many people with children in the world. Finding the most relatable aspect of your mission and putting that on TikTok will help gain traction and support.

How Does TikTok Support Donor Communication?

There are two primary groups of donors: traditional donors, which include Gen X and Baby Boomers, and next-gen donors, which include Gen Z and Millennials.

Traditional donors, being more established in their careers, tend to give more significant amounts to nonprofits. However, their giving is less frequent and is overall starting to plateau.

On the other hand, next-gen donors give less per gift but tend to give much more frequently. They are also 2.7X as likely to host an individual fundraising page on behalf of an organization they support, according to Classy’s report Why America Gives.

In 2022 alone, next-gen donors gave $27 billion on TikTok.² These giving behaviors make them an increasingly important group for nonprofits.

Relationship Building and Donor Stewardship

The first step in building lasting donor connections is establishing strong communication with your donors and showing them how their donations make an impact. This is key to demonstrating effective donor management for your organization.

You can share impact videos, personally thank donors through hand-written thank you letters, provide updates in your nonprofit annual report, or even invite them to a VIP event experience. These are all key parts of donor stewardship that help build trusting, authentic relationships.

How Will Your Nonprofit Use TikTok?

Hopefully, by now, you’re convinced TikTok can complement your digital marketing strategy in new, exciting ways. With next-gen donors quickly becoming a primary target audience, it couldn’t be a better time to experiment with this fast-growing platform. Are you prepared to meet them at every touchpoint?

Article Sources:

1. “TikTok Statistics to Know in 2023,” Influencity, last accessed August 2, 2023, https://influencity.com/resources/studies/tiktok-influencer-marketing-study-statistics/.
2. “TikTok Statistics – Updated Mar 2023,” Wallaroo, last modified March 21, 2023,https://wallaroomedia.com/blog/social-media/tiktok-statistics/.

Instagram, which continues to be a highly engaged community-building and social media platform, celebrates its 13th birthday in 2023. Learn how your nonprofit organization can capitalize on the sixth most-visited website in the world to engage donors in ways that work.¹

Instagram for Nonprofits

Originally a personal photo-sharing platform, Instagram has expanded to be a must-have marketing tool for businesses to promote products, provide insight into company culture, and share stories with widespread audiences.

Nonprofits can use an Instagram business account to elevate a mission, advocate for support, build community, solicit donations, and show impact. This marketing strategy makes these possible by using one of the most natural and powerful mediums possible: visual media.

In our latest Why America Gives report, over two-thirds of next-gen donors (69%) said they prefer to hear from organizations on social media compared to other mediums. With that in mind, nonprofits must prioritize social presence in 2023 and beyond.

Instagram by the Numbers

Understand the full potential and reach of Instagram with a closer look at the numbers.²

• It has more than two billion active users, with 1.3 billion visiting the site daily
• It has weekly site visitors that include 47% of U.S. adults
• It has a potential ad audience of 996 million for accounts that use Instagram stories
• It has become a top social media platform for people looking to connect with brands

Additionally, it’s helpful to look at how Instagram use compares across generations. In our Why America Gives 2021 report, we highlight the following generational breakdown of donors who are likely to learn about and donate to causes they care about on Instagram:

• Gen Z: 53%
• Millennials: 51%
• Gen X: 35%

Instagram for Nonprofits: 26 Ways to Use the Latest Instagram Features to Your Advantage

Data supports using Instagram for nonprofit marketing, but it can feel challenging, especially when you don’t know where to start or how to keep up with the platform’s latest features. Below, we share 26 Instagram tips for beginners and seasoned experts to step up their game.

1. Understand the Algorithms

There’s some conflicting data regarding general best posting times. HubSpot claims it’s Monday to Thursday at any time except 3 to 4 p.m.³ On the other hand, Latergramme claims it’s 5 p.m. on Wednesdays.⁴

Our best advice? Try both out and see which times are most effective for your audience. Then, refer to the insights Instagram provides for business profiles or the results within your social media management tool.

You can see insights on individual posts by clicking on the photo and selecting “View Insights.” Or for more holistic statistics about your profile, click the bar graph icon in the upper-right corner of your profile page.

When posting, ask yourself, would I see this right now if I followed this account? For example, think about when you log on to your personal account. It may not be until after work hours, so keep your audience in mind when posting.

However, there’s more to Instagram algorithms than timing. After all, timing may not have the greatest impact on what followers see anymore. The algorithms also consider:⁵

• Post data: This includes information like location or how many likes and saves a photo has. Using a location can help your post pop into more feeds connected to that region, while greater likes and saves increase your reach overall.
• User data: This includes information on how often other users interact with your content. The more often people interact with your content, the more the algorithm learns to show it. This is why it’s crucial to create engaging content.
• Your data: This includes information like how often you engage with others’ content, including likes and saves. You’re more likely to have your content seen if you also engage with others’ content.
• Relationship data: This includes information on how your interactions look with a specific person. The more you and another account interact through comments, likes, shares, and saves, the more likely your content will continue to show up in their feed. This is why it’s crucial to respond to supporters and like their content too.

2. Consider Instagram Ads

Use Instagram ads to promote your upcoming event or fundraiser. These ads look more like regular photos in a user’s feed than on any other platform, so this Instagram tip is worth trying out if you can put some money behind your social media efforts.

Since Meta owns Facebook and Instagram, you can run Instagram ads in the same place as your Facebook ads. Go through your Facebook Ads Manager and check out all the ways you can cross-promote on both platforms.

You can also create Instagram ads through the phone app. Post a photo, video, carousel, or story with paid promotion.

3. Use Pinned Posts

Instagram users can now pin three pieces of content to the top of their profile grid.

Your nonprofit can use this feature to highlight news or announcements, content that best highlights your brand and mission, or a call to action for supporters to donate to your cause.

To use this feature:

• Click the three dots next to a post or reel you’ve previously shared
• Select the “Pin to Your Profile” option

4. Optimize Instagram SEO

Instagram search engine optimization (SEO) involves taking steps to ensure your Instagram content pops up near the top of the results list when users search the platform for words related to your nonprofit.

The Instagram SEO feature is particularly crucial for engaging younger generations, as nearly 40% of Gen Z prefers conducting their internet searches using Instagram or TikTok rather than Google.⁶

A few factors that impact what content appears first for Instagram search results include:

• Search text: Instagram looks for usernames, captions, hashtags, locations, and bios that match the text a user puts in their search.
• User activity: Instagram is more likely to suggest results from hashtags and accounts a user previously interacted with (or ones their mutual connections have interacted with).
• Popularity signals: Instagram will recommend content that’s already popular with others based on clicks, likes, shares, and follows.

Given these factors, some ways you can improve your Instagram SEO include:

• Use tools like Google Analytics and Google Trends to learn which keywords drive traffic to your website and include those in your Instagram bio and captions
• Use Instagram Insights to learn which hashtags drive the most traffic to your account and use those strategically
• Select “Write Alt Text” from the “Accessibility” section under “Advanced Settings” to draft custom alt text that makes your content more accessible to people with visual impairments while allowing you to incorporate relevant keywords
• Add a location to your bio
• Engage with other accounts that rank for your keywords

5. Use Instagram Collab for Greater Engagement

Instagram collab is a feature that Instagram business accounts can use to co-author content with someone else. This strategy helps increase the engagement and reach of your social media posts. You or your collaborator can create a single feed post or reel, then invite the other to collaborate on the content. Once the collaborator accepts the invite, the post will appear on your account and theirs, along with its likes, comments, and shares data.

This feature is particularly useful when working with influencers. Not only will you be able to automate some of the process of reaching a wider audience better, but you’ll also gain new followers and increase engagement with your content.

It can also be helpful when partnering with a corporation, as you can showcase the corporation’s sponsorship of your event or matching gift. This helps you share your mission with a larger audience while your partner company gets to showcase alignment with your values.

6. Schedule Posts Ahead of Time

When you schedule out Instagram posts, you save precious time that you can use to engage with your supporters instead. There are various tools that let you schedule out automated posts.

For example, you can use Meta’s Creator Studio app to schedule Instagram Reels if you’ve connected your Instagram account to a Facebook business page. This means you can create them in bulk, then post them strategically when the time is right without needing to pour resources into creating new content.

7. Incorporate Nonprofit Instagram Hashtag Tips

Hashtags are a vital part of any successful social media strategy, but these can also be the toughest to get right. Instagram’s @creater account has advised users to include between three to five, despite the platform allowing up to 30 per post. However, other data has shown that the more hashtags you use, the more eyes you get on your post, so some still stick to the eight to 12 rule.⁷

But no matter how many hashtags you use, it won’t help you boost engagement or attract the right audience if you use the wrong ones. That’s why it’s crucial to be selective when creating your hashtag strategy for Instagram.

If you’re just getting started, follow these two basic steps:

1. Come up with a branded hashtag for your nonprofit or a specific campaign. Keep it simple and to the point, like how Girl Up simply uses #GirlUp.
2. Use community hashtags that aren’t specific to your nonprofit but to your sector or cause, like #girlpower in the Girl Up example or #givingtuesday during that annual campaign.

When looking for the right community hashtags, use the search feature on Instagram to check which hashtag iterations are the most popular. For example, the hashtag #pride has nearly 13.4 million uses, but #pridemonth has around 1.1 million uses. In this case, if you wanted the potential to reach more people or use a more general hashtag, go with #pride.

On the flip side, if you wanted to use hashtags that will pull up fewer total posts to have a better chance of standing out, you could use the search feature to find a hashtag with fewer posts.

Check out this post to see how Girl Up gets the hashtag just right.

In addition to selecting the right hashtags for your posts, you can track hashtags related to your cause or organization to see what gains traction and how you can become a part of those conversations.

One more #tip for the road: if you don’t want to display your hashtags in your caption, use the following caption trick to hide them:

• Open your notepad on your phone
• Type out five periods, each on a separate line
• Type out all the hashtags for your photo on the sixth line
• Copy all this text
• Paste this text into a comment on your photo and post
• Refresh the photo

The comment will “shrink,” forcing readers to click it to see your hashtags.

8. Use Tag Handles in Your Captions, Stories, and Videos

To boost your posts’ exposure, the rule is to over-tag rather than under-tag. For example, if you post a picture of other people or participating organizations, make sure to @tag their handles in the caption and the photo itself.

Tagging a handle in the caption will notify the organization, but tagging the organization in the actual photo places the post in the “Tagged Photo” section of their profile, enabling all their followers to see it.

Imagine posting a photo of your volunteers: if you tag them in the caption and photo, you could add exponentially more views.

Collaborative efforts with influencers, staff, volunteers, corporate partners, or other supporters are a particularly effective way to leverage tagging. When you’re both in agreement to tag photos around a certain cause, you increase the number of eyes both accounts receive.

9. Use the Instagram Desktop Site

Instagram’s desktop site allows you to comment on posts, see overall engagement, and view your feed and your profile page. For example, if you’re at work and simply want to check your account, use Instagram.com instead of pulling out your phone to log in to the Instagram app multiple times a day.

You can even access Instagram Insights on the desktop site, including how many individuals your posts reach, how many individuals interact with your content, how much your reach could increase with a sponsored post, and more.

Additionally, you can add posts from the desktop site, a long-awaited feature for many users. To do so, log into the browser site and click on the plus icon shown at the bottom of the screen between the direct messages and explore icons. That will pull up a “Create New Post” window similar to what you’d see on mobile.

10. Upload Stories and Save to Story Highlights

Instagram Stories allow you to upload fun snapshots of your organization’s work without inundating your followers’ feeds. You can include photos, donation stickers, short videos, graphics, text, or a combination of the above.

However, keep in mind that Instagram Stories only last for 24 hours and don’t appear on your profile’s image gallery or in users’ general feeds. Users will see your stories listed in the top row of their app, along with other accounts they follow that have active stories. They can also find your stories by clicking on your profile photo on your business page.

Save stories to the “Story Highlights” section of your Instagram account to give your content a longer shelf life. This section lives right above the contact navigation bar on your profile (pictured below).

Instagram Stories have more than 500 million daily users.⁸ Can your organization afford to ignore that massive pool of potential donors?

For a full breakdown, read our blog, How to Create Instagram Stories That Engage and Excite Nonprofit Donors.

11. Be Strategic With How You Use Links

One of our top Instagram tips is getting creative with the links you place in your bio section and in the link sticker on each of your stories. For example, if you have blog content or are launching a new fundraising campaign, add a link directing viewers to your site.

You might even consider using a bit.ly tracking link to analyze traffic from your Instagram profile. This will help you see which donors click through and strategize your social media approach.

For example, if you see that a single Instagram story about an upcoming fundraising event results in five registrations from the link sticker to your nonprofit event registration page, your event strategy should include more social content to boost registrations.

12. Post More Video Content

Storytelling with concise, creative videos has become increasingly popular. That’s why in July 2022, Instagram consolidated all shared videos in the Instagram Reels tab and allowed any video 15 minutes or shorter to have access to the reels editing tools.

Instagram Reels lets users create short videos, capped at 90 seconds, with access to filters, music, and other editing tools to up their creative flair. The feature is similar to TikTok and has the potential to tap into a younger audience. Instagram also launched templates for reels with preloaded audio and clip placeholders to help streamline the creation process.

13. Reduce the Time It Takes to Answer DMs

The direct messages, or DMs, feature on Instagram allows you to connect one-on-one with your supporters. For example, if followers respond to your stories, those responses go to your DMs. Supporters might also reach out directly to ask you how they can help with your latest call to action or where they can learn more about your work.

DMs can be a great way to foster relationships, although responding to them can be time-consuming for your staff. Luckily, there are ways to automate this. Using the Meta Business Suite, you can set up an auto-reply for all new messages and an away message to let users know when they can expect to hear from you again.

You can also use Instagram quick replies for commonly asked questions or comments. This allows you to respond to messages based on keywords automatically. For example, say a supporter sends a message asking how they can register for your upcoming event. They’ll receive the quick reply you created with that information, including any relevant links.

14. Browse Posts You’ve Liked or Saved

If you want a record of the content you’ve liked or saved recently, this easy tip is for you. To view posts you’ve liked:

• Click the hamburger icon (three lines) in the upper-right-hand corner of your profile page
• Select “Your Activity”
• Click on “Interactions”
• Click “Likes”

To view posts you’ve saved, start at your profile, click on the hamburger icon, and select “Saved.”

This can help you gauge how much you’ve interacted with your target audience recently. And if you want your audience to engage with your content, you should do the same.

A simple like or comment is an invaluable part of building relationships with your supporters, helping your nonprofit become a part of their everyday life. By demonstrating that you support them, you’re more likely to gain loyal supporters that go beyond social media.

You can also review this information to see if there’s a particular supporter whose high-quality content you regularly save or like to identify potential nonprofit influencer partnerships.

When you save content, remember to organize the posts by specific folders. This keeps your Instagram research and engagement organized. For example, you might have a folder of saved user-generated content from your virtual fundraising events.

15. Ask Supporters to Turn On Post Notifications

If a user turns on a particular account’s post notifications, it means that they’ll receive a push notification every time that account posts something. To increase engagement for your nonprofit, consider posting a photo in your story that asks followers to turn on notifications for your profile. You can also promote this through your email newsletters.

But only do this once in a while to avoid overwhelming your followers, and frame your ask as an invitation to stay updated. For example, you could say, “If you want to stay up to date and never miss a fundraising event, make sure you turn on our post notifications.”

You might also want to turn on notifications for other accounts you’d like to keep tabs on, whether you admire an influencer or another organization. This would ensure you never miss content that draws inspiration.

To turn on push notifications for someone you follow:

• Go to the account’s profile
• Tap the notification icon that looks like a bell
• Toggle the button next to “Posts, Stories, Reels, or Videos” on
• You can also tap the arrow next to “Live Videos” and select notification options

16. Change Your Tagged Photos to “Add Manually”

When another account tags your handle on their photo, you’ll get a notification. However, you might miss a crucial notice like this, among other notifications for comments and likes.

To solve this, turn on the “Manual” approval option to approve photos where you’re tagged. Start on your profile page and click the second to the last icon on the right just below your bio and above your photos to view your currently tagged photos.

If you want to add photos you’re tagged in manually, click the cog wheel in the upper-right-hand corner, scroll down to “Privacy and Security” and tap “Photos of You.” From there, you can toggle the “Add Automatically” option on or off.

17. Reorder and Delete Your Filters

Did you know you can reorder your filters to allow your favorite ones to appear first? Once you land on the filter page of your post, scroll left through the filter options until you see the “Manage” tile and click it. Then, uncheck the filters you want to delete, and click and drag your remaining filters to reorder them.

You can also use the free Adobe Lightroom app for professional-looking photo editing, including retouching photos and adding additional filters. This is one of several options that allows you to create Instagram presets, meaning custom filters that you can apply to your photos with the simple click of a button.

18. Build a Consistent Look and Feel

You want your Instagram posts to be recognizable as users scroll their feeds. One way to do this is to ensure everything has a consistent look that ties to your brand. To pull this off effectively, try using available design apps, like Canva for Nonprofits, to incorporate your brand’s font, logo, and color palette into what you share.

You can also review examples of nonprofits leveraging this for digital marketing in our Classy blog, 10 Social Media Post Examples That Drive Engagement.

19. Add Instagram to Your Website and Donation Pages

Make sure to add social media follow icons to your nonprofit’s donation websites. After all, Instagram is a major social media platform that deserves a place alongside the other big players—Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, and YouTube.

There are other ways to promote your Instagram account too. Consider including a QR code at in-person events or mailers that direct people to your page. To drive traffic, you can also include Instagram links in your emails and embed posts from your account onto your blog or other online web content.

20. Make Your Profile a Business Account

There are many perks to registering for a business account on Instagram, including the ability to add your “Type of Business Category.” List yourself as a nonprofit so visitors can immediately see and understand your social mission. You’ll also be able to include your website and contact information, which makes it easier for donors to get in touch.

When you make your profile a business account, you gain access to content insights like impressions, engagement, and reach. After all, having a clear understanding of how your content performs is critical to optimizing your Instagram strategy. And without it, you’re unable to make informed decisions.

Another feature you can take advantage of as a business account is Instagram’s e-commerce options. Use these fundraising tools to directly sell branded products, experiences, naming opportunities, or other options to your supporters.

You can also have a “View Shop” button on your profile, link to products within your posts using a tag, or add product stickers within the Instagram stories feature.

21. Make Your Account Public

This one seems obvious but can get easily overlooked: make sure your nonprofit supporters can follow your account without needing to request access. To check up on this:

• Click the settings icon near the upper-right-hand corner of your profile page
• Scroll to the section called “Account Privacy”
• Make sure the “Private Account” option is off

Additionally, use your logo as your profile picture so Instagram users can quickly identify your account as connected to your cause.

22. Toggle Between Your Personal Account and Business Account

Instagram allows you to switch seamlessly between multiple Instagram handles without having to log in and out each time. To add another handle into the mix:

• Click the three lines in the upper-right-hand corner of your profile page
• Select the settings icon
• Scroll to the bottom of the drop-down and click the “Add Account” button
• Input your information

Then, to toggle between your personal and nonprofit Instagram accounts, start on your profile page and press the respective logo at the bottom-right-hand corner of your screen. Easily switching between accounts is a huge time-saver for on-the-fly updates and checking your engagement throughout the day.

23. Have a Designated Team Member Review Push Notifications

If you have multiple people logging into your nonprofit’s Instagram account, it might be unnecessary to have everyone turn on push notifications on their phones. This can also confuse which team member is supposed to respond to notifications and cut into team members’ productivity.

That’s why it’s a good idea to have one person turn them on and be in charge of monitoring activity on your account. This person should also be responsible for addressing any notifications that require immediate attention.

24. Follow the Instagram Blog to Be the First to Know About New Features

The easiest way to stay up to date on all new Instagram features, best practices, and all things creative, check out the Instagram blog. And for business-account updates, tips, and announcements, follow the Instagram Business Blog.

Check out these Classy posts for more nonprofit social media strategy tips:

• 10 Amazing Nonprofits to Follow on Instagram
• Event Marketing: Your 3-Phase Approach to a Stronger Social Media Strategy
• Your Nonprofit’s Social Media Content Planner

25. Invite Your Facebook Community to Instagram

Like Facebook, Meta owns Instagram, so there’s a lot of overlap with what’s possible between the two platforms. This includes being able to post content between the two platforms automatically.

By syncing your accounts, whenever you share a post or story on Instagram, the platform will ask if you want to share it to your Facebook account as well. This can be a big time-saver.

Additionally, if you’re an admin of your nonprofit’s Facebook page, you can log into the Instagram app and invite your Facebook friends to follow your Instagram page. For those of your donors googling “How to add an organization you’re supporting on Instagram,” make it easy on them and simply send out an invite via Facebook. This is a great way to generate more followers and build your Instagram presence. To do so:

• Click the settings icon near the upper-right-hand corner of your profile page
• Tap “Invite Facebook Friends”
• Log into your Facebook account as prompted
• Invite away

Below this section, you can also connect to Facebook to discover Facebook friends on Instagram that you might not follow yet.

26. Use New Instagram Features to Stay Ahead

As we’ve seen over the years, with features like Instagram Reels and stories, Instagram continues to add new features to improve the user experience. By keeping up with these, you show your followers that your content is fresh and engaging.

For example, stay up to date on the new stickers Instagram adds. Stickers are the graphics Instagram lets you include on videos and photos, like a location icon, gif, or animated hashtag. Also, remember to use interactive story elements, like polling or question boxes, and consider incorporating these into quick infographics to share with your followers.

Following the Instagram blog, as explained in number five of this list, is a great way to learn about updates in real-time.

Instagram for Nonprofits Is a Powerful Way to Connect With Your Supporters

As one of the world’s most popular social media platforms, Instagram offers a powerful way to meet your supporters where they are while driving momentum toward your donate button. When using the platform, remember a few key tips:

• Be creative with your content
• Use the features available to you, including hashtags, links, stickers, tagging, and more
• Lean into video content through reels
• Interact with your supporters to increase engagement

Article Sources:

1. “The Global State of Digital 2022,” Hootsuite, accessed March 12, 2023, https://www.hootsuite.com/resources/digital-trends.

2. “34 Instagram Stats Marketers Need to Know in 2023,” Hootsuite, last modified January 24, 2023, https://blog.hootsuite.com/instagram-statistics.

