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Welcome to the Click & Pledge Fundraising Command Center Podcast!
Welcome to the Click & Pledge Fundraising Command Center Podcast – your mission control for mastering modern philanthropy. Every month, we equip you with the insights, tools, and strategies you need to elevate your impact. We believe in understanding the why, mastering the what, and showcasing the how of successful fundraising. Tune in every Monday for a new perspective:
The Why
Start your month with the big picture. "The Why" is our thought-leadership series that dives into the deep, foundational concepts behind our work. Every first Monday, we explore the science, philosophy, and psychology of fundraising, technology, and giving. This show isn't just about what you do; it's about providing a framework for why you do it. Join us as we connect big ideas from neuroscience, behavioral economics, and cognitive science to the future of philanthropy.
The What
Get to know your toolkit. "The What" is our product-focused series where we go "under the hood" of the Click & Pledge platform. Every second Monday, we deconstruct our features, reveal the "story behind the product," and explain what our technology is designed to do. If you want to understand the architecture, the design, and the specific problems our tools solve, this is your guide to the blueprint.
The How
Learn from the leaders. "The How" is our community showcase, where we pass the microphone to the experts: your peers. Every third Monday, we invite nonprofit leaders, fundraisers, and innovators to share how they are using our platform to run successful campaigns, engage donors, and grow their impact. These are their stories, their strategies, and your real-world templates for success.
Welcome to this edition of the Click and Pledge's fundraising command center podcast, where we talk the why, the what, and the how in the Click and Pledge's ecosystem.
Speaker 2:And today we are doing a, a really critical deep dive. Our mission is to walk you through six high impact features we really recommend you implement right now for year end success.
Speaker 1:Especially with Giving Tuesday and you know that whole December rush just around the corner.
Speaker 2:Exactly. So the tools are Pay Quickly, Intellibooster, Trackers, Peer to Peer fundraising, AI Link, and Boost Days.
Speaker 1:And before we unpack all of that, I think we need to hit the most important point right up front. These are not optional add ons you have to buy.
Speaker 2:No. Not at all.
Speaker 1:These tools, all six of them, are already included in your Click and Pledge account. There's no additional charge.
Speaker 2:That is the key takeaway. We're just showing you how to flip the switch and use the tech you already own.
Speaker 1:Okay. So where do we start?
Speaker 2:Well, we always suggest starting by minimizing friction. I mean, if you can remove every single barrier between a donor's impulse to give and them completing that gift, you win.
Speaker 1:And that brings us to the first tool.
Speaker 2:That brings us to pay quickly.
Speaker 1:Which is essentially it's our short donation form right? It's stripped down, built for speed.
Speaker 2:Yes and it's real power comes from its deep integration with payment wallets.
Speaker 1:So think like Google Pay, Apple Pay.
Speaker 2:Google Pay, Apple Pay, Amazon Pay, PayPal, Venmo, even Stripe Link. Think about the old way. A donor has to find their wallet, pull out a card, type in 16 digits and expiration date.
Speaker 1:And the little code on the back.
Speaker 2:Right, the CVV. People just give up. We see a massive drop off rate right at that moment.
Speaker 1:But with a wallet?
Speaker 2:They just click. The details are instantly populated. All they need is a first name, last name, and email, and the gift is done. It's nearly instantaneous.
Speaker 1:So you capture that generous impulse right away. Now speed is one thing, but placement is also a big deal. Where should organizations be putting pay quickly?
Speaker 2:This is key. We recommend treating your website like an active command center, not a static brochure.
Speaker 1:So not just one donate button hidden on one page.
Speaker 2:Please know pay quickly should be on every relevant page.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Your about us page, projects page, even the contact us page. It can be what we call a sticky element.
Speaker 1:Like a little tab or icon in the corner.
Speaker 2:Exactly. It just stays there in the corner or on the side as the donor scrolls down the page. It's a constant but gentle reminder.
Speaker 1:We've seen organizations that implement that sticky feature report. I mean huge increases in just those casual conversions.
Speaker 2:It works. And for, you know, those really specific campaigns, we also suggest embedding the form directly into the page itself instead of just having the icon.
Speaker 1:So if you're trying to fund a very specific program, for example
Speaker 2:It's perfect for that. A hyper specific ask.
Speaker 1:Now I want to go back to implementation for a second. We hear from a lot of smaller organizations, you know, they don't have a big web team. You mentioned the code is agnostic. What does that actually mean for them?
