Annual giving is an organization’s efforts to raise ongoing funding throughout the year to support projects, programs, and other daily operations.
By building an annual giving pipeline that continually encourages audience members to become donors, you can sustain a program that brings in reliable funding year after year.
In this guide, we’ll cover annual giving essentials, including:
- Annual giving FAQ
- Steps to build your annual giving campaign
- Best practices to grow annual giving sustainably
- Successful annual giving campaign examples
- Launching your annual fund strategy with BWF
These tips will help you develop an annual giving strategy that appeals to donors’ desires for compelling, tailored experiences and helps you exceed your fundraising goals.
Annual giving FAQ
What is annual giving?
Annual giving involves the campaigns, strategies, and initiatives that nonprofits, universities, museums, healthcare organizations, and other organizations use to raise a steady, sustainable fundraising stream each year. The generated revenue is used to cover operational costs, staff salaries, mission-related programs, and urgent needs.
Annual giving campaigns can take place at any time of year, but the year-end giving season is typically the most important fundraising period, as donors submit their final tax-deductible gifts for the year. According to the M+R Benchmarks 2026 report, nonprofits received 37% of all 2025 online revenue in December, with December 31st alone accounting for 4% of annual revenue.
Are annual gifts restricted or unrestricted?
Annual gifts are most often unrestricted, meaning they can be used for any purpose. Building your annual fund provides a sustainable funding source to cover everyday expenses and operational costs. Specific campaigns, such as capital campaigns, may focus on restricted funds—money that must be used for a single, defined purpose like supporting a specific program.
Why is annual giving so important?
Creating a clear annual giving plan is necessary because annual giving:
- Covers your basic needs. Nonprofits and universities have all kinds of ongoing expenses, from overhead costs like rent and utilities to employee salaries. With a robust annual fund, you can ensure that your basic costs are covered and that you’re able to direct more funding toward projects and programs that directly impact your mission.
- Helps you engage donors. Through the process of developing an annual giving strategy, you can build a pipeline of loyal donors by leveraging your current outreach efforts to provide opportunities for support to both existing and new donors.
- Gives donors a fulfilling opportunity to direct their funding. Annual giving allows donors to direct their funding to support your organization’s daily operations. Knowing their funds will go directly toward mission-critical needs can help them feel greater pride and accomplishment. Plus, when you create a donor society or sustained monthly giving program, you offer an exclusive group that makes supporters feel more connected to your cause.
Who should be on your annual giving team?
Annual giving responsibilities are divided among development team members, so no one is responsible for the entire strategy on their own. A few individuals involved in the planning and management of an annual giving strategy might be:
- The executive director of annual giving
- The director of annual giving or the associate/assistant director of annual giving
- The associate director of direct response
- The associate director of constituent marketing
- The associate/assistant vice president of annual giving and digital engagement
With everyone juggling other responsibilities, it can sometimes be challenging for development teams to make annual giving a top priority. Staff members are frequently diverted from core annual giving responsibilities to troubleshoot issues and assist with other work.
That makes clear communication between team members essential. As you identify your annual giving team members, assign each individual clear deliverables that they will take responsibility for throughout the year. Also, develop a centralized reporting system for team members to submit their updates and track their progress.
For long-term success, consider working with a fundraising consulting firm to give guidance and support to your annual giving team. Fundraising consultants can also provide expertise and advice for creating your team’s accountability structure and fostering open communication.
Steps to build your annual giving campaign
1. Define your annual fund goals.
Establishing clear, attainable goals will set your annual giving strategy in motion and give your team something to strive for. We recommend using a TEAM framework to orient your goal-setting process:
- Team, Tools, and Tactics: Design a plan and equip your team to execute it.
- Donor Experience: Create conditions for sustainable donor relationships.
- Audience Development: Identify, understand, and steward prospective supporters.
- Message: Develop a clear and consistent message.
This framework helps define the areas where you want to set quantifiable goals, including donor experience, messaging, and audience development. It should also narrow your revenue objectives and set a target fundraising amount for your team.
Focus your goals on donors and revenue
Your ultimate goal in any annual giving campaign is to build and strengthen donor engagement and your fundraising pipeline. With a strong pipeline, you can increase your supporter retention rate and create sustainable donor relationships. With this in mind, consider setting goals related to:
- Pipeline development. In its most basic form, pipeline development is measured in donor counts—how many donors your organization engaged throughout the campaign. Emphasis is placed on the volume of supporters, and resources are allocated to build a base of support for the future.
- Revenue generation. Revenue generation goals are measured in dollars raised. This includes metrics like total amount raised, total online donations raised, total matching gifts accepted, and so on. Resources are allocated to maximize giving now rather than in the future.
Keep in mind that your goals should be specific and measurable. For instance, don’t just create a goal to engage more donors or raise more revenue than last year. Set a goal to engage at least 6,000 donors and raise at least $1 million. This way, when you run reports, you can clearly see how close your team is to achieving goals.
