That’s it folks! We’ve reached the end of 2020, which means it’s time for a little reflection and some holiday slow-downs.
This time of year I always do a bit of reflecting. I think about what my kids accomplished and experienced. I think about what we did as a family. And of course, I think about all the awesome that happened at GiveWP and because of GiveWP.
Though 2020 definitely took us for a crazy ride, this was still a year full of awe-inspiring moments.
2020 Was a Year of Great Fundraising
This year, we saw fundraising increase at an exponential rate. It’s so encouraging to see, with data, that when humanity is suffering, we collectively step up and become more generous with our funds, resources, and our time. It was wonderful to see our Givers coming together to help each other and their communities.
Here are some of the most inspirational Give Stories that came out of 2020.
Giving Tuesday Now
Every year we prepare all kinds of resources and materials for our Give users to fully participate in #GivingTuesday. This year, as a response to the global pandemic, the folks at The Giving Tuesday Organization decided to pull together a new initiative called “Giving Tuesday Now.” Doing this early was a bold move, but those that participated saw great results.
Sam Adams and the Restaurant Strong Fund
The Greg Hill Foundation and Sam Adams partnered to create the Restaurant Strong Fund. This fundraiser raised money for full-time restaurant employees who lost their income due to the pandemic. Their results were astounding.
Caninedidates Helped Pets in Need With a Doggy Mayoral Election
Okay, seriously, how can you NOT smile when you read this story? These dogs helped to raise money for the PAWS of Coronado foundation, who added to their regular mission this year! In addition to housing stray pets who need homes, PAWS of Coronado helped pet owners that came down with COVID care for their animals while they were ill.
Maroons Made Masks to Keep Up School Spirit and Help the Community
When schools closed down, Dr. Catherine Sarisky went into action. She created a website for her students to keep track of their contributions to keep their community safe. The campaign brought back the spirit of campus life when students couldn’t get together in person.
Allie and Greg Eloped, Including Their Family and Friends Online
One of our favorite stories to come from this year are all the unique ways people decided to get married in the face of unsafe gatherings. Allie and Greg used GiveWP to include their family and friends on their special day, even when they couldn’t be there in person.
Giving Tuesday
Fundraising in 2020 wouldn’t be complete without talking about the annual Giving Tuesday event.
This year we saw over $10M raised via our over 100,000 active users of GiveWP during the Giving Tuesday season. We are beyond thrilled to be part of your success this year!
GiveLIVE Showed Us New Ways to Use GiveWP
GiveLIVE transformed this year into Give Stories LIVE! We interviewed a variety of our customers to see how they use GiveWP to raise more money. The tips and information they gave us were truly insightful.
- This concert-funding website uses GiveWP to “chip in” for the event. Musicians can also create a profile where prospective customers can book lessons and more.
- We found out just how powerful Airtable + GiveWP can be when we interviewed a GiveWP customer using it to gain an understanding of their donors.
- This GiveWP customer increased their average donation amount to over $400 by segmenting their donor list and crafting asks and donation forms for different types of donors.
- Online fundraising events got kind of boring until we discovered this community-wide virtual dance party, with a TWIST.
GiveWP Enhancements and Add-ons
This year was a great year for new add-ons and enhancements to GiveWP. Here’s just a quick list of all the great add-ons and features for you to review in case you missed any:
- We launched 2020 as “The Year of Free Add-ons” and successfully launched 7 new add-ons this year, that already boast over 1800 active installs this year.
- We had 4 major releases this year (2.6, 2.7, 2.8, and 2.9). These added things like a gorgeous new reports dashboard, our new multi-step donation form template, a new onboarding wizard, and a brand new PayPal Donations experience.
- We released our fifth email marketing add-on so Givers can connect their donation forms to Active Campaign.
- We also launched the popular “Funds and Designations” add-on. This add-on has already gotten wide adoption among our customers. See all the details to get the Funds and Designation add-on today.
#TeamGive Grew!
We hired some highly skilled developers, top-notch support technicians, and new marketing experts this year. We now have 23 full-time professionals all dedicated to helping YOU have success with your online donations.
We also started working with some excellent nonprofit and fundraising writers with years of expertise. You might start seeing some of them on our blog. If you are a writer with nonprofit and/or fundraising experience, we’d love to hear from you.
100K Users!
This year we crossed a very big milestone. The free GiveWP plugin now is installed across 100,000 websites all over the world! We are beyond ecstatic to see so many people doing good with GiveWP.
Preparing for 2021 Fundraising and Giving
Not all nonprofits have seen increases in giving this year, but we expect donors to continue their generosity in 2021. If your nonprofit has struggled, consider pivoting your fundraising strategies to meet these new challenges. Of course, this means coming up with new fundraising ideas, of which we have plenty for you.
We also highly recommend creating a crisis communications plan. Even if the crisis isn’t directly related to your organization, creating a plan for any situation will help you stay afloat in the face of anything.
Remember to keep in touch with your donors over the holidays so they enter 2021 with you top of mind.
We’ll see you next year! Subscribe to our newsletter if you haven’t already so you get an update when we return.
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