Healthcare sector fundraisers might be forgiven for feeling like the sky is constantly about to fall on their heads.
No sooner did the pandemic begin than demand for emergency funds surged. But where would those donations come from in the midst of layoffs and furloughs?
Later that year, we worried whether donors would give again at year-end.
Then, as we went through the second year of the pandemic, we wrung our hands with concern that donors were fatigued even though the need continued to be high.
Month-by-month comparisons in 2021 all suggested that results would not match 2020’s highs and we worried again.
Astonishingly, 2021 fundraising totals actually exceeded 2020s – though only modestly, largely thanks to donors who dug deep and contributed more. The economy roaring back to life and a buoyant stock market coinciding conveniently with peak fundraising season.
The narrative seems to be that, despite fears to the contrary, our donors come through when we need them most.
Leveraging historical performance data showing corporate, foundation and estate giving all increasing in line with strong stock market performance, the Lily Family School of Philanthropy predicted that donors would continue giving and that total charitable giving would rise by 5.7% in 2022.
But then 2022 unfolded.
War in Ukraine. Extended COVID lockdowns in China. Further supply chain tightening. Inflation reaching its highest point in 40 years. The Federal Reserve twice increased interest rates in response. The reversal of Roe vs Wade. A series of devastating heatwaves and wildfires. Another (less-publicized) COVID surge.
Unsurprisingly given this context, Q1-Q2 fundraising revenue was down 2.2% across the nonprofit sector year-over-year, suggesting the drop may already be upon us.
Historically, weaker year-end fundraising performance has correlated strongly with the kind of bear stock markets we have experienced in the past two quarters.
Charitable giving also correlates quite strongly with consumer spending which has been trending down as inflation has pushed up the cost of goods and services.
However, economic data shows that markets tend to bounce back in the second half of years in which the first halves were in a recession. And, elections usually cause short-lived economic spikes.
Healthcare issues remain among the most topical and most searched issues of our time.
Healthcare nonprofits are also better equipped to face the future thanks to their COVID-enlarged donor files. More donors to reach out to can help mitigate lower response rates.
More total donors tend to mean more wealthy donors. As we saw at year-end 2021, donors giving larger gifts can also mitigate lower response rates, and it is wealthier donors who are more likely to have the capacity to donate when the economy is weaker. In fact, research suggests that philanthropy has an asymmetric relationship to the stock market. Meaning that giving spikes with strong stock markets, but tends to lag, not mirror, downturns.
But while files are larger, they grew thanks to the pandemic when donors often gave to causes they hadn’t previously supported, typically with online gifts. That means donors now have even more organizations vying for a share of their digital wallet. Combine that with softer year-to-date revenues across the nonprofit sector and it makes for a highly competitive year-end period when standing out in overcrowded inboxes and mailboxes will be a challenge.
Oh, and remember inflation?
Because the costs of running an organization have risen dramatically this year and prices seldom drop even when inflation cools, 2022 dollars can purchase less than 2021 dollars. This puts a greater emphasis on finding ways to further upsell year-end gifts to bridge that gap.
To summarize, it appears that the 2022 fundraising outlook is weaker than in recent years, but not dramatically, thanks to continued interest in healthcare issues, and deeper and wealthier donor files. So, how should healthcare nonprofits prepare for year-end?
Non-profit hospitals recruited thousands of new donors during the pandemic. Communities rallied behind healthcare workers and were constantly in tune with the needs of their local hospital. And their donations were put to good use — hospitals were able to purchase critical PPE to protect caregivers, staff capacity was expanded, and life-saving equipment and treatments were made possible. But the needs of your hospital go much further than COVID response.
As we transition out of the pandemic, it’s important to nurture your COVID donors and convert them into lifelong supporters of your hospital. Here are a few recommendations:
Many of your new COVID donors gave for a specific reason: supporting healthcare workers during the pandemic. But these donors may not be familiar with the other life-saving work that your foundation supports. You should pay special attention to your new COVID donors — welcome them to your community of supporters, highlight the priorities of your foundation, and detail the impact of philanthropy at your hospital.
New COVID donors were there for your hospital at a critical time. As you transition them to long-term supporters, it’s important that you segment your renewal appeals to them.
Your messaging should be targeted and it should underscore the unique circumstances that brought them in as a supporter. You should also highlight the impact of their past gifts. As you ask for continued support, you should customize your donation asks based on their pandemic giving history. Over time, you can begin to fold your new COVID donors into your regular universe — but not without taking the time to nurture them at first.
By segmenting COVID donors appropriately, one hospital foundation was able to retain 21% of their COVID donors into 2021. But, more importantly, those retained donors increased their giving amount, leading to a 137% increase in revenue for our client.