Speaker 2:It means life is a lot easier. It's a huge time and money saver. We designed the embed code to be totally independent of the campaign settings. So, the color, the tracker, all of that. You ask your web developer one time to place the code on five pages.
Speaker 2:That's it. Job done.
Speaker 1:And then, when Giving Tuesday comes around, you want to change the color or point the donations to a different fund?
Speaker 2:Precisely. Instead of calling your developer and waiting for them to update five separate pages, you just log in to connect. You change the campaign target or the color right there, and the form on your live website updates instantly.
Speaker 1:Wow. So no new code needed?
Speaker 2:No new code. It completely removes that administrative hurdle.
Speaker 1:That's huge. Okay, so we've made the process frictionless. How do we track the data? How do trackers work here?
Speaker 2:Trackers are, well, they're your best friend for analysis. They let you segment where your donations are actually coming from. So when you set up PayQuickly, you can assign it a static tracker like About Use Bedge.
Speaker 1:Okay. But what if I want to get more granular?
Speaker 2:That's where dynamic trackers are so powerful. You add them right to the URL and they override the static one.
Speaker 1:Can you give an example?
Speaker 2:Sure. Let's say your CEO sends an email blast. You could add TRK CEO message 20 to the link in that email. Or if a staff member named John is doing outreach, his link could have TRK John Outreach.
Speaker 1:Got it. So you know not just that the money came from the website, but exactly which effort on the website drove it.
Speaker 2:Exactly. That data, the trackers and the campaign names, it's all in your reports.
Speaker 1:That makes perfect sense. Okay, so we've mastered the frictionless process. The next step is optimizing the ask itself and this is where Intellibooster comes in.
Speaker 2:It really is. I mean, the core idea here is that users expect personalization now. Netflix knows what show you want to watch. Yeah. Amazon knows what product to recommend.
Speaker 2:Why should a donation form be any different?
Speaker 1:Why should it be a static, one size fits all experience?
Speaker 2:It shouldn't be. Intellibooster brings that intelligence to your form.
Speaker 1:And it's literally a single checkbox to turn it on in the campaign details, right?
Speaker 2:That's it, just one click.
Speaker 1:So how does it, how does the intelligence actually work? What's it looking at?
Speaker 2:It's a multi layered algorithm. First, it looks at the donors giving history, but it heavily prioritizes their recent gifts. Recency is a huge predictor.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:Second, it factors in their location using their IP address and public IRS data to get a sense of the giving propensity in that specific area.
Speaker 1:So if a long time major donor who always gives $500 lands on a form that's pre filled with a $50 ask.
Speaker 2:You've insulted their capacity to give. You've anchored them low until a booster prevents that. It makes sure the donation buttons match their identity as a donor. Right? A maximum of four, yes.
Speaker 2:Based on, gosh, twenty five years of data, that's the optimum number anymore and you get paralysis by analysis.
Speaker 1:And many choices and people just freeze, they don't do anything.
Speaker 2:They abandon the form. We want to give them guided personalized choices. Yeah. Not an overwhelming menu.
Speaker 1:It's about respecting them. Yeah. Now let's talk about maximizing the gift value with donor covered fees. How should we be framing this for year end?
Speaker 2:Yeah, this is important. Donors at this point they expect to see the option but we strongly recommend customizing the language so get away from credit card fees!
Speaker 1:Please! It sounds so technical and cold frame it positive Something like maximize the impact of my gift by adding x amount to cover our essential administrative costs.
Speaker 2:Oh, I like that. It feels like you're helping the mission, not just paying a bank.
Speaker 1:That's the goal. And you have flexibility here. You can adjust the percentage percentage to cover a little more than just processing, maybe a bit of overhead. You can add a fixed fee.
Speaker 2:And for the accounting side of things.
Speaker 1:Also flexible, you can have the covered fee post as its own separate line item, which auditors often prefer, or you can have it combined with the main gift. It's all trackable with SKUs or GAUs.
Speaker 2:That's critical for reconciliation. Okay let's move on. We've optimized the ask in the process now we need to expand our network. Let's talk peer to peer fundraising.
Speaker 1:Peer to peer is a strategic imperative. I mean it is the single most effective way to introduce your organization to a donor base you would never otherwise reach. You're basically deputizing your biggest fans.
Speaker 2:You are. Board members, staff, charismatic volunteers. You give them their own branded fundraising page.
