Shannon Scanlan · Springboard, Senior Project Manager | As we head into the last two weeks of 2022, it's time to gear up for another year of badass funraise-ery. To help prepare you for 2023, join host Justin Wheeler and guest Shannon Scanlan in unpacking the top trends for P2P nonprofit fundraising projected to make the biggest impact in the new year. Halfway through, you'll hear a bonus interview with Brady Josephson from NextAfter’s 2022 NIO Summit! Plus, learn all the juicy details about Funraise's new partnership with Springboard.
Shannon Scanlan is a champion of peer-to-peer fundraising. With an impressive career that has touched nearly every avenue of nonprofit fundraising, Shannon brings her expertise to the Nonstop Nonprofit podcast to break down top trends for P2P fundraising in 2023.
Listen in as Shannon talks to Justin about the untapped potential of P2P fundraising—and shares clever ideas to leverage P2P in new and innovative ways.
And if this episode gets you excited about P2P fundraising for your nonprofit organization, be sure to create your free Funraise account to get a head start on knocking those 2023 trends out of the park!
Hello, I'm Justin Wheeler, and welcome to this episode of Nonstop Nonprofit!
As we wind down the year and prepare to head into 2023, we wanted to set you up for fundraising success with a roundup of the top trends that are expected to impact the peer-to-peer fundraising landscape in the new year.
And if you know anything about our guest for this episode, you'll agree that she is the perfect person to help us forecast P2P nonprofit fundraising trends––because she has touched nearly every level of P2P fundraising, from door-knocking-for-donations as a college student to serving as Senior Development Officer for The Clinton Foundation.
Shannon Scanlan is a powerful leader in fostering generosity through communications, outreach, and forward-thinking solutions. She currently serves as Senior Project Manager for Springboard by Jackson River.
In this episode, I sit down with Shannon to discuss why peer-to-peer is an underutilized nonprofit fundraising tactic––and how Springboard is moving the P2P needle with Funraise toward the future. Make sure you stay until the end to hear about Funraise's exciting new partnership with Springboard. And later in the episode, you'll get a bonus interview from the Nonprofit Innovation & Optimization Summit with Brady Josephson, Marketing & Growth Lead at charity: water!
Let’s dive in!
Justin Wheeler Hey, listeners. Welcome back to Nonstop Nonprofit. Very excited for today's guest. With us today is Shannon. Shannon, how are you doing today?
Shannon Scanlan I'm doing pretty good. It's kind of chilly up here in New Jersey, but not too bad.
Justin Wheeler I can only imagine compare it, especially compared to Southern California.
Shannon Scanlan It sounds nice.
Justin Wheeler So very excited to kind of jump in and talk about an exciting new partnership between Springboard and Funraise. But before we before we do that and talk a little bit more detail about peer to peer fundraising, I'd love it if you could just provide a little background to our listeners about yourself, your background, and what you do with Springboard.
Shannon Scanlan Yeah, absolutely. Well, I think I always knew that I wanted to work to make the world a better place. I moved around a lot as a kid and that gave me a really unique perspective in seeing that, you know, not everyone had the same opportunities based on where they live and who they were. And so, you know, in college and kind of starting out in my career, I just wanted to do what I could to make the world a more equitable place. But specifically kind of starting out in fundraising, it was actually one of those fliers that I saw on college campus that says Work to Save the Environment and ended up knocking on doors in the summer in Washington, D.C., raising money for an environmental organization. It was by far the hardest job that I've ever had in my life. Not only because, you know, it's summer in Washington, D.C., but asking for money is hard, especially as as an introvert. But I think it kind of I don't know. I think it set the stage for the next 20 years in my career and just really enjoying talking to people about causes that I'm really passionate about and getting them excited about it, too. You know, from there, you know, I went on to do some political fundraising and organizing and ended up in the mid 2000 working for an organization that was doing digital fundraising and advocacy for nonprofits. And so this was really kind of I, this was that yeah. After like the Dean campaign that really saw the growth of digital fundraising and nonprofits were really looking to like, how can we capitalize on, on email and Facebook was just out and just kind of doing invites at that time. And since then, I've been working with nonprofits both, you know, on the consulting side as well as as clients, and have been really honored to work for some tremendous organizations like the ACLU, the Clinton Foundation, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, in helping them really use the digital space and platforms, seeing what is what is out there, what's coming out, what works for their audiences to grow their supporter base and raise money, and obviously ultimately further their mission to make the world a better place. And about six years ago, I joined Jackson River, which is the builder of this springboard platform in which we'll talk a little