According to research from Double the Donation, more than 26 million people work for companies that match employee gifts. Unfortunately, the vast majority (approximately 78%) of this segment has never been made aware of the programs in the first place.
That’s why nonprofit organizations are increasingly promoting the initiatives to their audiences and taking the necessary steps to uncover these opportunities themselves. And in this guide, we’ll walk you through five easy ways your team can do so to drive more matching gifts.
These include:
- Donation form fields
- Confirmation page search tools
- Email domain screening
- Follow-up messaging
- Employer appends
When it comes to uncovering matching gift potential, the single most important data point you can prioritize is your donors’ employment information. Once you have access to this knowledge, you can screen against top-giving companies and identify matches to pursue.
Let’s get started!
1. Donation form fields
Some of the best opportunities to identify the potential for (and engage donors with) gift-matching programs take place directly within the giving process. It all starts with locating an individual’s employing company—and simply asking them for this information while they’re actively supporting your cause is a great way to go.
After all, your donors are likely used to providing a number of personal data points within the giving experience—from their name and phone number to their email and mailing addresses. What’s one more optional field to donors in the grand scheme of things?
If you’d like to request employment information from your donation page, keep in mind that sharing context relating to matching gifts can inspire more individuals to provide the detail. It can be as simple as adding a blurb like this: “See if your employer matches donations! Enter your company name here to find out.”
Not to mention, research indicates that donors are more likely to give—and to give in larger amounts—when they know that a match is being offered. In fact, the above-cited study reports that 1 in 3 donors would make a larger donation, resulting in over 51% increase in the average donation amount, when matching opportunities are highlighted.
2. Confirmation page search tools
Once an individual has submitted their donation, they’re likely redirected to an online confirmation screen, thanking them for their support. This page is another key opportunity to collect employment information, specifically for those who hadn’t opted to provide their company in the previous step. And it’s easy when you embed a matching gift database search tool within the page!
And for those that did enter their company name during the giving process, the confirmation screen can serve as a detailed call to action for donors to take the next steps outlined by their employers.
3. Email domain screening
As donors complete your online giving form, they are typically prompted to enter an email address. This data point enables your team to keep in touch, thanking donors for their support and providing additional opportunities for involvement. But it can also allow you to identify matching-eligible donations—particularly when supporters provide their corporate email addresses in the field.
For example, let’s say a donor makes a gift to your organization through an online donation page. When filling out their personal information, the individual enters “jennytaylor@thehomedepot.com” in the email box. From there, you can assume that your donor, Jenny, works for Home Depot, which you know offers a generous matching gift program for employees.
Email domain screening for match-eligible donations results in a 1% increase in total revenue for nonprofits. For a small nonprofit receiving less than $500K per year, that’s an additional $5,000. Meanwhile, a large organization that brings in over $50 million in annual revenue may see upwards of $500K in increased matching gift funds—just by enabling email screening!
4. Follow-up messaging
Another way to collect employment information from donors who had not provided it within the giving form or confirmation page, nor used a corporate email address, is by leveraging strategic follow-up communications. This type of digital outreach can encourage donors, once again, to search their employing company in your nonprofit’s corporate giving database.
Here’s some sample text you can use: “Dear [Donor], our records indicate that your recent donation of $[gift amount] may qualify for a matching gift from your employer. Want to learn more? Click here to find out if your company matches employee donations.”
Once they do, they’ll be provided access to company-specific program guidelines and next steps—including minimum and maximum match amounts, qualifying nonprofit and employee types, submission deadlines, direct links to request forms, and more.
5. Employer appends
Unfortunately, you might get through all four of these top practices without uncovering some donors’ employing companies. In that case, third-party service data appends companies can be an additional aid.
If you’re not familiar with this idea, employer appends essentially enable organizations to fill in their missing donor data points using information that they do have. For example, a nonprofit typically provides as many of the following details as possible about each donor record they’d like to append:
- Name
- Unique ID number
- Mailing address
- Email address
- Phone number
- College or university
- Last gift amount
- Date of most recent donation
- Date the entry was last updated
From there, the appending service cross-references the information against a number of publicly and privately available databases—including government records, stock holdings, social media profiles, business registrations, and more—to match individual donors with the companies they likely work for.
Once your organization receives the completed append, you should have accurate employment information for an additional segment of your donors and can identify and pursue match opportunities with the recommendations outlined above.
Corporate matching gifts have the potential to bring your organization’s revenue to new heights. But you have to know where to look to locate the opportunities.
The above tips and tricks can help—and we recommend leveraging dedicated software to streamline and simplify your efforts. Luckily, the industry-leading provider of matching gift tools, Double the Donation, integrates seamlessly with your Giveffect fundraising solution to produce significant results for you and your cause.
Good luck!
Learn more about how to increase your matching donations with Giveffect and our integration with Double the Donation. Schedule your demo today!