Philanthropy Front and Center-Atlanta: Network for Good Updates ...

The online giving platform Network for Good recently released their 2011 Digital Giving Index.?In just over 10 years of operation, Network for Good has?processed more than $625 million in funds for more than 83,000 charities. Such a wealth of information gives?Network for Good a unique perspective on the experience and behaviors of?charitable giving across multiple online channels, and their 2011 study examines giving on individual?charity websites, charity portals, and social giving (peer-to-peer)?websites and applications. The 2011 study?includes?trends and analysis on $138 million in donations to more than 40,000?charities through the Network for Good platform in 2011.

Online giving continues to rise across all the channels studied, and total online giving rose 17%. From the report:

• Charity Websites saw growth across?both generic (doesn't look like the nonprofit's website) and branded donation pages by 5% and 11%?respectively from 2010 to 2011
• Portal Giving grew 9%, excluding disaster relief?donations. If you factoring in donations for disasters, portal giving grew?15%: "Disaster giving for Japan tsunami relief in March 2011?accounted for a quarter of total 2011 portal giving."
• Social Giving increased by 29%, which makes sense, given that peer-to-peer fundraising is becoming much more common on social networks.

The majority of online donations still happen through charity websites. In 2011, 65% of online donations happened via websites, down 2% from 67% in 2010. This is largely due to an increase in peer-to-peer fundraising, which made up 15% of all online giving in 2010 and 2011. Portal giving still sees a bigger percentage of online giving at 17% for both years, but Network for Good reports that the gap is narrowing. It will be interesting to see how things change for 2012.

Donation pages that look like the rest of your website see more and larger donations than a generic giving page.??Dollars donated through charity websites?increased 10% over 2010, but growth was higher for branded donation pages: "In 2011, Network for Good saw a 4%?increase in average gift size for charities with a branded donation?page, versus a 2% increase for those with a generic donate page." Here's the real kicker: "Further, an average charity with a branded donation page received 5?times more donations and raised an average of almost $15,000 more?than an average charity with a generic donate page raised in 2011.?The impact of a branded donation page can increase to 6 or 7 times?during year-end peak fundraising season."

End-of-year fundraising is huge, both in terms of gift size and total percentage of donations. Your giving website becomes even more important during this time. In the fourth quarter of 2011, average gift sizes on charity websites grew from a little over $100 for the year to $174 for generic giving pages and $203 for branded giving pages. Giving through websites also increases: 71% of online donations happened through nonprofits' website (as opposed to 65% for the whole year), up from 67% in 2010. December is an especially key month: "Roughly one-third of annual giving through the?Network for Good giving system ?occurs in the?month of December alone; and in 2011, over?10% of donation dollars came in on the last?three days of the year." 13% more dollars were donated in December 2011 over December 2010.

Since these are just a few highlights, be sure to check out the full report from Network for Good for all the charts and numbers.?Download the report?

Elyse Klova, Program Associate, Foundation Center-Atlanta

Source: http://atlantablog.foundationcenter.org/2012/03/network-for-good-updates-2011-digital-giving-index.html

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