bit about, because they I wanted to continue helping other nonprofits find the right tools and implement the right systems to be able to to use this space in a way that works best for them. And the the Springboard Fundraising Advocacy Engagement Platform is just a really tremendous tool. And I knew the people that had founded the organization and I'd worked with them in the past. And one of the founders was actually one of my first bosses in 2006. And so I've kind of been in the the small world for a while and just really look to helping more organizations find the right tools. You know, at the ACLU, the Clinton Foundation and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, I had gone through a number of projects in which we were tasked to find something better because our tools weren't working. We weren't able to communicate with the right supporters. We weren't asking for the right amounts. We weren't growing our lists. We weren't able to do some of the fun and innovative campaigns that we were seeing others doing. And there were a lot of, you know, mistakes learned or mistakes made and lessons learned during those processes of like finding email tools, finding new fundraising tools, finding new advocacy tools. And so I was kind of excited to be able to bring a lot of those experiences and lessons learned to help other organizations with those decisions, as well as implementing those tools. You know, it's a huge project. You know, it's more than just build it and they will come. It really requires the entire organization to adjust their thinking and adjust, you know, their approach to marketing. And fundraising, the back end staff and front end and all of that. So, you know, it's it's been really a pleasure and an honor to be able to to work with the clients that Springboard supports. And, you know, especially as you mentioned, this recent partnership with the Funraise in expanding our peer to peer offering. So beyond some of the fundraising tools and tactics that Springboard offers, including like a very robust, you know, fundraising, sustainer, fundraising, offering and tools, integrations with CRMs, advocacy, both federal, state and local level. You know, peer to peer is kind of where we see a lot of growth and a lot of potential to help organizations, including existing clients or new clients. You know, is this kind of digital world grows? And also, you know, it's it's not just online. It's, you know, when you're looking especially at peer to peer, offline events, races, kind of virtual events, all of that is all becoming more integrated.
Justin Wheeler Absolutely. You know, it sounds like your your career kind of spans the like pre digital adoption of fundraising. And then, you know, as as you progressed in your career, you started to see, you know, more more giving come online. Just kind of curious like as you look back on your career and as you look forward on where fundraising is going, what are some of like the key changes that you've seen that have made a very positive impact on the overall philanthropic community?
Shannon Scanlan Yeah, I mean, I think, you know, in the kind of mid 2000s email was king and it's been kind of interesting to see a little bit of the progression from email using social media text messaging like all of the digital channels out there. And then I would see more and more newsletters and blogs come back, which, you know, I remember from 2007 that that was really being king. And it's I think also learning that's digital is is a tool. It's not just like an end, you know, it's a way to communicate and kind of seen the progression of, you know, that there's only unique ways to fundraise digitally. But it's really it's part of like a holistic way to communicate and markets with organizations. So it used to be very siloed. I think the digital fundraising and advocacy that, you know, you had your own little department and you just sent out emails. But what I've really seen grown is that it's and someone likened it. I remember that, you know, organizations used to have like electricity departments and that's now it's just it's a part of communicating, it's a part of fundraising and it's a part of marketing. And it's just one of the many channels and ways to connect with supporters out there. You know, so when we're looking at marketing and fundraising campaigns, it is it's looking at physical advertisements, it's looking at phone campaigns, it's looking at direct mail campaigns, you know, social SMS advertising. And of all of that, is is built in, particularly in this direct marketing world. It's just it's a part of it. And, you know, digital describes, you know, a lot of different aspects of that. Yeah. So I think it's better to really look at it holistically, but there are, you know, specific tools that are part of that entire ecosystem that we are seeing, you know, more and more integrations of that, you know, particularly as organizations are trying to get a hold of or understanding their data, you know, as these, you know, they're getting different sources, you know, from direct mail, from phone, you know, advertising, like how do you really help connect all of that? And so we're seeing some of the tools and springboards actually really great at that. And you know, we have phone call centers that are actually inputting donations into Springboard, which then goes into the CRM, you know, so that's also collecting donations that are coming from ads that are coming from emails that are coming social.
