Okay, it’s happening. Everybody stay calm! (Michael Scott, anyone?)
First: we want to extend a warm welcome back to GIVING SEASON. We’ve missed you. And what makes it even better: these recent Meta updates can really launch your social media fundraising campaigns into orbit.
The fact is: our friends at Meta are really working hard to make sure they’re refining, developing, and releasing tools that maximize your fundraising on Facebook. The newest addition to their growing toolbox? Enhanced recurring giving tools and a new match structure.
Bottom Line Up Front
Release Details
- The recurring donor feature set was released in October 2022
- The recurring donor feature set is only available for nonprofits in the United States at this time
Release Features
- Enabling nonprofits to capture recurring donations: A new fundraising type, Recurring Giving, has been introduced along with additional features such as automatic welcome messages and enhanced ongoing communication options will help nonprofits ensure they are making the most of this new fundraising type.
- Providing enhanced insights & metrics centered around recurring giving: New recurring donor insights that track donations by type and amount, additional data points for recurring donation types in transaction reports, and easy filtering for recurring donors in Nonprofit Manager.
Giving Season 2022 Match Structure on Facebook
For Giving Season 2022*, Meta will match recurring donations on Facebook 100%, up to $100, on the 2nd monthly donation.
Here’s the 411 on eligibility:
- There is a cap of $100,000 match per nonprofit organization
- The match budget cap is $7 Million overall, and we will match until funds run out
- *Only recurring donations setup between November 15th - December 31st, 2022 are eligible to be matched by Meta
- While Meta has previously matched one-time donations on prior Giving Tuesdays, we are shifting to only matching recurring donations on Facebook to help nonprofits sustain donations beyond the holidays, applying the above guidelines
The Tools
As Meta puts it, these enhancements provide “new reporting features and insights to help you acquire, engage with and retain recurring donors and build a thriving community of long-term supporters.”
Sounds familiar… kind of like what we’ve been saying all along.
What’s cool is that—while recurring giving on Facebook has always been an option for donors—nonprofits can now create campaigns geared specifically toward growing the number of recurring donors for your organization. In other words, rather than have a revenue goal, nonprofits can target a number of recurring donors to be signed up through the fundraiser.
This is a massive step for nonprofits when it comes to building lasting relationships with your supporters. Paired with their other recent updates, Meta has been BUSY getting the tools in place to make Facebook the leader in social media fundraising.
There are a couple other updates worth noting in this rollout:
- Recurring Engagement: When someone makes a donation or creates a fundraiser on Facebook, they will see a screen that prompts them to connect with your organization. Page follow, Messenger and email sharing are all now turned on by default (if your nonprofit organization’s page has Messenger turned on), with a simple one-click “Save” required from users.
- Automated Welcome Message: Set up an automated message series to welcome donors who sign up for recurring giving. To be clear: A positive welcome experience = A strong foundation to build a long-term relationship.
- Enhanced Data Insights: In both Nonprofit Manager as well as your Facebook Transaction Reports, you are now able to sort and view donation metrics and enhanced insights into your recurring donors. (And you know what we can do with additional supporter insights? Personalize.)
Facebook’s Donation Matching
Double underline and highlight this: Meta will match your donors’ recurring donation 100% up to $100 in the next month (up to $100k per organization).
As if you needed more incentive for building your pool of recurring donors… free $$ from Meta.
And all new recurring donors who start a recurring donation between November 15 and December 31, 2022 are eligible for this match. (you can find the specific terms and conditions for this Giving Season 2022 program here)