Who are Your Best Prospects to Become Recurring Donors?

Know your data to know your best prospects

Recurring giving is attractive to lots of different people, but especially if you’re just starting out and building your recurring donor roster, you want to focus your solicitation efforts on folks with a high likelihood of conversion.

If you’re working to build up a recurring giving program, one of your chief considerations is whom to ask. Recurring giving is attractive to lots of different people, but especially if you’re just starting out and building your recurring donor roster, you want to focus your solicitation efforts on folks with a high likelihood of conversion.

So, who are your best, most likely prospects to become recurring donors?

Thread has two suggestions for you.

#1: New donors

Huh? New donors are good prospects to become recurring donors? But they just gave! You’re telling me to ask them again?

Yes, we are telling you to ask them again – and sooner than you would think!

According to data from Classy’s 2019 State of Modern Philanthropy Report, asking a first-time donor to give again and convert into a recurring donor within 45 days of their gift is your best chance of securing that second gift (and then third, fourth, fifth, and so on!).

Why? Recency and relevance. If you do your job of appropriately stewarding that first gift, you’re keeping yourself top-of-mind and relevant to the donor. When you then approach the donor with a thoughtful and compelling ask to become a recurring donor, the donor is drawn to that invitation – not remembering or reacting to how recently they just gave.

New donors are interested in you, so don’t let that interest go to waste. Make the ask to increase their impact as a recurring donor!

#2: Existing donors

The other place to find likely new recurring donors is within your existing donor base. More specifically, look for donors who fit one or both bills: they give ~$250 cumulatively in one or more gifts per year, and/or they give multiple gifts per year.

Donors giving around the $250 level annually are prime prospects for recurring giving, because it’s an easy jump to making one $250 gift to 12 gifts of $20-$25/month, which is right around Classy’s benchmark for the average recurring gift ($24).

Donors making multiple gifts per year are prime prospects for recurring giving because they’ve shown that willingness to give repeatedly within a year. The next step is simply to formalize that habit into regular increments!

Now that you know whom your best prospects for recurring giving are, if you would like help designing the ask, let us know! We’d love to help, so go ahead and contact us to get the conversation going.

Additionally, be sure to check out our YouTube channel, where we have lots of great video content on the best practices of designing and launching recurring giving program.