3. “The Best Times to Post on Social Media in 2023 [New Data],” HubSpot, last modified January 24, 2023, https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/best-times-post-pin-tweet-social-media-infographic#sm.00000jzmmwjrycde0qpcp9me490dt.

4. “When Is the Best Time to Post on Instagram? Find Out,” Tech Times, last modified February 26, 2015, https://www.techtimes.com/articles/35741/20150226/when-best-time-post-instagram.

5. “Everything You Need to Know About Instagram Algorithm in 2023,” Kicksta, last modified December 12, 2022, https://blog.kicksta.co/instagram-algorithm/#How_Does_Instagram_Algorithm_Work_In_2022.

6. “Nearly Half of Gen Z Is Using TikTok and Instagram for Search Instead of Google, According to Google’s Own Data,” Insider, last modified July 13, 2022, https://www.businessinsider.com/nearly-half-genz-use-tiktok-instagram-over-google-search-2022-7.

7. “Instagram Hashtags: Everything You Need to Know in 2022,” LaterBlog, last modified June 15, 2022, https://later.com/blog/ultimate-guide-to-using-instagram-hashtags/#ARTICLE_SECTION_3.

8. “The Complete Guide to Using Instagram Stories for Business,” Hootsuite, last modified July 26, 2021, https://blog.hootsuite.com/how-to-use-instagram-stories.

What makes LinkedIn valuable for your nonprofit is its active audience. In fact, LinkedIn is the top choice for marketers who want to promote their content, data, and relevant news.¹

LinkedIn users are predominantly business professionals looking for connections. They’re interested in industry research, organizational best practices, and transparent storytelling, as well as opportunities to strengthen their relationships with like-minded thought leaders. 

Take advantage of LinkedIn’s tremendous opportunities for organic reach by connecting with people who want to engage with you. Below, we provide eight tips to maximize your presence on LinkedIn, increase engagement with potential donors, and connect with your target audience in a more meaningful way.

How to Use LinkedIn for Nonprofits

1. Audit Other Nonprofit LinkedIn Pages

To maximize your LinkedIn presence, you need to have a point of comparison. Before you begin building or optimizing your LinkedIn page, take time to research what other nonprofits, brands, and companies do.

Identify some of the top nonprofit organizations within your cause category that operate on a similar scale. You should also examine nonprofits with an online presence that you find admirable and inspiring. For both segments, ask the following questions:

• What about the page grabs my interest?
• Is there anything here I would do differently?
• How easy is it to find relevant information about the mission, location, staff, etc.?
• What type of content does the nonprofit create?
• How many comments, likes, and shares does the content receive?

Evaluating these pages can provide insights that will shape your company page. For example, if you notice that other nonprofits within your cause category don’t prioritize video content, double down on your video marketing strategy to get ahead. 

On the other hand, if nonprofits you admire write brilliant opinion pieces that generate massive engagement, consider building similar content into your strategy.

2. Optimize Your Nonprofit’s Page

The goal of auditing other pages is twofold. It provides a benchmark that shows where you stand with other nonprofits and helps identify the gaps in your page that you need to fill or update.

It’s likely that donors, volunteers, peer-to-peer fundraisers, and the general public will visit your social media pages to vet your organization further after they land on your website. And when they land on your LinkedIn page, everything needs to be clear to them, like:

• Your location
• Your number of employees
• Your organization’s mission
• Your current job openings
• Your website and fundraising campaign links

Here are three of the best Nonprofit LinkedIn profiles to inspire your process.

3. Optimize Your Page Photos

Ensure the photos on your page are high quality, sized properly, and professional. These are a direct extension of your nonprofit branding, and if your photos appear pixelated, blown out, or confusing, people are likely to lose trust and abandon your page.

For your profile image, the recommended minimum size is 400 x 400 pixels. However, you can get away with uploading a photo that’s 4320 x 7680 pixels. As long as it’s eight megabytes or less, you’re good. The best photo choice for your profile image is probably your nonprofit’s logo.

For the cover photo—the banner at the top of your page—the recommended size is 1548 x 396 pixels. This is the first thing most people will notice about your page. Instead of randomized selection, take the time to find a photo that captures the essence of your impact. You might choose a photo of:

• Your beneficiaries
• Internal staff members
• Custom-designed illustrations
• Volunteers in the field
• Event participants

4. Have Staff Update Their Profiles

As you update your nonprofit’s LinkedIn page, it’s a prime opportunity to help your staff update their LinkedIn profiles as well. This is especially critical given that their personal profiles tie directly to your nonprofit’s page when they list your organization as their employer. 

As people click through to network with your employees, ensure your brand, voice, and tone carries from your page through theirs.

First, perform an audit to ensure all their headshots are business-oriented and professional. If your staff’s photos aren’t up to par, consider investing in a photographer to take professional-grade headshots of everyone.

Second, provide boilerplate copy they can use to fill in the “About” section on their profiles. In this blurb, you can include your nonprofit’s mission, the steps to accomplish it, and the associated social impact. 

This helps ensure brand and voice continuity between your organization’s page and your employees’ profiles. On that note, you should also give your staff the same cover photo used on your page to provide a consistent visual.

5. Activate Your Staff

There is one piece of bad news: you can only join groups and participate in conversations as an individual, not as an organization. However, the good news is that your staff’s personal pages are now optimized and up to date. That means you can activate them to participate in conversations on your nonprofit’s behalf.

LinkedIn Groups are essentially discussion boards that provide a place to have conversations with others in your professional network. The member count ranges from the hundreds to the hundreds of thousands, and groups span just about every topic you can imagine. 

Have your staff join these groups and re-promote your nonprofit’s content to tap into huge audiences of potential new donors or attendees to upcoming events.

The caveat here is that your staff can’t simply join a group and spam your content to everyone—there’s no faster way to destroy your credibility. Instead, they’ll have to participate in conversations with a vested, legitimate interest before sharing your content organically. 

When done right, your content gets massive promotional legs and your staff will learn countless new social media marketing strategies and fundraising tactics to advance your organization.

6. Create Captivating Content

One of the best ways to connect with different audiences on LinkedIn is by creating relevant, interesting, and informative content. This applies to your staff as they join groups and participate in conversations, but it’s also critical for your nonprofit’s page in general. 

It’s not enough to have an optimized page. You have to fill that page with resources that align with your nonprofit’s content marketing strategy.

When you publish something on your page, it gets added to the “Content” section and appears in all your followers’ feeds. If you want to drive high levels of engagement on these posts, your content needs to be compelling enough to pull in users.

Content that fits well on LinkedIn could include:

• Announcements about new hires
• Features that highlight new and existing board members
• Free resources from your nonprofit resource hub (e.g., blog posts, reports, etc.)
• Community celebrations
• Photos or videos of event volunteers 
• Updates about staff working on-site with beneficiaries
• Job postings for job seekers in the nonprofit space

Content that wouldn’t fit well on LinkedIn would include:

• Links with no context
• Pixelated images
• News relating to your personal life
• Content that publishes protected or sensitive information

7. Use LinkedIn Ads

Organic posts should always be part of your LinkedIn marketing strategy. These organic updates will reach the news feeds of anyone who follows your page. 

If you want to expose your nonprofit to new audiences, consider budgeting for fundraising ads.² LinkedIn offers multiple ways you can spend your budget across different types of paid ads, like:

• Message ads: Send direct messages to people that will appear in their inboxes. This works well when looking to hire for open positions.
• Sponsored content: Run video, photo, and image carousel ads in the LinkedIn feed across desktop and mobile. These ads are strong options when promoting your content.
• Text ads: Drive traffic to your nonprofit on a pay-per-click (PPC) or cost-per-impression (CPI) basis. This is the best route if you’re on a tight budget or want to target your spending.
• Dynamic ads: Create automatically personalized ads for your audience. Dynamic ads work well if you want to build brand affinity, drive traffic to your page, and increase online fundraising conversions.

8. Use LinkedIn Analytics

As you work to optimize your page, activate your staff, and promote your content, you need to know that hard work pays off. To accomplish this, make heavy use of the built-in analytics engine on LinkedIn. 

Once you’re in the engine, you can break down your data by:

• Total page views
• Number of followers
• Unique visitors to your page
• Custom button clicks
• Mobile versus desktop traffic sources
• Audience demographics

Additionally, LinkedIn will provide detailed breakdowns of every post you create. You can see the impressions, clicks, click-through rates, reactions, comments, and shares.

More than just numbers on a page, these insights are how you inform a data-driven nonprofit marketing strategy. For example, if you notice that 85% of your traffic comes from mobile sources, size most of the photos you post to your account to fit a mobile screen.

Take Proactive Steps to Elevate Your Social Media Strategy

LinkedIn prioritizes professional, timely, and relevant content catered to individuals in professional fields. As your team begins to optimize your organization’s presence on LinkedIn, you can build robust strategies to supply that content to nonprofit professionals and thought leaders worldwide.

There’s also a special section on LinkedIn solely built for nonprofits—LinkedIn for Nonprofits. Take the time to explore the different ways you can leverage its tools to find top talent, drive brand awareness, and inspire action on your programs and campaigns. 

Article Sources

1. “The Sophisticated Marketer’s Guide to LinkedIn,” LinkedIn, last modified 2017, https://business.linkedin.com/content/dam/me/business/en-us/marketing-solutions/cx/2017/pdfs/Sophisticated-Marketers-Guide-to-LinkedIn-v03.12.pdf.
2. “Get Started With LinkedIn Ads,” LinkedIn Marketing Solutions, last accessed February 13, 2023, https://business.linkedin.com/marketing-solutions/ads.

Our latest data from The State of Modern Philanthropy found that Facebook is a great place to start building exposure, as this social channel drives 83.4% of traffic to fundraising campaigns. Even further, 98% of nonprofit organizations have pages on Facebook, and 48% of all nonprofits believe social media is “very valuable” to their organizational strategy.¹

Below, you’ll find a deep dive into Facebook’s tools and opportunities for nonprofit fundraising, essential considerations, and tips for developing a well-rounded approach to fundraising on the world’s largest social media platform.

Facebook Fundraising Tools for Nonprofits

As you build awareness and steward your community of supporters, it’s impossible to ignore platforms like Meta. Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, reports 1.96 billion active Facebook users.² For perspective, that’s roughly 29% of the Earth’s population.

Meet your supporters in the place they visit daily to interact with others. Let’s start by exploring the specific fundraising tools and donation options Facebook offers nonprofits and individual fundraisers.

Facebook Fundraisers for Nonprofits

Facebook allows nonprofits to fundraise for a cause and provides individuals with the tools they need to successfully fundraise on behalf of a nonprofit organization. Upon expressing interest, users can search for nonprofits they would like to fundraise for.

Once they’ve decided who to fundraise for, users can create their fundraising pages. Personalization tools make it easy to customize items like their cover photo and story. Adding a personal touch helps fundraisers communicate their connection to the cause and motivate their networks to act.

It’s not uncommon to see people fundraise to celebrate significant milestones, like birthday fundraisers or anniversaries. You’ll also find many people calling for donations in response to current events, like natural disasters. This is their time to share why they support your cause and how each donation can help make a difference.

To ensure your mission is immediately evident to anyone landing on a fundraiser’s page, provide each supporter with compelling imagery, videos, links, or statistics to include on their campaign. These visuals can help emphasize your organization’s urgent need for support and therefore fuel conversions.

Facebook and Instagram Live Donate Button

Meta is committed to innovation to help people raise money for the causes near and dear to them. One way Meta demonstrates this intentional evolution is through Facebook Live, which allows users to add a Donate button or fundraiser directly within their livestreams.

Fundraisers in Reels

Facebook and Instagram have multiple features working in tandem. One example is that people can now donate and promote fundraisers directly within their Instagram reels. Once users add a donation link with a custom URL, this link remains available for 30 days.

Thank-You Tools

Expressing gratitude is now easier through Facebook, too. The Thank You Tool and Automated Thanking feature allow people to recognize an individual who supports their fundraiser. Meaningful appreciation sets a positive tone for donating to your cause and increases the chances that donors will return to give again in the future.

Facebook Messenger

Chat in real-time with your volunteers and potential donors to build relationships that extend off the platform. You can take this opportunity to share more details about your nonprofit, nurture existing relationships, and attract new donors to support your cause.

Organic Posts and Facebook Ads

Posting organic content from your nonprofit’s page helps followers stay up to date on events and happenings at your nonprofit and keeps you top of mind when these supporters feel inclined to make a gift. Facebook Ads allow you to target new donors interested in your nonprofit by getting more precise with your messaging and zeroing in on your ideal supporters.

How Do Facebook Fundraisers Work

Like any technology, it’s best to research Facebook fundraising before adopting it into your strategy. Below, we’ll outline a few considerations as you brainstorm your plan.

Donor Data

Facebook fundraising tools are great to help collect additional revenue, but the greatest potential comes from connecting donor data to your fundraising software. Without that connection, your organization can’t collect the data necessary to follow up with contributors and increase donors’ lifetime value.

Nonprofits using Facebook’s tools can view daily transaction reports. These reports include donors’ first names, last names, donation amounts, and emails (if provided). While a one-time donation will likely remain that—a one-time donation—if donors on Facebook omit key information, you can also find potential repeat donors if provided with the information you need to continue the conversation.

Using fundraising software with Facebook’s charitable giving tools sets you up for success by filling any donor data gaps. One example is through Facebook Conversions API (CAPI) for server-side tracking of basic user and event data not captured in a specific browser.

CAPI works with other analytics tools to provide a complete view of donor attribution data. By leveraging this option, your nonprofit will have seamless access to the best information to nurture donor relationships.

Collect as much of the following information as possible to create audience personas:

• Location
• Gender
• Educational level
• Income
• Marital status
• Values and beliefs
• Passions and interests
• Dreams and goals
• Political views
• Personality characteristics
• Motivations
• Day-to-day worries

Nonprofits can collect this data using various methods, including email surveys, social media surveys, and interviews.

Facebook Fundraiser Payout Lags

How long it takes to receive payment after a donation makes a big difference in how you can apply that funding to your mission. When nonprofits use a third-party payment processor to collect donations on Facebook, there are payout lags to consider. We’ll cover these, followed by the benefits of using Classy’s in-house payment processor.

• Payment timeline for Facebook Payments: Donations raised must reach the $50 minimum to be eligible for payout. It can take up to a month for your fundraiser to receive payouts from Facebook donations.

• Payment timeline for Network for Good’s Donor Advised Fund: Donations raised must reach a minimum of $10 to be eligible for payout. Funds roll over until you reach that minimum, but it can take a month and a half after the last date of the donation month to receive the payment distribution.

• Payment timeline for PayPal’s Giving Fund: Donations raised get distributed between 15 and 45 days from the donation date on Facebook.

Your donation will come through your payment processor once you link your Facebook Fundraiser to your campaign or fundraising website. However, nonprofits using Classy Pay as a payment processor can include options like PayPal, Venmo, digital wallets, and cryptocurrency. Donors get more options, and there’s less risk of long payout lags.

Stay Ahead of Algorithm Changes

Algorithms decide what content your followers see on various social media fundraising platforms, and Meta is notorious for switching things up for Facebook and Instagram users.

Stay ahead of the latest updates to get the greatest visibility for your campaigns. Setting up a business account for your nonprofit to see more analytics and sync data and content between Instagram and Facebook might also be beneficial.

Meta’s latest algorithms favor original content. To stay ahead of this shift, combine user-generated content with your team members’ or beneficiaries’ images, video, and audio content.

Find Consistency in Facebook Groups

Facebook groups are an additional opportunity to consider. One example is to repost your content to boost engagement among a key group of supporters, encouraging them to share it with their networks. Even further, if facilitating dialogue is crucial to your work, a Facebook group may help to achieve this fundraising goal by safeguarding you from algorithm changes.

Use these steps to help define your content strategy for Facebook groups:

• Examine what types of posts performed well in the past or on other platforms
• Write about your beneficiaries, volunteers, industry research, organizational achievements, and volunteer opportunities
• Create a content calendar to help you plan and schedule posts

Build a Well-Rounded Fundraising Strategy

As a champion for social impact, your goal is to create unique and meaningful experiences. Those experiences, in turn, create brand champions for your organization.

The importance of social media as a tool to meet potential supporters, secure donations, and raise awareness should not be underestimated. Here are the initial steps to consider as you develop your specific engagement strategy:

• Identify the types of content best suited to engage your social communities (e.g., infographics with data or videos showing your activities)
• Consider the most appropriate social media channels for your target audience (e.g., a Facebook page is great for general nonprofits audiences, but LinkedIn can engage organizations and industry professionals)
• Follow similar organizations to connect with and learn from
• Show your commitment to sharing your knowledge and exchanging ideas on how to help others (e.g., comments and participation in two-way conversations)

The right fundraising software provides supporters with the most straightforward path to fundraising on Facebook. On the back end, you get the sophisticated reporting and data you need to foster long-term donor relationships. After all, supporters who find you on Facebook could end up being your annual event attendees, volunteers, or recurring donors with the right donor retention strategy.

We hope this breakdown has helped you understand how your Facebook campaigns can work with your fundraising software. Now, get ready to build your comprehensive strategy and drive real results.

Classy’s Fundraising Suite

At Classy, we’re always looking to help organizations collect and understand their donor data better. To learn more about the platform and what it can do for you, check out our State of Modern Philanthropy Report with over 130 insights into how organizations like yours effectively attract, convert, and retain donors on Classy based on specific goals and campaign strategies.

Article Sources

1. “Where Nonprofits Spend Their Time On Social Media in 2022,” Marketing, HubSpot, last modified on June 21, 2022, https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/nonprofits-social-media-marketing-data.
2. “Meta Shares on an Upswing as User Growth Returns to Facebook,” Content, eMarketer, last modified on April 29, 2022, https://www.insiderintelligence.com/content/meta-shares-on-upswing-user-growth-returns-facebook.

More than two billion active monthly users head to Instagram multiple times every day to learn, get inspired, and engage with communities that were once out of reach.(1) It’s why this photo and video-sharing app is one of the most popular social networking services on the market.

On top of its photo-editing appeal, Instagram’s shareability across multiple networks has made it a dynamic social media marketing tool for nonprofit organizations. Because younger people use Instagram heavily, this social network can be a great way to connect with Gen Z and Millennial supporters.

Below are 10 nonprofit Instagram accounts to follow that creatively and effectively represent with a refreshing social media strategy.

What Helps the Best Nonprofits on Instagram Stand Out?

While the list of social media examples and tips is expansive for nonprofit marketing today, here’s a brief checklist to recap what matters most when building your community on Instagram.

• Set up an Instagram business account: Take advantage of metrics and opportunities for growth that come with a business profile vs. a private one
• Use Instagram stories, reels, and lives: Create a mix of live videos, engaging posts, and real-time updates that the algorithm loves
• Take advantage of features: Use the Instagram donate button and donation stickers to create high-quality and high-converting content
• Use hashtags thoughtfully: Focus on a set of 5-7 hashtags that represent your organization and mission to help you reach your niche audience
• Highlight online fundraising opportunities: Feature your donation page or online fundraising events right from your page for a clear, next-action step
• Build a meaningful content strategy: Think about the way each post you put into the world works together to tell a story and demonstrate nonprofittransparency
• Lean on influencers and partnerships: Extend your social media strategy with other accounts to speak on your behalf and advocate for your cause

Cool Nonprofits on Instagram to Follow

1. charity: water

The @charitywater Instagram account documents the organization’s efforts to provide a higher quality of life through clean drinking water. We love how the nonprofit’s photos share the direct results of its programs through the faces of those helped by its fundraising efforts. Instagram page visitors also get to see the areas that benefit from their ongoing support and feel a connection to the cause in an entirely new way.

Leaning into the power of emotion, the charity: water Instagram account uses various formats to reach more viewers. The team creates thoughtful reels, carousel posts, and story highlights that make a strong first impression, such as the following reel that remains pinned to the top of its grid to pull in  its target audience.

2. World Central Kitchen

The @wckitchen Instagram account consistently shares content demonstrating the scale of particular challenges the nonprofit is attempting to solve. The organization posts imagery of their work on the ground in communities around the world front and center so that with one scroll, a page visitor understands how many lives their mission impacts.

Their Instagram reels feature team members speaking directly to the camera about the urgent situations they rush to support, keeping new followers engaged and updated about what they can do to help.  Videos like the one below speak for themselves and pull a human element into social interactions with their community.

3. Pencils of Promise

The Pencils of Promise nonprofit aims to build lasting educational systems in communities throughout Laos, Nicaragua, and Guatemala. Its @pencilsofpromise Instagram account provides a great channel for learning about the organization’s campaigns and the people impacted by the cause. By posting photographs of individual children and their hopes for their futures, the organization allows you to see the actual dream your efforts will help make possible.

Pencils of Promise also has a magnetic content strategy that encourages supporters to engage with language like “raise your hand if …” or “change begins with you.” Just as critical as its heartfelt imagery is the message that comes across cohesively in every reel, post, and story, like the one below.

4. Minnesota Zoo

The @mnzoo Instagram account is full of personality, starting with each animal cared for having a moment to shine on its Instagram feed. The account invites Instagram users to participate in a community that highlights the adorable features of various animals, educates about what they need to live fulfilled and healthy lives, and features the zookeepers who dedicate their time to making it all a reality.

We love the way Minnesota Zoo has employees take over its account regularly and share how they turn donations and support into outcomes for the animals. It keeps this little series in a highlight for easy access and a welcoming way to get to know why the organization is worth following.

5. Cleveland Clinic

The @clevelandclinic Instagram profile is full of education. Every post is jam-packed with information, but the approach is entirely relatable. It’s clear that the Cleveland Clinic knows its audience and speaks directly to them in ways that boost engagement and admiration.

Reels like the one we’ve pointed out below have a way of making people feel seen and build connections that result in long-term donor loyalty.

6. TWLOHA

The TWLOHA Instagram feed showcases powerful words with creative visuals. We love its approach of using soft colors to share essential messages on mental health, healing, and recovery.

On top of that, the @twloha Instagram account brings these words to life by highlighting merchandise with impactful sayings printed on the front that followers can purchase to support the cause.

