The Blackbaud Index of Charitable Giving and The Blackbaud Index of Online Giving provide fundraisers with up-to-date data on fundraising trends and to couple that information with valuable analysis by leaders in the sector.

Blackbaud updates these indices each month and they are based on a three-month moving average of year- over-year percent changes in revenue. This makes them less sensitive to small timing issues or large fluctuations over a short period of time.

Overall Fundraising Trends

The Blackbaud Index of Charitable Giving is a broad-based fundraising index that reports total revenue trends of 2.512 nonprofit organizations representing $7.4 billion in yearly revenue on a monthly basis, both offline and online. The Index is based on actual revenue statistics from nonprofit organizations of all sizes representing arts, culture, and humanities; education; environment and animals; healthcare; human services; international affairs; public and society benefit; and religion sectors.

The Blackbaud Index of Charitable Giving reports that overall revenue increased by 2.2% for the 3 months ending March 2012 as compared to the same period in 2011.

Online Fundraising Trends

The Blackbaud Index of Online Giving is a broad-based fundraising index that reports online revenue trends of more than 1,832 nonprofit organizations representing $381 million in yearly revenue on a monthly basis. The Index is based on actual revenue statistics from nonprofit organizations of all sizes representing arts, culture, and humanities; education; environment and animals; healthcare; human services; international affairs; and public and society benefit sectors.

The Blackbaud Index of Online Giving reports that online revenue increased by 9.8% for the 3 months ending March 2012 as compared to the same period in 2011.

NTEN is back in San Francisco and the NTC conference is once again sold out. You can follow what’s happening on Twitter by searching for the #12NTC hash tag.

If you can’t attend in person, then please check out NTC Online. It has lots of sessions available for viewing at a very affordable price.

Once again this year, Blackbaud is live streaming a few of the sessions. To view any of these sessions live, simply go to www.blackbaud.tv/12ntc at the session start time.

Better Nonprofit Websites: 52 Tweaks in 52 Weeks
April 4 from 10:30 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. (PT)
Speakers: Raheel Gauba and Jono Young

101 Social Media Tactics for Nonprofits
April 4 from 1:30 to 3:00 p.m. (PT)
Speakers: Chad Norman and Melanie Mathos

What is Social Influencer REALLY Worth?
April 4 from 3:30 to 5:00 p.m. (PT)
Speakers: Mark Davis and Casey Golden

Gaming for Good: Boosting Fundraising, Engagement, and Connection
April 5 from 10:30 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. (PT)
Speaker: Frank Barry

I will be doing a completed updated version of my “5 Biggest Trends in Online Fundraising” session. Check out my slides on Slideshare…

Disclosure: I serve on the board of directors of NTEN.

Blackbaud released its 2011 Online Giving report today. The report combines findings from The Blackbaud Index of Online Giving with additional multi-year giving data to provide the most comprehensive analysis of online giving trends in the nonprofit sector.

The report includes 24 months of online giving data from 1,895 nonprofit organizations, online major giving data from 2,397 nonprofits, and both online and offline data representing $5.1 billion in total fundraising from 1,560 nonprofits.

Here are some key findings in the 2011 Online Giving Report:

• Online giving was up 13% on a year-over-year basis when large International Affairs organizations are removed from the analysis.
• 54% of the organizations in the analysis experienced results at or above this growth rate.
• Large organizations grew by 8.6% and medium organizations grew 13.1% in 2011. Smaller nonprofits grew 12.8% compared to the same time period in 2010.
• When large International Affairs organizations are included in the analysis the growth rate drops to 0.3%.
• The Japanese earthquake and tsunami in March 2011 had no significant effect on the overall online giving trends.
• 34.8% of online giving happened in October, November, and December of 2011.
• 87% of organizations had at least one online gift of $1,000 or more.
• The percentage of total fundraising that comes from online giving decreased to 6.3%.
• Every nonprofit sector in the analysis has had double-digit online fundraising growth since 2009.

Lots more data, trends, and analysis in the complete report. You can download the 2011 Online Giving Report here.

Many special thanks to Jim O’Shaughnessy and Allison Van Diest for their help on the report again this year.

The Blackbaud Index of Charitable Giving reports that fundraising has returned to pre-recession levels. Through the first 11 months of 2011, overall giving is up 3.4% over 2010, and is now officially above the level of giving last seen in 2007. Most economists agree that is when the recession began.

“Total U.S. charitable giving appears to finally be back to its pre-recession levels. Fundraising remains challenging but hopefully the worst is behind us, and nonprofits will continue to see positive growth in 2012,” according to Chuck Longfield, Blackbaud’s chief scientist.

