Easiest Free Way to Retain Donors and Get Funding

We talked about sustainable fundraising earlier. Retaining donors fall into stewardship and one of the easiest ways to retain donors is by email. The best part of email is that you can schedule them, saving you time. Let’s explore an email schedule and how to save time.

Email Schedule

Your email schedule will follow a set pattern to keep it easy for you. This pattern is thank you, mission/related, and need / appeal. If you haven’t been doing email, start easy at once a quarter. The main point here is consistency. If four emails is all you can consistently handle, then once a quarter is all you need. If you can handle more, then do it. You can’t communicate how awesome donors are too much!

Thank you emails will follow the pattern

• Thank your donor for their donation / support
• Tell them how their donation is being used

Mission related emails will follow the pattern

• Tell a story related to your mission. Think impact here.
• Major donors your hero of the story
• Thank them for transforming a life – helping your cause

Need / appeal

• Tell us a story that illustrates the need
• Ask
• Thank
• When did you have to turn someone away?
• Is there a waitlist you want to help?

Saving Time

The best thing about email is that you can schedule them way in advance. If you decide to send one email a quarter, you can schedule all 4 at one time for the entire year! Since you know your basic content, writing email won’t take long. Sit down in half to a full day and get it done for the year.

Another time-saving tip 

Use a story bank for your stories. A story bank is simply a strategy to store and reference stories from your nonprofit. Having stories saved up will help you save time when you need to find a story.

 

Get your email schedule and start.  Consistency is key in an email schedule.

 

Sample Schedules 

 

One email per quarter (minimum schedule)

 

Q1 Jan-Mar	Feb	Thank you themed email
Q2 Apr-Jun	May	Mission/Donor Centered email
Q3 July-Sep	Aug	Mission/Donor Centered email
Q4 Oct-Dec	Nov	Need Statement and Appeal (4th quarter)

 

Mid-range schedule (every other month approximately)

 

Q1 Jan-Mar	Jan Mar	Thank you- Donor Centered Mission and Donor Centered
Q2 Apr- Jun	May	Mission Centered
Q3 Jul-Sept	Jul Sept	Need/Appeal Thank you- Donor Centered
Q4 Oct-Dec	Oct Dec	Mission Centered Need/Appeal

 

Ambitious schedule

 

Pro tip- Add a story from your mission page or website. Use in an email and social media when you need a story but don’t have time to find one.

 

 

Q1Jan-Mar	JanFeb Mar	Thank youMission/donor centered Mission centered
Q2Apr-Jun	AprMay June	Thank youMission centered Need appeal
Q3Jul-Sept	JulyAug Sept	Thank youMission centered Mission centered
Q4Oct-Dec	OctNov Dec	Thank you- donor centeredMission Centered Need/appeal

 

Another Pro Tip and Timesaver- lay out three stories now that you want to tell. The 4th will come from your year-end campaign.

 

Need more help? I write Donor Retention Plans for organizations. Check out the plans or schedule a free call to talk about how I may help you.

 

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Keywords: nonprofit donor retention, email

Tags: Fundraising