7. Oxfam America

The Oxfam America organization has spent decades working to end hunger, poverty, and social injustice on a global scale. While the @oxfamamerica Instagram account highlights campaigns and fundraisers, one of its most valuable practices has been highlighting the impact of its supporters on the ground.

Its unique use of hashtags and infographic-style posts prompt followers to initiate meaningful conversations with their networks. We love how the information is easily digestible, which you can see in the post below. This helps increase engagement levels and grow its following.

8. Eat.Learn.Play

The @eatlearnplay Instagram account instantly creates a fun feeling for a cause near and dear to founders Stephen and Ayesha Curry. We can’t help but feel happy when seeing the colorful feed and the information it conveys in humanistic posts that bring kids to the spotlight.

Eat.Learn.Play uses Instagram story highlights to organize the three main aspects of the organization: food insecurity, education, and becoming active in the community. As supporters click on each highlight, they can learn all about the work done by such an impactful organization.

9. Rescue City

The @rescuecity Instagram account gets the Instagram for cute—if there was one. This nonprofit lets its pups take the stage by introducing each one’s unique story. A scroll through its posts showcases the diversity of dogs that desperately need a foster home and pulls on users’ heartstrings as they watch each animal’s journey play out.

Rescue City ups the game with nonprofit influencer support from well-known names like Peter Weber of the Bachelor franchise to grow awareness that results in more animals with a safe home. That doesn’t stop them from also featuring the everyday heroes who welcome pups into their families to provide safety and love.

10. She Recovers Foundation

The @she_recovers Instagram account speaks to women looking for empowerment on their journey to recovery. It features the organization’s blog, events, and resources for anyone to benefit right from its social feed. We love that it’s easy to feel the embrace of the founders like “Mama Dawn” with the humanistic content writing approach.

SHE RECOVERS believes each new follower should know why they matter and how their team is here to help. It’s a great way to make a powerful first impression on someone who chooses to visit the page.

The Potential for Nonprofits on Instagram

Nonprofit organizations center on storytelling, which makes Instagram and other social media platforms the perfect tools to connect with new audiences. Just be careful to avoid comparing tactics and followers. Staying authentic to your mission and values with a consistent posting cadence is most important to reach the right people who are passionate and ready to make a difference for your cause.

Article Sources

“34 Instagram Stats Marketers Need to Know in 2023,” Hootsuite, last modified 2023, https://blog.hootsuite.com/instagram-statistics/.

Below, we’ll share some tips to help you improve how you use social media for events. We’ll cover how event organizers can use platforms like Instagram, LinkedIn, and Snapchat to build momentum pre-event, increase real-time engagement during the event, and improve future event management through post-event surveys and other touchpoints.

1. Pre-Event Social Media Marketing

In the months, weeks, and days leading up to your event, spread the news far and wide to ensure it’s on the radar of all potential attendees. Effective event promotion can drive registrations, ticket purchases, donations, and peer-to-peer fundraising sign-ups.

To get started, you’ll need to identify the:

• Social media channels you want to use
• Social media event marketing goals you want to reach
• Type of content you plan to share

Prioritize Your Social Media Channels

Each of the dominant social media platforms—Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, and Instagram—requires slightly different strategic approaches. For instance, Twitter only allows 280 characters, while others are unrestricted. A well-rounded social media marketing plan to promote your upcoming event will use all four platforms. However, you’ll likely want to prioritize one or two as your primary channels.

Select the social media channels your target audience uses most to be your primary focus. Additionally, look for a social media pairing that lets you balance content types.

For example, you might select Facebook and Instagram because your largest and most engaged following is on these platforms. You can use Facebook to provide plenty of details on your event, its story, and how it connects to your mission.

You might also create a Facebook event, so supporters can save the date and easily find your registration page. Meanwhile, you can use Instagram to share quick graphics of your event poster, and Snapchat can help you push out imagery-driven event teasers.

Finally, you might also consider using social media tools like Eventbrite or Hootsuite to help schedule posts and drive traffic to your event registration page.

Set Your Social Media Event Goals

Clear SMART goals will help guide your social media marketing efforts. For example, you may want to use social media to:

• Increase attendance for your quarterly webinar
• Encourage participation in the virtual fundraising event component of your charity gala
• Track supporter engagement across platforms to target future social media promotions better
• Gain new social media followers likely to remain engaged post-event
• Drive ticket sales to support your larger fundraising goals

No matter what your goals are, solidify them before you start marketing your event. By doing so, your efforts will be more targeted and effective, and you’ll have a clear vision of what you want to accomplish.

Schedule Key Event Announcements and Deadlines on Social Media

It can be helpful to structure your pre-event social media promotion around a few crucial announcements or deadlines. For example, you might:

• Announce the date of your event
• Showcase the various activities happening at your event
• Reveal speakers or special guests
• Present your official event hashtag to your social channels
• Offer a giveaway for one free event registration
• Inform the public about deadlines for early-bird or VIP ticket sales
• Amplify excitement for the event through a countdown during the final pre-event week

Creating a social media posting schedule educates your audience on event details while repeatedly promoting your event in an organic, non-forced way.

2. Social Media for Events in Real-Time

Your pre-event social media marketing should focus on creating awareness for the event, driving registrations or ticket sales, and building excitement for what’s to come. However, on the day of your event, your objectives will shift to:

• Delight attendees on the ground
• Share posts on your channels to engage those who couldn’t make it
• Collect event content for future promotions

Since live event coverage is a big job, it helps to designate one person to handle it. This way, event organizers don’t have to stress about running the event while simultaneously capturing all its golden moments.

Delight Attendees to Entice Social Media Sharing

To ensure your event receives the awareness it deserves, encourage attendees to share posts about their experience on social media. Look for ways to surprise and delight your attendees to encourage them to talk about it online. For example, you can:

• Host a fun photo booth to capture the event’s vibe and create ready-to-share content
• Ask attendees to record short videos about their favorite moments
• Hand out branded swag with your event’s hashtag on it
• Announce sponsor and partner shoutouts throughout the event

As you post to your channels, also pay attention to what others say about your event. Like, share, and respond to positive posts to continue fueling the conversation.

However, if you come across any complaints or negative posts, don’t ignore them. Even if you don’t have an immediate solution, replying to these posts or privately messaging the attendee shows that you care and want to make things right. Also, these negative posts can alert you to problems that you may not even know exist.

Use Social Media for Your Virtual Event Audience

No matter how successfully you market your event on social media, there will be people who can’t attend in person, aren’t interested in participating, or are still unaware of it. Your day-of coverage is a prime opportunity to show them all the great things happening.

For people who can’t make it, your live coverage can play on their fear of missing out (FOMO) and ignite a sense of urgency to be present for the next event. It’s also a chance to re-appeal to those who didn’t want to go—maybe they realize it’s a more impactful event than they initially thought and now want to get involved.

Finally, for those who were unaware, this lets you market the event to them again and drive their attention back to your nonprofit. Use your social media posts during the event to nurture relationships and start new ones, all while marketing your impact.

Virtual event platforms for nonprofits make it easier than ever to host a hybrid event and engage those who can’t join in person. Of the many benefits, you’ll be able to livestream any presenters, including your keynote speaker.

Collect Event Content for Future Social Media Efforts

Nonprofit content marketing and social media marketing go hand in hand. Your event can help generate content for blog posts, special email blasts, future social media posts, and more.

Ask your entire team to capture content, like photos, videos, and attendee testimonials, on the day of your event. Then, post-event, they can upload it into a shared folder. It’s also a good idea to have a specific list of images or videos you want to capture beforehand to ensure you get them.

Finally, while it’s critical to have a plan walking into your event, be flexible with your day-of social strategy to capitalize on in-the-moment content that organically comes your way. If you pay attention, you can capture these authentic moments for future use.

3. Post-Event Social Media Plan

The final phase of effective social media event marketing occurs after your event. You’ll want to:

• Thank your attendees and reflect on the event
• Analyze key social media event metrics
• Send a post-event survey

Use Social Media to Thank Event Attendees

First and foremost, after an event, use your social media channels to thank donors and attendees for making the event possible. You might want to do a few separate posts for different groups, such as:

• Sponsors
• Partners
• Volunteers
• Attendees
• Major donors

If you have individuals’ or sponsors’ social media handles, you can tag them in the posts to ensure they see them and encourage re-sharing.

You can also take this post-event time to reflect on the event with an attitude of gratitude. Share a recap or wrap-up post that highlights five or six key moments from the event. Pair this with a few high-resolution photos of each moment.

Analyze Social Media Event Metrics

Following your event, review your social media data to inform your marketing strategy for future events. You’ll want to consider:

• Which platforms led to the most registrations, user-generated content, donations, and overall engagement
• Which content types drove the most engagement (e.g., photos, links, text messages, etc.)
• How engagement varied on different social media channels before, during, and after the event

Understanding how effective your social media event marketing was will help zero in on your efforts to increase engagement and participation for your next event.

Send a Post-Event Survey for Greater Social Media Insights

In addition to reviewing your social media metrics, ask your audience for their input. A post-event survey can help you further understand:

• How your supporters want to engage with you on social media
• What type of content resonates most with them
• How they heard about your event
• What communication styles they prefer

Soliciting supporter feedback is extremely valuable for planning future events. You’ll know which social media strategies to double down on or improve next time.

Once you’ve reviewed your survey data, use it as a donor touchpoint. Reach out to your supporters to let them know what you learned and any changes you’ll make as a result. Doing so demonstrates that you value their feedback and hold yourself accountable to continuous improvement.

Optimize Your Social Media Marketing With Classy to Improve the Event Experience

Social media marketing is a crucial cornerstone of your event’s success, so treat it as you would any other facet of your strategy: with time and due diligence. That’s where Classy comes in. For even more tips, download our Social Media Marketing Guide below.

Article Sources

1. “Number of Social Media Users Worldwide From 2017 to 2027,” Statista, last modified January 24, 2023, https://www.statista.com/statistics/278414/number-of-worldwide-social-network-users/.
2. “State of Social 2019,” Buffer, accessed January 26, 2023, https://buffer.com/state-of-social-2019.

Becoming more familiar with your supporter base through effective outreach is key to creating social media content that resonates with potential donors. And what better way to learn about creating engaging posts for your nonprofit organization than looking at how others break molds and put ideas into action?

Below, we’ll share 10 fundraising social media post examples that deliver impactful messages and give bonus tips to drive user engagement, connect with your target audience, and reflect on current events.

Examples of How to Ask for Donations on Instagram

1. Direct Relief CEO Showcases Donations in Action

In this Instagram reel, Direct Relief’s President and CEO, Thomas Tighe, creates an impromptu video talking to the nonprofit’s online audience live from a Santa Cruz County storm emergency response. Tighe showcases the emergency kits given out and talks to the kit recipients, demonstrating firsthand how donations result in impact. He ends the message with the simple words, “I appreciate everyone’s support,” which subtly and authentically calls on donors to continue making these solutions possible.

2. Runway for Recovery Invites Donors to Give Recurring Donations

This Instagram carousel features a cover image that makes viewers curious to read on, followed by informational text slides introducing a reimagined monthly donor program creatively named the Always Dancing Club. The engaging post calls on donors to grow their support level for the organization year-round with an incentive of swag and welcoming language.

3. Denver Rescue Mission Turns a Personal Story Into an Appeal

With a single Instagram feed post, Denver Rescue Mission puts a face to its work by introducing its audience to Robert. The caption shares Robert’s story through a quote he gave about a guest experience at one of the organization’s centers. Using an authentic voice followed by a clear call to action of “Please consider helping the most vulnerable in our community Donation Link in Bio” is a straightforward approach to asking for donations when it’s most needed.

Examples of Fundraising Facebook Posts

4. Eat.Learn.Play. Foundation Promotes Successful Celebrity Partnerships

This Facebook fundraising post leads with the impact Eat.Learn.Play. made in 2022, and immediately follows with its goals for 2023. The post calls on social media followers to join in its ambitious efforts by featuring images to showcase the individuals who benefit from its work. It also doesn’t hurt to subtly tag founders Stephen and Ayesha Curry in the post to generate a buzz.

5. Women’s Earth Alliance Invites Supporters to Share Good News

Another example of great Facebook fundraisers is this post from Women’s Earth Alliance. You immediately see a beautiful image with the words “Good News” that stop the scroll and invite supporters to read on. The post shares the news of a Time100 Next list feature and statistics that quantify the 2022 achievements possible when a community comes together.

6. Tunnel to Towers Foundation Advertises a New Event

A Facebook page can be a great place to share events, and Tunnel to Towers Foundation did just that to feature its Operation Deep Blue online fundraising campaign. The post shares compelling imagery and an opportunity to match donations in the caption, letting people know exactly how to get involved.

Examples of Donation Social Media Posts on TikTok

7. Many Hopes Shines the Spotlight on Its Beneficiaries

In this example, Many Hopes leverages TikTok to showcase short videos featuring incredible children with impressive dreams. Talking directly to the viewers, the post includes a caption that calls on new audiences to participate in these children’s futures with a donation. It’s also a good reminder that your ask doesn’t need to be complex when rooted in humanity: “Your support gives him the opportunity to dream big and work hard.”

8. Special Olympics Maryland Puts a Creative Spin on Event Marketing

This is an example of an unexpected but fun-filled way to engage donors on TikTok. Special Olympics Maryland screen records a text conversation between “Beary White” and a recipient to ask them if they’ve signed up for their annual plunge event, highlighting how easy it is to use a mobile link to register in seconds. We love how Special Olympics Maryland emphasized the value of mobile-optimized campaigns and simple peer-to-peer fundraising.

9. Feeding San Diego Highlights Voices of Appreciation

Allowing donors to hear from those who benefit from their donations is a powerful way to deepen their connection to the cause. Feeding San Diego does this beautifully on TikTok with clips of individuals who frequent the food bank, sharing how much it means to them to have this help. The post highlights the timely need for more donations given inflation and features a donation match in the caption to make it easy to take action.

10. Beat the Streets Pulls on Emotional Heartstrings Through Video

This TikTok fundraising effort pulls a short clip of Beat the Streets speaking to its mission. The video flashes to a child who benefits from the nonprofit’s work and individuals who rally around its cause. Plus, the clip effectively communicates Beat the Streets’ message, so there’s no need for a caption. Lastly, the post adds relevant hashtags for expanded reach and visibility, potentially inspiring new supporters to get involved and make a difference.

Social Media Fundraising Best Practices

Offer Shareable, Relevant Information

Nonprofits work on critical issues. As these situations arise, your audience wants to know how you address them. They’re also eager to share information with their networks to further the cause.

Remember, your social media posts are as effective as the strategy behind them. Follow the lead of nonprofit organizations above to highlight why donations matter now and the gratitude people feel for the timely support.

Take a Stance on Challenging Issues

As a nonprofit, your supporters want to know you’re willing to take risks to effect positive change. You can use social media to communicate your stance on challenging issues, initiate necessary conversations, and encourage your audience to join or support your cause.

Unexpected moments on social media are the ones that garner attention the most, so think about how you can take a unique approach to get your message across and showcase your personality along the way.

Provide Action Items

Social media users are hungry for actionable education. Consider using tools like Canva to create text-centered, action-focused infographics with simple templates. This type of content can help organically drive engagement by mobilizing your audience to share your content on their platforms and help spread the word.

The number of saves and shares you receive are crucial in social media algorithms, so create content users want to repost or save to reference later to improve your visibility. Just don’t forget to add a link to your donation site in your profile bio.

Uplift Other Voices

During difficult times, it’s likely that your nonprofit won’t be able to address all the gaps within a community. Promote the other organizations doing that work rather than trying to reinvent the wheel.

With budgets to keep and fundraising goals to meet, nonprofits may encounter a scarcity mindset and not want to promote another nonprofit. However, elevating other organizations emphasizes your collaborative spirit and commitment to supporting critical causes. This can also be the perfect time to highlight your local partnerships and how these make your work possible.

Be Responsive to Current Events

Being prepared to promptly respond to big news and current events, especially related to your nonprofit’s work, demonstrates your organization’s attention to wide-reaching global matters. In fact, Gen Z is the generation most likely to donate to a current event.

Partner With Public Figures

Create organic opportunities to highlight partnerships with recognizable public figures. And even if your nonprofit doesn’t have relationships established with Hollywood celebrities, you can still partner with other nonprofit influencers to increase awareness for your cause. Classy’s Why America Gives report found that Gen Z and Millennial donors are 4x as likely to learn about causes from influencers and celebrities than their older counterparts.

Communicate Emotion Through Photos

Capture your audience by showing your beneficiaries’ genuine emotions.

If you don’t have an in-house photographer, search hashtags on social media that include the city you’re in, plus “photographer” (e.g., #sandiegophotographer). Look at the photographers’ portfolios that pop up in the search and consider whether their style aligns with your goals and mission. If the mood of the photos seems like a good representation of your nonprofit brand, reach out and tell them about your cause.

Allow for Lightheartedness

Nonprofits often communicate emotionally-heavy information. Help break that message up occasionally with something more lighthearted.

There are many ways your nonprofit can do this while staying on brand. Some fundraising ideas include:

• Share a positive beneficiary story
• Check in with how your social network is doing
• Express gratitude for your supporters
• Have an influencer partner give your nonprofit a shoutout
• Share meaningful testimonials

Coordinate Your Big Announcements

Whenever your nonprofit goes to make a big announcement, whether informing your audience that you’re starting a new social media account or sharing the date for your next fundraising event, consider:

• What photo will best capture the emotion of your announcement
• How your social media campaign will work with press releases and other nonprofit marketing tools
• What specific text (e.g., audience questions, beneficiary stories, thank you notes) you’ll use in your social media campaign to drive engagement

Simply put, when new donors engage with your page, it’s an opportunity to gain their support for your cause through compelling content.

Be Authentic and Compassionate

Especially during times of crisis, people want to engage with authentic content that’s compassionate toward their experiences at that moment.

Let your audience know how things affect you and your thoughts on the situation during that time. In doing so, you offer compassion to people facing challenges and communicate your authenticity to your audience. Your supporters will be more likely to engage with your content if they see you as an ally rather than a faceless brand.

Drive Social Media User Engagement Through Authentic, Creative, and Timely Posts

Modern social media platforms like TikTok, Facebook, and Instagram offer collective learning tools to capture conversations in real time, emphasize emotional connection through imagery, and tap into a crucial and growing youth demographic to enhance your fundraising strategy.

With an original and creative nonprofit social media strategy, your nonprofit can grow an audience and foster critical engagement among supporters. This community-building can help strengthen your nonprofit while simultaneously supporting several significant social issues.

Whether you’re a regular Canva user or haven’t tried it yet, these eight simple design ideas will help you share your visual story and attract more donors to your cause.

The Power of Visual Designs for Your Nonprofit

Modern marketing is often visual, as platforms like TikTok, Snapchat, and YouTube set new expectations for viewing a brand’s content.

At one point, a nonprofit’s marketing materials called for an eye-catching logo, branded email signature, and a few design elements used across event signage. Today, marketers need to think about visuals that align with each new fundraising campaign and produce fresh visuals for every post and donor communication they share.

Social media platforms understand this, building engagement algorithms that favor original visuals and video content posted at least several times a week. Each platform additionally asks users to adapt graphic design to different specifications and sizes to fit optimally in their feeds.

Taking a page from social media platforms, nonprofit organizations can get more creative about the visual storytelling by incorporating this element into campaign pages and associating promotions across various channels as design tools become more accessible.

What Is Canva for Nonprofits?

The Canva for Nonprofits program gives social impact organizations free access to premium features and design tools through its interactive platform. Canva’s platform delivers thousands of templates, design tutorials, and premade designs to make your own. However, you must complete an application to qualify.

Registered nonprofit users can then team up on designs and turn their creations into any size visuals they need across fundraising campaigns, social media channels, and various communication channels.

Setting Up Your Brand Kit in Canva

The biggest benefit of using Canva is that you can easily carry out your unique nonprofit branding across designs using its brand kit feature. It keeps your teammates thinking about your core brand values and visual elements as they put a unique spin on existing templates.

You can use the Canva brand kit to store your preferred:

• Main and supporting logos for various campaigns or initiatives
• Color palettes with specific hex codes
• Fonts that match your campaigns and website

8 Simple Designs to Create With Canva Pro for Nonprofits

1. Post Frequently With Social Media Post Templates

Social media platforms help you engage your audience, specifically through stories outside of the more formal posts that live on your feed. Planning story posts can also enhance interactions around your prescheduled content calendar.

However, developing new ideas for social posts that look consistent across platforms can be challenging. Social media graphic templates can help. Create them once, then modify versions for each platform you use with Canva’s Magic Resize tool.

Social Media Post Template Examples:

• Share polls to get your audience thinking
• Announce new campaigns and events
• Offer real-time updates on the progress of your fundraising goals

2. Engage New Donors With a Website Landing Page

Canva now supports web design for quick landing pages outside your existing domains. So with no development knowledge, you can turn a template design into a web landing page using Canva.

It works the same way as creating other templates with simple navigation and access to design elements. You can also link to your donation page or other campaign pages from the landing page designs you create.

Website Landing Page Template Examples:

• Host a splash page to share new projects
• Share a simple newsletter sign-up page
• Build a dedicated page to showcase your recurring donation community

3. Educate Supporters With Video and Animation

Canva’s nonprofit account gives you access to video tools to help you create content that educates people about your organization.

Consider making a founding story video for your nonprofit that appeals to a donor’s emotions. Talk about your organization’s roots, showcase your growth, and help people envision the impact of their support. You can even create videos with your footage or Canva’s library of GIFs and other motion-design elements.

With the animation tools available, you don’t need a B-roll to make something engaging.

Video and Animation Template Examples:

• Develop a fun video message to donors that thanks them, acknowledges them, or keeps them up to date with what you’re doing with their contributions
• Create a teaser video to promote a new campaign you’re launching

4. Stand Apart With Visual Fundraising Campaign Pages

Your fundraising campaigns are essential to convert donors, and visuals create the first impression that welcomes them to your giving experience. Stand out by taking the time to include a compelling campaign header, graphic elements, and logo.

Design can help guide donors to the most impactful step in supporting your mission. So remember, each campaign can (and should) have on-brand visuals and take on its own visual identity unique to that campaign.