Justin Wheeler So awesome. No. Yeah, thank you. Thank you for that. I'd be curious to hear your thoughts on obviously, we're going to spend the next few minutes talking [00:09:35]about peer-to-peer fundraising. And for those listening and wondering what is peer to peer fundraising, simply, it's it's an opportunity or a way to activate your supporters to get involved and allow them to fundraise on your behalf. Most of your supporters are likely to have friends and family members that would be happy to contribute to the causes that you care about. And so peer-to-peer fundraising gives your supporters a way and a tool to actually reach out and raise funds. About six months ago, Funraise and Jackson River, Springboard started talking about a partnership. So can you maybe share a little bit more why peer-to-peer fundraising was and is an important aspect of, or important feature you'd like to offer your customer base today? [41.0s]
Shannon Scanlan [00:10:17]Yeah, I mean, peer-to-peer, you know, as you're talking of just like asking friends and family to raise money on behalf of organizations that you care about, You know, it's always kind of been part of philanthropy, whether it's selling chocolate bars at school or, you know, inviting friends to an event. And, you know, as you know, we're looking at these tools as part of the bigger philanthropy and fundraising ecosystem. We know how important it is to be able to reach supporters and potential supporters where they're at. and they're on Facebook doing Facebook fundraisers around their birthday for causes that they care about. There are training for marathons and raising money for causes that they care about like this. This is happening, and it's a huge opportunity for nonprofits to find supporters where they're already at and where they're willing to raise money. And it's a really great opportunity to build momentum and community and campaigns for new time-based events. You know, giving days for events, you know, around, unfortunately, like if there's disasters, you know, people want to help. And by not kind of providing the avenue or the channel to do that, organizations are missing opportunities to reach more people, ultimately, not just in fundraising, but in able to raise money to help more people. [94.2s]
Justin Wheeler [00:11:51]Absolutely. [0.0s] Yeah. You know, speaking to that, the community aspect of it, we had we have a customer there called Thorne and they just did a pretty big peer to peer campaign around the New York Marathon. And it was in partnership with Peloton, actually, and it was really cool. They ran it on Funraise. And Ashton Kutcher was actually the cog, the figurehead of the campaign. And basically, like it was like a month leading up to the New York Marathon, which is just a couple of weeks ago, basically like he was training with Peloton instructors and then would also bring in another celebrity and just really created this like really kind of cool, fun environment and community to bring people in. And like the whole kind of like theme of like the conversations where like, what's your why? Like, what do you care about what's important to you? And then they ran the marathon, of course, and they raised over $1,000,000 in like 30 days. And it was all done, you know, through through peer to peer fundraising. And so when you said something along the lines of it's a great way to kind of inspire the community and to build community, you know, that's that's what peer to peer does at its finest, is it gives it builds the community and it also gives the community something to rally behind and support. And so I'm curious what as you look towards 23, how do you see peer to peer playing a role in a potentially downturned economy going into a potential recession? How do you look at peer to peer fundraising and through that lens?
Shannon Scanlan Yeah, I mean, it is a way to diversify fundraising. And, you know, actually going back to your example that ran the New York City Marathon, I've spoken to a couple non-profits recently who are looking to 2023 to build those communities around, giving days that they have and they have supporters for their organizations that are tremendously invested. You know, these are often like chapter organizations. And so they have local communities, you know, so they know people that they would be fundraising with. And one of the reasons that they're really excited about peer to peer is because it offers them a place to to build that community and to really kind of, you know, support and encourage and empower supporters where they're at. Whereas it was always kind of it's a little disjointed in each chapter kind of raising money and then being able to showcase that using a platform with Springboard and Funraise, you know, it allows the community kind of across the country in all of those chapters to see what everyone else is doing and to be able to hear those stories, you know, of why it's this organization is important to them. You know, how is it meaningful? And so you can see it, you know, not only within your community, in your chapter, you can see it kind of across the country and how that's really building toward something that's incredibly impactful. You know, when you're looking not only at the dollars raised, but then organizationally like how that organization is using, using the money to actually impact real people and, and help others. So I've heard that a couple of times just in talking with organizations, boards towards the end of this year. And so. Looking to expand on those giving day opportunities, you know, to bring it, you know, online and engage people where they're at. And then just to have more visibility kind of across chapters, I think folks are tremendously excited about.
Don't go away! When our episode returns, Shannon and I discuss misconceptions about P2P fundraising and talk about why donors *really* give to nonprofits. Stay tuned!
And now, enjoy this segment sponsored by Funraise, the world's most innovative and friendly nonprofit fundraising platform. Nonstop Nonprofit recently took our podcast on the road to NextAfter’s 2022 NIO Summit in Kansas City, MO. At the conference, I had a chance to catch up with Brady Josephson, Marketing & Growth Lead at charity: water!
Listen in as Brady shares his experiences on the frontlines of nonprofit fundraising, and shares his take on how economic trends impact fundraising.
Justin Wheeler Brady, thanks so much for stopping by the podcast. How are you doing?
Brady Josephson Good, thanks. Thanks for having me.
Justin Wheeler How's the conference so far?
Brady Josephson It's great. You know, it's one of the first times I've been able to actually sit in the auditorium and listen. And it's it's a fun experience.
Justin Wheeler Yeah. And not have to stress about the logistics and the presentation. It's great. That's awesome. Yeah, it's awesome. So you're a charity water now? Tell us a little bit about what your role looks like at Charity Water to what you're in charge of.