He also noted that while giving is up, the increase is not uniform across all sub-sectors. However, most nonprofits saw greater stability and predictability in their 2011 fundraising than in the past few years.

There are two important caveats to the trends. First, the demand for services from nonprofit organizations remains high and in some sectors continues to grow. Second, when adjusting for inflation, fundraising dollars are not yet back to where they were before the recession began.

The other good news is that the Blackbaud Index of Online Giving continues to show double-digit growth in November. This marks seven consecutive months with growth over 10% on a year-over-year basis. Online giving growth remains very positive across small, medium, and large sized nonprofit organizations. These trends are important to see in the last quarter when a very significant amount of online giving happens.

Overall Fundraising Trends

The Blackbaud Index of Charitable Giving is a broad-based fundraising index that reports total revenue trends of 1,281 nonprofit organizations representing $2.5 billion in yearly revenue on a monthly basis, both offline and online. The Index is based on actual revenue statistics from nonprofit organizations of all sizes representing arts, culture, and humanities; education; environment and animals; healthcare; human services; international affairs; public and society benefit; and religion sectors.

The Blackbaud Index of Charitable Giving reports that overall revenue increased by 1.4% for the 3 months ending November 2011 as compared to the same period in 2010.

Online Fundraising Trends

The Blackbaud Index of Online Giving is a broad-based fundraising index that reports online revenue trends of more than 1,769 nonprofit organizations representing $383 million in yearly revenue on a monthly basis. The Index is based on actual revenue statistics from nonprofit organizations of all sizes representing arts, culture, and humanities; education; environment and animals; healthcare; human services; international affairs; and public and society benefit sectors.

The Blackbaud Index of Online Giving reports that online revenue increased by 12.0% for the 3 months ending November 2011 as compared to the same period in 2010.

I get a lot of nonprofit email messages through subscribing to lists, working with lots of organizations, and being a donor. That means my inbox gets pretty flooded at the end of each year.

Back in 2010, I wrote about all the direct mail pieces that I had collected over a year. This time I collected all of the nonprofit emails that I was sent between December 15, 2011 and January 1, 2012. Here’s what I discovered after going through all the email messages.

So Different, Yet So Similar
Despite these organizations having a wide variety of missions and causes — it was surprising and a bit concerning how similar most of the subject lines appeared to be.

It was almost as if many organizations were reading from the same recipe book. It was very common to receive multiple messages from different nonprofits at about the same time with very similar subject lines.

I ran the subject lines of the 80 emails from 35 nonprofits through a text analyzer. Common words and the names of the organizations were removed. The result was that words like “give” and “gift” were used the most along with “deadline” and “midnight” in the subject lines. “Donate” and “support” were less common as was “thank” in the emails.

The subject lines also followed a similar pattern over 18 days. The emails began on December 15th with a holiday related message before shifting to gift or giving subject lines, and then a major focus on the end of year and tax-deduction reminders by December 31st. The frequency of the emails and sense of urgency also increased up until the end of the year.

Now, I certainly realize that the subject line is just one part of a successful email message. How you segment the message and the actual content and calls-to-action are also very important. But end-of-year and time-sensitive emails place a higher importance on the subject line. This is because a tremendous amount of email during this time of year is read on mobile devices and the subject line may be the online thing people see.

I may be an outlier because of the volume of emails that I receive and that I’m really paying attention to them — but imagine what potential donors are seeing.

Standing Out in the Inbox
The average donors gives to 3 or more nonprofits. By now, most nonprofits are engaged in email marketing. They might not all be sending a lot of email but you can guarantee that they use email as part of their end of year fundraising programs. This mad dash at the end of the year creates an attention crunch and nonprofits that don’t stand out are simply going to be ignored. The key to success is standing out in the in the Inbox.

From a completely subjective perspective, I would say that less than 10 of the emails subject lines stood out in some remarkable way. One email with a subject line of “Is it Friday yet? Email error” caught my attention enough to read the actual message. The organization was apologizing for sending members and lapsed members the same email appeal. It says something that they took the time to send another targeted message and that stewardship was important to them.

Some stood out for the wrong reasons. I’ve never been a fan of the “fake FWD” subject line — it’s a trick spammers use. And there are good ways and bad ways to highlight the possible tax deduction benefits of donating. I say “possible” because in the US, charitable contributions are deductible only if you itemize deductions. Less than 35% of Americans actually itemize their deductions.

Several nonprofits ran matching gift campaigns and others focused on outcomes. These work well when paired with good message content. Thank you messages from prior gifts also stood out in the inbox. Some simple A/B testing could tell you which subjects lines and messages will perform best for your organization.

