By: Keisha Hartman

New year, new donors.

Did your end-of-year fundraising efforts reward you with new supporters? Now’s your chance to steward and cultivate these donors into long-lasting partnerships. We’ve put together our three top ways to follow up!

1. Implement a Welcome Series

Get to know your donors with a three-part email welcome series to welcome them to your work and to engage them more deeply in your mission. Here are some examples of content to include:

• A link to a YouTube video sharing more about the campaign or organization
• Create a survey to ask more questions about what inspired the donor to give or what topics they’re interested in learning more about
• Highlight a specific program
• Offer other ways to get involved, such as volunteering, becoming a monthly donor, or spreading awareness

2. Send an Impact Message

Take a quick video on your phone, or write a handwritten letter thanking and updating the donor on the impact they’ve made. This helps illustrate the value in continuing to support your cause. Include a donor-centric tone focusing on “you” rather than “I” or “we”. Here are some key phrases to try:

• Look what you accomplished
• You are helping X
• Your support drives X

3. Give a Shout-out on Social Media

Don’t forget to include social media when you are thanking and updating your donors on the impact of the campaign. Repurpose and resize your content from your thank you email for your social channels. Like any other campaign, taking an integrated approach allows you to interact with your constituents at every touch point. Consider these tactics for social:

• Go “live” for a behind the scenes look at what the donors have helped fund
• Create an infographic using Canva to tell a story that shows their impact
• Highlight and tag your sponsor to show them some extra love
• Share a video of a thank you message from the CEO

Taking the time to follow-up with your new donors isn’t as hard as you may think. An extra “thank you” can go a long way. If you need some help crafting a donor stewardship strategy, please drop us a line and chat with one of our senior fundraising consultants.