2. Identify metrics to track.
Metrics allow you to track progress made toward your goals using quantitative data. Depending on what your nonprofit’s specific annual giving goals are, you might track metrics such as:
- The total number of donors
- The total number of major donors (however your organization defines this category)
- The number of first-time donors
- Donor retention rate
- The number of leads generated, including marketing and fundraising leads
- Total number of referrals
- Fundraising conversion rate
- Donor growth rate
- Donor lifetime value
Choose your metrics and set up your reporting processes early on to keep your development team aligned. Make sure each team member knows which metric they’re responsible for updating and when they should run reports.
3. Develop your lead generation strategy.
Audience development is a core component of creating a strong annual giving pipeline. So, how will you find donors for your annual giving campaign? You can find leads by engaging with these four types of supporters:
- Supporters who’ve participated in an event or other non-donation opportunity with your organization
- Supporters who’ve interacted with your organization online
- Supporters who use your services or have visited your facilities
- Supporters who have given to your cause
For example, your organization might have a broad audience that includes:
- Past donors, including first-time donors, recurring donors, in-kind donors, giving day donors, donors who recently upgraded their gift amount, etc.
- Past event attendees
- Volunteers
- Social media followers
- Community members who have used your services in the past
- Website visitors
After identifying your core audiences, you can create specialized messages for engaging each group.
4. Write your annual giving story.
Your annual giving story is the compelling, creative narrative that your nonprofit uses to communicate the impact of a gift to prospective donors. When your messaging aligns with your audience and the communication channel you’re using, you’ll be able to convince more prospects that your organization is worthy of their support.
Your story should summarize the purpose and goals of your organization’s annual fundraising campaign. It can be helpful to choose a campaign theme or slogan to give your annual giving strategy a single message to rally around.
When writing your narrative, keep these questions in mind:
- Do you have a clear and consistent message? Your annual giving story should focus on a single core message rather than trying to cover everything your organization does.
- Is your case for support compelling? Have you given audience members a protagonist to root for throughout your story, such as a student, beneficiary, or volunteer? Have you connected this individual’s story to your greater mission? Is your overall case for support clear and convincing?
- Have you highlighted a clear value proposition for the donor? Ensure your message describes the benefits donors will receive from supporting your organization, such as access to exclusive donor events, free merchandise, or free publications.
- Is a journey model used to guide donor communications? Have you created clear donor pathways for each of your core audiences? Do you have a plan to guide prospective donors to learn more about your cause and access donation opportunities that resonate with them?
To support your story with engaging imagery, videos, and anecdotes, gather compelling content from your audience and beneficiaries. For example, if you’re fundraising for your university, ask students to send photos and videos about what the school means to them. Rich user-generated content makes your annual giving story come to life.
Best practices to grow annual giving sustainably
Personalize outreach
Segment your core audiences to send relevant content to each group and emphasize the parts of your annual giving story that resonate with different audiences.
For example, you might email your volunteers a story about how their recent efforts to build homes in your area have helped local families get back on their feet after a tragedy. Then, you can send them donation appeals emphasizing the fact that volunteers can take their support to the next level by giving.
Use different communication channels (email, social media, direct mail, phone) based on your past engagement data or general engagement metrics. Demographic data, in particular, can reveal donors’ communication preferences. For example, younger supporters tend to prefer digital communication, such as social media, while older supporters appreciate email and phone calls.
Steward donors
Your annual giving campaign should include a variety of donor stewardship activities throughout the year to introduce prospective new donors to your cause and engage existing donors. Your donor stewardship plans may include:
- Calling prospective donors on the phone
- Hosting one-on-one in-person meetings
- Making sure donors know who to go to on your team to get their questions answered
You should provide the same positive experience to your existing supporters to secure their long-term support. Invite them to take advantage of multiple opportunities throughout the year and get involved in new aspects of your nonprofit. For instance, invite volunteers to donate or participate in peer-to-peer fundraisers, and invite donors to volunteer or attend a webinar.
Remember: It’s important to steward donors at all levels, not just major donors. Your lower and mid-tier donors are just as important to the success of your annual giving campaign, and these donors may someday have the capacity to become major donors themselves.
Maintain an ethical annual giving approach
Setting clear ethical guidelines for annual giving ensures your organization complies with relevant regulations and builds trust with donors. Start by taking the following steps:
- Provide tax-deductible donation receipts. Nonprofit organizations must provide donors with a receipt for any gift of $250 or more. This allows donors to claim tax deductions for their charitable contributions and ensures your nonprofit remains in compliance with IRS regulations.
- Maintain donor privacy. Ensure your annual giving efforts comply with relevant industry data privacy laws, such as HIPAA or FERPA. Protect sensitive donor information with safeguards such as encryption and multi-factor authentication.
- Provide transparency into AI fundraising. Ask donors for their consent for their data to be used in your organization’s AI fundraising efforts. Let donors know how you’ll use their data, such as via predictive analytics. Allow donors to opt out at any time and respect their decision.