Campaign Visual Template Examples:

• Represent your campaign’s goal and those it supports with unique visuals
• Build templates for annual campaigns such as Giving Tuesday fundraisers
• Design powerful hero image templates to use for the top of each campaign page, which Classy recommends sizing to 1280×720 px

5. Build Relationships With Fresh Event Branding

Events are a time to present donors and potential supporters with an unforgettable experience. That has a lot to do with the visual experience they associate with the process, from the point of registration through the live event itself. So unite your online and in-person experiences with consistent branding.

Event Branding Template Examples:

• Design a QR code flyer on napkins, business cards, and posters that links back to your donation page
• Create a distinguished visual identity for your event to use on your registration page and all associated emails

6. Empower Peer-to-Peer Fundraisers

Create the branding you want to showcase on your peer-to-peer campaign page and bring that into each fundraising page to set individuals up for success as they raise money for your cause. Consistent branding and a professional look will help build trust and credibility as new donors learn about your organization.

You want to create visuals your donors want to share on their personal social media and company communication platforms.

Peer-to-Peer Fundraising Template Examples:

• Design custom images that match your campaign page headers for supporters to share with their communities
• Develop a fundraiser toolkit with social-sharing images you’ve created to match the look and feel of the campaign

7. Showcase Your Work With Infographics

You can tell your supporters about the results you’re achieving with their gifts or show them. Visuals can be a great way to demonstrate your work in numbers and graphs. So create an infographic that you can replicate your impact in an exciting way across any platform you’d like to share with your community.

Infographic Template Examples:

• Turn your annual report into a fun infographic
• Showcase impact with results from specific campaigns
• Develop a year in review to send to donors

8. Keep in Touch With Email Templates

When you think about how many emails come through your donors’ inboxes each day, you can see the importance of making yours memorable. Visuals can connect to a reader and enhance your email communications to drive donors to take action.

Design email templates to keep people excited about your mission and continue the experience after a donation, switching things up for various use cases throughout the year.

Email Template Examples:

• Create a special welcome visual to send to new donors
• Level up your thank you letters to major donors and corporate sponsors
• Build excitement around your weekly newsletter

Bring Your Ideas to Life With Free Canva for Nonprofits

We hope your creativity is flowing with all the possibilities at your fingertips with Canva. You already have an incredible founding story and mission. Now, you can bring that to life to attract even more supporters to raise more. And with consistent branding to reflect your nonprofit’s personality, you’re sure to pull them in.

Get ready to create something amazing.

The start of the new year is an opportunity to reflect, re-evaluate, and plan for success. Of course, it’s impossible to know what 2023 will hold for your nonprofit, but we can make educated guesses by looking at new and emerging trends.

To help your organization get ahead of the curve, I asked my fellow LinkedIn for Nonprofits colleagues to share the LinkedIn trends they predict will impact the sector in 2023. Here are three trends they highlighted based on what they’re hearing directly from the nonprofits they work with:

Trend #1: Employer branding takes center stage

In a tight labor market, nonprofits have to work extra hard to attract and hire high-potential candidates. At the same time, the market is being flooded with tech talent that nonprofits wouldn’t typically have access to, presenting a major opportunity to bring new skills into their organizations.

Your nonprofit can rise to this challenge by elevating your employer branding efforts on LinkedIn and positioning your organization as a fulfilling place to work. That might include creating a LinkedIn Career Page that showcases your culture, values, and testimonials from employees, and posting eye-catching employer branding content from your nonprofit’s LinkedIn Page.

Focus on telling authentic stories about what it’s like to work at your organization, the impact of the work, and the tangible and intangible benefits you offer employees. This content isn’t just useful for attracting new candidates. It can also be sent to existing job candidates to boost their interest in your organization.

Trend #2: Executive thought leadership sets nonprofits apart

Nonprofits may not be able to compete with the big marketing budgets of corporate brands, but they have an ace up their sleeve: a mission that inspires.

Paired with their leadership team—including dedicated board members—who regularly engage with organizations’ content and share their insights and expertise on timely issues, the impact of nonprofit marketing can achieve an extremely far reach.

Encouraging executive leaders at your nonprofit to develop a thought leadership presence on LinkedIn can help get your organization noticed in 2023 and beyond. Plus, it can complement your employer branding efforts. After all, who doesn’t want to work for thoughtful, inspiring people?

Creating thought leadership content takes time, but it can also be a team effort. This content doesn’t just have to live on your leaders’ profiles, either. You can easily reshare it via your organization’s LinkedIn Page and pull out quotes to feature in future posts, newsletters, and articles.

Trend #3: Learning opportunities play a crucial role

The Great Resignation (or “Great Reshuffle” as we think of it at LinkedIn) of 2022 highlighted the critical importance of investing in employee retention efforts.

With 43% of U.S. social sector organizations reporting that a lack of opportunity for upward mobility, or career growth, is a primary reason for voluntary turnover, providing employee growth opportunities should be a priority for nonprofits in 2023. Given the current economic climate, developing your existing talent and hiring from within can be the most cost-effective strategy.

As more employees embrace remote work and nonprofit workforces become increasingly dispersed, on-demand learning resources like LinkedIn Learning can allow organizations to provide development opportunities equitably and at scale—while filling skills gaps.

Nonprofits that use LinkedIn Learning have noted that features like “Learner Challenges” foster engagement and connection among their employees, creating friendly competition that turns learning into a fun, communal experience.

Set Your Nonprofit Up for Success

Whatever 2023 brings, it’s worth strengthening your nonprofit’s presence on LinkedIn. With more than 875 million global professionals using the platform, the opportunities are endless.

Download the Complete LinkedIn Checklist for tips to help your organization build and maintain a powerful presence on LinkedIn. Visit nonprofit.linkedin.com for more LinkedIn resources and exclusive discounts on LinkedIn products.

Why America Gives 2022 found that a top benefit of donating is when loyal donors feel gratitude for the work a nonprofit is doing. Loyal donors are 1.5X as likely to donate because they feel admiration or gratitude for the work an organization does, compared to passive donors. As you’re thinking about retaining donors and their desire to fund your mission, it’s worth noting the value of loyal donors. Surveyed loyal donors show a strong pattern of repeat donations to the same causes or organizations over the last five years.

So, how can your nonprofit tap into the feeling of gratitude within your donor base this holiday season? Fuel your next fundraising campaign with creative ways to showcase donor appreciation and foster donor stewardship. Keep reading to spark your next creative idea.

How Gratitude Builds Deeper Donor Connections

Gratitude is a genuine emotion you can’t force. When nonprofit organizations have donors who feel gratitude for their work, they’re humanizing themselves to build stronger connections. Most donors will feel good in the moment of a donation. Organizations that continue to tap into that emotion to build trust and pride see first-time donors return again.

Gratitude strengthens relationships and has a ripple effect

Harvard shares various studies that look at the relationship between gratitude and relationship building. They state one study of couples found individuals who took time to express gratitude for their partner increased the positivity they felt toward the other person. They also became more comfortable expressing their feelings about their relationships.

They also show another study where researchers at the University of Pennsylvania compared a group of university fundraisers who solicited donations as they always had to those who received a pep talk before they made their calls expressing gratitude for their work from the director of annual giving. The second group made 50% more fundraising calls than those who weren’t shown gratitude.

Your relationship with donors is similar to the relationships referenced above, where people find it easier to build trust and connection when they feel appreciated. Below, you’ll see ways to unlock that gratitude in donors, and show your gratitude right back for a strong long-term partnership.

Why Gratitude Matters More Than Ever Before

Gratitude from donors comes from knowing an organization is doing great work. It grows when they feel connected to employees dedicating their time to make it all happen, beneficiaries receiving support and the reason the organization came to be.

As modern donors have more opportunities to give, gaining their gratitude can help you stand out. Understanding their internal drivers may be key to unlocking their attention.

Today, we’ll talk about how you can increase donors’ gratitude for your organization with creative campaigns. We’ll also show you ways to reciprocate that gratitude right back.

How to Practice Gratitude Fundraising With 6 New Ideas

Showcase a Mission to Be Thankful for

Gratitude can play a large role in donor acquisition. Donors may already feel an emotional connection to your work, even if they have never heard about your nonprofit. That’s where you can build lasting relationships that tap into their passions and attract support to your campaigns.

The key is to send a message that doesn’t just ask directly for a generous gift. Instead, focus on building an internal appreciation that naturally leads to generosity.

1. Idea: Showcase bold ways to live out values

Brands that take unexpected and bold actions are the same names you’ll see going viral on social media. People remember what surprises them, and appreciate when the message resonates.

Your nonprofit can gain inspiration from brands who make not-so-subtle stances to live their values in a big way. Start thinking about bringing your mission to life to showcase what donors appreciate most.

An example to inspire you

Inspiration: In 2015, REI closed its doors on Black Friday despite losing out on the profits the biggest shopping day of the year could have brought in. Why? Well, the company prides itself on helping people enjoy the outdoors and knows that its loyal customers share that value. So, they enabled their employees and customers to #optoutside to lead by example.

Turn inspiration into action

Could you have your founder lean on public transportation to lend a vehicle to volunteers to get more done in a heightened moment of need?

Could you have employees donate their pantries to support the hungry?

Maybe you host a competition to see which employee can dedicate the most volunteer time outside of their paid hours to making a difference on the ground.

Making a bold statement comes from the organization’s comfort to identify how to show donors that values will always overshadow income. Use your specific timeframe, mission, and budget to create something that’s unexpected to your audience.

2. Idea: Reach Grateful Donors Through a Corporate Partnership

Your nonprofit is already doing the work that many donors appreciate and connect to. A wider supporter community could simply be a matter of nonprofit awareness.

Even the most passionate donors can only take action if they know about your organization or ways they can offer support. One way to change that is by identifying a corporate partner that these donors already interact.  Build awareness and invite donors to a clear call to action.

An example to inspire you

Make-A-Wish has been teaming up with Macy’s since 2008 on a creative letter-writing campaign built to create hope and spark joy for children during the holiday season. Make-A-Wish is dedicated to helping children fight critical illnesses and their donors are already connected to that. When they paired up with Macy’s, they expanded their reach to entirely new audiences drawn in by the idea of helping children.

Turn inspiration into action

Which businesses can you partner with to reach supporters who already share an appreciation for your work but may not know about your organization?

Does a certain celebrity or public figure regularly advocate for your cause category?

Take the opportunity to have these entities introduce your work to their communities and welcome supporters who come ready with the desire to make an impact aligned with your mission.

3. Idea: Create a powerful visual aid to tap into emotions

The fastest way to resonate with donors is to showcase what they’re most grateful for visually. Consider crafting a video that brings your nonprofit’s beneficiaries and other donors to the spotlight. Highlight voices who can talk directly to other donors about the way your work is making a true difference. A more intimate platform can broaden the connections your message forms with donors.

An example to inspire you

Peloton put out a video campaign titled, “It’s You. That Makes Us.” The video showcases the similarities between Peloton users as they come together as a community, and the brand’s impact on everyone interacting with it daily as part of their lives.

Turn inspiration into action

Imagine a short two-to-five-minute video featuring individuals whose lives were changed by your work. Their personal stories and testimonials can greet each new visitor to your website and instantly pull on their heartstrings.

You could also gather your loyal donors to speak directly to others in a video format. Have them share why they feel grateful to be a part of your mission. That can spark the same emotion in others as you use the footage across various social media platforms and emails.

A single video can establish an appreciation for your nonprofit’s mission and the desire to be a part of it.

How to Show Gratitude to Donors

By showing gratitude to your donors, you express your appreciation and drive donor relationships. Once you have a loyal donor, your ongoing relationship building through gratitude can keep them loyal. Thanking donors also serves as a constant reminder that they mean just as much to your organization as it means to them.

4. Idea: Surprise donors with a personalized touch

Seeing someone’s handwriting on a letter you receive in your mailbox went from typical to novelty. People know your organization is busy, especially at the end of the year. That’s what makes a hand-written letter of appreciation that much more impactful.

An example to inspire you

A popular fitness apparel brands, Sweat Betty, takes up the art of hand-written notes to recognize it’s most loyal customers. They add the elements of personalized details as well as a discount the customer can take action on to continue engaging.

While simple in nature, the notes stood out to customers who are used to digital communications from many of Sweaty Betty’s competitors.

Turn inspiration into action

Consider writing thank you donor communications based on how they’ve interacted with your organization at milestones throughout the year such as:

• Thank your Giving Tuesday donors: Send a hand-written letter thanking Giving Tuesday donors for their support in January, when the giving season passed and the gesture can reignite their spark to get involved

• Acknowledge volunteers: Write a hand-written thank you note showing your appreciation to any volunteer who’s helped bring your work to life in the last year, including details like the exact events or opportunities these volunteers contributed to, the results, and the value of the specific projects they worked on

It’ll be important to note that you know they’re busy, and their time and commitment to donate stand out. If you don’t have the time to handwrite letters, you can also consider sending a short video. The visual messages of gratitude can appeal particularly to younger donors who enjoy connecting on video-based platforms like YouTube and TikTok.

5. Idea: Create an appreciation event

Making people feel special can show your appreciation in a big way. What if you held an online virtual event for your nationwide supporters who’ve contributed to your goals this year? It can also reduce the cost.

An example to inspire you

Dunkin is one of many coffee brands that celebrates its customers with free coffee on National Coffee Day as a widespread event. They take the awareness day and turn it into a way to appreciate the people who make its business successful with thoughtful graphics.

Turn inspiration into action

The virtual format can bring together a large group of people around a value for them and build community through one another’s gratitude.

Here are some ideas to get your started:

• Partner with a local artist to perform a livestream concert

• Ask beneficiaries to share their stories directly to your donors who made their solutions possible

• Have donors volunteer to share the stories that connect them to your cause based on a special invitation

You could also take this idea to an in-person format by hosting satellite gatherings in large cities where your donors are located to get together for dinner or coffee and cover a portion of their bill. As you put your creative spin on these nonprofit fundraising event ideas, you’ll simultaneously expose new donors to the values that keep people connected to your organization.

6. Idea: Celebrate loyalty

Recognition is an incredible way to show gratitude, especially when it’s personalized.

An example to inspire you

Starbucks mastered a loyalty program that makes each and every customer feel rewarded for their purchases, and experience real-time recognition for their engagement with the brand.

Turn inspiration into action

What if you could engage your recurring donor community with a loyalty program that they enter into as they sign up for an automated gift? You can bring the mentality of rewarding their contributions by regularly showcasing their progress throughout the year via email.

Emails that recognize milestones in a recurring donor’s journey such as “$100 contributed for good” or “5-time donation superstar” can build the excitement that Starbucks star rewards program does. You could also offer swag or event registration discounts to donors who achieve certain milestones to keep it gamified.

You can get creative to introduce badges donors can show off on social media to build desire around joining the community to others too. After all, 77% of donors are most likely to learn about new causes by word-of-mouth through their friends and family.

Drive Donor Retention Through Donor Gratitude

Why America Gives 2022 showcases the importance of gratitude to motivate donor loyalty, as well as how donors who show a strong pattern of returning to give again to the same organizations expect to give through 2023.

As you learn more about what drives your donors internally to take action, you can establish an engagement strategy that stands apart and leads to better acquisition, conversion, and retention rates.

If you’re looking for ideas on how to tap into the season’s trends, our resource titled The Seasonal LinkedIn Content Calendar for Impactful Fundraising offers a go-to guide for all major cause awareness days, holidays, and giving days in the United States and globally.

Below, we’ll show you how to translate those seasonal themes into material for your fall content calendar. The following nine ideas aim to jump-start your planning for autumn-themed messaging to inspire donors to give throughout September, October, and November—and into the winter.

1. Give Summer a Farewell

September 22 is the first day of autumn. Use this transition into fall to look back on your nonprofit’s summer highlights.

Similar to the “Throwback Thursday” social media trend of sharing nostalgic photos from previous events, you can join your followers in saying goodbye to summer by reflecting on the past season with content such as:

• Photos from events you hosted over the summer
• Impact data on how many people you served over the summer
• Volunteer or intern stories during the summer months

2. Promote a Virtual Book Club

Fall is a great time to cozy up with a book, which may be why September is National Literacy Month, October is National Book Month, and November is National Novel Writing Month. A fun way to connect with your supporters while leveraging these awareness months is to highlight books related to your nonprofit’s mission.

Look for both nonfiction and fiction titles with themes that highlight your cause. Then, present them through your social media to supporters early in the month. As people read the books, post discussion questions throughout the month to promote engagement with your content and a sense of community around your mission.

3. Share a Recipe

There are several opportunities in the fall to center your content around food, including National Food Bank Day in September, World Food Day in October, and Thanksgiving in November. These holidays and awareness days are obviously beneficial for nonprofit food banks, community gardens, or other food-related causes to leverage. However, nonprofits focused on other topics can also let them drive their content calendars.

Since fall is known for its comfort foods and family recipes, have your staff share some of their favorites with supporters through your social media and newsletter. You can also ask your supporters to share their favorites with you to add an interactive component. In addition, if your nonprofit is a food bank or community garden, you can also highlight easy recipes people can make from some of your most common donations, produce, or ingredients.

However, if your nonprofit’s focus isn’t food-related, you can still take the opportunity to highlight food banks and other resources in your local area too. Nonprofits are stronger together, and your audience may appreciate seeing how you collaborate with other causes.

4. Thank a Teacher

October 5 is World Teachers’ Day and if your nonprofit’s mission focuses on that topic, lean into the material. Share highlights of your work that show how you support teachers, global education, or other related activities.

However, even if your nonprofit’s cause isn’t directly related to education, you can still leverage this day to produce relevant, timely content. For example, you can:

• Have staff share stories about their favorite teachers or other mentors who led them to their current role with your nonprofit
• Highlight your internship program or other ways you connect staff to mentors and continued education
• Partner with a local school or teacher to organize field trips or other activities related to your cause to share with your supporters

5. Highlight LGBTQ Contributions to Your Field

October is LGBT History Month. This is an excellent opportunity to dig into the history of your cause and identify some of the leaders from your field who identify as LGBTQ. For example, an environmental nonprofit could create a series of posts highlighting conservationists throughout history, such as Dr. Clyde Wahrhaftig, an American geologist, professor, environmentalist, and LGBTQ+ leader.

Representation matters as does sharing content centered on LGBTQ people who have significantly impacted your mission throughout the years to honor their legacy and help inspire the next generation of leaders.

6. Lean Into Halloween

After multiple pandemic years of Halloween events being canceled or altered, people are excited for the spooky event to come back in full force.

Welcome the return to this haunted annual trend with some Halloween-themed content. For example:

• Share photos of your staff in their Halloween costumes
• Update your logo or profile photo temporarily to incorporate Halloween decorations
• Carve pumpkins with your logo and share those photos in your October newsletter

Halloween is a chance to have a little fun with your supporters and show your nonprofit’s personality.

Fall is also a time when the days get shorter, which can be challenging for many people, including your supporters. Consider ways to use the Halloween aesthetic to let supporters “glow in the dark” with you. For example, you can use Halloween week to:

• Share highlights and good news from your nonprofit’s work
• Highlight tips from your staff on how they self-care and remember to “glow in the dark”
• Encourage supporters to share and tag you in their “glow in the dark” moments and tips to reshare

To set these posts apart, you can opt to use some bioluminescent (think fireflies) design styles or filters to brand the effort and evoke a jack-o’-lantern feeling.

7. Salute Veterans

November 11 is Veterans Day in the United States. You can use this day to create content that highlights veterans on your staff, profiles donors or volunteers who are veterans, and shows any ways your nonprofit provides services to veterans.

Remembering to thank veterans through your different communication channels on Veterans Day lets your supporters who are veterans and veterans’ family members know that you appreciate their service and continued assistance to causes like yours.

In addition, if you want to add a giving component to the holiday, you can encourage supporters to donate in honor of their favorite veteran.

8. Promote Kindness

November 13 is World Kindness Day, an excellent opportunity to create some feel-good content for your supporters. Nourishing these kinds of good vibes going into the holiday season can put people in a more giving mood.

Try using the stories feature on Instagram to share an ongoing thread of kind acts throughout the day. You can post some that happen to your staff, volunteers, or the people you serve. In addition, you can also ask your followers to share their moments of kindness on social media and tag you in their posts. This provides an opportunity to reshare their posts to your stories and increase your interactions with supporters.

9. Express Your Gratitude

Thanksgiving comes in late November, right before Giving Tuesday and the rest of the holiday giving season. It’s a great time to express gratitude for what your supporters and team have allowed you to accomplish throughout the year. By demonstrating how grateful you are in your fall content, you can nurture donor relationships in a way that encourages them to keep that attitude of gratitude going through continued support.

Consider starting a “Thankful Thursdays” theme throughout November where you highlight a new person, accomplishment, or another part of your nonprofit for which you’re grateful.

Heading toward Thanksgiving, supporters may also reflect on what they’re grateful for, including the relationships in their lives. Show solidarity with them by creating content highlighting some of the friendships or partnerships resulting from your work or even bestie pairs within your staff. Ask your supporters to share theirs too. This can foster a sense of community and authenticity between you and your donors.

Leverage Seasonal Trends to Get Creative With Your Nonprofit Fall Content Calendar

Each autumn month has a variety of cause awareness days and months, holidays, and other festive themes. Use these to drive your seasonal content and connect more deeply with your audience heading into end-of-year giving campaigns.

As November heads into winter and we reach the rapid series of Thanksgiving, Small Business Saturday, Cyber Monday, and Giving Tuesday, be prepared to increase the volume of your content. You can also check out the winter section of our resource The Seasonal LinkedIn Content Calendar for Impactful Fundraising for additional seasonal content ideas to drive your content calendar for the chilly season ahead.

5 Things to Avoid for Your LinkedIn Hiring Strategy

There are many ways to identify, connect with, and inspire passionate professionals to join your nonprofit team using LinkedIn. We’re looking at what not to do, so you can more easily engage with ideal candidates and find your next hire on LinkedIn.

The following advice comes from the experienced Classy and LinkedIn Talent Acquisition teams. Get ready to take impactful action to build your nonprofit teams with qualified and eager candidates.

1. Don’t Overuse LinkedIn Messages

LinkedIn messages offer you an easy way to get in touch with professionals without leaving the platform. Today, emails can feel constant in someone’s inbox. Using a LinkedIn message helps you get in front of candidates much faster and without the risk of falling into a spam folder.

