Increasing trust and engagement in fundraising
From a video at Digital Leaders
Ripples is a donation app created by a social enterprise which rounds up your card payment and then donates the pennies to your chosen not-for-profit and reports back on your impact. At a recent Digital Leaders conference, they reported on some research and results of piloting an impact feature. The video of the talk is below but key points are:
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In a 2021 charity commission report on donor trust, just 17% of donors are convinced that a high proportion of charity funds raised go towards the intended cause.
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Ripples research found 88% of donors said it is very important to them that their social impact was tracked.
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People are saying that they care about where their donations go but not actually following up.
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Although charities have space on website for impact it is not communicating with donors – they are not engaging with impact reports and newsletters that the charities put out as a matter of course.
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The way we consume information and communicate is getting faster and faster all the time. Our attention spans have shrunk drastically from 12 seconds in 2000 to 8 seconds in 2015 (Microsoft research).
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We now expect a certain experience from the brands that we engage with – fast, highly personal, timely.
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When you compare those experiences with the way that charities communicate social impact, the majority of charities are falling behind with things like; annual impact reports, long monthly emails/newsletters, impersonal social posts.
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Ripples is a donation app that encourages small regular donations. They were really interested in the idea of impact tracking and seeing how they could show and engage donors enough so they actually consume evidence of impact.
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They asked the question, ‘What if donors could understand their impact in five seconds?’. They created an impact feed within the app – micro moments that make you feel good. You get push notification from the charity you support giving you a really personal tangible piece of information about what your donations are doing, e.g. your £2.89 this week could protect 7000 sqm of rainforest (Rainforest Trust).
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It's all about delivering fast and highly personalized evidence, it's making the donor a lead character in the fundraising story.
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Pilot of the impact feeding experience with 4 charities found donor feedback was overwhelmingly positive. All respondents preferred this method of communication over monthly emails or magazines. Measures of trust and affinity with the charity increased in 80% of participants.
Watch this 11 minute video:
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From a video at Digital Leaders, 04/10/2022