121: 13 Last minute ideas for raising money on Giving Tuesday (plus a bonus 3-email fundraising sequence)
What’s the best way to make the most out of Giving Tuesday?
In this episode, I share 13 creative, last-minute strategies that charities and businesses alike can use to ride the wave of generosity and excitement during this global day of giving. From simple email-only campaigns to thoughtful donor appreciation ideas, you’ll hear practical ways to connect with your audience and maximize results with minimal stress.
Even if you aren’t involved with a charity, I invite you to tune in because these ideas are totally transferrable to small business, and you might hear something that sparks your next best step!
Topics We Cover in This Episode:
The email formulas that guarantee engagement on Giving Tuesday
Why starting your campaign before Black Friday can be a game-changer
How to make Giving Tuesday about more than just money
The one mistake you must avoid when crafting your Giving Tuesday emails
I hope these 13 Giving Tuesday strategies have sparked some ideas and inspiration for your own campaigns—whether you’re a nonprofit or a business looking to make an impact. Remember, even a simple, focused approach can lead to meaningful results when paired with thoughtful messaging and a clear call to action. Don’t wait for the perfect moment—take one idea from today’s episode and run with it!
If you need expert support with crafting compelling fundraising messages or designing a strategy that connects with donors and drives results, I’m here to help. Reach out to me at hello@kimkiel.com to learn how I can support your charity or nonprofit. Let’s create something impactful together!
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[00:00:03]
Welcome to ill communication, copywriting tips and sales strategies for small business. I'm your host, Kim Keel. I'm a copy coach, sales strategist, and direct response copywriter. It's my mission to help women leaders and changemakers amplify their voices through copy. It's why I'm dishing out all the juicy tips, writing prompts, and sales formulas to help you generate more leads, book more calls, and get more high value clients on repeat. Sounds pretty good. It's time to ditch the overwhelm you might be feeling and find confidence in your copywriting so you can get your message out there and attract more soulmate clients. Let's get started. Hello, hello and welcome back to this episode of the Yell Communication Podcast. I'm your host, Kim Keel, and this is episode 121. If you are newer to me, maybe you don't know this already, but I used to work in the charitable sector, the nonprofit sector, for almost my entire career before I became, quote unquote, a copywriter. And so I'm really attuned to what's going on in the charitable sector. And I still write for and work with a few charities in my business. So today, I wanted to talk about something that's coming up on the calendar, Giving Tuesday. I want to share 13 last minute ideas to help you raise more money on Giving Tuesday. And if you aren't involved with the charity, I want to invite you to listen to this whole episode anyway, because the ideas I share are totally transferrable to small business, and you might hear something that sparks your next step.
[00:01:47]
I also have an episode 17, which is how to get the most out of Black Friday, even if you're not selling anything. And in that episode, I talk about how businesses can leverage Givingtuesday as part of your values, as part of how you show up on that very lucrative weekend of Black Friday, Cyber Monday. And so much attention is given to Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, Cyber Monday for good reason. It is one of the most lucrative weekends of the year. 200.4 million shoppers will participate in Black Friday Cyber Monday sales. 48% of people say they save money specifically to shop the Black Friday Cyber Monday sales. And about 12 years ago, an initiative called Giving Tuesday popped onto the scene. It comes a day after Cyber Monday, and it was positioned as an antidote to the consumerism of the Black Friday Cyber Monday sales. Giving Tuesday was a movement to inspire radical generosity and philanthropy. However, I can't help but think that Giving Tuesday is a way for charities to tap into the momentum of buying and consumerism that happens over that Black Friday, Cyber Monday. People are already opening their wallets to buy, so why shouldn't people also invest in charitable causes? What started in New York City in 2012 as a simple idea, a day to encourage people to do good, has grown into a worldwide phenomenon that has inspired millions of people to give back.
[00:03:19]
Giving Tuesday is now a global generosity movement that spans over 100 countries, and in 2023, Giving Tuesday campaigns raised $3.1 billion in the US and $54.8 million in Canada for charities in just 24 hours. Now, as I mentioned at the top of this episode, before I started my business, I worked in the nonprofit sector. I was on the ground writing fundraising copy for Giving Tuesday when it just started, and I still write fundraising copy and specifically Givingtuesday campaigns for my charity clients. So if you work with or are involved with a charity, I want to encourage you to participate in Givingtuesday. And if you currently don't have plans, I'm sharing some last minute tips and email strategies. If you want to throw together a kind of quick and dirty givingtuesday email campaign. Because if millions of people are donating billions of dollars in a single day, you might as well get your share of the generosity pie. And before I launch into all the ideas I'm going to share for running a Givingtuesday campaign, I want to qualify it. With this. You can totally have a big, complex multi-channel campaign, meaning you have social posts and landing pages. You could run ads or have billboards. You could send emails, run influencer campaigns, or use text messaging. There are dozens of excellent blog posts out there that show you how to run multi-channel givingtuesday campaigns or major events and all the tech you need to support that.
