Just like retail, many nonprofit organizations earn a lot of their income in the year-end and holiday season, some as much as 35% or more of the whole year’s fundraising income.  Year-end giving, annual funds, and board appeals a big earners for many NPOs, and year-end giving is popular among donors looking to offset their taxes.  This year a lot of people are nervous about fundraising in a down economy, but this note at philanthropy.org suggests that things have to get a lot worse before giving drops significantly:

But based on IRS tax-return statistics, Mr. Sharpe notes, giving as a percentage of income by most Americans held steady at 1.8 percent throughout the Depression and in some cases even went up slightly.

At Firstgiving, we’re running a sale on our donation processing fees starting tomorrow through the end of the year to help our customers get a little extra out of these year-end giving campaigns.  From 11/21 through 12/31, we’re cutting our fee on direct donation in half, from 5% to 2.5%.  This sale applies to donations through any basic or premium start page, but not to donations through personal fundraising pages.  Credit card fees apply as usual.

The discount will be applied automatically, so all you need to do is start sending out your year-end appeal with a link to your Firstgiving start page, or with a link directly to the donate process - just right-click the “donate” button on your start page, and choose “copy link” or “copy shortcut” to find your direct donate URL.

Consider it our little stimulus package.  As always, drop us a line if you have questions.

Here are three things to keep in mind when doing a year-end appeal:

1. Make it real: Remind donors and prospects about the good you’ve done this year, and ask them for a contribution to help you continue to do good in 2009.  Be concrete about what benefit different donation amounts can deliver.
2. Make it brief: Remember how busy everybody is this time of year.  Be respectful of their time and get to the point.  But don’t be afraid to send a reminder or two.
3. Stress tax-deductibility: Year-end financial planning is more than just budgeting for holiday gifts, it also means looking over the whole year and planning for tax time.  Remind donors that charitable contributions can be tax-advantageous in many cases.  Always refer detailed questions to a tax professional.