80 Email Subject Lines from End of Year Fundraising
Here are all the subject lines beginning with those received on January 1, 2012 and moving backwards in time to December 15, 2011:

• Happy New Year from _____
• URGENT-Just a few hours left!
• Last chance! Just hours left for year-end gifts
• Only a Few Hours Left: Help Us Reach Our Goal
• Midnight Deadline to Give
• Hurry! Triple match ends at midnight tonight
• LAST CHANCE to make your tax-deductible year-end donation!
• It Ends Tonight at Midnight
• Please Open! 12 Hours Left to Double Your Impact with _____
• DEADLINE: Twice as Strong
• Tax Deduction 2011. Close the year by offering struggling families self-reliance.
• MAKE YOUR DONATION BEFORE MIDNIGHT
• Midnight deadline for tax-deductible donations
• DEADLINE: midnight tonight
• It’s New Year’s Eve
• Final hours to double your year-end gift
• Don’t miss out on a tax deduction
• So close
• Happy New Year from the _____
• Last Chance to Give in 2011
• Only 1 day left–don’t forget to donate!
• Let’s Rally Together
• Last Chance to Make a Tax-Deductible Gift in 2011
• MATCH: LAST CHANCE!
• _____ Still Needs Your Help
• URGENT: year-end deadline is tomorrow
• Just one day left
• Time is running out for your dollar-for-dollar year-end match
• It’s not too late to give in 2011
• It’s the end of the year, but just the beginning for many!
• 73,000,003 reasons
• Assurance, hope and stability
• The perfect team?
• A special message from _____ Co-Founder _____
• In the New Year
• Sharing light and hope with grieving families year round
• Don’t miss your chance–donate before December 31!
• An expression of your passion for birds
• There’s Still Time to Give in 2011!
• Make Your Tax-Deductible Gift and Save a Life
• Make a difference in 2011
• Maximize your 2011 tax deduction before December 31
• Just a Few Days Left
• Don’t miss the 2011 tax deadline!
• Every surgery, vaccine, or meal
• MATCH EXPIRES: HELP US MEET OUR GOAL!
• Will our closest relatives survive this?
• URGENT: TRIPLE Matching Gift Offer!
• Happy Holidays from __________!
• Double Your Impact
• Finishing Strong – What Can We Do Together?
• Thank You from the _____
• _____’s year-end match will double your impact for the Bay
• It’s not too late. Give gifts of hope from _____.
• Meaningful Last Minute Gifts
• Please don’t forget your gift for the birds
• Make a Year End Impact by Supporting the _____
• FWD: Give last-minute _____ gifts. Give long-lasting hope.
• Why You Should Support _____ this Holiday Season
• Make your gifts count in 2011
• Invest in the future of _____
• There’s still time to give a Gift of Hope
• It’s not too late to give a gift that lasts a lifetime
• Thank you for your support of _____
• Give last-minute _____ gifts. Give long-lasting hope.
• It’s a Last-Minute Gift that Makes a Difference
• There’s Still Time to Give in 2011!
• Donate to protect polar bears and your gift will be matched
• MATCH: HELP US MEET OUR GOAL
• Is it Friday yet? Email error
• Thank You for Supporting the 58th Annual Free Care Fund Benefit Show‏
• Give the Comforts of Home for the Holidays
• A Very Important Message to Our Treasured Friends
• Join Now, Get a Tax Deduction
• Adoption Fees for ALL Adult Animals Underwritten by an Animal Angel!
• Happy Holidays from _____
• Happy Holidays from the ______
• Happy Holidays from ____!
• Shop today and your gift will be matched for maximum benefit
• Holiday Greetings

Do you recognize any of these? How do some of your own subject lines compare to these? Are you standing out in the inbox?

Thanks to The Agitator for letting me have the last word in 2011. Tom Belford and Roger Craver’s daily e-newsletter and blog are the first thing that I read each day. I have a lot of respect for them and their expertise in the nonprofit sector.

It’s an honor that they decided to pick a comment that I posted in response to this article about online fundraising. There’s a lot of talk about who gets credit for online giving and what really is online fundraising — but what it all boils down to is a silo problem. Resolved: No Fundraising Silos.

Here’s the comment:

“Is it channel conflict or cognitive dissonance? It is sometimes very hard to tell.

There is way too much philosophical debate on which channel should get the credit for the gift. This is mostly fueled by organizational silos or incentives that nonprofits have put in place.

Here’s the reality: Donors are multichannel. They receive messages across multiple channels and they give across multiple channels. They don’t care about your org chart or who gets credit for the donation.

