That old saying, ‘No good deed goes unpunished’.
How many of us have experienced that firsthand? And, really, it’s almost the genesis of Fundraise Up. When Peter Byrnes, Fundraise Up CEO and co-founder, attempted an online donation all those years ago, he found the experience clunky, slow, and frustrating. How many of us can relate to that? But it inspired him, COO Yuriy Smirnov and CTO Anton Isaykin to build Fundraise Up — an online donation platform that values the donor experience.
And the rest is history…
Not really.
We’re as passionate about improving the donation journey as ever, and 2024 is the biggest evidence of that fire yet.
The idea is simple. Nonprofits need donations to further their mission. Donors are the primary source of that revenue. Engaged donors = more donations.
Here’s where it gets complicated: How can nonprofits engage supporters to give, give more, and give again? Let’s talk about this year’s innovations.
A look at the most impactful innovations from 2024
Throughout the year, we've introduced continuous improvements to maximize funds for nonprofits. These enhancements include new ways for nonprofits to attract donors' attention, a smoother donation experience that increases completion rates and average donation amounts, and backend improvements to simplify the delivery of this best-in-class experience.
Innovation 1: Capture donor attention
With Fundraise Up, it’s a quick set-up to grab attention during timely fundraising events. Add Elements to existing web pages, or create a dedicated no-code Campaign Pages to direct in just minutes.
When tragic wildfires struck Alberta, the Canadian Red Cross had to respond quickly. We leaned on our strong processes and documentation, alongside Fundraise Up’s Campaign Pages and Elements. The outcome was a record time launch for the 2024 Alberta Wildfires Appeal — and, most importantly, more resources made available quicker for our frontline teams and people needing support on the ground. - Jessica Bernat, Director of Digital Marketing, Canadian Red Cross
Innovation 2: Maximize the chance and size of donations
Our Checkout experience has been fine-tuned to offer the best donor experience possible, and is optimized to increase conversions and donation amounts so that you can earn more revenue to support your cause.
We don’t rest on our laurels — we prioritize continuous A/B testing because it allows us to deliver a platform that is not only feature-rich, but also rigorously tested and constantly evolving to meet the ever-changing needs of the nonprofit sector.
Organizations can be confident that they're using the most innovative and effective tools available to achieve fundraising goals. Throughout 2024, we introduced both small improvements that were proven to move the needle for conversion, as well as new features including Abandoned Donations and Impact Descriptions.
In the world of nonprofit fundraising, every missed opportunity for donation completion represents a potential lost impact. We introduced a feature specifically to address this challenge: Abandoned Donations. This functionality empowers nonprofits to capture and re-engage supporters who have initiated but not completed a donation.
We understand that every donation is more than a transaction — it's a powerful story waiting to be told. With our new Impact Descriptions feature, you can now show donors the impact their generosity will have — whether it's building a school, providing medical aid, or supporting a local community project.
Finally, Fundraise Up’s simple and secure Virtual Terminal allows nonprofits to process in-person and over-the-phone donations. Plus, it integrates with your existing tech stack (including CRMs). Improvements to this feature included adding saved payments and a language selector.
Innovation 3: Grow and retain your recurring donor base
At Fundraise Up we always say “the only thing better than a donor, is a recurring donor”. We introduced innovative new features this year to help our nonprofits increase their sustainer programs.
Upgrade Links are the golden ticket for recurring donations. When your recurring donors visit an Upgrade Link, they can select from a series of personalized upgrade amounts and increase the size of their donations without having to reenter payment method information.
With just one click, they can easily increase their recurring donations or cover transaction fees. Nonprofits using these links have seen impressive increases in recurring donations — think 50-110%. This year, we made Upgrade Links easier and more efficient to create with a new automation to streamline the process.
Success stories
Partners In Health used a multi-channel strategy to send personalized Upgrade Links not just through email, but also via SMS text messages. Across both channels, the campaign reached an impressive 6,000 donors who were giving monthly to the nonprofit's unrestricted funds. This multi-pronged approach paid dividends with 72% of those who clicked through from email going on to upgrade their monthly gift. On average, donors upgraded their gift by 34%.
- We now offer the ability to add an end date to recurring plans, which is ideal for giving periods such as Ramadan.
- The Donor Portal is a key part of retaining and nurturing donors. We added the ability to increase donation amounts in the Donor Portal, as well as make new donations.