Brady Josephson Yeah, so I helped lead the Marketing and Growth Team. And so we do a lot of classic marketing functions, driving traffic, generating leads, and then we're real specific in shaping the role and team to be inclusive of growth. So it's not just say we generate some leads or we got some new donors, but we're responsible for the full funnel of donors to give $1,000 and less with an emphasis on our monthly giving program. So acquire, retain and upgrade or monetize. Our team is responsible with other teams, our product team and things like that. But our team focuses exclusively on how do we get and grow mass or consumer donors.
Justin Wheeler Okay. How does retention look like for you guys compared to like national average? You guys, you guys being national average? Are you victim to the national average?
Brady Josephson It it depends. In aggregate, we're probably actually slightly below...
Justin Wheeler Okay
Brady Josephson ...the national average, but huge caveats abound. I was just talking to someone how difficult it is to get accurate benchmarks for an organization like us, but also just a larger, more digital centric sustainer program. A lot of the benchmarks and sustain are recurring. Is like face to face or telephone. Yeah, there's very, very few programs that I know of in the U.S. that are paid paid media paid digital driven and digital only. Yeah, like we are. And so it's it's really difficult to find averages. And then our donor pool skews way younger than most programs. Our our average donors around 35 to 40 as opposed to more like 55-60. Yeah, they give on their credit card, they use mobile payments. So all those things drag down your average. So yeah, we're lower than the national average, but we're very different than the national average. So it's one of the flaws of benchmarks.
Justin Wheeler Okay. Okay. Yeah. And so how is how is the transition been from, you know, being at an agency like nex after to being now like on the front lines of fundraising?
Brady Josephson It's been great. It's been a big challenge, too. And, you know, one of the reasons what I wanted to switch back is as a consultant or I was even not even doing much consulting, it was research and teaching and things like that is you just get to tell people like, Hey, you should do this thing, but like you're on your own. You know what? If you do it or not and even consulting always a little bit arm's length, you can only do so much. You can only go so deep. But if you believe like I do, that things like retention or things like testing and optimization are more fabrics of culture, not just strategy. It's really difficult as an outsider to help change and shape culture, unless that's like what you do. You're like a consultant for culture or something like that. So the real fun thing is like building this team and trying to weave in more testing. We were doing testing before, but making that more of a priority or thinking, you know, how do we imbue this sense of retention is so paramount and you know, so many of those things existed, but that's the real fun part of like, it's really messy consulting sometimes a little cleaner. Like, you hire us to produce X results, we tell you to do Y and Z happens.
Justin Wheeler Yeah.
Brady Josephson Working in a nonprofit is way more fluid and messy, but there's also, like, a beauty and a fun in that.
Justin Wheeler Yeah. Yeah, interesting. So yeah, I mean, a lot of people look at charity water already as sort of like, you know, the digital maven of fundraising and just, you know, overall, like kind of like the pinnacle of like what they strive to be as they look to grow themselves. So going into an organization like Charity Water, like, you know, you get thrown into it really like the kitchen, right? You're like, you see how the sausage is made. You see the underbelly. Was was there a lot of work to be done when you when you came in and or were you just adding on to like a lot of the great work was already being done?
Brady Josephson Yeah. Way more of the the latter like I think so many of the things that Charity Water one of the great things that Charity Water has done is say what's really really important and then they do that unbelievably well. We do that. Unbelievable. And there's a lot of little things that are like kind of important. They don't spend as much time worrying about those kind of things. And I think that served the organization really, really well. So some of the things that were maybe, maybe not quite to the same level, like you look at the brand and the experience and the care and the messaging and the design and the beauty. Some of the data analytics are probably not at the same, you know, kind of level as that. And you think of some of like the CRM or some of the automation or some of the nuances. We're probably not quite there, but is a good example to me who's kind of will gravitate towards those things of saying those are important, but they won't actually make or break your whole org. Yeah. If you don't have the right automated trigger email that goes out on this day to this person because it's their birthday, you'll still survive. Yeah. If you don't have a great brand with a great value proposition that people can easily understand and want to give to and get behind your toast. Yeah. So it's been a really interesting lesson of like, oh, the important things are really important and some of these things aren't quite as important, but that's a big area of opportunity for us to see if we can come. Buying all these amazing things and all of the foundational core attributes that Charity Water is unbelievable at and added maybe a little bit more kind of like data sophistication to a degree then it's I think sky's the limit.