[00:04:57]
But it doesn't need to be that complicated. You can do something a little more simple, like an email only givingtuesday campaign. And given that this episode is going to air just a couple of weeks before Giving Tuesday, I'm focusing on some of the easier, lower lift, very focused, email only strategies. If you have a bigger team, bigger budget, and more time, you can absolutely go bigger with your campaign. But this episode is for you. If you're looking for some last minute, easy to implement ideas to leverage Givingtuesday for your charity. Number one use Givingtuesday to promote a specific campaign or goal like a stock the shelves campaign, or buy a year's worth of school supplies or fill the holiday hamper program. Studies show that the more specific and Intangible your campaign, the more successful you'll be. Number two, use Giving Tuesday to run a campaign to convert one time donors to monthly donors so over your 24 hour period or longer, send emails to your one time donors inviting them to upgrade and become monthly donors. Really drive home the impact their monthly donation will have over a single gift. Number three use Givingtuesday to upgrade your existing monthly donors so you could run a $1 more, a $5 more, or even a $10 more campaign to motivate your monthly donors to upgrade their recurring gift. Send this campaign to a specific segment of your list, not to everyone, and see if you can get some results.
[00:06:36]
Number four use Givingtuesday to showcase the other ways people can support your organization, so you could highlight your employee match programs, how to donate stocks and securities. Or you could promote your tribute giving program with the holidays coming up. It's a really good time to encourage people to donate money to your charity in lieu of holiday giving. Number five consider a matching gift campaign. Donors will often give more if they know it will unlock a matched gift from another donor. So see if you have a major donor or a board member who's willing to match donations over that 24 hour period. Send a few emails announcing this opportunity and ask for donations to double the dollars and double the impact. Number six if you have a little more lead time to organize and promote it. You could have a virtual fundraising raffle or a 50 over 50 event on Giving Tuesday. Number seven use Givingtuesday to run a campaign to renew or reenroll past donors. So segment your list and just speak directly to lapsed or expired donors to inspire them to give again. Number eight instead of asking for donations, you could promote and sell your swag. In fact, you could leverage the entire Black Friday Cyber Monday weekend to promote people to buy your charity's merchandise. Number nine use Givingtuesday to promote and sell tickets to your gala or annual fundraising event, or really any upcoming event.
[00:08:16]
Again, promote that through the entire Black Friday Cyber Monday Giving Tuesday weekend. Giving Tuesday isn't just about raising money, it's also about inspiring generosity in all forms. So here are a few other Giving Tuesday ideas for you to consider that don't involve raising money. Number ten, you could use Givingtuesday to inspire people to volunteer for your organization so you could promote some of the volunteer roles and ask people to. Sign up for the volunteer posts to share their time and talents to your cause. Number 11 if you run a shelter or a food bank or any kind of charity that accepts physical goods, use Givingtuesday to get the donations of goods you need to deliver your mission. Again, keep it as specific as possible. For example, we're running low on blankets and towels for the animals in our shelter this Giving Tuesday. Bring in towels and blankets you no longer use, and let it bring a little comfort and love to a puppy in need. Number 12. You could also leverage your existing donors and invite them to showcase your charity on your behalf. Use Canva to create some easy social media. Post templates or badges that say I'm a donor or why I love Charity X or why I donate to Charity X. Share these templates with your donors. Ask them to share a single post on Givingtuesday about why they are loyal and generous supporters of your charity. And number 13 Giving Tuesday is also a wonderful day to appreciate your donors and volunteers.
[00:09:56]
So instead of asking for gifts, you could use Givingtuesday to give thanks or host a thank you campaign. Spend the day calling or sending a simple, heartfelt email message to your existing donors and volunteers thanking them for their wonderful generosity. You might be surprised to find that some folks will upgrade or renew their giving, even if you don't have a specific ask and are just calling to thank them. So my friend, those are 13 simple and last minute Giving Tuesday campaign ideas, and I want you to see that they're all very specific. It's running a monthly giving upgrade program or it's trying to renew expired donors. Pick one area to focus on and just do that for your Givingtuesday campaign, and you don't need to run it to your whole organization. You can pick a specific segment of your email list or specific segment of your donors and just send it to them. Keep it simple and send emails to help run this campaign. But once you choose your focus for Givingtuesday, then of course you need the email copy. And aside from the thank you campaign where probably one email is enough, I'm going to recommend you send more than one email for Giving Tuesday. I recommend sending at least three, and I recommend sending it over more like a two day period. Think of Giving Tuesday not as a single business day 9 to 5, but really leverage that 24 hour period.
