Proud to have contributed a blog to the European Fundraising Association's site this month on why keeping a watchful eye on changes in how the public are feeling and on the wider environment is critical for supporter loyalty. It also includes essential recommendations for communications:
Supporter loyalty is vital for fundraising organisations that rely on individual giving. Roger Lawson, founding director of About Loyalty, explains why nonprofits need to monitor changes in public sentiment and the wider environment to tune into donor motivations and drive up loyalty.
Well before the pandemic struck, we were becoming more and more aware of the importance of donor loyalty. In the UK, media scrutiny and nonprofit scandals had damaged public trust, while ever decreasing donor acquisition returns had made it impossible to recruit donors in the volumes we used to, and GDPR had forced the fundraising sector to see the importance of donor data and consent and appreciate that this doesn’t come easily.
And then the COVID-19 pandemic shut off many of the donor acquisition channels that were left.