Finding Your Volunteer-Donors: A Guide for Nonprofits

Last year, our team traveled to Miami to gather for our first Dreamforce2You event with our nonprofit community in Southern Florida. We shared expertise, stories, and strategies with a talented group that included local nonprofit leaders, our awesome client the Zoo Miami Foundation, and partners at Salesforce, FinDock, and Golden. 

Now, we are gathering together some tips we learned at that event and have seen put into practice that nonprofits can use to ensure interested volunteers aren’t overlooked as long-term financial supporters. 

Volunteers can be a nonprofit’s greatest untapped resource, as they are 10x more likely to donate than non-volunteers.

In this post, we are taking a look at how teams can access their potentially overlooked gold mine of support.

Volunteers: Your Ideal Donors

Volunteers already believe in your mission and have seen its impact firsthand. They’ve invested time and energy and are eager to see your impact continue. The first step to building a network of volunteer-donors is to recognize that many volunteers would actually welcome an opportunity to become donors. Don’t write your volunteers off or feel guilty about asking them for money. Most already have a strong emotional connection to your mission and are ready to support your work financially. 

Engagement Is Key

Creating meaningful volunteer experiences is foundational to building a strong network of supporters – that includes your financial supporters. Volunteers want to make a difference and know more about how their contributions affect change. It strengthens the connections your supporters have with your cause when you call out their contributions and share stories about how much their efforts matter. 

Identify the Times to Ask

There are often critical points during the volunteer experience when people are more open to making a donation. After completing a successful project or celebrating an anniversary with the organization, volunteers can feel connected, accomplished, and ready to celebrate by increasing the impact of their efforts with a financial contribution. 

It’s ok to let them know you welcome these financial contributions. It can go a long way to customize requests for money based on the volunteer’s contributions and experiences. Show them how their donation can further amplify the work they’ve already done. They may be eager to help you but just need to know what help you need.

Build a Communication Strategy

Successful communication is personalized. Emails, social media, and direct outreach should reflect the volunteer’s level of engagement. For new volunteers, consider messages that cover the basics of your mission. For more involved volunteers, go into more detail about how their financial support can increase their impact.

By tailoring communication, nonprofits can support volunteers, keep them engaged, and show them how much they are valued. Multichannel communication—whether through emails, personal notes, or social media updates— can be an important way to keep volunteers connected to the mission.

Stewardship for Long-Term Support

Once a volunteer becomes a donor, stewardship is vital to keep them engaged. Nonprofits should continue offering opportunities for involvement, whether through more volunteer projects, leadership roles, or event attendance. Show your volunteer-donors that you appreciate them not just for their financial contributions but also for their ongoing dedication to volunteer work.

Encouraging volunteers to become recurring donors through monthly giving programs is a tried and true way to secure long-term support. Nonprofits can take it a step further, recognizing the donations directly tied to the volunteer’s work, and reinforcing the connection between their time and financial contributions.

Next Steps: Connect with Your Volunteers

Maximizing the potential of volunteer-to-donor connections includes meaningful engagement, timely donation requests, and personalized communication. Reach out to Arkus to learn more about how we help teams use software to engage their volunteers and connect with their communities to deliver on their mission. 

Reach out to Arkus through our  contact us form or connect with us on LinkedIn.