People give money to institutions and organizations not only because it helps them maintain a social identity but also because they want to transform lives and make an impact.
However, this can be a difficult thing for the college to tap into, as requests for alumni donations are most frequently made via telethon or through direct mail, both of which inherently lack personal connection. Just as the college should work to build genuine connections with alumni, alumni should work to maintain these connections, too.
As a result, alumni will likely be more willing to donate to the student experience. The key to improving engagement with and support from alumni is finding out what their interests and passions are and matching those with available opportunities at your institution.
At Mongoose, we work with hundreds of colleges and universities, helping them foster relationships with their students and alumni, and most examples of success involve an emotional or personal connection being made. It can be difficult to collect the interests of thousands of alumni.
But there is a way if you have a means of contact. Would you mind answering this one question survey — Which of the following do you identify with the most?
Software and Information Systems B. College of Computing and Informatics C. Athletics D. The Library E. After all, a picture is worth a thousand words. Whatever you do, make sure your posts are consistent. Instead, post multiple times a week, analyze which types of posts alumni interact with, and adjust your strategy according to those results. Want to continue your research? For more effective social media tips, click here. Why this works: These days, social media is the preferred method of communication.
It allows you to reach a wider audience of alumni members by telling powerful stories. Instead, enable multiple giving opportunities and establish a strong line of communication.
Start implementing these strategies, and boost alumni engagement today! Her experience ranges from working onsite and remotely with clients executing phonathon programs, developing annual giving strategies, onsite consultations and also developing multichannel strategies allowing for strong synergy between annual giving channels and creating strong major and planned gift pipelines. Katie is based in Metro Detroit and is a graduate of Central Michigan University, where she worked for the phonathon for 3 years while working towards her History Major.
Kim Jennings, CFRE is a skilled fundraising leader who believes in the power of Christian education to raise up thoughtful, strong, committed leaders who can make our world a better place for all. Jennifer is a skilled fundraising and communications professional who helps ministries articulate vision, communicate mission, and raise abundant funds to advance Kingdom priorities.
Here are a few effective strategies to help you get started: Encourage donations using corporate giving tech. Invest in a digital fundraising platform. Create personas to better understand alumni.
Use automation to keep alumni engaged. Turn to social media for more effective outreach. Ready to revamp your alumni engagement strategy? Read on! Encourage donations using corporate giving tech Chances are, your school is looking to enhance alumni engagement for revenue-sake.
If eligible, they submit the appropriate form to their employer. The employer confirms the donation to your school. Invest in a digital fundraising platform Schools of all sizes rely on funding to continue evolving. For instance, the right platform can help your school do the following: Organize giving events. Gamify fundraising. Keep up with your youngest alumni and start developing those social media engagements. Concentrate most of your efforts there for the most fruitful engagement.
Ask your current students to help run this account for a more intuitive touch! Vary your engagements to more than fundraising asks. Customize your online donation form to include a recurring gifts option. A way to increase alumni participation and your donor retention rate is to encourage recurring gifts. With a recurring gift of a smaller amount, they can end up donating their original gift and even surpass it. Conduct prospect research.
Many nonprofits and other charitable organizations turn to prospect research to better understand their donors and engage with them. For instance: Affinity to give. This helps determine how likely someone is to give. Prospect research will screen alumni for philanthropic motivations, such as past charitable giving, personal relationship to cause, involvement with other nonprofits, and political giving. Capacity to give. This helps determine how much someone might give. Prospect research will screen alumni for wealth markers, such as past giving amounts, real estate ownership, stock ownership, and business affiliations.
Using a Prospect Research Tool Prospect research can be done manually, but it would take an incredible amount of resources and time. With a top-notch prospect research tool, you can increase alumni giving with: Major donors. As you know, alumni participation has gone down and major alumni givers are making up a larger chunk of annual alumni giving.
It makes sense to want to start those relationships early on and then continue to cultivate them. This way, the next time that alumni want to give, your university is at the top of their minds. Alumni who are most likely to become major givers are those with both a high affinity and high capacity to give. Prospect research is used heavily to identify potential major donors early on so fundraisers can prioritize those engagements.
Matching gifts. Corporate matching gift programs are essentially giving out free money. However, not enough fundraisers are taking advantage of it, and not enough eligible donors even know about it. Donor-advised funds. Donor-advised funds DAF , the fastest growing form of philanthropy today, is a type of philanthropic giving where someone deposits contributions into a dedicated savings account for charity.
The catch? Prospect research can identify alumni who have DAF accounts. This way, you can start developing that relationship early on. When they have to choose their recipient, you could be first in line. Planned Giving. Planned gifts are essentially a gift that is arranged in the present and then given at a later time. Often, planned gifts are granted once the donor has passed away. Though prospect research cannot predict who is preparing a planned gift, it can highlight key donor traits that might indicate a planned gift is possible.
For instance, it can look out for metrics such as age, whether they have children, how affected the alumni were by the school, past giving history to school, and more. From there you can begin to nurture those relationships. Deep dive more into prospect research and the best ways to approach it. Learn more about your donors and increase fundraising in no time.
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