10 ways to supercharge your year-end giving

The end-of-year season is always packed with holidays, travel, and, hopefully, charitable donations! To help you make the most of your nonprofit’s year-end giving strategy, we’ve assembled 10 essential fundraising tips and techniques. 

For extra inspiration, you’ll see real-life campaign examples from nonprofits that knocked it out of the park, with a breakdown of what made these year-end fundraisers so successful. 

Year-end giving by the numbers

November and December really are the most wonderful times of the year if you’re fundraising for a nonprofit or other worthy cause. Let’s look at the numbers:

• In 2023, 34 million people participated in Giving Tuesday, raising $3.1B for good causes in just the U.S. 💛
• Nearly a third of annual giving happens in the month of December alone. 📅
• The final three days of December account for a full 10% of the donations that nonprofits bring in for the year. 💰

Why are end-of-year donations so high? Aside from typical holiday generosity, many individuals and institutions make last-minute donations to reduce their taxable income (and make a difference, of course) before the tax year ends when the ball drops on December 31.

Dive deeper

Learn more surprising statistics you might not know about year-end giving →

Build a better year-end giving campaign with these 10 tips

Revise your fundraising strategy ahead of the holiday season and make sure you’re prepared for the biggest fundraising period of the year.

1. Reflect on past campaigns 📈

Check out your previous fundraising campaigns to help you craft a data-driven annual giving plan and set realistic goals for your end-of-the-year campaign.

Have your key metrics available and ask yourself the following questions:

• What was the average gift amount last year? 
• What was the average cost per donor?
• Which segments of your donor base gave the most?
• What were the most popular campaigns with each donor segment?
• Which campaigns had the greatest engagement?
• What campaigns raised the most money?
• Which channels were best at converting donors (email, direct mail, social media, etc.)?

2. Let your software do the heavy lifting 🤖

It’s the busiest time of the year, and every minute you spend updating contacts, tallying up donation totals, or sending confirmation emails manually is time you aren’t connecting with donors. Put your fundraising and donor management tools to use to help you raise money and stay organized. 

• Fundraising pages: Create a year-end campaign page or donation form for simplified giving.
• Communication channels: Design and automate outbound text and email blasts for your year-end appeal.
• Donor management: Track supporter activity and create easy donor segments with a CRM.

💡 Pro tip: Givebutter everything you need for a successful year-end giving campaign—all in one place and all completely free! Explore our top-rated features for fundraising, donor management, and nonprofit marketing. 

3. Optimize your website 🤩

There are several ways you can make your website stand out and bring in more donations. Consider optimizing by:

• Putting your campaign front and center: Update your homepage or donation page with your year-end appeal messaging. For instance, change it to a holiday theme, update your headline, and add your campaign hashtag.
• Adding an action: Embed a custom donation form, donate button, or other website widget connected to your year-end campaign. 
• Making it mobile: Don’t forget to double-check that your website is mobile friendly for supporters viewing from their smartphones.

4. Engage with your donors well before year-end 👋

You should be engaging with your donors regularly, but it’s especially important when it comes to the year-end giving season. Consider using a different outreach strategy for each segment, such as major contributors, recurring supporters, new givers, potential donors, and volunteers. 

5. Create a sense of urgency 🚨

Even the strongest year-end giving campaigns have to battle against apathy—the human tendency is to say, “I’ll give later.” To make sure donors give before the year’s over, inspire them with techniques like these on your online donation forms:

• Use strong, time-bound language: Include phrases like “Don’t miss out!” in your year-end appeal, especially for your email subject lines.
• Give a reason: Think about what truly motivates your donors to give and be as specific as possible about the impact their contribution will make.
• Try a matching gift: Set a deadline for donors to get their funds doubled or tripled.
• Offer different giving levels: Customize the suggested donation amounts on your form so supporters can feel good about their impact regardless of their contribution level.
• Make it relevant: Contextualize your appeal by sharing your nonprofit’s progress and connect it to real-world news, if applicable.

More to explore

Learn how to write a year-end appeal that resonates (free template!) →

6. Seek out collaborations 🔥

A thoughtful collaboration—whether it’s a corporate sponsorship, a matching gift program, or a new partner program—can maximize your fundraising efforts. These partnerships can help you increase your brand exposure, gain a new audience, and get some fresh ideas at the year’s end.

As long as your goals and core values align, you can approach anyone—from your local bookstore to major retail brands.

7. Emphasize recurring giving options 🔁

Recurring donations are on the rise, which is good news for nonprofit organizations in need of more sustainable funding. Enable monthly giving options in your donation flow, and be sure to emphasize the benefits of recurring giving for donors, not just your organization. 

8. Create a year-end email series

An end-of-year drip campaign can keep your organization top of mind, build momentum, and provide multiple touchpoints for donors to connect with your cause. 

Need some inspiration? Start with this structure to customize your own end-of-year drip series.   

