Community is a powerful donor retention tool
“I came for the event, but I stayed for the community.”
Do you wish this is something your donors would say? (If it is something they already say, good work!) Passionate communities of supporters can be an asset to a nonprofit, especially with the current rates of donor retention and public trust in institutions.
This week on The Responsive Weekly, Louis Diez of the Donor Participation Project and Almabase joined us to talk about community-led donor growth.
The Quick Summary
Top Takeaways
- Community is a powerful donor retention tool.
- Louis shared a definition of community from Get Together: Community is people getting together in ways that are participatory, purposeful, and recurring, and identify leaders.
- There are likely communities around your nonprofit already (think alumni, volunteers, parents of kids in your program, people who have adopted pets…) You can also build a community of supporters from scratch.
- The magic happens when you build a community, communicate with that community via content, and ask for the right types of gifts.
- The content you produce for your community doesn’t have to be polished. Casual messages in social media groups, sharing photos, and asking questions are all useful ways to connect. It’s about starting conversations, not presenting a finished product.
- Lead with the purpose–continuously remind the community of what brings them together.