- Honor restricted gift purposes. If donors contribute restricted gifts, you must honor their wishes by using the donation as the donor intended. For example, a restricted gift to your scholarship program shouldn’t be used to pay staff salaries.
Create an ethical annual giving policy and provide a link to it on your website so donors can review your ethical and privacy standards. Conduct ethical fundraising training every quarter or every six months to ensure fundraising staff members are aligned on requirements.
Create a donor society
Creating an annual donor society or membership program can help donors feel like members of an exclusive club.
For example, a university with a comet mascot could create a Galaxy Giving Society. Donors who make annual gifts of $1,000 or more gain access to this exclusive club. The Society may offer tiered membership levels based on donation amounts, with names like Star Voyager, Galactic Pioneer, and Cosmic Legend.
When designing a donor society for your university or nonprofit, consider assigning different benefits to each donor tier. For instance, those who give $1,000 or more may receive a personal phone call from the dean of students, while those who give $10,000 or more can attend an exclusive event.
See what this could look like in action:
Continually steward donor society members throughout the year using outreach mechanisms such as exclusive email newsletters, free merchandise, event opportunities, and more.
Express gratitude
No annual giving campaign is complete without a comprehensive approach to thanking donors for their support. Send all donors heartfelt thank-you letters and messages, personalized with their names and references to their specific contributions. These messages can be emails, handwritten letters, phone calls, or direct messages on social media.
You can even create personalized video content to send to donors, catching their attention and helping your organization stand out from the crowd.
Encourage donors to stay in touch by subscribing to your email newsletter or attending an upcoming event, such as a webinar or volunteer opportunity.
Ask donors for feedback
Use your thank-you messages to gather donor feedback. By asking donors for their input, you show them that you’re dedicated to creating a donor experience that exceeds their expectations. Send out a short satisfaction survey asking questions such as:
- On a scale of 1-10, how convenient was the donation process?
- Do you have a clear idea of how your donation will be used?
- What is your preferred communication platform?
- How likely are you to donate to our organization again?
Use the feedback you receive to adjust your donor stewardship and other annual giving strategies moving forward.
Watch and learn from an annual giving expert
In this helpful webinar, BWF’s own James Barnard dives deep into the intricacies of a successful annual giving strategy beyond what we’ve discussed in this article.
Check out this webinar recording to learn the following:
- How to create an annual giving strategy with objectives and metrics.
- How to develop lead generation and scoring models.
- How to create donor journeys and prospect warming campaigns.
- How to design the infrastructure to make it all work together.
Successful annual giving campaign examples
George Washington University
In 2019, George Washington University (GW) faced declining donor rates and decreasing returns on its traditional annual giving strategies. The fundraising team decided to close their student call center, and in 2022, they faced nearly complete turnover in their annual giving team.
They decided to use this opportunity to rebuild their annual fundraising approach from the ground up, with student-donor engagement as the core element of their work going forward.
They partnered with BWF to reimagine their donor engagement center, prioritizing digital outreach to modernize their approach. These enhancements allowed GW to sustain greater year-over-year donor growth.
Sarasota Orchestra
The Sarasota Orchestra approached the BWF team with a clear need: to invest in developing a stronger donor acquisition and retention strategy.
The orchestra needed guidance on reviewing, re-strategizing, and implementing a powerful multichannel acquisition strategy, as well as launching a new monthly giving program.
With BWF’s help, the orchestra created and launched a new monthly giving program called the Fermata Society. They also grew connections through digital outreach, streamlined the online giving process, and enhanced their audience segmentation strategies and results.
Non-GMO Project
The Non-GMO Project is a nonprofit with a mission to build and protect the non-GMO food supply. In 2021, the Non-GMO Project had 1 million social media followers, but a small existing donor pool. They wanted to convert as many followers as possible into donation leads, so they turned to BWF. BWF provided them with a digital lead-generation strategy to guide them through a warming and lead-generation campaign. Ultimately, the nonprofit generated 3,000 additional leads.
Launching your annual fund strategy with BWF
Creating an annual giving strategy can be complicated, especially for large universities or nonprofits with complex fundraising needs. Working with digital fundraising and marketing professionals, such as the BWF team, can help make the process much more manageable.
BWF empowers organizations with comprehensive, resilient annual giving strategies. Our team can also set you up with a powerful donor engagement strategy, whether you’re interested in building a donor society, membership program, or grateful patient program. And for some of our clients, we even manage their entire annual giving program to ensure success and stability.
Ready to learn more about how BWF can help your organization find annual giving success? Contact us today to start the conversation.
Additional resources
For more information about what makes an annual giving strategy successful, review these free resources from BWF:
- Prospect Development: Tips to Build a Smarter Donor Pipeline. Find more qualified prospective donors to support your annual campaigns with the tips in this guide.
- The Definitive Campaign Communications Checklist for Success. Optimize your annual campaign communications with this robust checklist.
- An Ultimate Guide to Driving Year-Round Donor Engagement. Keep donors engaged 365 days a year with this strategic resource.
Let’s Talk
Find out how BWF can partner with you to optimize your annual giving strategy.