The problem is that many nonprofits are still organized around single channels — each doing their own thing, with their own strategies, their own data, their own donors, and their own systems. That’s broken and really costly.

Ultimately, you want to use the right number of channels to drive the right people to take the right action using the most effective and satisfying giving mechanism as possible.

If that means a direct mail piece and a check, then great! If that means a phone call and an online donation, then fantastic. If that is a tweet, an email, a QR code, a website, and a donation form, then so be it.

And if you’re looking at donor behavior across channels, then you will begin to see some trends in what channel mix works best for different types of donors. Oh yeah, did I mention that donors don’t all respond the same way to the same channels? One size fits all approaches are as doomed as single channel tactics.

Statistically speaking, online donors are much more likely to switch to become offline donors. About 32% of online donors will become offline donors compared to only about 3% of offline donors switching channels. Your results may very. Always be testing.

No one channel should get all the credit or all the blame. You succeed or fail based on how well you do these things together.”

Thanks again Roger and Tom. Let’s put an end to silos in 2012.

P.S. Earlier this year, I posted the article “5 Questions for Roger Craver” —  it’s worth a second look.

One of the most common questions that I get is how much money is raised through online giving. The answer leads into plenty more questions about who, what, when, when, and why online fundraising continues to grow. The good news is that we can now answer most of these questions.

Here are some important questions, answers, facts and figures about online giving:

How much money is raised through online giving?
In 2010, online fundraising in the United States surpassed $22 billion. This was an increase of over 34% from 2009. The year-over-year growth was in large part due to the tremendous amount of online giving towards the Haiti Earthquake. Compare that to the $290 billion in total fundraising in the United States according to Giving USA 2011.

How much of all fundraising is done online?
About 8% of all fundraising is now done online. This has grown tremendously over the past decade. The 2010 Online Giving Report revealed that the size of the nonprofit makes very little difference in what percentage of total fundraising comes from online giving. Keep in mind that 92% of giving still comes from offline channels and that 32% of online donors switch to give through offline channels.

When does most of the online giving happen?
Over 30% of online giving happens in the final three months of the year. The majority of this online fundraising takes place during the final weeks of December. It is also worth noting that online giving spikes during disasters or extraordinary circumstances. Online fundraising during a disaster can be 3x to 4x normal trends and the vast majority of giving happens in just a few days. In non-disaster fundraising, The Communities Foundation of Texas raised $10.7 million online in a single day during the 2011 North Texas Giving Day.

Which nonprofit organizations raise the most money online?
According to The Chronicle of Philanthropy, the nonprofits that raise the most online come from the social service, international, and health sectors. These organizations raise most of these funds from disaster relief or from peer-to-peer event fundraising. Nonprofits in the education, hospital, and the arts sector raise smaller amounts of money online compared to other organizations.

How much is the average online gift?
The average online gift has been trending in the $140 range. This varies a lot by sector and online giving type, but is still significantly larger than the average offline gift. For example, online average gifts in higher education can be in excess of $250 or more. Peer-to-peer fundraising has average online gifts of $60 or higher. Multichannel donors have both higher average gift amounts and are more loyal than single channel donors.

How much online giving comes from social media?
Donations made through social media currently represent a very small percentage of online giving currently. The 2011 Nonprofit Social Network Report indicates that less than 1% of nonprofits have raised more than $100,000 using social media. One area where social media is helping grow giving is peer-to-peer fundraising. The use of social media tools with friends asking friends fundraising has proven itself as a method for raising money.

How is online giving trending right now?
The Blackbaud Index of Online Giving is a monthly view of online fundraising trends. The Index is based on data from more than 1,700 nonprofit organizations and is broken down by size and sector. The Index shows a three-month moving average of year-over-year percent changes in giving. Both the Blackbaud Index of Charitable Giving and the Blackbaud Index of Online Giving are updated on or about the 15th of every month.

What about online giving trends in other countries?
Data from outside the US is easy to count but harder to measure. We have plenty of giving data but there isn’t enough formal classification of organizations or in-country reporting to help measure what’s really happening. Knowing the size of organizations and being able to compare groups with a certain focus can be challenging in certain countries. For that reason Blackbaud does not currently report on certain international trends.

Where can I get more information about online giving trends?
Here are three good places to start: Blackbaud Index of Online Giving (monthly trends), 2010 Online Giving Report (annual trends), and the 2011 donorCentrics Internet and Multichannel Giving Benchmarking Report (multi-year trends).

How do you know all this stuff?
Blackbaud has more data about the nonprofit sector than anyone else. That allows us to do research, produce reports, and give more representative information about what is happening. Blackbaud’s research and insights into the nonprofit sector have been featured in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Chronicle of Philanthropy, Los Angeles Times, The Agitator, and other leading authorities.