COVID-19 fundamentally transformed the way that we deliver care — and the way that our communities view their health. Unfortunately, its impact will be felt long after the pandemic ends. And when compiled with the everchanging health concerns ahead of us, the need for philanthropy is even greater. Those with long COVID will continue to need care. New infectious diseases will develop. The growing epidemic of substance use and mental health challenges will strain our healthcare system. And those who delayed preventive care will require more care and focus.
However, there is a reason for hope. Healthcare supporters have shown their willingness to give at a critical time. Now, it’s on you to show them how their continued support can help going forward.
Every donor is a valued member of your community — no matter the amount that they give. But it’s important to ensure that you’re taking advantage of all that they have to offer. That’s why wealth screening is so important, especially after such a huge influx of new donors. Now is the perfect time to review your new donor list and wealth screen them for giving capacity. Use these insights to find a giving level that fits their profile — and be sure to slide on your white gloves and nurture them, especially those at the higher end of the spectrum.
Here’s the bottom line: You relied on COVID donors to support your work at an important time. Now, the ball is in your court to retain them and support your care for years to come. We work every day to help hospital foundations speak with their communities and raise money for a good cause. And we’d love to help you, too. Reach out to a team member today.
Every email marketer knows that open rates have long been the gold standard for measuring an email’s success. We build lists around them, adjust our content based on them, and can gauge the results of a fundraising campaign on them. We’re here to tell you that all of this has changed. But fortunately, there are other ways to measure success and have a strong email program without them.
In the fall of 2021, Apple implemented a Mail Privacy Protection program across their operating systems. In short, their system may tell your platform that an email was opened — even if in reality it wasn’t. A recent report by Litmus showed that 58.4% of desktop email opens happen through Apple Mail, and 90.5% of mobile opens happen on an iPhone. We hate to be the bearers of bad news, but this change will affect your organization. So what does this mean?
Any of your supporters who use Apple Mail and opted in will appear as “opens” on your recent emails, regardless of whether they’ve seen them or not.
If you didn’t have issues with bouncing emails in the past, this program won’t create new problems. But should these challenges arise in the future, they’ll be harder to identify.
Your click-through rate and other conversion metrics won’t be affected by this change (in fact, these metrics have become even more important!)
Most email fundraisers (ourselves included) tend to use recent openers to build an “active list”. This won’t be effective anymore. Instead, consider building your list around new contacts (through our Honor Your Caregiver℠ platform).
There are still quite a few unknowns when it comes to the impact of this change. But it’s important to remember that this is a barrier you can overcome. Email marketing and fundraising is a dynamic industry because it has to be. We’ve maintained our success in non-profit hospital digital fundraising by sticking to the Four Pillars of Successful Email Campaigns and identifying innovative new ways to connect with our audiences.
If you need a team of dedicated experts by your side to help you navigate this change and build a digital fundraising program that you can count on, drop us a line and connect directly to a member of our team. We can’t wait to hear from you!
No matter when you’re reading this, there’s likely a fundraising campaign right around the corner. As we write this in January 2022, our team is already ramping up for Doctor’s Day in March. Are you prepared for your next campaign?
In our years of experience helping non-profit hospitals raise money, we’ve made countless changes and optimizations to the way we strategize and implement our campaigns. No matter the changes, we consistently return to what we see as the four cornerstones of successful email fundraising. Keep these in mind as you prepare for your next campaign:
Your relationship with your donors, just like any relationship, needs cultivation and hard work. Donors don’t only want to hear from you when you’re asking for money. Be sure to steward them throughout the year and keep them up-to-date on what’s going on within your organization. They’ll be more likely to give at campaign time, and will appreciate hearing what’s new in your hospital. After all, they likely helped pay for it!
Pro-Tip: Build regular stewardship communications into your communications calendar ahead of time.
These goals don’t have to be a dollar amount. They can be a number of donations, a number of new donors, or anything else creative! What matters is setting a goal that you and your donors can aspire to. And if you can secure a matching gift from a generous individual or business, it helps create buy-in from the rest of your community. They see that others are supporting you, and they want to join.
You know when your campaign ends. Make sure that your donors know that, too. Using your goal or matching gift is a great way to drive urgency. Explain to your donors why it’s important that they donate now, not tomorrow or next month.
It’s perfectly fine to raise money for your organization’s area of greatest need. But be sure to tell your donors exactly what that’s funding. If your hospital needs new medical equipment, or you’re funding a nursing education scholarship, make that clear! Donors are significantly more likely to give if there are tangible priorities that they can help you achieve.
Pro-Tip: Use clinical staff to your advantage here. Hearing from a physician or a nurse why a new piece of equipment or a facility upgrade matters to them can be very impactful.
No matter what your next campaign is, best of luck! And remember that our team is here to help. We love working with non-profit hospitals to optimize digital fundraising and communications. If you want to learn more, we want to hear from you! Connect with a member of our team today.
If you’re anything like us, you’re constantly obsessing over every aspect of your fundraising emails. What can I do to boost my open rate? Is my content engaging enough? What changes can I make to raise more money? The smallest details can make or break your email campaign. As you know, less engagement means fewer donations. And that leaves your foundation with less to invest in your patients, caregivers, and community.
