There are just weeks until the ball drops at the end of the calendar year. But, many nonprofit fundraising leaders are not ready to start planning New Year’s Eve celebrations just yet.
The end of the calendar year comes with heaps of anxiety, whether it marks the fiscal year or not. Anxiety about missing year-end fundraising goals. Anxiety about the donors still on LYBUNT and SYBUNT lists. Anxiety about how much pressure they can place on fundraisers to bring gifts in the door by 11:50 PM on December 31.
The problem isn’t necessarily the donors who have been unresponsive this year. The problem is really the donors who have verbally committed to a gift, but it hasn’t arrived yet.
Verbal commitments are complex. On one hand, you have a donor who says they are bought into your cause. On the other hand, you know that verbal commitments don’t always materialize. It’s a very real probability that verbal commitments won’t come in on your deadline or won’t come in at all. And verbal commitments aren’t something you can report to the board or book as revenue. As a result, every fundraising shop has a thick LYBUNT/SYBUNT list that it obsesses over at the end of the year.
How confident are you that the verbal commitments your fundraisers generated over the last 11 months will turn into bookable revenue by the end of the calendar year?
Solution: Bookable End-of-Year Pledges
Securing bookable end-of-year pledges is a solution most fundraising teams can implement today in order to relieve the December 31 anxiety.
On the surface, it may seem counterintuitive to ask a donor to make a pledge that’s due in the next few weeks. However, think of it this way: would you rather the outcome from hundreds of donor conversations be verbal promises, or would you rather the outcome be a signed commitment?
Converting verbal commitments into formalized pledges solves many of your challenges as a fundraising leader. First, formalized pledges are immediately bookable as giving revenue the second they are confirmed, rather than when the gift arrives. Second, when donors formally commit to giving, the probability of that gift materializing skyrockets to 92%+ certainty. Third, a formal commitment eliminates the time fundraisers have to follow up with donors, which can mean the difference of tens of thousands of dollars in revenue during the waning seconds of the calendar year.
Proactively Exceeding Fundraising Goals & Relieving Anxiety
Many fundraising leaders are already using these proactive solutions to exceed their calendar-year goals and dispel the anxiety we all feel come December 31.
Givzey’s Gift Agreement Platform supports soliciting bookable year-end pledges via our Digital Gift Agreement solution. Through Givzey, organizations have uploaded and managed more than $200,000 in one-time pledges within minutes of kicking off a campaign. And, we can help you do the same.
Within a week of signing with Givzey, we can have your team onboarded, trained, and executing an end-of-year pledge strategy that immediately empowers you to convert verbal commitments into bookable revenue.