The Blackbaud Index of Charitable Giving and The Blackbaud Index of Online Giving provide fundraisers with up-to-date data on fundraising trends and to couple that information with valuable analysis by leaders in the sector.

Blackbaud updates these indices each month and they are based on a three-month moving average of year- over-year percent changes in revenue. This makes them less sensitive to small timing issues or large fluctuations over a short period of time. The latest Index data covers the 3 months ending October 2011 as compared to the same period in 2010.

Overall Fundraising Trends

The Blackbaud Index of Charitable Giving is a broad-based fundraising index that reports total revenue trends of 1,264 nonprofit organizations representing $2.56 billion in yearly revenue on a monthly basis, both offline and online. The Index is based on actual revenue statistics from nonprofit organizations of all sizes representing arts, culture, and humanities; education; environment and animals; healthcare; human services; international affairs; public and society benefit; and religion sectors.

The Blackbaud Index of Charitable Giving reports that overall revenue increased by 2.2% for the 3 months ending October 2011 as compared to the same period in 2010.

Online Fundraising Trends

The Blackbaud Index of Online Giving is a broad-based fundraising index that reports online revenue trends of more than 1,748 nonprofit organizations representing $424 million in yearly revenue on a monthly basis. The Index is based on actual revenue statistics from nonprofit organizations of all sizes representing arts, culture, and humanities; education; environment and animals; healthcare; human services; international affairs; and public and society benefit sectors.

The Blackbaud Index of Online Giving reports that online revenue increased by 10.6% for the 3 months ending October 2011 as compared to the same period in 2010.

The Blackbaud Index of Charitable Giving and The Blackbaud Index of Online Giving provide fundraisers with up-to-date data on fundraising trends and to couple that information with valuable analysis by leaders in the sector.

Blackbaud updates these indices each month and they are based on a three-month moving average of year- over-year percent changes in revenue. This makes them less sensitive to small timing issues or large fluctuations over a short period of time. The latest Index data covers the 3 months ending September 2011 as compared to the same period in 2010.

Overall Fundraising Trends

The Blackbaud Index of Charitable Giving is a broad-based fundraising index that reports total revenue trends of 1,319 nonprofit organizations representing $2.32 billion in yearly revenue on a monthly basis, both offline and online. The Index is based on actual revenue statistics from nonprofit organizations of all sizes representing arts, culture, and humanities; education; environment and animals; healthcare; human services; international affairs; public and society benefit; and religion sectors.

The Blackbaud Index of Charitable Giving reports that overall revenue increased by 3.9% for the 3 months ending September 2011 as compared to the same period in 2010.

Online Fundraising Trends

The Blackbaud Index of Online Giving is a broad-based fundraising index that reports online revenue trends of more than 1,792 nonprofit organizations representing $425 million in yearly revenue on a monthly basis. The Index is based on actual revenue statistics from nonprofit organizations of all sizes representing arts, culture, and humanities; education; environment and animals; healthcare; human services; international affairs; and public and society benefit sectors.

The Blackbaud Index of Online Giving reports that online revenue increased by 10% for the 3 months ending September 2011 as compared to the same period in 2010.

This is the sequel to the original 5 Good Nonprofit Infographics article. The first five got such a great response that it deserves an update. Here are five more good nonprofit infographics worth looking at.

1. Social Giving: The Power of Peer to Peer Fundraising

Blackbaud and Mashable teamed up on an infographic that explores the social side of fundraising. Peer to peer fundraising has becoming a powerful way for individuals to raise money and awareness for the causes that are important to them.

2. How the Top 50 Nonprofits Do Social Media

Craig Newmark, founder of craigslist and craigconnects.org, created this infographic to look at who was proactively and effectively utilizing social media in August and September of 2011. Lots of great trends and information about how the top nonprofits are leveraging social media.

3. The Secret to Achieving 3X Better Fundraising Results

Blackbaud took the widely discussed 2011 donorCentrics Internet and Multichannel Giving Benchmarking Report and turned it into an infographic. Learn more about online giving and multichannel fundraising trends with this graphic.

4. We Can End Malaria

Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has an interactive infographic showing where progress in preventing and treating malaria is being made. The infographic shows the number of lives we can save with increased interventions, the methods used to fight malaria, and more.

5. How the Internet is Revolutionizing Higher Education

Best Education Sites put together this in-depth look at how higher education institutions use their websites. They break down a lot of great information and some interesting trends.

If you’ve seen some other good nonprofit infographics, then leave a comment. Let’s help share information about what’s happening across the nonprofit sector.