Here are four simple email best practices to set you up for fundraising success:
Emails from a physician or other clinical leader can produce open rates 2-3x the industry average*. Your supporters see them as trustworthy, familiar, and authoritative. And they can provide a unique perspective about the impact of philanthropy. As an added bonus, engaging with physicians is a great way to build a relationship between clinical staff and your foundation. *(Source: Digital Health Strategies Internal Data)
The subject line is the first piece of content your supporters see in their inboxes. It should be catchy, engaging, and make the reader want to learn more. Avoid direct asks in your subject line, be careful with emojis and punctuation, and be concise. This ensures that your message gets through spam filters and is opened by your supporters. When in doubt, use A/B testing.
Even half an hour’s difference in send times can have a drastic impact on your engagement rates. Every audience is different, so it’s important to take a look at your personal trends. In general, avoid sending fundraising emails on the weekends, late in the afternoon, or very early in the morning. For us, 8:30 am is usually a safe bet.
Your email should have a single call to action: “Donate now, Honor Your Caregiver℠ today,” or “register soon.” Too many asks can clutter your email and cause confusion for your supporters. Make sure that your ask is direct, and make it as simple as possible for your supporters to follow through.
At Digital Health Strategies, we obsess over the details so that you don’t have to. Through years of working with non-profit hospital foundations of all sizes, we’ve identified the trends that drive success in digital fundraising. If you’re ready to learn more and maximize your fundraising opportunities, we’d love to hear from you. Send us an email and let’s get to work!
It’s time to turn your grateful patient program digital. As more and more of your supporters use online channels to engage and donate, it’s critical to your fundraising efforts that you be on the leading edge of the trends that drive success and growth for your organization. Taking this step can save you time and money and cultivate your donors in a new and exciting way. And getting this started may be simpler than you’d expect. Let’s break it down:
Turning your grateful patient program digital accomplishes everything that your existing program does — without the headache and cost of direct mail and other channels. Instead, you’ll use the power of email and automation to reach discharged patients in a timely and efficient manner, driving them to a customized web application to share their stories, honor their caregivers, and donate to your organization.
Don’t just take our word for it. Digital grateful patient programs are driving results for non-profit hospital foundations of all sizes right now. One of our clients implemented a digital grateful patient program and grew their email list by 500% within one year. On top of that, they converted one patient into a $1 million+ donor within 6 months of receiving a grateful patient email message.
We’re experts in building digital grateful patient programs that work for our client’s specific needs. We’ve helped non-profit hospital foundations of all sizes grow their email lists, honor their caregivers, and raise more money.
Our Honor Your Caregiver℠ platform provides you with every tool you need to get this done. Within 90 days, we’ll help you launch a digital grateful patient program with customized messaging and content, a dedicated online platform for patients to share a story and make a contribution, and automated workflows to streamline the process from discharge to donation.
Ready to learn more? We’d love to hear from you! Reach out to us and our member of our team would be happy to chat!
WASHINGTON, D.C., Dec. 14, 2021. — Digital Health Strategies, which specializes in creating comprehensive digital fundraising strategies for healthcare organizations, and the Association for Healthcare Philanthropy (AHP), which provides education, networking, information and research to hospital foundations, today announced the publication of the first-ever Digital Fundraising Benchmark Report for Hospitals.
Designed exclusively with hospital foundations in mind, the groundbreaking report uses data gathered from regional and national U.S. health systems, academic medical centers and specialty hospitals to provide insights and metrics that matter to hospital foundations and which can help strengthen their fundraising and digital operations.
“Seeing how our performance stacks up against other hospital foundations will help us identify the areas we need to optimize. We can also benefit by implementing many of the best practices outlined in the report.”
— Robin L. Endicott, CFRE
Vice President, Philanthropy, Geisinger Health Foundation.
“The shift toward digital fundraising in healthcare philanthropy accelerated during the pandemic. Knowing our current performance and adopting new best practices is critical to continuing that evolution and succeeding in an increasingly digital world.”
— Alice Ayres
President and CEO, Association for Healthcare Philanthropy
Digital Health Strategies is a boutique digital agency dedicated to serving the needs of healthcare providers. Their team brings decades of expertise with Fortune 500 companies, national nonprofit organizations and Silicon Valley to create comprehensive data, technology and communication solutions that healthcare organizations can use to effectively reach patients, physicians and donors. Visit DigitalHealthStrategies.com to learn more.
The Association for Healthcare Philanthropy is an international professional organization that provides education, networking, information and research to more than 5,500 development professionals worldwide. Visit www.ahp.org to learn more.
Digital Health Strategies
Matthew Tripsas, Director of Partnerships
matt@digitalhealthstrategies.com
Association for Healthcare Philanthropy
Jenny Love, Chief Content Officer
jenny@ahp.org