Justin Wheeler Yeah absolutely. So heading up the consumer mass. I'm seeing a lot of a lot of donors, obviously. What are your thoughts or what do you how are you thinking about sort of like where the direction the economy's heading? Are you seeing anything kind of play out in the data today? Does it keep you up at night? Like what? What are your thoughts around sort of, you know, what's happening. The macro level potentially can impact your, you know, your donors under $1,000.
Brady Josephson Yeah, it's it's a good question. I wish I had like a more definitive answer. It is definitely showing up. And it's in two ways. One. You know, we have an off boarding survey. When everyone cancels their monthly donation, we ask kind of why. And we've specifically added, was it like a macroeconomic factor or COVID or something like that? Because people will always say it's financial. Like 80 to 90% of the people say, oh, it's financial. Right. It's not super helpful. So we're trying to get a level deeper and we are seeing a big time rise of people citing inflation or macroeconomic factors. And then where it's showing up, probably even more so that's detrimental to our business, is people choosing to make a one time donation instead of a monthly donation. Interesting. So like our overall donor acquisition is okay, our overall conversion rates are kind of okay, but way more people than we had predicted or expected are saying, I'm just going to give once now and not actually make a monthly donation than we've previously seen. And that for us, we're a very monthly donor, led, focused organization. All the modeling, all of our projections, all of our goals are focused on monthly donors. And so that's where we've seen this continued trend in where it shows up more and where it's it's more damaging to our business. So we have to figure out how to kind of adjust if that's the way that it's going to be.
Justin Wheeler Yeah, interesting. Interesting. So you mentioned that like you're you lead with like recurring, right? That's like your first ask you track when you're when you're converting once someone gives once. Do you have any sort of metrics around like the likelihood of them converting to a recurring donor and is it. Yeah, I'll I'll start there.
Brady Josephson Yes. It's not very.
Justin Wheeler High.
Brady Josephson Yeah. So what we do know is, is about 40 to 50% of people over the past five years who made a one time gift and then join our monthly giving program, do so within 30 days. So it's a very kind of short conversion window and then it's pretty flat and goes for a long time. People give once and then three years later just pop back up and become a monthly donor so that timelines too long to like optimize within. And there's so many other variables going on. And so we've kind of built these new pathways to try to move people from one time to spring, and it's just now kind of getting into market. But we're really focusing on that 30 day window to say can can we speed up that process of get get more of those folks? Because we do know if you start as a one time donor and then you give monthly, you give about 40% more. It's a little like try before you buy. Like I gave you a donation. I like what I saw. Hey, I'll make a bigger commitment, and that's not unique to us. Blackbaud did a study a few years ago around containers and found the same thing. People who give one time first and then join are more likely to give more in aggregate. But it's such a small number for us. Most people join right away. Yeah. So we're trying to figure out, is this a real big opportunity or just a small opportunity? And so we'll see. Yeah, yeah.
Justin Wheeler What drives like that for like the kind of a top of the funnel acquisition? Like what, what drives that traffic? Is, is it paid? Is it organic? Is it something else? Like you guys have a do you feel you have a good handle on sort of like what's driving the activity at the top of the funnel?
Brady Josephson Yeah, it's two things. It's brand and paid. Yeah, that's it. You know, we have a really strong brand that that a lot of people, not as many people as I wish knew, but it's still pretty well known. Got a lot of great brand partners who carry a lot of our brand for us. Our founder, Scott, has a book he speaks that carries a lot. So we get a lot of out of brand kind of direct traffic, organic traffic that's brand related. We don't have a lot of non brand related organic traffic and then paid, you know, paid is has led about 60 to 65% of our monthly donor acquisitions over the past few years. So like really, really. And when I say paid, I mean paid social. Yeah, it's like Google and Facebook. Facebook, that's it. And so that was a real liability actually. You know, it's.
Justin Wheeler With that with yeah. With like the the changes happening on privacy changes.
Brady Josephson We got smoke and it really yeah cost of acquisition basically doubled overnight and then continue to rise to even be three or four times what it was. And so same thing when it's going well, the model's great. Yeah, it's very predictable. Tons of scale. It's been amazing. And then basically overnight, like the carpet was pulled out from under us and because it was working so well, we maybe didn't spend as much time as we could to like diversify or explore other channels because it was just so efficient.
Justin Wheeler Every dollar you put any new right.
Brady Josephson Now, I'm like, Why would we do anything up? Yeah, and but then it dried up so quick we weren't in a great position to like shift funding. And so that's what this year's really been about is diversifying off the Facebook and Google hamster wheel.
Justin Wheeler Yeah.