LinkedIn inboxes can also overflow and overwhelm your candidates if you don’t use discretion. Think about who else might be messaging them and how to stand out with fewer but more impactful messages. Take the time to target your communications, be mindful of your candidate’s time, and be clear about what you want to share.

Characteristics of an impactful LinkedIn message:

• Introduce yourself and your nonprofit in a conversational way
• Quickly elevate why their unique skillset matches your needs
• Help them see how they can be part of your mission
• Deliver examples of your work or achievements that may excite them
• Make your call to action clear, mentioning specific roles or opportunities
• Deliver next steps that don’t feel daunting but show you’re organized
• Thank them for their time, and give them time to respond

2. Don’t Push Too Hard

It’s exciting to see ideal candidates right in front of you on LinkedIn. You’ll want to share your opportunity immediately when they know exactly who you’ve been seeking for a specific position at your nonprofit. It’s essential to be mindful of the excitement coming across as a sales pitch that could drive people away.

Remember that you are on LinkedIn to build relationships. You’ll want to avoid any urge to be overly assertive when you’re warming people up to the idea of exploring your roles. Show people you’re interested in learning more about them as individuals before you ask them to learn about you.

Pro Tip: Avoid proposing an exact day or time to chat in your opening message. Instead, lead with a more gentle call to action that opens the door to another casual conversation.

3. Don’t Follow Up Too Soon

People are busy and only getting more active. Work has become synonymous with the home for many people following the COVID-19 pandemic shutdown in 2020. You never know when someone will be able to follow up on a LinkedIn message in a given week. The best approach is to give them the time to get back to you when they are most present and available to chat.

Avoid the urge to follow up through LinkedIn with a candidate to avoid making them feel rushed. Open the door to an organic conversation, establishing trust and respect around their schedule. Once you show candidates that you’re flexible, they can also associate that value with your nonprofit as they envision future employment.

4. Don’t Use Generic Language

When you get the chance to connect with an engaged candidate on LinkedIn, be sure your message is clear. Think about how you can show them your outreach isn’t just like any other they’ve received.

Candidates can easily see if your message has been copied and pasted. Avoiding generic language goes a long way to building relationships. It makes your candidates feel special and like you understand them. Take the time to craft personalized messages per candidate.

Show them you did your research by adding in specific mentions of their experience or the reason their LinkedIn profile caught your eye. From there, you can also demonstrate why the individual is the right fit to apply for your role.

Pro Tip: Be sure to help each candidate see themselves as a seamless addition to your team. Provide clear examples of how their experience would translate to a meaningful impact at your organization.

5. Don’t Lose Touch With Candidates

The reality of hiring is that you can only fill a role with one person. That doesn’t mean you didn’t engage many more candidates for that role. So, what do you do after you fill the position? You follow up.

A candidate might not be right for the role you initially mentioned. That same individual could, however, be perfect for another open requisition. Even if not, they could be a great person to have a relationship with as you build talent pools to align to roles you know you’ll hire for in the future.

Picture this: Someone could have stood out to you as a great communicator and marketer, but you filled the role they applied for. Reach out to them to let them know as soon as possible that the role has been filled, and ask if you can keep in touch for a future marketing role opening up in a few months.

Once you have that door open, you can quickly return to the conversation. Share regular organization updates to keep them warm when it is time to hire again.

Recruit Top Talent With LinkedIn Hiring

Ready to take action? Here are a few last tips to get you started and a full Nonprofit’s Guide to Hiring on LinkedIn to explore next.

• Optimize your nonprofit’s LinkedIn Page to strengthen your online presence, showcase your impact, and boost your credibility among job seekers
• Engage with your network in meaningful ways to remain top of mind with industry professionals
• Advance your thought leadership to earn a well-trusted and highly-respected reputation within the social sector
• Share timely, impactful content that highlights the unique impact of your organization and the particular elements that set it apart

Get Everything You Need to Hire on LinkedIn

Attract skilled candidates on LinkedIn with a comprehensive guide created specifically for nonprofits.

Identify, attract, and connect with talented professionals who believe in your mission, align with your organization’s values, and offer the support your team needs to drive meaningful change using our Nonprofit’s Guide to Hiring on LinkedIn.

Download your guide to uncover:

• Must-have elements of an engaging job description
• Authentic ways to connect with qualified candidates on LinkedIn
• Opportunities to promote your job listing to wider LinkedIn networks
• Platform tools to source and screen potential candidates
• Plus, expert advice from Classy and LinkedIn’s Talent Acquisition teams

People give for various reasons, like supporting others in need, coming together with coworkers, and playing a role in the more significant challenges impacting our world. We saw this more than ever in our annual donor sentiment report, Why America Gives.

Our report proved that word of mouth is still how most donors (67%) find new causes to give. When we looked at how that translates to online communities, we found that social media is the top way Gen Z finds new organizations to donate.

Focusing on your donors’ communities allows your nonprofit to meet donors’ passions for philanthropic action and channel this in ways that unite them with others. We share exactly how to do that.

One Donor Unlocks a Community

What if you looked at a group of people instead of at each individual donor? Instead of targeting a single individual to convert into a donation, nonprofits can see a donor as a community member. Each individual donor has natural connections to vast networks of potential supporters.

Your donors are often employees within a larger organization, members of family units or circles of friends, or active participants in timely social media conversations. Shifting your strategy to attract, convert, and retain these communities that your donors are already a part of can widen your fundraising scope. One way nonprofits bring this approach to life is through the power of peer-to-peer fundraising.

A single individual fundraising page brings in an average of 20 donors. That means if you can secure ten supporters to fundraise on your behalf, you could reach 200 people. Those donors then become part of your community that you can nurture to take further action.

The ideas below help you understand donors’ relationships with their communities and how you can mobilize those groups to take action to support your cause.

4 Ideas to Raise More Through Your Donors’ Communities

1. Promote New Peer-to-Peer Giving Opportunities

A simple yet practical place to begin embracing the power of community is with your loyal donors. It’s never too late to introduce a peer-to-peer fundraising platforms that empowers them to invite their networks to support your cause.

Put the Creativity in Your Loyal Donors’ Hands

Create a DIY peer-to-peer landing page to get started. This allows your donors to build from the template you’ve created to fundraise on your behalf whenever they’d like. Using a DIY model makes it easier for supporters to launch and customize their campaigns to reflect their unique stories or life events. Many donors will fundraise in honor of a big celebration, memorial, or another timely event that they know will resonate with their communities.

Turn Event Participants Into Fundraisers

Adding peer-to-peer fundraising to your events is a simple way to encourage participants to recruit their networks with a timely call to support. Our annual The State of Modern Philanthropy reports showed us that 4 out of 5 donors who gave to an individual fundraising page in 2020 were brand new to the organization. In 2021, individual fundraising pages raised 34% more on average. We also saw that events with a peer-to-peer fundraising element deliver the highest conversion rates through donations and registrations.

Spin Up a Peer-to-Peer Campaign for Timely Donations

Peer-to-peer fundraising is one way to bring people together quickly. We see that play out when news breaks about a current event or a particular community calls for support.

Peer-to-peer campaigns raise 3.8X more on average than all other time-based campaign types. Feeding San Diego tapped into this peer-to-peer model to gather donors during the pandemic. They were able to deliver on the increased demand for hunger relief by raising $5.4 million to replenish food supplies.

2. Create Content Donors Are Excited to Share on Social

Campaigns with a peer-to-peer fundraising element see the most mobile traffic from any other campaign type from social media. Engaging with new communities means being present in both in-person conversations and the ones happening online. In today’s increasingly mobile world, social media has proven its influence in reaching motivated donor audiences.

Go Where Passionate Donors Are Looking

Social media offers nonprofits many options to connect with donors. The key is identifying which platforms are the most effective use of time and resources.

Our recent report, The State of Modern Philanthropy 2022, dove into which social media platforms offer the most significant potential. We found that Facebook is a clear winner when driving the most traffic. LinkedIn also shows the highest potential to convert supporters who are ready to take action.

Take a Stab at Influencer Marketing

Younger generations look beyond friends and family for daily inspiration. Most young people are turning to social media influencers to inform their decisions.

Philanthropic activity is no different. Start engaging influencers to promote your donation opportunities. Provide creative briefs around specific campaigns, or ask them to help with general cause awareness tactics. Providing them with enticing graphics that catch followers’ eyes will make sharing easier and more enjoyable on their end.

3. Connect Employees Through Workplace Giving

We still see that 25% of all professional jobs in North America remain remote through 2022. More remote work means many people may experience the feeling of disconnection from others. Workplace giving could be the perfect solution to engage corporate partners and employees looking for ways to connect with their communities.

Knowing that the “Great Resignation” continued with 4.53 million U.S. workers quitting their jobs in March 2022, think about how you can encourage businesses to incorporate workplace giving into their employee retention strategies.

 Make It Easy for Employers to Bring Your Cause to Work

The power of peer-to-peer fundraising can perfectly tie into workplace giving. Provide existing donors with company team pages to introduce your mission to their coworkers. Make a strong impression with video materials, photos, timely appeals, and suggested donation goals. From there, engage each new participant with updates about the impact of each dollar raised to encourage them to invite even more supporters over time.

Engage Corporate Partners Directly

Engage local businesses for in-person events and volunteer opportunities. The virtual nature of fundraising brings that to the next level by broadening your reach to more communities. Invite corporations who align with your values to a virtual event to unite their employees around a central cause.

We recently highlighted how Children’s Cancer Association engaged 19 companies and their employees. An activity tracking competition resulted in a 30% increase in fundraisers year-over-year.

4. Bring Communities Back Together Around Events

Events are back and bringing communities together in new ways. They’re also getting stronger fundraising results along with them. Ticketed events grew by 49% between 2020 and 2021, more than any other campaign type.

Our Fundraising Event Attendee Experience Report shows that over 92% of virtual and in-person attendees are likely to donate in addition to registration costs. Over 40% of those donations will likely be more than $100.

Use the Appeal of In-Person Connections to Attract Attendees

Inviting people to your in-person event is a way to meet your team and other supporters. Build on your corporate outreach strategy with individuals who feel exhausted from virtual work. Your event might be their opportunity to interact with others.

Think about hosting concerts and galas, or pull from this list of 77 creative event ideas to ensure you’re offering a memorable experience people want to be a part of. Regardless of format, make it your goal to leave attendees feeling compelled to take action. How attendees feel once they leave will determine how likely they are to share your cause with even more community members.

Bring On the Competition to Keep People Motivated

Some people are naturally drawn to competition, especially with friends, family, or co-workers. Think about hosting a sports tournament to attract passionate groups to take part. You could also introduce a fun challenge to see which local businesses can raise the most.

A team fundraising competition doesn’t need to limit participants by athletic ability. In the end, the community always wins, but the fresh spin may be enough to capture passive donors to participate and become aware of your cause.

Build Your Strongest Community of Donors

By now, you’re probably thinking about which idea to start with to get your community fundraising strategy off the ground. Hopefully, you see that it’s simple but impactful when applied alongside your goals for the year.

For more information on the donation trends and insights shaping fundraising, visit our interactive online report, The State of Modern Philanthropy.

LinkedIn is home to more than 810 million members in 200 countries and regions worldwide. The professional social media platform offers a space for nonprofits to establish meaningful connections with those who share their passion for social good.

This seasonal content calendar can serve as your single source of all major cause awareness days, holidays, and giving days, both in the United States and globally, to build into your annual LinkedIn content strategy. Learn how to leverage these opportunities to engage wider audiences and start conversations about the significant impact of your mission.

What’s Inside

• A full list of cause awareness days, holidays, and major giving days happening around the world
• Steps to build your annual content calendar around relevant, timely events
• Examples of top LinkedIn posts from nonprofits across the sector
• Year-round LinkedIn best practices to fuel your content engine
• Creative ideas for LinkedIn posts to engage larger audiences
• Free LinkedIn post resources to take your content to the next level

Take a peek:

You’re just a click away from an actionable plan to bolster your LinkedIn content calendar and strengthen ties to your nonprofit community.

The more people rely on their phones for everything from grocery shopping to buying a home, the more expectations they may subconsciously form about making a mobile donation. We know donors are giving through mobile devices at increasing rates from our The State of Modern Philanthropy report.

Now, it’s about understanding how to mimic these innovative e-commerce transactions to simplify giving and capitalize on that mobile traffic. One way to better understand how people may interact with the giving experience is to observe mobile shopping trends.

Exploring the Tie Between Mobile Shopping and Online Donations

The trends we’ll talk about here are not limited to just consumer and donor behaviors. They’re leading indicators of human behavior in the age of technology.

Mobile experiences aren’t linear. For example, someone may see a sneaker ad on Instagram, do a quick Google search to learn more about the brand, and then download its app to make their purchase using a digital wallet.  Nonprofits can benefit from understanding these various consumer pathways to optimize donor interactions through mobile devices and guide supporters on a more seamless route to their donation page.

Mobile Shopping Is Driving More Sales

Mobile shopping, often referred to as m-commerce, reached $359.32 billion in sales in 2021. For context, that’s a 15.2% increase from 2020, when mobile interactions spiked due to social distancing.

While growth is steady, the biggest reason to pay attention to mobile commerce is the potential surge ahead. By 2025, mobile commerce is expected to bring in $728.28 billion in sales across the U.S. alone.

While mobile isn’t a new concept, it’s an opportunity for businesses and organizations to convert larger audiences with increased convenience, speed, and security levels. It’s not just about having a mobile-optimized site, but rather an experience that makes every step simpler. Did you know that 57% of customers won’t recommend a business with a poorly designed mobile website? Half will not recommend a company with a poorly designed mobile website.

Nonprofits, let’s take note and get proactive. We’ve researched four key mobile shopping trends that will help you see what captured the interest of a passive visitor and how to convert that into a completed donation for your cause.

4 Mobile Shopping Trends That Predict Donor Behavior

Trend 1: QR Codes Drive Immediate Action

Let’s start with the simple, tiny square graphics that bring shoppers exactly where a brand wants them to go. QR codes are being scanned at increasing rates to get people to specific links in seconds.

Blue Bite found that between 2018 and 2021, interactions per QR code increased by 98%. That number shows just how fast this method for sharing information took off.

The easy-to-create images are used for everything from tipping your hairstylist on Venmo to accessing the latest specials at a restaurant.

The appeal is in the convenience of accessing a link without jumping through hoops. Once you’ve accessed a link, it’s stored in your phone’s history to reference or send along with ease.

Donor Behavior Prediction: QR code donations will rise

In 2021, 41% of millennials and 32% of Gen Z donors told us they’d lean toward QR code donations in the future. Donors know exactly what to do when they see these codes, so help them get to your desired donation or campaign pages quicker by including them on:

• Swag
• Brochures at local businesses
• Event signage
• Holiday giveaway items
• Gift wrap
• Business cards
• Posters
• Direct mailers

Trend 2: People Are Purchasing More Through Social Media

Social media evolved drastically in the past year to benefit business accounts and those selling directly from platforms like Facebook and Instagram. To paint a picture of the reach social media has today, consider that 90% of Instagram’s 1 billion users follow at least one business, and 1 in 2 people use Instagram to discover new brands.

It’s almost essential to note that once users land on a social media ad or appeal, they don’t want to leave the platform to complete a purchase. And why should brands want them to? The more points of friction added to a user’s experience, the greater the risk of losing that individual’s interest.

There’s power in presenting people with the option to take immediate action in a moment of heightened interest. Social commerce is taking flight in creative ways that step away from typical sales tactics, including new short-form video content and partnering with trusted influencers to guide consumers’ purchase decisions.

Donor Behavior Prediction: People will seek out charitable causes on social

You can expect donors to click through your social posts the same way they interact with their favorite shoe brand. Link your donation or campaign pages directly from Instagram and Facebook Stories, and add those same links to TikTok videos when it makes sense.

Beyond that, more donors may be open to purchasing tickets to an event or buying merchandise that benefits your organization directly on social media, as they do for brands taking advantage of the Facebook Shop feature.

Here’s a breakdown of the social media platforms each generation of donors looks at  to find new causes to give to:

Trend 3: The Shopping Experience Is Taking Off Through Apps

Cart abandonment is around 97% for mobile sites, compared to just 20% for mobile applications. Globally, mobile e-commerce applications were installed at a 10% higher rate in 2021 than 2020.

We’re used to mobile apps for just about everything we do, and the shopping experience on these apps has only gotten better. Mobile apps get people to act and remain within a specific organization’s experience. There are far fewer distractions that could take their attention away.

Donor Behavior Prediction: Mobile apps will grow to meet donor demand

Most donors will be delighted to use an app experience that ties them to your organization. Our recent event attendee sentiment research shows us that for fundraising events specifically, donors would like to use a mobile app to:

• View the agenda
• Check-in upon arrival in person
• Mobile bidding for auctions
• Donations during the event
• Live notifications with updates and happenings

Nonprofits can creatively deliver on the convenience people love at fundraising events, mainly by asking their fundraising platforms to offer an easy-to-use mobile application for donors.

Trend 4: Simple Checkout Experiences Convert

Mobile wallets solve the frustration of digging around in your bag or coat pocket to find the right card. The ease of a quick checkout on mobile is part of what makes the entire process so attractive.

Edesk predicts that e-commerce businesses can increase conversions by 35.26% with a better checkout design. People don’t want to search for their credit card numbers to make a purchase when one-click payments have become the norm through Google Pay, Apple Pay, PayPal, Venmo, and more mobile payment apps.

Donor Behavior Prediction: People expect one-click payments

Donating through PayPal or Venmo captures the interest of 55 percent of donors who share that they would likely donate through these methods if they are offered.

To avoid the loss of donations due to donor frustration, consider how these one-click payment options and checkout modals can help increase conversions for your nonprofit.

See just how Golden Harvest Food Bank doubled the size of its recurring giving program after adopting digital wallets. The organization raised more than $13k through PayPal alone in December 2021.

Don’t Miss Out on Mobile-Savvy Donors

Let’s look at the way donors interacted with nonprofits on their mobile devices in 2021 to indicate how we’ll see the behavior trend this year.

Of donors who made an online donation:

• 58% donated via a website on their phone
• 23% donated via an app on their phone
• 14% donated through text message

These numbers show us the power of efficient mobile payment options, on-the-go fundraising opportunities, mobile-optimized donation forms, and frictionless transactions from any device. More options mean more donation potential.

By creating, sharing, and engaging with content that’s authentic to who you are, you’re indirectly communicating your values and the values of your nonprofit. Embracing your personal identity on LinkedIn helps establish a memorable brand and attract a like-minded following.

Learn how to elevate your trusted voice on LinkedIn as a thought leader in the nonprofit space and garner support for your organization with these five tips.

Why Is Thought Leadership So Important?

Thought leadership is the most influential channel in today’s economy.

On an individual level, your distinction as a trusted nonprofit expert captures the attention of wider audiences to organically expand your reach. On an organizational level, earning a reputation for being the go-to resource within the sector boosts supporters’ confidence in donating to your cause.

Establishing thought leadership begins with authenticity. Connect with like-minded people who are more likely to engage with your content. Allow those conversations to strengthen your reputation as a reliable source and capitalize on that personal exposure to seamlessly increase the visibility of your organization.

5 Ways to Advance Your Thought Leadership on LinkedIn 

1. Establish a Consistent Posting Cadence

A large part of connecting with your audience in meaningful ways is posting quality content on a consistent basis. Demonstrate your expertise and keep your followers engaged to gain their long-term support.

Ensure you’re making a strong first impression with a professional LinkedIn profile. Here are a few must-have elements to consider:

• Select the right profile picture
• Customize your headline to illustrate your value
• Tell your unique story in your page summary
• Incorporate engaging visual elements, like a custom background image
• List relevant work experience
• Spotlight your achievements, awards, and certifications

Next, solidify your posting cadence by creating a pre-set plan of how often you’ll be sharing content with your network. Posting once a day is recommended, but starting with 3-5 times per week may be more realistic for your current schedule.

Remember to:

• Capitalize on the peak hours of Tuesday through Thursday, 8 a.m. to 3 p.m.
• Schedule posts for times when you’re able to comment and engage with your followers
• Consider the time zones of your audience

Lastly, consistency is only as valuable as the content you share. Posting on a regular cadence is critical to gaining followers. However, the quality of your content is what keeps those followers coming back.

If you can’t produce valuable content at a high volume, it’s best to reduce your output and focus on the impact of your message.

2. Showcase Your Personality

It’s important to remember that your network chose to follow you as an individual, not just your organization. Most people are more interested in connecting with others we can relate to on a human level than a buttoned-up brand or company.

Here a few simple tips to keep in mind:

• Use common language that is welcoming, approachable, and relaxed, like you’re speaking with a friend
• Share monumental moments that reflect your character, both personally and professionally
• Leave comments on content that you relate to and explain why it resonates, without slipping into too much professional jargon
• Publicly or privately connect with others to ask questions or discuss a shared experience
• Think about what type of content you’d like to see on LinkedIn and shape your interactions around that
• Avoid any topics that are too polarizing to avoid backlash, unless they are central to your nonprofit’s mission

3. Build Trust Through Authenticity

You and your nonprofit team are experts in your craft. Find opportunities to openly share your personal and professional learnings to inspire, educate, and inform your network.

Consider writing LinkedIn articles to elaborate on your nonprofit’s wins and losses. You could even go live on your feed to tell your story in real time and build deeper connections. Discuss a new project you or your team is working on, or a recent roadblock that interfered with your success.

When sharing these experiences, think about how your personal and professional values played a role. Connect your decision making back to your unique belief system to remind others what you stand for. It can also be helpful to clarify the intention behind each action when analyzing the outcomes of your personal projects, nonprofit campaigns, or other initiatives.

Above all else, don’t be afraid to admit your imperfections. While it may seem counterintuitive to share failures or mistakes, it actually serves as a positive reminder that we’re all still learning, growing, and evolving. Normalize those moments of frustration and use them as touchpoints for connection.

4. Share Content That Resonates

Striking the right balance of authentic personal content and valuable professional resources on LinkedIn will differ depending on your unique audience. Experimenting with various topics, content formats, and emerging trends can be helpful in better understanding what your network is most interested in.

Stay in line with LinkedIn best practices to optimize your posts and boost engagement, and explore LinkedIn’s advanced tools to elevate your strategy.