Speaker 1:So you're leveraging their social capital, their trust. It's not a cold ass coming from the organization.
Speaker 2:Exactly. When a friend asks you to support a cause, that initial barrier is so much lower. And we also really emphasize the donation and comment stream on those pages.
Speaker 1:The social proof
Speaker 2:is powerful. Seeing names and messages of support from your peers encourages you to give. People are motivated by community.
Speaker 1:And since it's included, our suggestion is to start small for year end. If you're new to this, don't try to launch with 50 people.
Speaker 2:No. Just find one enthusiastic cheerleader. Set up one custom page for them. See how it goes. Use that success story to build for next year.
Speaker 1:That's great advice.
Speaker 2:A quick pro tip, set up a custom sub domain like fundraising.yourorg.org. It keeps your brand front and center. The donor never even sees a click and pledge URL.
Speaker 1:That's a great nugget.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Okay. That brings us to the most automated data driven tools. This is for our Salesforce users, AI link and boost days.
Speaker 2:Right. This is where we move from personalizing the ask to automating that personalization at scale.
Speaker 1:And it all starts with something called the engagement rank.
Speaker 2:It does. Our system is constantly analyzing every single patron in your Salesforce instance. It looks at giving history, volunteering, everything. And it assigns them a rank. Visionary, platinum, gold, silver community.
Speaker 2:This is running in the background every night.
Speaker 1:So it's always up to date. And that rank is put into action with the adaptive Intellibooster link or AI link.
Speaker 2:Yes. So every single contact record in Salesforce gets its own unique lifetime link. It's like their personal digital key to your organization.
Speaker 1:And when they click it
Speaker 2:When they click that link, say from a year end email, two things happen automatically. One, it pulls their latest contact info and auto fills the form. Two, and this is the magic, it instantly reads their current engagement rank and shows them four donation amounts customized just for them.
Speaker 1:So wait, the same link could show different amounts on different days to the same person?
Speaker 2:If their rank changes, yes. Let's say they raised money for you last week with a peer to peer page. Their influence goes up, their rank might go up. The next time they click that same lifetime link, the donation amounts on the form will automatically be higher to reflect that.
Speaker 1:The link is static but the experience is dynamic.
Speaker 2:That's it exactly. Yeah. And then we take that automation one step further with Boost Days.
Speaker 1:This is the strategic calendar tool, right?
Speaker 2:It is. It's an override. You can go in and preset your entire year's strategic pushes and just let them run on autopilot. Giving Tuesday is already hard coded in there for you.
Speaker 1:But you could add say April 10 to the fifteenth for tax season.
Speaker 2:Or December 20 to January 1 for that final end of year push And during those boost days, the AI link automatically elevates the donation buttons to a higher level than normal.
Speaker 1:That's brilliant. So you are seeding a higher ask precisely when the donor is already most motivated to give?
Speaker 2:It's augmented intelligence. Yep. You are ensure you're always making the optimal ask without having to do anything manually during your busiest season.
Speaker 1:We should also quickly mention Clicky.
Speaker 2:Yes. Our integrated AI assistant powered by OpenAI right inside Salesforce.
Speaker 1:How can an organization use that for the year end push?
Speaker 2:It's amazing for personalized outreach. You can use natural language. Just ask it. Who are my top 10 donors who haven't given in the last six months? Or you could paste in your mission statement and ask it to draft a personalized thank you letter for your top tier donors.
Speaker 2:It saves so much time.
Speaker 1:So if we synthesize everything we've talked about today, the core theme is moving from static fixed ask fundraising.
Speaker 2:To a dynamic personalized, and fully automated system using the tools you already have in the click and pledge ecosystem.
Speaker 1:I think the highest value here isn't just the increased donations, which is great, but the incredible reduction in manual labor.
Speaker 2:I completely agree. We highly recommend you spend time now before things get crazy, setting up your boost days and AI links for the entire next year. Then on January 1, can, you know, relax a little.
Speaker 1:You can enjoy your life while the system makes sure you're always making the right ask, automatically.
Speaker 2:For more information about this and all Click and Pledge products, make sure to visit clickandpledge.com and request for a one on one training or demo. Whether you are a client or curious about our platform, just ask us and we will gladly get together with you to chat.
Speaker 1:And don't forget to subscribe to this podcast to stay up to date with all the latest and greatest features of the Click and Pledge fundraising command center.