10.26.08
Online Fundraising War Stories
I’m on tap to do three sessions at CASE’s “Online Strategies” conference this week in Seattle. As part of my preparations, I’ve had the chance to chat with online fundraisers on five campuses—east, west, and points in between. Here are some of the interesting things I heard:
- University of Washington has worked with 110 campus units to “skin” online giving pages with the unit’s own branding (an example). The underlying technology is managed by the university’s development office. Dartmouth also offers customized branding options to units on campus.
- Dartmouth is considering an e-campaign to promote major campaign giving opportunities, which are cataloged in a searchable “Gift Browser” the college launched last year.
- Ohio State, where the online giving program grew by 45 percent between 2006 and 2007, added a search function to its online giving site in March. Donors can now make contributions to more than 3,000 funds. Previously, OSU offered only the primary dean’s discretionary funds as online giving options.
- The University of Iowa’s Flood Relief Fund received contributions from 2,605 donors this summer, and 82 percent of those contributors made their gifts online. Online gifts comprised about half of the total dollars raised for the flood fund.
- Dartmouth recently raised its maximum for online gifts to $100,000, after a donor’s attempted to make a $72,000 gift and hit the college’s $50,000 ceiling.
- Cal-Berkeley recently redesigned its giving site to reflect the branding of its separate campaign site. The new giving site focuses exclusively on transactions, rather than making the case for private support because at that point, people “have already been sold on the need.” The folks at Berkeley based their assumptions for the site on 22 interviews (90 minutes each!) with donors.
If you’ll be at this CASE conference, be sure and say hi. With Mizzou’s Lori Croy serving as conference chair, you know it’s going to be both informative and FUN!
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