NPR Digital Services Blog

An article by Chronicle of Philanthropy reports that online giving grew considerably in 2010, especially for year-end giving.  They provide results from three large organizations that handle online gifts for non profits, and their numbers show an increase in online giving amounts in 2010 ranging from 10% to whooping 40% over 2009.

How did our Quick Pledge stations fare in comparison? I pulled some stats to see:

• Comparing 2010 to 2009: Quick Pledge stations brought in $23.2 Million in revenue in approx. 230,000 transactions. That’s an increase of 12% over previous year!

• Narrowing down to just year-end giving: In December alone, Quick Pledge stations brought in $2.7 Million in 23,000 transactions. That’s a 14% increase over December 2009!

• Quick Pledge donors were also more generous with their year-end giving amounts.  While the average pledge amount for the year was $101, for December donations it topped out at $117.

What will the trends in fundraising be for the upcoming year?  A few industry experts give their recommendations and predictions.

Some key items that I think are particularly relevant to public broadcasting are the following:

• The role of mobile engagement is becoming more and more important.
• The importance of connecting and building relationships with your donors.
• Really knowing your donors by analyzing your database.

Read the full articles:

5 Fundraising Trends for 2011

Game Changing Strategies for Nonprofits in 2011

Technology Trends for Nonprofits in 2011

So tomorrow is Friday, Dec. 31st and you’d like to get your pledges from Quick Pledge processed before the end of 2010 so your donors get the tax benefit.

But it’s a holiday, and PI is closed. Don’t worry, there is a way.

You can use the Pledge Delivery Manager tool to Send Pledges Early on the Same Day.

• If you receive a daily batch file, you can use this tool to receive transactions early.
• Pledges will be sent to the dedicated pledge email address. (NOTE: This is different from the non-secure pledge notification email.)

To access this new feature:

• Log into your Quick Pledge Administrative Tools
• Scroll to the bottom of the Index page to the Administrative section
• Click on Pledge Delivery Manager
• Enter Date (Dec 31st) and Select your Form from the list

Lost your encrypted batch file? Missing a recent pledge transaction email? You can now resend that.

We created a handy new Pledge Delivery Manager tool that lets you resend a daily batch file or individual pledge transaction to the dedicated pledge email address.  (NOTE: This is different from the non-secure pledge notification email.)

As you know, the encrypted pledge files are sent to your dedicated pledge email address automatically, but occasionally, one might go missing. Now, you can easily resend that file to yourself.

Send Early on the Same Day: If you receive a daily batch file, you can also use this tool to receive transactions early, e.g. so you can start processing Dec 31st transactions on Dec 31st, instead of waiting until next year for the batch file to arrive.

Individual Pledge: If you currently receive separate real-time encrypted email, you can also use this tool to resend an individual pledge transaction based on the Pledge ID.

A small update to cover. You can now edit the wording for the field “May we read your name on air?” on your Quick Pledge Form.

This can be useful if you need to provide additional information and details to the donor about what information you’ll use and how.  For example, if your host will mention not only donor’s first and last name but also their city and state or other details about their donation, it is a good idea to mention that when asking for their permission.

If you are not using this field, but would like to ask a different question on your pledge form, you can also customize the field to an entirely different question with a “Yes/No” answer.

To adjust the copy:

• Log into your Quick Pledge Administrative Tools
• Click on Pledge Form Manager

Sarianne Palmesano sent out an email about year-end fundraising that’s definitely worth sharing.

The end of the year is a great time to reach out to your listeners and members and thank them for being a valued listener, and at the same time ask for a contribution.

People are in the holiday spirit, and with tax time around the corner it’s a good time to remind them of the tax advantages of contributing to your non-profit organization.

Ideas and more info here.

Need some ideas for a year-end fundraiser for you radio station?  DEI (The Development Exchange) is organizing the now 4th national Best of Public Radio program again in December to help stations boost their year-end fundraising efforts.

What is Best of Public Radio?

Best of Public Radio is a special  fundraiser broadcast featuring some of public radio’s best stories and features from the past year, created in collaboration with  NPR, American Public Media, and Public Radio International. Participating stations may air the program between December 11-31st.

DEI, with the help of Public Interactive’s Quick Pledge and Paypal, will process and distribute the funds, or stations may opt to collect the donations via their own web site.  They’ll also set up a special web site at http://www.givetopublicradio.org/ for collecting the donations and providing information about the program.

You can find out more information about Best of Public Radio and how to sign up for it on DEI’s website.

Quick Pledge, our industry-specific online pledge system, has an enormous impact on results…and it gets better each year.  Just take a look!

• In October 2009, stations using Quick Pledge raised over $5 million online during their fall drive, with 48,000 donor transactions at an average pledge of $104.
• In October 2010, stations using Quick Pledge raised $6 million dollars in some 61,000 donor transactions.

That’s a 21% increase in both the total amount raised and the number of individual transactions.

This past year, our stations raised $22.6 million dollars with Quick Pledge. That’s a whopping 227,000 pledge transactions, with an average pledge amount of $100.  Our top station, WXPN, raised $2.6 Million online this year alone.

Congratulations to all our stations!

To find out how Quick Pledge can grow your station’s online fundraising, contact Joe Orlando, Marketing and Sales Manager, 888-729-8809.

If you use both Pulse and Quick Pledge, you can track this. When sending out Pulse e-solicitations with links to your Quick Pledge form, make sure to use the special Pledge Tracking link instead of linking directly to your pledge form URL.

This allows you to track the total number of pledges and dollars raised from the email campaign, in addition to viewing opens and click-thrus. You can drill down to individual pledges by searching via the Pulse email ID in Quick Pledge reporting.

To include Trackable Pledge Links in your Pulse Email Campaigns:

• In Pulse,  when Adding Custom Content, Click on Insert Pledge Tracking Link. This adds special tags into the message. (Looks something like < pledge_tracking_link station=’wxyz’ form=’default’ prefill=’n'> Link Copy Goes Here < / pledge tracking link > ).
• Customize the Text in the link, or Insert an Image between the taglines.

The credit card industry is tightening their guidelines. The PCI (Payment Card Industry) now requires all organizations that process, store or transmit credit card information to be PCI compliant.

What does this mean for you as a station?

It means that if you store any credit card information for any length of time, whether in electronic format on your server or simply written on a piece of paper, you need to go through the certification process and become PCI compliant. The only way to avoid this is by not storing any credit card numbers in your systems, and Public Interactive can help you with this.

How we can help

Now is the perfect time to consider Quick Pledge with integrated real-time processing to eliminate the need to store credit card info. No credit card numbers are sent to you for processing – that’s online and phone orders, too – so your systems are less vulnerable.