• Email 1: Send a recap of the year’s milestones and express gratitude in November.
• Email 2: Kick off your campaign reveal and ask for donors to contribute in early December.
• Email 3: Share a heartfelt message and a reminder to give around the holidays in mid-December.
• Email 4: Communicate a last call to donate, including a tax credit reminder, in late December.

9. Share end-of-year reports

Sharing end-of-year reports both internally and externally is another essential piece of year-end giving, helping your organization build trust, demonstrate accountability, and plan for the future. 

• Sharing reports with donors: To solidify your relationship with supporters, send personalized end-of-year giving summaries—necessary for both tax purposes and donor retention.
• Sharing reports with stakeholders: Sharing data with board members and community partners, for example, not only helps wrap up the year efficiently but also sets a strong foundation for continued support in the year ahead.

10. Track all of your to-dos in one place

One of the most important steps in ensuring a successful year-end giving campaign is task tracking. Without a clear system, it’s all too easy for crucial steps to slip through the cracks. 

Instead of manually tracking your to-dos, use a task manager that will allow you to automate and assign repetitive tasks, set due dates, schedule notifications, and ensure that everyone knows what needs to be done and when. 

💡 Pro tip: Givebutter Plus automated workflows and centralized task manager make it easy for your team to get ahead of their to-do list—and stay there!

Download a free year-end giving checklist

Want to make sure you’re set up for success? Download our free year-end checklist that covers everything you need to accomplish before the holidays roll around.

Freebie alert!

Download your free year-end fundraising checklist ->

5 year-end giving campaign ideas and examples you can learn from

Covenant Community Inc. 🫂

Covenant Community Inc. (CCI) is an organization that helps support men suffering from addiction. 

Here’s what we love about their end-of-year campaign:

• Visuals: CCI includes an image of real people with a tagline, which is a powerful way to create connection and encourage action. Putting a face to the cause can go a long way.
• Evidence of impact: To assure supporters that their contributions are meaningful to the cause, CCI lists several of their accomplishments thus far.
• Clear goals: CCI breaks down exactly how donations will support their initiatives—from educating family members to improving communication.

Foster Love Project 👕

Foster Love Project assists children impacted by foster and kinship care through the provision of goods, services, and support.

Here’s why we love their year-end campaign:

• Program specifics: FLP explains each of their initiatives clearly and succinctly so supporters know exactly how their contributions will make a difference.
• Videos: This campaign uses two videos—one that provides a powerful overview of the mission and another that highlights real beneficiaries. Together, they create a compelling narrative about the impact of the cause.
• Gift matching: FLP was able to surpass its campaign goal in part due to a generous matching donation offer—a strategy that is often essential to encouraging more people to give.

Fight Colorectal Cancer (Fight CRC) 🏥

Fight Colorectal Cancer (Fight CRC) serves as a relentless champion of hope for all affected by this disease through informed patient support, impactful policy change, and breakthrough research endeavors.

Here’s why we love their end-of-year fundraising campaign:

• Recurring giving: When supporters click “Donate,” they’re prompted to consider a monthly contribution, too.
• Gift matching: Fight CRC notes that donations will be doubled up to $50,000 by an anonymous donor. Talk about motivation! 
• Peer-to-peer fundraising: Fight CRC lists every individual fundraiser on their page, including the number of donations each has received, as well as the total raised. 

Word in Black 📰

Word in Black is a groundbreaking collaboration of the nation’s leading Black news publishers.

Here is why we love their end-of-year giving campaign:

• Customized to brand: Word in Black’s fundraising page features a custom image that’s tailored to their brand colors and style, so supporters never forget their unique mission.
• Clear and to the point: This nonprofit makes their ask simple and succinct so donors know exactly to whom and why they’re giving.
• Supporter feed: Word in Black’s use of their supporter feed provides donors with social proof of others who are contributing to the cause.

APBD Research Foundation 🩺

APBD Research Foundation​​ advocates for patients’ unmet needs, develops networks of health professionals, and funds research. For their year-end campaign, they incorporated several best practices that paid off.

Here is why we love their year-end campaign:

• Impact infographics: APBD’s fundraising page includes custom infographics that show the nonprofit’s progress over the years.
• Lots of gratitude: Throughout the custom copy on their fundraising page, this nonprofit consistently thanks and acknowledges supporters for all of their contributions thus far.
• Easily shareable: With Givebutter’s one-click social share feature, any supporter can spread the word about the campaign right from their own social media posts.

Access free, easy, and fun year-end fundraising with Givebutter

It’s never too early to start planning your year-end giving strategy to make sure you hit your fundraising goals and gain new followers. 

‍Sign up for a free Givebutter account today and get access to an all-in-one fundraising experience. With Givebutter, you can make interactive fundraising pages, send beautiful emails, accept every payment method, track donor engagement, and create exciting fundraising events (including auctions!) for your year-end giving campaign.

Want to free up even more time during the holidays? With Givebutter Plus, your team can automate donor communications with powerful workflows, securely create, schedule, and share reports automatically, and manage all of your team’s to-dos in a centralized task manager.