Brady Josephson And so piloting part. Guest adds live events. We're getting into TV. We're putting out a lot of these little bets to try to see, like, not just what can work, because we're at a size and scale. If something works, that's fine. But can it scale, right? It sounds I don't know if it's braggadocious, but like getting pockets of 50 donors or ten donors here, you can't do that enough times to keep the program going. We have to have something that has some real scale behind it. Otherwise it's not a good use of our resources. So we've done seven pilots, we have two more and hopefully one or two of those shows promise. And then moving forward, we can invest more in them.
Justin Wheeler Do you think you'll completely divest from like Facebook and Google or just finding new ways to optimize it?
Brady Josephson Yeah, Facebook potentially. I mean, we are seeing like really bad.
Justin Wheeler Performance here now.
Brady Josephson And we've iterated and tested a new creative and new audience like we're doing all the right things. And so more of it will probably be will shift funding to be a little bit more lead generation focused like move it up the funnel or down the mountain or whatever and still have a presence and or maybe just go hyper efficient. Just forget scale. Let's just target cost of acquisition and we won't spend above it and it just won't scale. YouTube's been okay. YouTube has been way better for us and then hopefully some of these other other avenues can kind of replace that. Otherwise, yeah, we're going to have to keep finding something to replace that part of our growth. Yeah.
Justin Wheeler Well, it sounds sounds challenging, but sounds like you're also up for the challenge, so.
Brady Josephson I hope so. I hope so. It's. It's super fun.
Justin Wheeler It's like it's all compounding to it's like on top of, like, all these changes. Then you got the macro economy and things happening. So you've got you've got some, some, some fun times ahead of you.
Brady Josephson Yeah. Yeah, we do.
Justin Wheeler All right. We got we're going to I'm going to ask you some quick quickfire questions and you can answer however you want. Just know though, internally I might be judging a little bit inside. Depending on how you.
Brady Josephson It's fair, I would expect nothing less.
Justin Wheeler All right. So we'll start we'll start easy digital reading or actual book?
Brady Josephson Actual actual book.
Justin Wheeler What do you have? Like a book that comes to mind?
Brady Josephson That's I'm reading a book called Hunt. Gather Parent. Hunt, Gather Parent. Yeah. It's an NPR author who embedded themselves in different ancient cultures to see how they raise kids.
Justin Wheeler Interesting.
Brady Josephson It's recommended by our founder, Scott, and it's really good.
Justin Wheeler Do you have kids?
Brady Josephson I have one. Yeah. A four year old.
Justin Wheeler Okay. Okay. Awesome. Yeah. Pizza or salad?
Brady Josephson Is that even a question? I mean, pizza.
Justin Wheeler So so far, just just like we've had, most people say salad.
Brady Josephson Liars.
Justin Wheeler Yeah, that's unbelievable. Would you choose where you're going to live the rest of your life? Would it be the beach? The mountains?
Brady Josephson Mountains.
Justin Wheeler Football or football?
Brady Josephson Football.
Brady Josephson Dogs or catS?
Brady Josephson Dogs? Nah. That's even more of a no brainer than the pizza question.
Justin Wheeler I literally I have to be careful what I say, because I don't know, like, how much someone loves to write.
Brady Josephson That's fair, but I don't like them.
Justin Wheeler I have a very I if I see a cat like I get bad thoughts. Yeah. Same funnel cake or cheesecake?
Brady Josephson Funnel.
Justin Wheeler And then this one is a slam dunk. But The Goonies are sandlot and?
Brady Josephson Sandlot.
Justin Wheeler I guess. Sandlot only person that said Goonies. Can you guess, Tim?
Brady Josephson Contrary, I guess.
Brady Josephson I do know that.
Brady Josephson I mean, he's my best friend.
Brady Josephson I got.
Brady Josephson To know.
Brady Josephson That's awesome. Awesome. Well, thanks so much for having me.
Brady Josephson Yeah.
Hey! Welcome back to Nonstop Nonprofit. Before our Funraise-sponsored break, Shannon was about to give us the inside scoop on misconceptions about P2P fundraising. Listen in to hear Shannon's ideas for incorporating P2P into special events and holiday fundraising--Plus, why you should be leveraging P2P to make the most impact.
Justin Wheeler Absolutely. You know, I think there's you know, when you when you're having like broader conversations with just organizations, nonprofits know, one of the one of the common objections you hear is like now our database, you know, it doesn't do peer to peer. Like they wouldn't be activated to to Funraise and ask people, you know, they're not like professional Funraisers, trained professionals, whatever the excuses might be. But if you take a step back and look at like, what is the number one reason why people give to charity in the first place? You know, like a lot of people are like overthink it. It's the reason why people gave is because someone asked them to give. Like, that's like it's that simple. And so when you think about, you know, building out a peer to peer program, essentially what you're doing is you're creating this environment, this network of people to, you know, turn one fundraisers into five, five fundraisers into ten and so forth. And so I think it's one of those tools that, like every Funraiser needs to have in their tool belt. It's not a fundraising program that you run, you know, 3 hours, 65 days a year. It's usually seasonal around giving days, around certain types of campaigns. I strongly believe that it's it is a tool that every fundraiser needs in their tool belt, because it's such a pivotal way to to grow the donor base and to sustain fundraising efforts throughout busier seasons of fundraising.