A few of LinkedIn’s top content tools include:

• Content Suggestions: Discover and share content that your member community is engaging with, like Trending Articles, Employee Milestones, and Company News
• LinkedIn Articles: Publish articles about your expertise and interests that will be displayed in the Activity section of your profile
• LinkedIn Newsletter: Write about a professional topic you’re interested in to engage with your network on a consistent basis and stay top of mind with your community
• Content Boosting: Extend your reach to a larger audience, beyond your followers
• Events and Groups: Build and engage an active community that shares your values, passions, and goals

For more ways to amplify your voice on LinkedIn, download our complete checklist.

5. Evaluate Your Metrics to Deliver the Most Value

Gain insight into who is engaging with your content, how often, and how other leaders in the space are supporting your message to ensure you’re giving your audience what they want and need.

On LinkedIn, you can easily access and review analytics for your posts, articles, and videos. From the Post Analytics page you can see:

• Engagements
• Discovery
• Impression demographics
• Article performance
• Article viewer demographics
• Video performance
• Video viewer demographics

Set time aside on a weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly basis to dive into your analytics and align your strategy with emerging trends. Keep tabs on how often your name or content is being mentioned by others by checking your Activity tab, and take note of whether or not your nonprofit’s website is generating more traffic as a result of your growing brand.

Drive Meaningful Impact on LinkedIn

In its simplest form, LinkedIn serves as a platform to convey your personality, showcase your professional expertise, and prove your unique value.

Prioritize authenticity in the content you create and share things that humanize you in a relatable, approachable way. When people resonate with your values and beliefs on a personal level, they are more likely to trust and support you and the work of your nonprofit.

For more tips on how to advance your personal and professional mission on LinkedIn, download our Complete LinkedIn Checklist.

With everything from beginner to expert-level strategies, this all-encompassing checklist created in partnership with LinkedIn for Nonprofits can help you establish credibility with a corporate partner, improve your content strategy around an upcoming event, expand the reach of your general donation fund, and more.

Finding the right people to support your cause is the first step, but motivating them to make a donation is what determines the success of your fundraising efforts. Guide your decision making as you move through the creative process with this checklist, complete with resources to make it simple.

Advance Your Mission on LinkedIn

Capitalize on LinkedIn’s member base of nearly 800 million professionals in more than 200 countries and territories worldwide to educate and inspire both new and existing supporters about your worthy cause.

Did You Know? LinkedIn pages with complete information get 30% more weekly views, and pages that post daily get 2x the member engagement.

Our checklist breaks down the five steps to achieving greater success on LinkedIn, including:

• Step 1: Build a credible nonprofit profile
• Step 2: Engage with your network to establish a following
• Step 3: Expand your reach and garner support
• Step 4: Elevate your content strategy
• Step 5: Raise money for your mission

Learn how to complete and customize your profile to establish trust and credibility with your supporters. Build and strengthen donor relationships, share content that resonates with your audience, and promote your fundraising initiatives to boost conversions and drive your mission forward.

You’re just a click away from a step-by-step breakdown of how to grow your brand’s organic following on LinkedIn.

Take a peek inside:

Get Started 

A strong online strategy is critical to the sustainability of your mission. Download our checklist today to learn how to tap into the generosity of LinkedIn’s global member base and boost your visibility.

Nonprofit influencers can help you do this. These individuals help increase awareness of your mission, garner support for new initiatives, and improve your online reach. Their participation can inspire new audiences to engage with your organization, as well as reignite the passion and interest of existing supporters.

Let’s take a look at some key tips that will help you find the right nonprofit influencers for your organization.

But first, what is an influencer?

Simply put, an influencer is someone who has amassed a large following online and uses their voice, personal brand, and values to influence their audience in some way. They can encourage their followers to buy a certain product or service, or they can use their personal brand and trustworthiness to cultivate certain values or rally people around an important cause.

Here are the steps to take to attract the right nonprofit influencers for your organization.

1. Have a clear set of goals in mind

Influencer marketing, much like any other marketing strategy, begins with clear and actionable goal-setting. Define your strategy, set a budget, and identify your key performance indicators (KPIs) to get started.

Clearly defined goals are a critical piece in accurately measuring whether or not your results were worth the investment. Start setting some short, mid, and long-term goals to guide and measure the results of your influencer marketing strategy.

Tailor each goal to the platform you’re using. Ask yourself which networks are the most relevant for your audience since each offers a unique value.

For example, Instagram influencer marketing can help reach younger donors and expose your organization to a potential advertising reach of over 800 million users. On the other hand, LinkedIn might help you engage corporate sponsors to boost your corporate fundraising opportunities.

Assign concrete goals to each relevant network of donors to maximize your engagement potential. Keep in mind that influencer marketing doesn’t just raise awareness; it can strengthen trust with both new and existing supporters.

2. Consider your shared values and causes

People tend to trust the experiences and reviews of others—especially those whom they admire—so invest in word-of-mouth campaigns executed by influencers.

New data from Classy’s Why America Gives report shows that word of mouth is the top way donors identify new causes to give to.

However, for these influencers to tell the story of your brand the way it’s meant to be told, they need to share your values. Shared values are the key to a thriving brand-supporter and brand-influencer relationship. Plus, there’s a high chance that many of these individuals’ followers will align with these same values.

If you partner with an influencer who does not reflect the vision your nonprofit stands for, you risk sending out the wrong message to your online community. This could not only deter new donors but also jeopardize your brand’s reputation.

3. Start with thorough research

Once you’ve set your goals and have defined your key values, it’s time to start researching the trends in your cause sector. This will help you gain a deeper understanding of your target demographic (the kind of supporters you need), as well as the current state of nonprofit influencer marketing.

Start by looking at the relevant hashtags in your industry to find influencers who are already supporting nonprofits. See who is advocating for other organizations within your sector and consider reaching out to them or the organization itself to hear more about their influencer marketing experience. You can also pay for influencer databases and tools to conduct your research, some of which we’ll mention at the end of this post.

Market research will also allow you to uncover the costs associated with influencer marketing in your specific sector, which can help you budget more accurately. You might even discover some timely content trends while you’re at it.

Consider every platform and its best practices. For example, Facebook video ads are a great way to promote a new campaign, especially if they feature a trustworthy influencer. On the other hand, you might want to let Instagram influencers do most of the work and allow them to attract new supporters more organically through regular posting.

4. Search through relevant hashtags on social media

Hashtags are a great tool for raising awareness and improving the visibility of your nonprofit, but they’re also great for identifying influencers who might align with your goals.

People use hashtags to gain exposure, boost discoverability, and increase engagement. Influencers use them regularly to do the same, ensuring that their content is seen by the largest possible audience.

Here are some relevant hashtags being used today:

#nonprofit #charity #donate #community #volunteer #nonprofitorganization #giveback #love #education #support #fundraising #covid #socialgood #dogood #ngo #change #givingback #philanthropy #help #fundraiser #makeadifference #children #instagood #donation #hope #donations #causes #volunteering #mentalhealth #bhfyp

Supplementary hashtags that are closely related to the nonprofit sector are also helpful in boosting discoverability:

#helpingothers #motivation #health #inspiration #youth #art #socialimpact #india #nonprofitlife #family #nonprofitsofinstagram #coronavirus #bethechange #bhfyp #activism #c #life #leadership #africa #awareness #humanrights #womenempowerment #music #repost #giving #volunteers #fitness #adoptdontshop #humanity #empowerment

Influencers use hashtags on every social platform, but there’s no denying that they’re most popular on Instagram. If you’re looking to find the right influencers for your brand, start your search there.

Hashtags will depend on your unique niche and the causes you support, but you should start with some general terms to discover a wider pool of influencers. Once you identify a handful of potential partners, aim to collaborate with at least one influencer on every relevant social platform. Keep in mind that striking a balance between niche and general influencers is key to optimizing your engagement potential.

5. Focus on micro-influencers instead of the big names

Some influencers have millions of followers on Instagram, but it’s important to note that a bigger following is not always better—especially when it comes to marketing a nonprofit. There are many reasons why you should focus on working with nonprofit micro-influencers instead, and one of the top considerations is your budget.

The more followers an influencer has, the more expensive it will be to work with them, and the results can be underwhelming. This is because their large following might not all necessarily align with your brand or your values.

Nonprofit micro-influencers, on the other hand, have a more concentrated audience that might be more likely to engage with your organization. These influencers will have between 10,000 and 100,000 followers on average, which means that more of their followers are likely to actively engage with the content they put out on a daily basis.

These are the same followers who might follow a link to your donation page, or decide to learn more about your organization’s impact.

In return, you can offer these influencers some swag, access to an upcoming event, or a shoutout from your account where more advocates of your cause can connect with them.

Remember, finding the top Instagram influencers in your niche is not just about the follower count, but the values they hold, the trust they garner from their audience, and the balance between follower count and the rate they charge. After all, working with an influencer should be a mutually-beneficial relationship.

6. Conduct email outreach to prominent influencers

Most of the time, you won’t be able to discuss the details of your collaboration in a direct message on social media, nor should you. Influencers on Instagram and other popular platforms will typically leave a business email address in their bio section, which will allow you to reach out through the right channel and open up a direct line of communication.

It’s important that you approach email outreach with a strong strategy. Personalize every email to the influencer’s unique brand. Do your research, find out what they’re passionate about, and start crafting customized emails that will grab their attention and inspire them to agree to an introductory call.

Consider this email example highlighted in our How to Engage Celebrities and Influencers in Fundraising webinar as one approach to take when initiating outreach:

You can propose a short-term collaboration consisting of just a few posts or discuss a long-term agreement. Whichever you choose, ensure that your goals and values are clear and expectations are set from the start. In doing so, you can begin forging a trustworthy relationship that will benefit both parties over the long term.

You might even keep a running list of the influencers you connect with to target for future recurring giving appeals or to reach out to when launching a new campaign.

7. Consider automating your vetting process

Nowadays, there is automation software for nearly every marketing process. You can automate everything from email sends to posting on social media. This not only makes for a more efficient workflow, but also allows your nonprofit to reallocate the time and money spent on those tasks towards your mission-critical work.

What you might not have known is that you can also automate influencer research and use a dedicated tool to find the right influencers in your niche. There are many tools out there that use AI and machine learning to pair you up with the best nonprofit influencers in your industry, but it’s important to find the right fit for your budget.

Here are some tools you can explore:

Upfluence. Upfluence is a dedicated influencer marketing platform built to help you find influencers and manage your entire relationship and strategy. With more than 3 million influencers in its database and a robust search feature, this can be a useful tool to find the right influencers for your nonprofit. Its built-in AI feature constantly adds new influencers to the database as well, so you can continue to surface new partnership opportunities.

Social Blade. Social Blade was one of the first free influencer databases in the world, and still remains as one of the most reliable. Access a database of millions of influencers scattered across Instagram, YouTube, Twitter, and other platforms, and you can even leverage the tool’s reporting feature to gain valuable industry insights and news.

Awario. Awario is a social listening tool that allows you to monitor the conversations in your field about your own brand or your competition, simplifying the process of finding nonprofit influencers that align with your mission.

Dibz. Dibz is a comprehensive prospecting and search engine optimization (SEO) tool with plenty of useful features, including prospecting and contacting influencers. You can use its powerful search functions to find the right influencers for your needs and within your niche, and then create an outreach campaign to get them on a call or quickly seal the deal via email.

Next Steps

Influencer marketing remains an effective way to organically spread the word about your organization’s impact and build trust with supporters from around the world.

That said, it’s important to work with the right nonprofit influencers in order to maximize your marketing dollars and achieve your long-term goals. Do your research and be intentional with your partnerships. When executed correctly, influencer marketing can take your nonprofit to new heights.

Go beyond the basic Instagram post; Instagram stories are a fundraising tool that can help you stay connected to supporters. Creating Instagram stories that attract, excite, and motivate nonprofit donors is a whole lot easier when you understand the basics.

Explore our responses to this list of frequently asked questions to learn everything from how to add music to your next story to accessing insightful performance metrics. Take your social media strategy to the next level with new ideas and grow your online audience with these simple how-tos.

Boost Engagement With These Instagram Story Ideas

Q: How do I include a website link to my Instagram story?

A: Instagram rolled out a new way for Instagram users to share links in their stories. All nonprofits, regardless of their follower count, can now link out to their website, donation page, or even other social channels.

Simply select the sticker icon, select the link sticker, paste the URL, and select done. Once the link sticker is in your story, select the color option that best fits your brand by tapping directly on the link.

Q: Is there a simple way to add music?

A: Add a soundtrack to your story to elevate the narrative, catch donors’ attention, and better express your message. Simply tap the music note icon at the top of your screen and search for a song or artist directly in the search bar.

Once you’ve found the song you’re looking for, tap the play button to the right of your screen for a quick preview. If there’s a particular part of the song you’re hoping to use, you can even fast-forward or rewind through the song to find the exact timestamp that fits your content.

Another way to access Instagram’s music library is to tap the sticker icon. From there, select the music sticker and browse through the different sections and genres to find the right fit.

Q: What’s the easiest way to save my story to my Instagram highlights?

A: Give your supporters the option to revisit your stories by creating Instagram Highlights on your profile. These serve as folders that display at the top of your profile for users to easily access your content on-demand and give your stories a shelf life longer than 24 hours.

To create a highlight from an active story:

• Tap the highlight icon in the bottom right corner
• Click the plus icon
• Enter a name for the new highlight
• Select add

To create a highlight from your archive:

• On your profile, go to the stories highlights section
• Scroll to the end
• Select the plus icon 
• Choose the stories you want to feature
• Select next
• Click edit cover to select an image for the highlight icon
• Enter a name
• Select add

If you’re simply trying to add more stories to a highlight that already exists, hold your finger down on the highlight you want to edit, select Edit Highlight, tap Stories (this will bring you to archived stories), and choose the stories you want to feature.

Capitalize on your Instagram highlights by aligning the content with your brand, experimenting with bold icons and text, showcasing your organization’s impact, and portraying your team in a way that’s both positive and welcoming.

Q: Is there a way to tag people in my story?

A: It’s a great idea to tag donors, employees, sponsors, or volunteers in your story so they receive the recognition they deserve and feel appreciated by your organization. Tag up to 10 accounts by simply adding text and tagging them in it, or adding a mention sticker.

To tag someone directly in your text, type the @ symbol and then the person’s username. Instagram will automatically populate suggestions so all you have to do is select the correct one.

If you prefer to add a mention sticker, tap the sticker icon and select the @mention sticker. Type the person’s username and suggestions will pop up for you to select from. Simply tap the profile of the person you want to highlight and you’re set.

Q: How do I add animated GIFs? 

A: Adding an animated GIF to your nonprofit Instagram story is an easy way to catch viewers’ attention and keep them engaged. Once you’ve created your story, tap the sticker icon in the navigation bar, select the GIF sticker, and begin browsing the top trending GIFs.

To find a particular animation, enter a word, theme, object, or any other search term into the Search GIPHY bar. While you’re at it, be sure to search ‘classyorg’ to check out our latest GIFs.

Q: Can I post a campaign countdown to encourage donations?

A: Luckily for nonprofits, you can add a countdown to your Instagram story that will support your fundraising efforts in a few simple steps. Use this feature to remind supporters of your upcoming events, fundraising campaigns, or other meaningful announcements.

Simply select the sticker icon, select the countdown sticker, and create a name to give supporters a description of what you’re counting down to. Enter the set end date and time and select the circular rainbow icon at the top of your screen to customize the color palette.

The best part is that people can turn on a reminder for the day your countdown ends by tapping the sticker in your story and selecting Remind me. Followers can also share this countdown to their story by tapping on the sticker and selecting Share countdown. That means more visibility, engagement, and support for your cause.

Q: How do I change the font style?

A: Adding text to your story can help get your message across in a quick and easy way. Start by tapping the “Aa” text icon in the top right corner of your screen. From there, use the keypad to type your message in the default font.

To personalize your text, scroll through the font options at the bottom of the screen. Once you find the style you like, play around with the scroll bar on the left to adjust the size. To change the color, tap the circular rainbow icon sitting at the top in your navigation bar.

Q: Can I upload photos from my camera roll as the primary image in my story?

A: To post a story from your camera roll, simply swipe up on your screen or select the square in the bottom left corner that shows a preview of the most recent photo in your photo library. From there, choose the screenshot, photo, or video you want to upload.

You can also add multiple photos to the same story by using the sticker icon. Simply scroll down until you find the photo sticker, then select the photo you want from your camera roll. You can repeat this process as many times as you’d like.

Q: Where can I see who viewed my content?

A: Understanding your online audience is crucial in knowing what content to share. To get an idea of who your audience is, keep track of who’s seen your story and if they keep coming back for more.

To discover who has viewed your content, open your story and swipe up. The number of people who have viewed each photo or video, along with the individual usernames of each viewer, will be listed out for you. You can look at this data for up to 48 hours after the story has been posted, and only you are able to see this list.

Delight Donors With Your Next Instagram Story

Social media is all about engagement and offering value to your audience. Instagram stories allow you to invite your supporters behind-the-scenes of your nonprofit organization, keep them up to date on your latest fundraising campaigns, and remain top-of-mind.

For a step-by-step walk through of each tip, visit the “IG Tips” Story Highlight on our Instagram.

For more tips, tricks, and best practices on ways to create a well-rounded social media presence, download our Nonprofit’s Social Media Content Planner. Gain access to a sample week of nonprofit social media content, user demographic and engagement stats for each channel, suggested post frequencies for the highest engagement, and more.

Just how massive? In 2019, the hashtag #GivingTuesday saw more than 20 billion social media impressions. In 2020, social media activity was present in every country and territory around the world.

Social media is a key driver of traffic (and donations) to your Giving Tuesday campaign. Understand the best ways to engage current supporters, attract new followers, and acquire new donors to fuel your mission.

Dive into these five strategies to make a lasting impression on anyone who encounters your organization.

1. Be Strategic With Hashtags

As the direct result of strategic marketing, #GivingTuesday has earned billions of impressions since its start in 2012. Be intentional with how you incorporate hashtags into your Giving Tuesday social media posts to drastically improve your reach, just like Gilda’s Club Chicago did for their 2020 campaign.

A strong hashtag strategy can attract more engagement, but using hashtags incorrectly can create challenges. It might actually trigger particular algorithms to push your content down further on viewers’ feeds.

Become familiar with each platform’s best practices and then get creative to determine which approach to take this giving season to elevate your cause.

Hashtag Do’s and Don’ts for Giving Tuesday

Twitter Hashtags

Instagram Hashtags

LinkedIn Hashtags

Facebook Hashtags

2. Boost Giving Tuesday Engagement With Video 

Video has become an integral part of social media across all channels. The COVID-19 pandemic drastically increased nonprofits’ reliance on virtual engagement strategies to keep donors active during uncertain times, but nonprofit video has only continued to climb in popularity.

Take a peak at how Haymakers for Hope leveraged video for their 2020 Giving Tuesday campaign:

Adopting video into your Giving Tuesday social media strategy has its fair share of advantages. Here are just a few:

1. Boost exposure and engagement by capturing a viewer’s attention for longer
2. Give content a longer shelf life by attracting more interactions, keeping it in the online ecosystem
3. Appeal to Generation Z donors who are the most likely to hear about new causes through social media
4. Communicate a powerful story through homegrown content with an authentic feel
5. Make your message easier to remember by communicating through video rather than written text

The good news is that production value does not determine engagement levels. In fact, the majority of most engaging videos in 2020 were first-person, unscripted, single-take videos.

Focus on creativity and powerful storytelling to establish a connection with your audience and motivate action, just like the Helen Woodward Animal Center did for their 2020 Giving Tuesday campaign.

3. Stick to Your Social Strategy 

While implementing new tactics into your Giving Tuesday social media strategy is critical to sustainable growth, we don’t recommend waiting until day-of to try something for the first time.

Stick to the platforms you’ve used before and have seen success with in previous campaigns. Analyze your performance metrics across all of your platforms to determine which is most effective in communicating your message.

Ask yourself, is there a particular platform your audience seems to engage with the most?

A generational breakdown of social media channels catching donors’ attention:

• Facebook: 66% millennials, 45% Gen Z, 59% Gen X, 37% Boomers+
• YouTube: 59% millennials, 56% Gen Z, 42% Gen X, 18% Boomers+
• Instagram: 53% Gen Z, 51% millennials, 35% GEn X, 11% Boomers+
• TikTok: 47% Gen Z, 37% millennials, 17% Gen X, 3% Boomers+
• Twitter: 36% Gen Z, 34% millennials, 23% Gen X, 8% Boomers+
• Snapchat: 25% Gen Z, 34% millennials, 17% Gen X, 2% Boomers+

Take note of any content you see this Giving Tuesday that inspires you. The key to a strong marketing presence is identifying new key trends and brainstorming ways to incorporate them into your future campaigns. Stay curious so that you’re prepared with a list of ideas come Giving Tuesday 2022.

4. Create Quality Giving Tuesday Content 

It may seem obvious, but creating high-quality content is one of the most important (and often overlooked) elements in a strong Giving Tuesday social media plan.

Content that triggers emotion can help cement an idea in the minds of supporters. Consider sharing an infographic to highlight key proof points that support your call to action, or post a custom graphic with a powerful statistic that emphasizes the urgency of your ask. Quotes and testimonials are also effective in establishing an emotional connection with donors.

To ensure your content exceeds all donor expectations, be sure to:

• Maintain brand consistency across all of your Giving Tuesday social media posts. This not only helps to develop a visual identity and language, but also inspires your messaging in a way that resonates with your community.
• Stretch your content across multiple platforms. By repurposing the assets you created for a webinar, blog post, or paid advertisement, you can save both time and resources while generating more engagement opportunities for your audience.
• Optimize your image and video specs to align with the most up-to-date requirements, like Camp Kesem did in their post highlighted below. Discover what video specs and image specs you need for Giving Tuesday 2021.
• Dive into analytics to inform your strategy. Avoid wasting your resources on content that’s not resonating with your audience.

5. Engage With Your Audience in Authentic Ways

The foundational purpose of social media is to interact with people, form connections, and establish meaningful relationships. Think of your feed as an ongoing conversation where you can answer questions, celebrate success, and highlight your supporters.

