5 Key Highlights from Current Snapshot of Nonprofit Fundraising Report

I continue to be surprised by the growing number of resources available to those of us working within the nonprofit fundraising industry to help us better understand giving trends. Blackbaud is a consistently reliable resource with its monthly Index, the Charitable Giving Report, How Nonprofit Fundraising Performed in 2012 and the Next Generation of American Giving report. Another comprehensive report that I have recently come across is the 2nd edition of CCS’s Snapshot of Today’s Philanthropic Landscape which explores nonprofit fundraising in the US and uses information from AFP (Association of Nonprofit Professionals), The Chronicle of Philanthropy, Giving USA Foundation, Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy, M+R Strategic Services, Merrill Lynch, NTEN and The Cygnus Donor Group amongst many other sources.

Providing results for the 2012 year, the information includes a variety of statistical data relating to areas such as giving online and social media, volunteerism and leading nonprofits. The following are some key highlights from the report:

1. Overall Giving – Totalling $316.23 billion, it represents an increase of $78.78 billion over the past 10 years. However the growth rate over the past 3 years of 2.3% in inflation adjusted dollars is slightly slower than the rate in the three years leading to the Great Recession in 2008 of 2.6%. This signifies that although nonprofit fundraising continues to make strides towards improvements we have not yet regained complete donor confidence perhaps due to the economic climate and the changes that have occurred in the industry over the same period. Donors are much more prudent and selective today with which causes they support and how they support them than they have been in the past. At this rate it is estimated that we will not reach 2007’s record high until 2018.
2. Subsectors – Broken down by subsector, Religion received the most donor dollars with $101.54 billion – more than double that of the second most popular sector Education which netted $41.33 billion and Human Services with $40.40 billion. The three sectors on the lower end of the spectrum are International Affairs with $19.11 billion, Art, Culture and Humanities with $14.44 billion and Environmental and Animal with $8.30 billion. However, this order changes when the top 400 organizations are analyzed where Colleges and Universities top the list with $18.6 billion followed by Social Services with $14.2 billion and International with $11.7 billion.
3. Individual Giving – Accounting for 72% of all fundraising dollars, individual giving has grown for three consecutive years representing 84% of generous Americans that had supported a cause in the past year. Their top reason for giving is that they want to make an impact as responded by 84%, while 66% responded that it’s due to their ability to give and 54% considered it their moral or religious obligation. Interesting to note is that tax deduction was the reason least cited by 22% of respondents. Notably 40% of individual donors had shifted their support in the past 5 years to giving to locally based charities.
4. Online Giving – In 2012 the average online donation was $146 and overall online giving continued to grow by an approximate 20% in both online dollar revenue and the number of donations charities received, while the number of gifts received based on an email appeal dropped by 21%. The busiest month with 20% of the year’s online revenue received is December largely due to the end-of-year fundraising push.
5. Social Media – On the social media front it’s not surprising 89% of nonprofits maintained a presence on Facebook for which communities grew by 46%. Twitter saw significant growth in followers by 264%.

Other areas explored in CCS’s Snapshot of Today’s Philanthropic Landscape report includes various aspects of millionaire and ultra affluent individual giving, The Giving Pledge, bequests, volunteerism and foundation/corporate giving.

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Miratel Solutions is a Toronto call centre, eBusiness, and letter shop mail house specializing in professional fundraising services including telephone fundraising, online fundraising, lottery services, donation caging, donation processing and other donor management services. We are committed to our CSR business values in all contact centre services and mail house operations and advancing the missions of the nonprofits we proudly serve.