With Fundraise Up’s AI, one-time donors are intelligently prompted to upgrade to recurring support. As a result, Sandra Schmirler Foundation’s monthly recurring donor base, Champions Circle, grew 300% and generates $150K per year — a 96% increase in monthly donation revenue.
Innovation 4: Tech stack integrations
Effortlessly connect Fundraise Up to any app in your tech stack, including the most popular CRMs. With our native, API-based integrations, you can scale your donation resources while delivering an optimized experience to prospective donors. These integrations allow your teams to make data-driven decisions by ensuring insightful donor information flows seamlessly in and out of your systems. We’re continually improving how Fundraise Up integrates into your tech stack, and introduced a new REST API, and added to our Salesforce integrations.
- With Fundraise Up’s powerful two-way API, you can open up new giving channels and automate workflows for smarter analytics and deeper donor engagement. Process one-time and recurring donations from face-to-face fundraising, direct mail, telethons, events, and more — directly in Fundraise Up. Plus, sync donation data with your CRM, BI tools, and beyond.
- Our new integration lets you connect Fundraise Up to Salesforce Nonprofit Success Pack to create a robust and fully integrated fundraising and marketing platform.
- Organizations with custom donor portals can connect directly to the Fundraise Up Donor Portal via API, providing supporters with seamless donor portal access without needing multiple logins.
Innovation 5: Offer best-in-class, enterprise-level experience
Some of the largest nonprofits in the world use Fundraise Up, making it essential for us to offer an enterprise-level platform. Secure your data, adhere to government standards, and check the box for every compliance with Fundraise Up, the only platform to offer enterprise certifications for fundraising anywhere in the world.
- This year, we added ISO 27001 compliance which ensures that Fundraise Up has appropriate policies, procedures, and safeguards in place as part of its information security management system.
- We’ve maintained our best-in-class 99.9% uptime and phenomenal processing speed of 200 transactions per second.
- For enterprise nonprofits, managing user access across numerous applications can be a significant challenge, leading to security risks and operational inefficiencies, which is why we added Single-Sign-On (SSO) for our platform this year.
- The new Audit Log for recurring plans provides detailed logging of user and system-initiated changes, so organizations can now easily navigate through historical data, troubleshoot issues promptly, comply with financial audits, and analyze trends in donation plan modifications.
Innovation 6: Easy-to-use analytics
The Insights Dashboard gives you instant, easy-to-understand data on how your fundraising is doing, saving you the hassle of putting together reports and data. It provides a clear, complete view of success at your fingertips.
- Earlier this year we gave the Insights Dashboard a refresh based on customer feedback, significantly enhancing charts to provide a more comprehensive understanding of fundraising activities. This knowledge will help you improve your campaigns to strengthen your impact.
Surpassing industry-averages
We’re focused on helping nonprofits increase their impact in the world. As donor behavior changes, the opportunity for digital is only growing. Throughout this past year we have continued to innovate to provide a best-in-class experience so that nonprofits can earn more donation revenue online than they ever thought possible.
Many don’t realize just how big the potential for digital donations is, and once moving to Fundraise Up, they’re blown away by the increases they see from online giving, unlocking a whole new level of generosity potential.
Success story
With the implementation of Fundraise Up, the International Committee of the Red Cross Brazil achieved significant results. Since partnering with FRU, the organization successfully increased its average donation amount by 28% with absolutely zero software costs associated with Fundraise Up thanks to the Adaptive Cost Coverage feature.
Backed by the best-in-class AI
Our dataset stands alone in that it doesn’t pull from crowdfunded donations. Instead, it’s powered by almost a decade of worldwide nonprofit donor data. Donors just like yours inform our AI, ensuring its predictions are compelling and accurate.
And while many of our competitors try to play catch-up by adding AI to their donation forms, it’s simply not possible to match the dataset and innovations that we’ve accumulated over the years.
We deeply believe in the power of innovation to tap into the world’s generosity—which is insanely huge. People want to help, we strive to make that easy for them to do. Nonprofits do an excellent job making their case and inspiring potential donors. It’s tragic if they lose them because of poor tech. Let’s not let that happen anymore! - Peter Byrnes, Fundraise Up CEO and co-founder
As 2024 wraps up, we’re motivated by past wins, excited for the new year, and ready to help even more nonprofits raise the revenue they deserve. If you’re ready to start 2025 on high note, book a personalized demo with our platform experts. Let’s make this the happiest year yet.