Communicate directly with your donors leading up to Giving Tuesday and actively exchange likes, favorites, shares, direct messages, and comments day-of to show how much you appreciate their support.

Tag donors, board members, or sponsors to give them a personalized shoutout. Featuring them in your stories is another great way to make them feel valued.

Keep in mind that some donors may turn to social media if issues come up while donating or if they have a particular question. Provide attentive customer service to your community by monitoring your direct messages and staying on top of the comments on your posts. Big events, like Giving Tuesday, are a smart time to assign a team member or two to social media engagement if you don’t normally have someone dedicated to that role.

Don’t Forget These Giving Tuesday Social Media Best Practices

In addition to these simple tips, don’t overlook the importance of the following best practices.

1. Capture Donors’ Attention With Photos

Facebook posts with images have 2.3 times the engagement than those without.

Images offer a simple, cost-effective way to grab people’s attention and show them why your cause matters. They are particularly effective on social media because they can quickly draw a donor’s eye, successfully getting them to stop the scroll.

Here are a few basic storytelling principles to inspire your strategy:

• Create context to tell an overarching narrative
• Offer a fresh perspective or unique angle to tell a familiar story in a captivating way
• Get personal by showing how your work impacts specific people
• Present the conflict and how you are working to solve it
• Be authentic by showing a behind-the-scenes look at your day-to-day
• Remain consistent to make it easier for people to identify your messaging

2. Include Your Campaign Link in All Posts

While you do want your social media posts to be seen and shared, the ultimate goal is to move supporters to donate to your cause. The key to conversion is a link to your campaign or donation page.

Be strategic when deciding which page to link to. Some of your Giving Tuesday social media posts will send supporters to your campaign page, but if the direct call to action is to donate, the link should send users directly to your donation page. This makes it easy for supporters to follow through before they change their mind or get distracted.

See how Farm Aid seamlessly linked to their campaign page in this Instagram caption:

3. Create Content Ahead of Time for Giving Tuesday

Save yourself a lot of time (and stress) by writing and designing your posts before Giving Tuesday.

Brainstorm the messages you want to share and then create a document with all the text, photos, and graphics you plan to use. This will give you a holistic view of what you’re sharing and how it will come across to your supporters.

Your content should be a mix of delightful images and stories, progress updates, and appeals. You can even create graphics to post when you reach 50 percent, 75 percent, or 90 percent of your goal so that when it happens, you can focus on engaging with donors in real-time.

Master Your Social Media Strategy at the Leading Nonprofit Conference

Last-Minute Giving Tuesday Social Media Tips to Boost Engagement

If you’re pressed for time or resources, check out this list of quick-win ways to make a splash on Giving Tuesday.

• Create and share graphics that immediately communicate your mission, like infographics or testimonials
• Live stream to connect with your donors in a more authentic way
• Include a link to your campaign or donation page in all posts
• Add a countdown to Giving Tuesday sticker on your Instagram story to keep the date top of mind
• Increase posting cadence the week leading up to Giving Tuesday, aiming for at least one post per day
• Dedicate time to engage with your followers during the days leading up to Giving Tuesday, and remain active day-of to ensure your supporters feel acknowledged and appreciated

Raise More With a Strong Online Presence

Social media is a vital marketing tool for any online fundraising campaign—especially Giving Tuesday. The global giving day has grown by leaps and bounds, in part because of the massive audiences it reaches on platforms like Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter.

Use these Giving Tuesday social media best practices to attract new donors, engage existing supporters, and inspire your larger community to take action this year.

Why Does My Nonprofit Need a LinkedIn Page?

A strong online presence can help your nonprofit tap into a wide network of people who are willing and eager to support your mission. By maintaining an active page that showcases your good work and clearly communicates your impact, you can foster a community of people ready to make a difference.

LinkedIn is home to more than 740 million members in 200 countries and regions worldwide. The powerful social media platform is one of the first places people go to learn about your organization and discover ways to get involved. Boost your credibility, elevate your impact, and keep your audiences engaged with a page that leaves a lasting impression.

Get Inspiration from Three of the Best Nonprofit LinkedIn Profiles

See how nonprofits like yours tap into LinkedIn’s extensive network with an optimized profile to foster engagement, connect with like-minded people, and meet key donor acquisition objectives.

Dig into these three examples from The LinkedIn Pages Action Plan for Nonprofits to inspire and guide your own efforts.

United Nations Foundation

What We Love: Complete and up-to-date profile

Establish credibility and improve your organization’s searchability with a page that clearly communicates your story, vision, and values. Provide visitors with everything they need to make an informed decision on whether or not to get involved with your cause.

See how the United Nations Foundation does this and more in the video below:

Pages with complete information get 30 percent more weekly views. Here’s what you need to do to achieve the same success:

1. Add your logo and cover image to personalize your page
2. Fill out your description with details about your origin story, goals, core values, and positioning
3. Incorporate relevant terms and phrases into your overview
4. Include your organization info, including your website URL, location, industry, and company size
5. Customize your call to action to align with your goals

These simple steps make your page more inviting to people who may be discovering your organization for the first time, and can help encourage them to stick around to learn more about what you do and why it’s important.

The Nature Conservancy

What We Love: Optimized for searchability

LinkedIn members can search by keywords, so be strategic with the messaging you choose to include on your page.

Just like you earn organic traffic to your website through search engine optimization (SEO) tactics, you can get more eyes on your LinkedIn page by leading with relevant terms and phrases that describe your organization’s mission and purpose.

Use words related to your cause, or a timely current event that someone may be looking to help support. Put yourself in the mind of your donors and get ahead of what they may be browsing in their LinkedIn feed to be sure your organization rises to the top of their search results.

See how The Nature Conservancy executed this on their Linkedin profile:

By driving more traffic to your page, you can also boost traffic to your website (and donation pages). Amplify your reach, elevate your impact, and further support your fundraising efforts with a page that’s optimized for LinkedIn search.

Environmental Defense Fund

What We Love: Consistent posting cadence

Remain relevant with your donor base by posting content once a day during peak times.

Pages that post daily get twice the member engagement. The hours between 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. during the work week have proven to be the busiest for LinkedIn users. Organizing your content calendar to capitalize on these high-traffic times is a strong strategy to boost your social performance.

It’s also important to cross promote your page on other social platforms once a week to reach different audiences.

Keep your content fresh with these best practices:

• Use LinkedIn’s Content Suggestions tool
• Reshare your organization’s best mentions
• Reshare advocates of your causes’ posts
• Include custom images and videos
• Share PowerPoints and PDFs
• Stream live video content

Bonus: 3 More Simple Ways to Stand Out

Stay Engaged With the Right People at the Right Time

Spark conversation with LinkedIn members to win engagement. Back-and-forth conversations are key to helping your post be seen by a wider audience.

Get started with these low-lift engagement tactics:

• Comment on and share posts that feature your nonprofit
• Interact with posts that relate to your orgaization’s unique cause
• Share trending articles that are relevant and supportive of your mission
• Explore your Activity tab to discover recent mentions of your organization
• Ask questions that encourage members to respond or tag their connections
• Create LinkedIn Events for your campaigns to engage new audiences and encourage sharing by participants

Tap Into Organic Sharing With Your Own Team

Notify employees of important posts and encourage them to react, comment on, and share them out with their networks. Your employees’ networks are typically ten times the size of your page followers. Extend the reach of your content by opening the door to their inner circles.

It’s also helpful to ask current and former staff, volunteers, and board members to list your nonprofit under the Experience section on their personal LinkedIn page. This not only increases brand exposure, but also ensures that your staff and board members’ affiliation is clear to all prospective donors they engage with.

Lean Into Analytics

Gain insight into the performance of your LinkedIn page to inform your future strategy. Getting access to analytics helps you keep a finger on the pulse of current trends circulating within the industry.

LinkedIn Page Analytics include the following types:

• Followers
• Visitors
• Competitors
• Employee
• Employee Advocacy
• Talent Brand

Discover what kind of content is resonating with your audience to ensure your organization remains relevant, timely, and in-tune with the preferences of your donor base.

Lead the Way on LinkedIn

LinkedIn can be a powerful tool to help you achieve your organization’s goals. Attract a loyal and dedicated following to help get the word out, drive action, and grow your organic reach. The more people you can get your message in front of, the more likely you are to drive conversion.

Lean on these nonprofit LinkedIn profile examples and best practices to guide your strategy as you brainstorm new ways to elevate your online presence and attract new audiences.

However, this amount of data can be overwhelming, so nonprofits have to prioritize which metrics to actually measure. Across platforms, you should be tracking social media engagement rates and conversion rates. Here’s what you need to know about both.

1. Engagement Rate

Engagements are the currency of online content. Thousands of people might see your content, but it won’t be relevant for everyone. By interacting with your content, a segment of the audience shows you they care about what you have to say.

This is especially true on social media because the platforms’ algorithms prioritize engagements. Facebook, Twitter, and the rest want to keep people on their websites, so they’re fanatical about delivering content that makes people click. When they do, the algorithms deliver your content to even more people—creating a snowball effect.

Measuring Engagements on Social Media

Engagements refer to nearly any interaction a user has with your content. Your goal is to stop the scroll and get them to click. Depending on the specific social media outlet, that usually means:

• Likes
• Shares
• Comments
• Link clicks

Keep in mind, not all social media engagements are created equal. Social media platforms treat these interactions differently, and so should your organization. Some engagements are more valuable than others because they show a deeper level of audience interaction.

• Liking a post on Facebook is nice, but it requires the least amount of effort.
• Commenting on a post is better because it shows the system that they took more time to add content of their own. It also encourages others to do the same.
• A share is even better—not only because it exposes your content to that user’s audience, but also because it tells the platform that this person likes what you created enough to do so.

This means prioritizing engagements accordingly when tracking social media metrics, but it also means creating content that encourages shares and comments. To learn user demographic and engagement stats for each channel, suggested post frequencies, and a sample week of nonprofit social media content, download the Nonprofit’s Social Media Content Planner now.

Why and How to Measure the Engagement Rate

It’s not enough to simply count the number of engagements collected over a given time period. Measuring your organization’s engagement rate is a more accurate reflection of your content’s relevance to the audience.

That’s because your content reach varies and you want to see what percent of that group who saw your post actually did something with it. In other words, calculating a rate smooths out the rough edges and gives you a more consistent measure of success.

To measure a social media platform’s engagement rate:

• Take the total number of engagements
• Divided by the total number of impressions
• Multiply by 100 (to get the percentage)

For example, if 1,000 people saw your Facebook post and 50 of those people engaged, your engagement rate would be 5%. Now that you’ve calculated the rate, you’re likely wondering how to tell whether or note that rate is good or not.

Benchmarking Your Engagement Rate

To measure the relative effectiveness of your social media engagement rate, you can start by comparing it to benchmark numbers for the nonprofit industry. Typically, an engagement rate of about 1% to 2% is average for most businesses, regardless of platform. Some organizations can see rates of about 4% to 5%, which is a better number to shoot for.

However, more important than benchmarking is consistent improvement over time. If you aren’t already, take some time to begin measuring engagement rate across your social channels. This gives you a baseline of how you’re performing and a place to improve on moving forward.

2. Conversion Rate

Conversions are measurements of how many people took the action you set out for them to do. That will be different depending on what your goal is, and you could have multiple goals depending on the season or campaign.

Measuring Conversions on Social Media

Here are a few different examples of relevant social media conversion goals:

• Click to a read a blog post
• Register for an event
• Make a donation
• Fill out a volunteer form
• Visit a website landing page
• Subscribe to an email list
• Sign a petition
• Purchase a product

Be laser-focused on what action you want people to take. Don’t try to pull off multiple conversions in a single post (or even a single campaign). The more intentional about promoting a single action step, the more likely people will actually take that step.

Pushing two or more calls to action can get cumbersome and confusing, and can also muddle the waters for your tracking purposes.

Tracking Social Media Conversions

Follower count or impressions can be easy to track, but calculating conversions takes things a step further. It requires you to bridge to another platform, usually your website or a CRM, where the conversion takes place.

Without proper tracking integrations that communicate data across platforms, this can be tricky, sometimes requiring you to make educated guesses. But there are often tactics you can employ to track users from social media through a conversion.

One example is a UTM tracking code that allows you to customize a link with tags that explain where a user originates from. If you’re using Google Analytics, you can view the path these users made through your website, including specific actions.

Just like with engagements, the sheer number of conversions lacks valuable context. It’s more helpful to measure conversion rate because it takes the size of your audience into account. Conversion rates are measured the same way as engagement rates—conversions divided by impressions multiplied by 100.

A solid conversion rate depends on the context of how many conversions you’re seeing compared to the number of users visiting your donation page. Ten conversions from 10,000 users viewing your donation page might seem lackluster, but 10 conversions from 50 visitors would be great.

Realize that social media conversion rates aren’t usually that high—typically less than 1%. But you’ll never realize this unless you track it. Keep in mind these rates should vary depending upon your desired conversion. It’ll likely be higher for something easy like driving web traffic, and much lower for a higher-value conversion like committing to a monthly recurring donation.

Make Engagements and Conversions Work for You

Nonprofits should track engagement and conversion rates when it comes to social media. These are not comprehensive by any means, and they aren’t always easy to measure.

However, these rates are likely the most accurate representations of your organization’s performance on social media. When you track the right things, you know how to make improvements and influence those metrics to increase.

To learn more about elevating your social media strategy, check out our other resources:

• The 10-Week Social Media Event Promotion Plan
• 28 Giving Tuesday Social Media Templates
• The Social Media Marketing Guide for Nonprofit Events

Social media drove 51% of donation traffic in 2020. 

Social media usage is growing rapidly among 4.2 billion users worldwide. It’s never a bad idea to establish a social media plan that accounts for post-pandemic best practices and shifts in modern donor behavior.

A nonprofit social media approach backed by a strong plan increases the likelihood of attracting donors worldwide, driving them to take timely action, and building a following of new supporters to engage for recurring giving campaigns.

The following seven steps help you navigate the confusion about what to post on which channels and when. The result? Your unique nonprofit social media strategy.

When you’re ready to apply your learnings, download The Nonprofit’s Social Media Content Planner, for sample posts, best practices, and a template to make planning your posts a breeze.

7 Tips to Create Your Nonprofit Social Media Marketing Plan

1. Take a Week-by-Week Approach

Who doesn’t love to plan as far ahead as possible? Apply the forward-thinking approach you use for donor stewardship and fundraising campaigns to your nonprofit’s social media presence, with a touch of flexibility.

Build a flexible weekly planning process that helps you stay on top of social media but also creative about last-minute ideas or pivots. You can establish a rhythm for posts that’s easy to replicate each week when you see content laid out by week. That structure makes it simpler to plan content for weeks or months at a time.

Each week, check in to confirm your posts are timely and relevant to your organization. You’ll want the added flexibility to create posts around events such as a promotion during a campaign lull or a new donation match announcement.

2. Look at Examples to Inspire New Ideas

One of the best ways to get inspiration for nonprofit social media content is to see an example. You never know what could spark your next big idea for a social media challenge, educational content shares, or behind-the-scenes videos.

Try browsing various aspirational accounts to get your creativity flowing or check out the sample week of nonprofit social media posts for seven of today’s most engaged with channels. It’s all included in the Nonprofit’s Social Media Content Planner.

3. Choose the Best Channels to Post on

New social media platforms like TikTok and Clubhouse became conversation starters overnight in 2020. A wide variety of social platform options is great to reach more people. It also makes it more challenging than ever to target specific audiences.

It’s much easier to focus your posts on channels where the most donors will see them when you understand what sets each of them apart. The first step is looking into the latest user demographic insights per channel.

These insights will tell you the number of monthly users, the average age of users, and how much time a user spends engaging on each channel. Pair your findings with what you know about your ideal donor base to create content that drives action from the right audience.

4. Narrow Down the Type of Content You’ll Post

There’s a wide variety of post ideas to choose from when you build your nonprofit social media marketing plan. Organizations use everything from creative challenges to touching quotes to engage new followers.

There’s no right or wrong way to approach your content because your organization has unique goals. There’s a basic rule of thumb however to avoid creating confusion among those who follow your social media accounts. Consistency is key.

Narrow your content options down to a list of about 10 to focus on each week. Being able to refer back to the content that you feel most comfortable with helps you manage, anticipate, and grow your nonprofit social media strategy over time.

5. Know the Best Time to Post on Each Social Media Channel

Every social media channel has different high-engagement windows across the various days of the week, and specific times that boost engagement for each of those days. As you learn more about engagement stats per channel you’d like to post on regularly, you’ll also want to consider how often you’re posting to keep your audience engaged.

It would be great if social media was as simple as posting a new Instagram Reel, Tweet, and TikTok video simultaneously every Monday. Each channel has to be looked at uniquely to make the biggest impact.

The Nonprofit’s Social Media Content Planner guides you through the best times to post on each channel and how to build that into a weekly content plan.

6. Build Key Messaging Around Existing Marketing Materials

A consistent message is the glue that holds your social media content plans together across every channel, content variation, and schedule you include. Everything you post should ladder up to a greater narrative that followers can easily follow along with.

In other words, you wouldn’t want the content you post on Facebook and Snapchat simultaneously to look like two completely different organizations wrote it. Consider a narrative per day of the week. Every post you publish across all channels should align back to that daily narrative for a more consistent follower experience.

To identify narratives and timely themes for your nonprofit social media content, take a look at what exists within your existing email calendars, your fundraising events, and organizational milestones.

7. Use a Weekly Social Media Content Planner

The key to putting tips one through six into action is to have a place to see all of your social media content from a bird’s eye view.

Your weekly social media content plan should include:

• A layout of every day of the week’s posts next to one another
• Specific times your audience will see your posts on the various platforms they use
• How your content aligns across every social platform
• Opportunities to cross-promote the same content on different platforms
• Your key message or theme to align each day’s posts back to

We’re making that easy for you with a free template to plan your entire social media strategy and a step-by-step guide to make it your own. Download The Nonprofit’s Social Media Content Planner to get started.

In previous years, Classy’s Why America Gives report has focused on consumer giving trends, what motivates donors to give, and their plans for Giving Tuesday and year-end giving. In our third-annual edition of Why America Gives, the 2020 report measures these year-over-year changes in giving sentiments and behaviors; in addition, it also analyzes how current events—specifically the COVID-19 pandemic and the social justice movement—have altered giving trends.

Most importantly, we wanted to pose the questions:

• How have the events of this year affected donor behavior?
• Will supporters be giving more or less than last year?
• Have COVID-19 and the fight against social injustice changed the causes or organizations donors will give to?

We sent out a survey in September 2020 to poll 1,000 individuals across the United States, all of whom were age 18 or older, to find out.

Based on the results of our survey, we’re optimistic about what the giving season holds for nonprofits. Below, we explore some of the major key findings from the report, but make sure you download your free copy of Why America Gives now to get all the insights.

The Outlook for the 2020 Giving Season Is Positive

The Giving Tuesday movement has grown to the point where over half of Americans have an awareness and understanding of the giving day. In 2020, 67% of our survey respondents who are familiar with Giving Tuesday donated last year, compared to 53% in 2019 and 57% in 2018.

Further, our survey results show that Americans still plan to give the same amount, or more, than they did in 2019. Among those who plan to give more, 33% say it’s because the societal need seems greater this year. Despite the economic impact from the COVID-19 pandemic, people still feel compelled to give, so don’t pass up an opportunity to engage your supporters with an ask.

COVID-19 Fuels Charitable Giving

Despite the financial challenges many Americans are facing due to the COVID-19 pandemic, 39% of our survey respondents said they definitely or probably will give more to nonprofits in 2020 than they did in 2019. The main driving factor behind this is that many see a greater societal need in 2020 than in previous years.

When asked which causes Americans were most like to support, respondents chose healthcare as the top cause category ahead of disaster relief, the environment, and education. Still, whether your nonprofit is health-related or not, you can be confident that prospective donors are looking for ways to support relief efforts alleviating various challenges presented by the pandemic.

The Social Justice Movement Creates an Influx of New Donors 

Our survey results show that many Americans are actively looking for ways to support causes fighting for racial equality. In fact, 42% of respondents either donated, or planned to donate, to social justice causes in 2020.

Interestingly, 58% of these donors claim this was their first gift ever made to the social justice cause sector, and 43% said this donation was made in addition to other contributions. This shows us that current events play a major role in creating new donors, but for nearly half of all people, it doesn’t replace their regular giving.

Virtual Fundraising Events Generate Attention and Donations

Countless nonprofits were forced to pivot their in-person events to virtual events after the COVID-19 pandemic hit, but donors weren’t driven away by this change. Our survey results show that nearly 30% of respondents have supported or participated in a virtual fundraising event since the beginning of the pandemic.

Of that 30%, the majority claim they have donated more in the virtual environment than they did at in-person events. This aligns with how many nonprofits have seen comparable or higher fundraising revenue generated from virtual events as well. Moving forward, the social sector will likely continue to host virtual events, even when in-person events make a return.

Download Why America Gives 2020 for More Insights

These insights are only the tip of the iceberg for this year’s edition of Why America Gives. Download the full report now and explore:

• Which causes Americans favor most
• The role politics plays in giving
• How donors prefer to give
• Insights around Giving Tuesday and year-end

Planning out your media strategy helps ensure that you’ll be able to leverage your budget to get in front of the right audience with the right message at the right time. For example, if you want to target a younger audience to generate donations, but only have $2,000, planning out your campaign will decide how that the budget is best spent.

When it comes to the year-end fundraising season, media planning becomes even more crucial to the success of your nonprofit. You have to compete with countless other organizations and for-profit companies for the attention and money of the public.

Below, we outline a quick guide for how to approach nonprofit media buying in a way that helps your overall marketing efforts and drives fundraising revenue.

Considerations for Your Year-End Media Buying Plan

In order to build a successful year-end nonprofit media buying campaign, whether you’re running your first one or looking to improve an existing one, you’ll want to answer five simple questions:

1. What is your objective?
2. What is your budget and timeline?
3. Who is your target audience(s)?
4. What platforms should you use?
5. What resources do you have available for creative?

To launch a successful campaign, you need a clearly defined goal. For your year-end campaign, you will most likely be focusing on driving donations. However, within this simple objective there are a few things to consider.

