Key Ways to Use Texting to Impact Your Fundraising Results

Texting with your donors is a key tactic. It’s the method of communication most of us prefer, and it can be used for so many key components of your donor outreach. That’s why RNL offers unlimited, easy to utilize texting services. These include mass texting campaigns to support events like giving days and the P2P response-focused texting integrated into RNL Engage.

Here’s why texting is the top outreach channel you should expand as part of your donor engagement.

Fundraising is about relationships, and you can text more than solicitations

You’ve all heard the worst quote any fundraiser wants to hear: “You only contact me to ask for money.” That’s where texting can help you truly expand the relationship with donors. You can utilize texting to do things like:

• Ask donors questions, get feedback, and use the responses in content.
• Share updates on key organization news, victories, and celebrations.
• Send “digital swag” like phone backgrounds that put you front and center as part of your donors’ lifestyle.

It’s about more than asking for money, and organizations who use texting to build a relationship see immediate results and build good will for the future.

Pictured: The University of Washington ended the year with a great phone wallpaper send featuring the beloved Harry the Husky.

Text your donors to support time-sensitive efforts and spark action

You should absolutely be texting donors for key events like giving days, campaign launches, and even the approaching deadlines for crowdfunding campaigns. You can event text event attenders with things like venue updates and parking directions.

You’ll see responses, even from large texting campaigns, that give you insights on how donors are feeling, and you can respond with everything from giving links to key resources like alumni career services or volunteer opportunities.

Pictured: A Giving Tuesday warming/engagement text to over 20,100 alumni at Southern Illinois University–Carbondale got this awesome response from two SIU pilots as they got ready to take off. The alumni sent in a gift and even encouraged SIU to use the pic in promotion.

Integrated texting boosts the impact of your omnichannel outreach

One of the key ways that texting can impact results is when it’s integrated into broader campaigns. This includes texting after a phone conversation (with, maybe, a link to a mobile-friendly giving page) or when you can’t reach donors.

Organizations have also seen massive response for texting as a pledge fulfillment reminder or at the end of an outreach campaign to contact people they could not reach. We see massive impact with donors who received coordinated texting, calling, and video message outreach giving at 24x the rate in 2022 compared to donors who were not engaged.

Pictured: Texting can elicit immediate, positive donor response, like these great examples at NYU.

Invest in a coordinated texting strategy and you should see immediate donor engagement results

At RNL, we’ve advanced the tech behind texting, and we have experts ready to help your team implement new strategies. We keep track, daily of texting rules and can help you navigate any internal resistance to this crucial donor engagement tactic. It’s time for us all to up our texting game, and the RNL team is ready to help. Contact us and we’ll share the newest innovations and how you can use texting immediately to boost your results while providing a quality donor experience.