Essential Stewardship for COVID Donors
Your communications and stewardship strategies during this difficult time will bear fruit.
Some days it can be difficult to find the positive in all of this, but each day I try to take a moment to find something to be grateful for – maybe it’s health, a nice sunny day, or extra time with family. And for many of your organizations, I’m sure you are grateful for the opportunity to continue to provide your vital services to the community – largely thanks to those donors who stood by and partnered with you during these past few months. So, let’s thank them again and again!
The essentials of stewardship and reporting back to our donors are more important than ever.
Many organizations have had an influx of first-time donors or reactivation of lapsed donors, which is excellent news. But now you must keep these donors engaged with your mission. You have been given the important opportunity to help supporters feel connected and serve a greater good, even from their home!
As with any gift, a prompt and personalized acknowledgment is necessary. While getting letters out is a bit more complicated now, still try to acknowledge these gifts as quickly as possible. And if there is a delay in printed acknowledgments, then make a thank you call and let them know their official thank you is on the way. And if your staff has the bandwidth from home, you can divide up even more of the lower dollar gifts and ask associate level staff to make thank you calls as well.
Impact reports are also an important communication tool right now to let your donors know how you’ve spent their donations so far – maybe it is PPE for your staff or shifting focus to provide virtual services if your doors are closed. Whatever it is, provide your donors with real-life examples of the lives changed thanks to their gift.
While a tour or in-person event is not possible right now, maybe now is the time to hold a Facebook Live behind-the-scenes tour, special sermon, send a short ‘thank you’ video, or hold a Q&A video call with your Executive Director for top donors. It doesn’t take much technical expertise to facilitate a meaningful video conference these days, so take advantage of this opportunity to get to know your donors and share more stories with them.
Your communications and stewardship strategies during this difficult time will bear fruit. You never know a donor’s situation, so let’s not make any decisions for them on their giving or communication desires at this time. Those meaningful touchpoints via mail, phone, email, and social media can go a long way for a donor and might just be the “pick-me-up” they were looking for!
And as always, our team is here to help if you need assistance with your stewardship plans. Please contact me at alyssa.jefferies@meyerpartners.com.