For instance, is your primary objective driving revenue or return on investment (ROI)? Is it important to you whether donors are new or returning, and if they give once or sign up for a monthly recurring donation?

Your objectives will help determine which platforms you select:

• ROI and Conversion: Social and paid search are great platforms for driving a return on investment.
• Awareness and Reach: Display and Video ads are great ads for driving awareness. You can drive low CPC, but not necessarily the greatest ROI.

Once you’ve answered these questions, it will be easier to determine which audiences, platforms, and budget strategy you need. Additionally, by identifying your goals early, you will be able to select the right platforms and build the right resources that allow you to set up and optimize your campaign appropriately.

For example, if you are looking to generate revenue, all the call to actions and ads should be set up and optimized for conversions. Your ads could say “Donate Now” or “Give today” driving individuals to a donation, optimizing all ads with this same donor journey.

If you are looking to drive high impressions, your campaign should be set up for impressions and reach. This means you just want to prioritize the most eyeballs possible on your ads over revenue generated from the ad.

Define Your Budget and Timeline

As you build your nonprofit media buying campaign, you’ll need to determine a concrete budget. This will ultimately help dictate how many audiences and which platforms you include in your campaign plan.

Many direct buy platforms have budget minimums starting at $10,000. If you know out of the gate you will have less than that, platforms like Facebook and Search that don’t have minimums, will be better suited for your budget.

With any campaign, you will want to make sure your budget is being spent wisely,  especially if it is lean. Avoid overextending yourself on too many channels and instead focus on the ones that will deliver the best results. This may need just advertising on one platform and that’s OK.

When launching your campaigns, consider when it makes sense to add more budget or increase ad variations. For instance, you may want to allocate more budget on Giving Tuesday and save a significant chunk of the budget for the last week of December when people are making a lot of gifts at the end of the current tax year. This is a peak and valley approach where some key days will have a higher budget and other days will have a lower budget.

It’s also important to keep in mind the eCommerce calendar for retail and be conscious of days like Cyber Monday and Black Friday, which tend to be very expensive as retailers pump up their marketing efforts on Display and Social channels. You may wish to pull back during these times to avoid overpaying for clicks.

It’s vital that you have enough budget to optimize your campaign. After you launch your campaigns, we recommend a second round of quality assurance (QA) to make sure everything is serving and tracking properly.

Once your campaigns have accrued some data, you will want to check back regularly to make sure performance is in line with expectations and adjust as needed. Being nimble and flexible is an important skill for media planners. Even the most well-thought out campaigns are subject to change if you see under- or over-performance within a particular audience or channel.

Identify Your Target Audience(s)

A good rule of thumb for year-end giving is to start with your owned audiences: those who are familiar with your organization and may have even given in the past. These will be your most responsive prospects and cost-effective donors.

Here’s a few of “owned audiences” to consider:

• Website Visitors: People who have been cookied on your website.
• Email and Donor File: Folks on your email list who are prospects or current donors. By adding your CRM file into advertising platforms, you are able to match and target folks from your email list on various advertising platforms. Your donor file can be even more segmented for one-time , recurring, or lapsed donor.
• On-Platform Users: These are folks who have engaged with you on social media. People who have liked you posts or ads in the past.
• Branded Keywords: People who are searching for your brand on search. For example, anyone who is looking for your organization name.

With any of your “owned” audiences, keep in mind the larger fundraising strategy. These leads have a pre-existing relationship with your organization and will be exposed to messaging on other platforms.

It’s important to think about their entire donor journey so that it’s consistent. Make sure you coordinate your audiences and messaging across all channels including email. You don’t want a multi-year donor to receive an email to give a second gift or to ask a monthly giver to become a monthly giver if they already are.

If your budget allows, you may also wish to expand your audiences beyond owned media and incorporate qualified audiences such as lookalikes of your top donors or people with an interest in your organization’s mission, charitable giving, or related nonprofits. These are audiences you can create based on targeting parameters within your advertising platform.

• Lookalike Audience: This is an audience created based on another audience. For example, if you have your donor file on Facebook or have pixeled everyone who has landed on a donation thank you. You can create a list that mimics the criteria of those donor audiences.
• Like-minded: Maybe you have “like-minded” organizations with a large online presence. This could be another qualified audience to test. Individuals who engage with or follow your competitors.
• Nonprofit Givers: Maybe you want to hone in on individuals who have a previous giving history to other nonprofits, that could be another potential audience.

Not every platform has the same targeting capabilities, so you’ll need to pick and choose. Facebook has some of the most comprehensive options.

For example, if you’re an environmental organization, on Facebook you can create an audience that includes only individuals who care about the “environment” and have given to nonprofits before.

Remember, prospective leads will tend to be “cold” or “lukewarm” meaning they may not know your organization personally, but care about the cause or maybe even support a like minded organization.

If your budget or on platform data is limited tools like Google Analytics are a great resource to familiarize yourself with your donor audience. You can analyze your past donors to understand who they are. For example, if the majority of your past donors were male ages 25 to 34, you can focus your budget on this demographic.

Select Your Advertising Platforms 

Once you’ve done some research and analysis and have a general understanding of who you will be targeting, it’s time to select which platforms you will be using.

When selecting platforms you really need to consider the questions listed above:

1. 1. What is your objective? The objective will help determine what type of ads you will want to run which influences which platforms you use.
   2. Who is your target audience(s)? Of course your audience is a huge factor of where you place your ads. You’ll want to select platforms where your audience tends to engage.
   3. What is your budget and timeline? Your budget will determine how many platforms you can be on and which platforms to use. Some of the larger media partners have minimum advertising budgets starting at $10,000+. 
   4. What resources do you have available for creative? If you have access to several creative resources where you can design various ads specs and maybe even video, this also will influence where you want to advertise.

Let’s dive a little deeper into your target audience and budget. If your donors tend to be older, Facebook is a great option, whereas if you have a younger donor set, Instagram could be a better fit.

Search is a platform that could potentially reach various audiences since it’s solely on their search terms. Understanding the demographics of each platform will take a bit of research.

If you have a small budget, using social media platforms and search is a great place to start. These platforms do not require any type of minimum spend—and are great at driving an ROI on direct response fundraising campaigns.

For larger budgets, you can expand into display and programmatic partners. Display campaigns on platforms like Google don’t have a budget minimum but don’t always have the same ROI as social media or search. If you use a programmatic advertising platform like Sharethrough, you’ll have an advertising minimum.

In any scenario, what you want to avoid is spreading your budget too thin and not giving the channels enough data to use for making optimizations.

Scope Out Your Resources and Creative Assets

The key to a successful campaign is developing creative that speaks to your audience and helps you stand out. We recommend creative that is eye-catching with high-quality visuals, a strong value proposition and a definitive call to action. For fundraising, telling a story and including concrete donation amounts are often successful tactics.

When creating ads it’s important to consider the specs of the ad platforms you are advertising. Adversely, it’s also important to consider the creative resources available when selecting the right platforms.

For example, if you have access to incredible videos, you should consider running ads on video heavy platforms. If you don’t have access to significant creative resources, maybe limit yourself to less platforms and only advertise on Facebook and search.

• Facebook and Instagram: Assets with little to no text on the image tend to perform better. However, Facebook did just announce the 20% rule has now been removed (as of September 2020). You could experiment some heavy text variations to see how they perform.
• Display: These ads can have a bit more text, but need to be incredibly clear as they can appear small and disappear quickly. It’s vital to design various ad sizes so that your ads are optimized on both mobile and desktop.

If possible, we recommend doing some pre-holiday testing to determine which types of messaging and formats resonate best with your audience. You don’t want to introduce brand new creative or messaging during year-end.

If it’s your first time advertising, start with two concepts and test those. Use email and social media to help you determine which messaging may work well for you.

Make sure your campaign is trackable

Make sure to have a plan in place for tracking revenue and ROI throughout the length of the campaign. Setting objectives won’t take you very far unless you have a good way to measure success.

The easiest way to set up Facebook conversion tracking is to follow these steps to have Classy’s support team add your organization’s Facebook Pixel. Make sure to request it be added account-wide in order to capture all data moving forward.

If you are using Google Ads to run media, you should also make sure to set up Google Ads Conversion Tags on your Classy account. You can complete a basic setup by following this process with Classy’s support team.

For a more advanced setup with value-based tracking, separate Conversion Tags for one-time and monthly donations, and additional tracking, we recommend taking advantage of Classy’s Google Tag Manager integration. As an official Classy integration partner, Media Cause has a number of packages available to get you set up with this powerful tracking solution.

Prior to launching your campaign, you should also make sure your organization’s Google Analytics account is set up to track donations from Classy under Conversions > Ecommerce. Simply enable Classy’s Google Analytics integration  within the “Apps & Extensions” section of your Classy Manager dashboard and “Enable Ecommerce” is switched on in Google Analytics by navigating from Admin > Ecommerce Settings.

Other revenue monitoring tools include: adding UTM parameters and Source Codes to your URLs which feed into Google Analytics and fundraising platforms like Classy.

It is very important that you test to ensure tracking is working properly before your campaign launches to avoid losing important data.

Reporting on Results

We recommend pulling reporting regularly to help you track performance and make optimizations. It’s also important to look at ROI at a granular level, if possible, to help make key optimization decisions.

There are a number of tools that help make reporting easier such as Google Data Studio, which accepts data from Google Analytics, Google Ads, and other sources. Even a simple Excel spreadsheet containing key KPIs broken down at a platform, ad, and audience level can get the job done. You should also take advantage of Classy’s pre-built on-platform reports: look under the “General Reports” second of your dashboard for account-level reports and within individual campaigns under the “Reports” tab. For more advanced reporting on donor journeys and multiple touchpoints, explore Facebook Attribution and Google Attribution.

Crush Your Nonprofit Media Buying

Having a system for reporting on results will not only be super helpful in helping you optimize this campaign, but will be useful for pulling valuable insights to inform future initiatives.

Stephanie Schug is an Associate Media Director at Media Cause. Before joining the Media Cause team, Stephanie worked at Digitas LBi and 3Q Digital. She loves books, cats, and drinking too much coffee.

While there are no shortcuts to sustained social media success, there are a few low-hanging fruit tips that you can implement quickly and effectively to ensure you’re covering your bases. Here are a few immediate social media improvements your organization can try to see results fast.

7 Quick Social Media Improvements for Your Nonprofit

1. Check for Consistent Branding on All Social Media Accounts

Make sure each of your social media accounts enforces your nonprofit’s brand. When used well, social media has the power to spread the word about your organization. But it can’t do that if your audience is getting mixed messages about your mission and brand.

Start by double-checking that your organization’s name is used consistently, and accurately, everywhere you appear on social media. That includes your social media handles and in your account’s custom URLs, where applicable.

For example, avoid using @GreatNonprofit as your Twitter handle and @TheGreatestNonprofit for Instagram. People may have trouble telling if they’re for the same organization—even if they’re legitimate variations of your organization’s name. Be consistent. Use a free tool like Namechk to see what handles are available across all social media channels.soci

Be sure that your nonprofit’s logo is being displayed consistently on all social accounts as well. Using the same logo in your various profile pictures will make your accounts more easily identifiable. The same is true for your header images. Using the same header or similarly branded images across all accounts can help people instantly recognize your organization’s brand online.

Finally, confirm that you’re reinforcing your mission statement in every bio for your accounts. Your social profiles may be the first place people find out about your nonprofit, so don’t miss this opportunity to inform them about your mission and include a link back to your website, where they can find out more about your specific programs.

Ensuring that your mission and brand are the same across your social media accounts builds credibility and minimizes confusion.

2. Select the Social Media Platforms to Focus On

The truth is you won’t be able to spend enough time on every social channel. Spreading yourself too thin over every social platform imaginable means sacrificing quantity over quality, so consider being more selective so you can truly put your energy where it matters.

Take a moment to assess your capacity to manage each account. How much time do you have and how much time do they require? It’s easier to manage more if you’re lucky enough to have an entire team or if social media is your full-time role. If not, you can scale down your efforts to make sure you’re spending time on the platforms where your supporters are.

Start by looking at which of your existing social media platforms have the most followers and the highest levels of engagement. Where does most of your audience naturally seem to gravitate? Those are likely going to be the accounts where you’re getting your highest return on investment.

Experiment by taking your top two or three platforms (depending on your bandwidth) and focusing exclusively on them. Increase your number of posts on these platforms and spend more time engaging and responding to comments. Start experimenting with different types of posts as well, such as more video content or polls; you might be able to increase engagement as you create the type of content your followers want to see. Check how your platform metrics change over time with this increased focus.

For your other accounts, you can let more time pass between posts for a while and come back later when you’ve got more bandwidth, or when you finally hire that intern. Monitor your accounts over time though to ensure you’re not missing any important opportunities to engage with followers on that platform.

3. Link to Your Social Media Accounts From Your Owned Media

It’s easy to assume everyone knows where to find you online, but your audience is also busy. So you’ve got to make it painfully easy to find your nonprofit on social media.

The simplest way to do that is by adding links to all of your active social accounts to your owned media. Owned media includes your website, email marketing, and any other digital platforms that you directly control.

Start with your nonprofit’s website. Make sure visitors can quickly find links to those social media accounts from either the header, footer, or both. Next, check one of your latest email campaigns. Are the social links easy to find there? No matter what email marketing platform you use, it should be simple to add those links into the footer of an email template. Even if people don’t click them every time, it’s a nice, subtle reminder of where to find you on social media.

These online platforms are obvious places to share about social, but don’t neglect offline places too. Print pieces like marketing brochures and business cards are options, too. Remember, these aren’t clickable links—so be sure to include more than just a Facebook icon, otherwise your audience won’t know what to do with it.

Join us at the Collaborative: Virtual Sessions for more nonprofit marketing tips.

4. Follow More Accounts Like Your Own

It’s tempting to focus exclusively on how many people follow your social media accounts. Many organizations push people to follow their accounts and forget that this is a two-way street. Sometimes you also have to remember to follow other accounts, too.

Following your followers and other like-minded organizations helps to grow your community, allowing you to expand how many relevant conversations you join without having to always ask people to follow you.

For example, following the local chamber of commerce will likely help you stay up to date with local events or business opportunities. Engage with these posts and share them on your account as a way to promote the community. Do this enough, and they may even return the favor.

Each time you check one of your social media accounts, take some time to follow a few relevant accounts. Search for other accounts by your city or by the industry you’re in and you’ll have plenty of accounts to choose from. Most social platforms even share lists of suggested accounts based on those you currently follow. Scroll through their latest posts to like and comment on a few of them.

Taking time to follow other accounts also allows you to learn from others and see how they’re engaging their audiences. Take notes on the types of content and engagement opportunities they’re offering their followers, and consider how you might be able to try something similar on your own account.

5. Use Online Tools to Streamline Your Process

Don’t spend all of your time manually posting to every account; take advantage of some of these helpful digital tools to streamline your process.

Buffer and Hootsuite are both great for scheduling social media content and viewing how your content performs.

Canva is a basic design tool that speeds up the graphic design process, especially for nondesigners.

Linktree allows you to create a landing page full of links. This is especially useful for Instagram, which doesn’t allow you to include links in posts. Linktree and similar tools can be used for any social account as a quick way to share a wide number of links.

Headliner is a handy tool for creating quick, simple videos, especially out of existing content you’ve already created.

Best of all, most of these tools offer nonprofit discounts. For Canva and Linktree, those discounts are even 100% off for their premium accounts, allowing you to use some top industry tools without having to break your budget.

6. Share Content About Your Audience

A trap that too many fall into is only talking about themselves on social media. As is with any organization or account, people can lose interest when you just talk about yourself. You need to talk about them, too.

Do a quick audit of your most recent posts. How much of this content is not about your organization? Aim for at least one out of every three or four posts to be about your audience. You can’t make this shift immediately, but it’s a goal you can start working towards right away.

From there, it’s a matter of bringing your audience into the story you’re telling. This starts with knowing who your audience is and what they care about. Create content that’s focused on them and their interests.

For example, donors care about the tangible impact of your work, so you might create posts that showcase the specific impact of their gifts, highlighting photos or videos of beneficiaries or the product of their donation. If you’re focused on volunteers, you might do a “volunteer of the month” spotlight.

Another great tactic is to collect testimonials from these groups about their experiences with your nonprofit, either text or video. You could even highlight testimonials from people who’ve fundraised on behalf of your organization and how meaningful the experience was to them. Let them inform and inspire the rest of your community by relaying how their work made a difference.

7. Engage Your Invested Audience First

Getting people to engage with you on social media can be difficult, and it’s easy to understand why. People are often bombarded with asks. Follow this company. Like that product. Share this post. People can burn out among all the noise.

Start engaging with the followers who already love your cause and believe in your mission. Keep a running list of the people who are already involved in other ways, like your volunteers or board members. Ask them to follow you and engage on their social accounts.

Share with them why it’s worth their time. Explain why social media growth is important to your organization, and how their engagement could increase your reach and draw in others to follow your page as well.

Make it as easy as a few clicks to spread the word. Arm this group with sample copy, stories of social impact, compelling videos or graphics, and stats that they can share with their networks. Communicate reminders and encouragement often.

Make them feel like your social media champions—because that’s what they are.

Social Media Improvements, in Less Than an Hour

Long-term social media success takes an investment of time. Don’t expect to be able to transform your entire social media engagement strategy in an hour. However, you can make small, incremental social media improvements that will pay off in the long run.

Try some of these suggestions out at your organization and see what happens. Use them as experiments to see what works and where you’re able to get results. Apply these same principles in the long run for continued success. Test them out and you might find a way to do it better.

Read more:

• Social Media Videos: Lessons Learned From 778 Nonprofits
• 10 Social Media Post Examples That Drive Engagement
• 8 Tips to Nail Your Social Media Posts During COVID-19
• 8 Social Media Mistakes Your Nonprofit Should Avoid
• 13 Tips to Level Up Your Nonprofit’s Social Media Engagement Tactics
• 4 Ways to Activate Social Media Influencers in Your Nonprofit Network

COVID-19 has taught us several marketing lessons, such as taking a more empathetic tone, which are predicted to stick around once we’re through the pandemic. Another trend we’ve seen is that social media use is up, reported as 10.5% higher in July 2020 than in July 2019. Twitter also saw its own first quarter increase of 23% for daily active users compared to 2019.

This presents an opportunity for your nonprofit to assess its social media marketing strategy. As people are spending more time on social media, you need to know when, where, and how to meet them where they are. In this post, we’ll explore the ways COVID-19 has changed social media trends and how you can update your nonprofit’s social media marketing formula to keep reaching your supporters.

Changes in the Best Times to Post on Social Media

Marketing companies have been analyzing social media engagement since the start of the coronavirus pandemic to gauge any changes in the best times to post on social media. These findings vary by platform and with the evolving landscape of the COVID-19 pandemic. Many companies report weekly updates, which you can check for changes over time.

Below, we share some of the latest findings for three of the top social media platforms, as surfaced by Sprout Social. Your nonprofit can use these to elevate or pivot your social media strategy to drive more engagement and get in front of supporters when they’re most active.

Facebook

Pre-pandemic, the most optimal times for posting on Facebook were Wednesdays at 11 a.m. and between 1 to 2 p.m.

Following lockdown orders, Facebook engagement has been consistently higher throughout the week. Currently, the best days for posting are Monday, Wednesday, and Friday between 10 to 11 a.m. Posts after 5 p.m. have lower engagement, presumably because remote workers have more demands on them during this time.

Instagram

Before COVID-19, the best times to post on Instagram were Wednesday at 11 a.m. and Friday between 10 to 11 a.m. There was also fairly consistent user engagement in the early mornings and late evenings throughout the week. Weekends were the worst time to post, particularly on Sundays.

Currently, Instagram is seeing overall higher traffic concentrated during the weekday working hours. Monday, Tuesday, and Friday at 11 a.m. and Tuesday at 2 p.m. are the best times to post for engagement. In addition, with more users turning to Instagram for a distraction and form of entertainment, weekends between 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. have seen high user activity, as well.

Twitter

Previously, the best times to post on Twitter were Wednesday and Friday at 9 a.m.

Currently, peak activity on Twitter is happening on Fridays at 9 a.m., with engagement generally higher starting at 7 a.m. Overall, user engagement with Twitter has remained more consistent than other social media platforms before and after COVID-19, likely due to people using the service as an information and news source.

Movement Toward Creativity and Entertainment

In addition to changes in engagement times, the impact of COVID-19 on social media trends has also affected the type of content with which users are most likely to engage.

Overall, there has been a movement toward posts that showcase creativity and aim to entertain. Social media users in the United States spent over 90% more time using apps to create and edit visuals post-pandemic than they did previously, and 42% of Gen Z users report wanting a greater volume of “fun” content in their feeds.

TikTok, a social media platform that focuses on short, creative videos, added over 12 million U.S. visitors in March 2020 alone and had over 2 billion downloads by April. Following the popularity of this trend, Instagram launched Reels, a similar concept to TikTok, where users can create brief, engaging videos that entertain and educate viewers.

You can respond to your supporters’ rise in creativity by increasing your nonprofit’s, as well. By pivoting your content to include greater creativity and entertainment, you can tap into an engaged social media user group.

Greater Reliance on Organic Material

With companies and nonprofits needing to cut advertising budgets or otherwise be mindful of their marketing funds, there has been increased reliance on organic, user-generated content post-pandemic.

This is a good time to empower your supporters to market on your behalf. You can encourage user-generated content for your nonprofit by:

• Understanding what types of content your supporters are already sharing and on which platforms, and focusing your efforts there
• Providing your supporters with a unifying, accessible message that creates a sense of community through social media
• Incentivizing your supporters through social media games, giveaways, and partnerships
• Leveraging the power of virtual events and livestreaming
• Interacting with supporters’ posts to reinforce your gratitude for them sharing your message

User-generated content helps organically spread your mission to new audiences in an authentic way. If you’re looking to tighten your marketing budget due to pandemic-related funding cuts, user-generated content is a great way to continue to have a strong social media presence during this time of increased user engagement.

Follow COVID-19 Social Media Trends to Establish an Effective Marketing Approach 

Social media marketing during the pandemic is a fluid situation. Engagement levels and times are subject to change with the evolving situation, and users are finding new ways to create entertaining content. By following these trends, your nonprofit can stay in tune with the moment to maintain an effective social media marketing strategy.