Shannon Scanlan Yeah, absolutely. And I mean, you know, as a fundraiser, I know it is hard to ask for money, but the hardest thing is like you just you have to ask and you know, a lot of folks are willing and want to to help out and, you know, kind of as part of that, I think another interesting thing that I've seen and have seen a lot of nonprofits ask about is, you know, beyond like giving days is kind of incorporating D.I.Y. peer to peer fundraising into kind of special personal events and holidays. You know, I think one of the organizations that we work with after someone signs up for an email or takes an advocacy ask and they ask them to pledge their birthday to raise money for this organization. And at that point, you know, it's a small ask to just, you know, yeah, my birthday is in February. You know, I support this organization, but then, you know, leading up to it, it gives them kind of this tool kit to build a DIY fundraising campaign to support the organization. So that's another way to incorporate peer to peer into your overall fundraising and and marketing programs, you know, so for things like birthdays or if there's kind of holidays coming up, you know, particularly for an organization working on like civil rights or something like that, using those days to encourage folks to to build their personal campaigns, not to it doesn't need to be a primary push of fundraising, but often those become a Funraiser is hidden under those, you know, like other ways to give, you know, like below the fold. But by just like offering it kind of in those normal communications, you know, we're finding folks are willing to do DIY Funraisers for important events. Ask their friends. One of the the cool things with the Springboard and Funraise platform is being able to make it easy. And so that includes, you know, being able to easily create Facebook Funraisers, you know. So if I'm reading a newsletter and it's like, Hey, would you be interested in doing a Facebook fundraiser? And it's kind of all set up and it's already there, whereas I may not know about it if it wasn't kind of promoted more often. So also seeing that incorporated more.
Justin Wheeler And yeah, and when we talk about optimizing or allowing technology to really optimizing the fundraising outcome, you know, specifically with Facebook, what our data shows is when an individual peer-to-peer fundraiser connects their page to Facebook, they see an immediate $200 increase in their overall fundraising goal. Right. So it's an extra 200 bucks for every individual campaign just by connecting your page to Facebook. And the really the big drive for that is that you tap into Facebook's notification ecosystem, which your friends and your network, you know, gets notified that you're raising for for a particular cause. And so things like that. And I think that as we go into 23 and as we have these headwinds in front of us, I think that like if you if we look back on sort of just the recessions that in the past, the most recent the Great Recession in 2008, you know, I think it's so important for nonprofits understand that giving does not follow the the public markets specifically the S&P. Right. When we when we when we see in 2008 the S&P falls 40%, but giving only fell 7%. It's because people are still inspired and motivated to give because it's such an emotional aspect of, you know, what we're giving with emotion, not logic. Right? So we saw this in the pandemic and I think we're going to see this in. 23. I think that giving will be recession resilient if nonprofits continue to focus on their fundraising programs. And I think that peer to peer is such a important strategy going into 23. As you think about your your donor base and as you understand the potential threats to overall fundraising in general, it's going to be individuals who are highly invested in the markets who maybe don't have as much liquidity because because of that. And I think peer to peer is just such a great way to balance sort of your fundraising programs going into 23. I'd be curious, I know that you guys work with, you know, large, large enterprise nonprofits. Is it hard to get them to move the needle on on peer to peer? Do you see them wanting to prioritize it? I'd love to hear your thoughts around how the Enterprise nonprofit is thinking of a peer to peer.
Shannon Scanlan Yeah, I mean, I think that's you know, I've seen in the past some hesitancy to build peer to peer programs. Previously, it's been very labor intensive for nonprofits to build campaigns, promote it to Funraisers, you know, really, really cultivates. And I'm not saying that there isn't any work moving forward, but there has been a little bit of a shift to open it up and really kind of give the tools to to their supporters and their fundraisers. But it's funny that it's smaller organizations that have actually been looking to incorporate peer to peer more than larger organizations because they're looking at it, you know, how do we make sure that we're really doing everything possible to capitalize on the peer to peer program? But we have seen actually a number of larger organizations kind of rethink their peer to peer to make it easier for folks to just create pages on their own and let them run with it, to promote it on social media and kind of let them run with it, as well as incorporate it into larger giving days or giving campaign periods, you know, understanding that it can be a really powerful tool not only to raise money, but also to engage their existing supporters. You know, in particular, as we're looking at kind of recession and uncertainty, it's a great way to retain your best supporters as well, you know, in kind of building these communities. And, you know, I know that just personally, like the organizations that I've Funraised for, you know, like I feel the kind of closest connection too, because I know that I've already like asked my friends and I'm invested in making sure that the organization is doing good work because I vouched for them. My friends have come on board because of that, and I want to be able to continue to support them in different ways, even though I may not be able to write a check right now. So it's also a great way to keep donors and kind of, you know, instead of just asking them for the same amount every year, like, would you consider doing something different, like pledging your birthday and things like that?