[00:11:32]
So I'm giving you permission to send Giving Tuesday emails actually over that whole weekend. Here's why people are watching their inboxes for great deals to snap up. They may as well be reading your emails as anyone else's also. Your readers are not going to see, nor will they read every single email you send. If you only send one email, there's a chance they will not open it and look at it. So when you send a sequence of several emails, you have a better chance. Your readers will open and read at least one of those emails. So I'm going to share with you a simple sequence that you can send first. I recommend a teaser or announcement email sent in the week or a couple of days before giving Tuesday, so folks can plan ahead and get ready for it. And I'm thinking this would be specifically important for campaigns that are asking for specific donated goods, like food items or shelter blankets or toiletries. Otherwise, you could simply tell your reader to watch their inbox for a special announcement or invitation. Coming next week, coming tomorrow. Coming in a couple days. Then the three email formulas I recommend you follow to raise money on Givingtuesday or over that whole weekend are Acca pays and P4. Now let me tell you what they are. Start your email campaign with Akka Akka awareness, comprehension, conviction and action. This is the formula you'll use to organize the copy in your email.
[00:13:07]
Next, send a passive email problem agitation solution. It's good to remind your donors of the problems they solve as a donor. And finally end your sequence with the P4 picture. Promise, prove, and push. In this email, you paint the picture of the beautiful future or mission you're trying to achieve, and then you gently push your reader or donor to give generously to create that beautiful vision of the future if you send these emails in a single day, said aka in the morning, PA midday and then P4 at the end of the day. But as I previously mentioned, consider starting your Givingtuesday campaign before Black Friday so you can send multiple messages over multiple days at a time when people are in a buying mood. I actually have specific episodes about Acca pays and P4 on the podcast already, so check the show notes, get the links, go and listen to those individual episodes to find out how to write those emails to your readers. And pro tip this also is a great sequence to send if you are in small business and want to send a little sales sequence to your readers as well. And if you ever need direct support with writing your fundraising materials, please reach out to me, because there are a few ways I support and work with charities to write messages that connect with your donor and generate more money.
[00:14:32]
That's all I have for you today, so please make sure you try one of these 13 strategies to dip your toe into Givingtuesday and then use that three email sequence, aka PR p4, to walk your readers through your campaign and compel them to donate more to you on Givingtuesday. Reach out with your questions. I'm here to support and I'll be back again next week with another tip, strategy or writing prompt to help you raise more money for your charity or generate more sales in your business. Hey, thanks for tuning in to today's episode, but before you go, tell me if this sounds familiar. You've just written or had someone else write your website or a course, or a mastermind sales page. Or maybe you've had the copy up and running for a while, but it's just not performing as well as you'd hoped. Wouldn't you love to have an expert sales and brand voice copywriter. Review your copy to flag any concerns that might be creating friction for your ideal client. Wouldn't you love to get a custom list of changes and recommended copy upgrades to immediately increase your signups and sales, without having to pay thousands of dollars or wait weeks to get your copy optimized? If that sounds like you, you might be interested in my no BS copy audit. When you book a no BS copy audit, you'll get a deep dive review of your copy, a video review, a detailed checklist report, and some copy punch ups you can use immediately, all delivered within ten business days.
[00:16:05]
Jennifer and Mindy recently booked an OBS audit for their conference sales page. They'd hired different people to write and design the page, but it never matched what they envisioned, and the conference sales were practically non existent. Within a few days of booking their no BS audit, they had a detailed report of what was working and what needed to be optimized and suggested copy. They went from barely selling any tickets to selling out 300 seats at their event. They said we are so grateful for how you went above and beyond in your work for us. You somehow crawled into our brains and were able to put into words exactly what we were thinking and imagining. We've been looking for you for a long time, you overdelivered and we can't thank you enough. No BS audits are delivered within ten business days and are a fraction of what it normally costs to work with a professional copywriter. If you want to book this quick and very effective service, visit Kim Dotcom slash audit to download a PDF info sheet that gives you all the deets and a link to book your audit. Within ten days, you could have some refreshed conversion focused copy and a roadmap to make other improvements and changes to get more leads, more clicks, and more sales with your copy. To book yours, visit Kim Dotcom slash audit.
Resources Mentioned
Episode 17: How to get the most out of Black Friday - even if you’re not selling anything
Additional Resources
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