Justin Wheeler Absolutely. And something, you know, interesting thing that we see is in our data is fundraisers. If an individual has funraised, they're four times more likely to become a recurring donor or sustaining donor. Right. And so as we think about retaining donors and nurturing donors, actually inviting them to Funraise on your behalf is a really solid way to actually retain and to keep them engaged because they're more bought. And just like you said, like in your own case, when you Funraise for an organization, you feel a bit more modern and then when just making a single donation. And so I think that that's an important aspect. I know in your guys is you guys have shared some insight around monthly donors. I think it is our sustaining monthly donors. They give 400% more to charity. Can you unpack that a little bit? Because I do think peer to peer fundraising is actually a really great way to attract new recurring donors. And so it has this snowball effect. And so just kind of curious if you could unpack what your what you guys are seeing in your data around that that phenomenal growth?
Shannon Scanlan Yeah. I mean, I think it is providing an easy way to like give a smaller amount, more read out over time, you know, might seem like initially like a smaller investment to me if I'm giving $5 over 12 months and over 60, $60 now. But what that really does is we see once folks sign up and a lot of times whether it's through credit card or giving through and even these other PayPal Apple Pay, we're seeing folks that remain sustaining donors for years and even decades. And this it's not that, you know, folks are forgetting that they're giving, but it's you know, it's an ongoing relationship that is less just has a lower burden of entry, basically, you know, if you're giving, you know, $5 a month, you know, and I think we work with a lot of public media stations. And obviously, you know, they've really. Shifted to focusing on sustaining giving. And that includes, you know, monthly, but also offering other, you know, sustaining options, whether it's like quarterly or annually. But just having this opt in process of being able to give and continue to give and support. Your organization just creates a much longer relationship. And I think it's also folks are recognizing, of course, how important these donors are and making them feel bought into like a sense of community and that you're a member or you're a guardian or kind of legacy supporter or something like that. And I really I love seeing as part of that, like organizations that are reaching out to monthly and recognizing you, even if it's just like a plain text email that says, hey, your monthly donor just giving you the inside scoop like that kind of cultivation just really makes my heart smile.
Justin Wheeler Absolutely.
Shannon Scanlan Mm hmm. And, you know, I also really love, you know, folks that are recognizing it. It used to be one of my pet peeves that in public media that they've always asked me to become a monthly donor. And I'm like, I'm already a monthly donor. Like, what do I get for that? You know, offering kind of pledge free streaming and things like that I think are really cool. And so just having that a part of, you know, peer to peer I think is also both a great opportunity to kind of get that, you know, $5 a month and have someone kind of bought into an organization kind of and then continuing that cultivation with someone at that level so that you're really growing your support, you know, so by not offering just that recurring giving, you know, you're kind of really missing out both on those relationships and revenue. Yeah.
Justin Wheeler AS So thank you for sharing that. That was that was super insightful. One more question before we wrap it up for any of the Springboard customers that are listening, Shannon, what would be the best way for them to activate this new integration and partnership that we have with what's the best way for them to approach that?
Shannon Scanlan Sure. On our websites, you know, there's a number of ways to sign up. But of course, anyone who's an existing springboard customer, you know, they have great project managers that they know personally. And so reaching out to them, they're interested in peer to peer, you know, happy to kind of help show them what's what's available and how to get them started. You know, everyone that we've we've talked to is really excited about it both because it's it's really easy to create the campaigns that are branded. I know a lot of organizations been kind of frustrated with like piecemeal peer to peer platforms that either aren't integrated IT or CRM or don't look like their website, things like that. So it's just a really great offering to have this as part of their bigger overall fundraising marketing platform.
Justin Wheeler Absolutely. Well, awesome. Well, Shannon, thank you so much for joining us today. We finally are very excited to be partnering alongside you all and we're excited to go into 23 and really help our mutual customers thrive and raise as much money as possible for their important causes. Thank you so much for joining the podcast today.
Shannon Scanlan Absolutely. Thank you.
Justin Wheeler Awesome.
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