4 Current AI Fundraising Trends to Keep in Mind This Year

AI fundraising tools are rapidly becoming some of the most important solutions in a nonprofit’s technology stack. Is your organization prepared to make the most of current AI fundraising trends?

AI solutions help nonprofits fundraise more efficiently, create a personalized donor experience, and ultimately raise more for their missions. 

In this guide, we’re going to explore four trending use cases for AI fundraising tools: 

1. Personalization
2. Predictive modeling
3. Automation
4. Content creation

According to BWF’s guide to AI fundraising, these tools have eliminated guesswork from the fundraising process, “allowing organizations to focus more of their energy on their top prospects.” Let’s explore how you can increase your fundraising ROI by prioritizing the most promising donor relationships. 

1. Personalization

Personalized experiences make donors feel like valued members of your organization. 89% of marketers say they’ve seen a positive ROI when they use personalization in their campaigns. 

AI solutions simplify the personalization process by assessing your nonprofit’s donor data and creating tailored marketing messages that speak to supporters’ interests and motivations. 

AI fundraising tools can help you develop the following types of personalized campaigns: 

• Targeted email outreach. Create email messages that resonate with different donor segments. Use AI solutions to determine the right tone and message for each group. For example, you can create a welcome series tailored to first-time donors or a personalized impact report for your monthly donors. 

• Tailored landing pages. AI solutions can assess a website visitor’s browsing history, preferences, and past online donation amounts to serve personalized landing pages. For example, a recurring donor might see a different version of your online donation page than a first-time visitor. 

• Personalized surveys. Surveys are an effective tool to help understand how your supporters view your organization. AI technology can develop personalized surveys with unique questions for different audiences. For example, you might ask corporate sponsors questions about their event experience or long-time donors for their input on your upcoming Giving Tuesday campaign. 

• Donation requests. Personal donation requests tend to be much more engaging than generic requests. With the help of AI, you can determine the right donation request amount for each donor based on their giving capacity and past donations. Donors will be much more receptive to a thoughtful request that resonates with them. 

Personalization will help your nonprofit’s marketing messages stand out. AI solutions streamline the personalization process to reduce most of the manual work required. 

2. Predictive modeling

Predictive modeling or analytics is the process of anticipating future donor behaviors using your nonprofit’s unique internal data. 

With the help of predictive modeling, you can determine which donors are most likely to: 

• Give for the first time
• Renew, or give again after also donating last year
• Upgrade, or increase their giving amount
• Reactivate, or give again after a lapse
• Become major or planned donors

You can even anticipate preferences such as donors’ preferred giving channels, communication platforms, and messaging. 

Be sure to look for a predictive modeling tool that uses your nonprofit’s internal database, not generic third-party data. This lets you access personalized insights that directly apply to your nonprofit’s goals and future performance. 

3. Automation

Automation is another way that many nonprofits are using AI solutions to revamp their fundraising approach. When you can automate much of the fundraising process, you can spend more time directly engaging with donors one-on-one. 

Here are a few activities that AI tools can simplify through automation: 

• Maintaining a healthy donor database. AI solutions can automate data entry within your nonprofit’s CRM. They can also enhance your data with appends to fill in gaps in your donor profiles, such as missing contact or demographic information. 
• Triggering automated messages based on donors’ actions. For example, AI software can automatically send thank-you emails right after a donor gives or an experience survey after a supporter attends an event. This ensures that you don’t miss a beat when it comes to donor stewardship and appreciation. 
• Providing real-time reporting. Generate real-time insights with the help of AI solutions. These tools can identify patterns and trends in donor behavior to help you craft data-driven future fundraising strategies. 

If your donor management system is currently disorganized or missing a lot of information, consider working with a CRM consultant before launching new AI processes. A CRM consultant can conduct a technology audit to analyze your current data analytics processes and make recommendations for revamping your internal strategies. 

This will set you up for greater success when implementing new AI fundraising strategies because the AI solutions will be able to leverage clean, accurate data. 

4. Content creation

Generative AI solutions can support a wide variety of content creation strategies. These tools produce content such as images, text, and sound in response to specific inputs. 

Currently, nonprofits are using generative AI to brainstorm ideas for content such as: 

• Social media posts, including text-only posts or text with images or video
• Email campaigns for specific appeals, such as your annual appeal or Giving Tuesday requests
• Blog post ideas, including topic suggestions, keyword strategies, and multimedia content strategies
• Grant writing assistance to ensure your application covers all essentials and catches the funders’ attention
• Video scripts to create different types of video content, such as explainer or appreciation videos
• Fundraising request scripts for phone calls and one-on-one meetings
• Compelling storytelling strategies to use in web, email, or social media content
• Annual report ideas to make your report more engaging with imagery and infographics
• Press releases to help you quickly develop content for a wider audience during a crisis or period of change
• Infographic ideas to help display important data or statistics in a visually appealing way

You can even use generative tools to help brainstorm new fundraising ideas, such as campaign themes or taglines. Input specific details, such as your budget, target audience, campaign type, and fundraising goal, to receive comprehensive advice on the best way to plan and promote your campaign. 

Remember to avoid directly publishing any content from generative tools because you could inadvertently hurt your SEO strategy. Search engines prioritize original material, and generative AI solutions often produce generic content that doesn’t fit this criteria. That’s why AI tools will serve your organization better as brainstorming resources to get the creative process started. 

To avoid potential negative consequences, adapt any content ideas that you receive from generative AI tools to your nonprofit’s distinct voice and branding. According to Kwala’s nonprofit branding guide, uniform brand elements ensure that your marketing materials are “consistent and identifiable.” This is essential to foster brand awareness and provide familiarity for your audience.

AI fundraising is constantly evolving, and new trends and use cases are developing all the time. Keep an eye out for the latest trends and consider how you can apply the use cases in this post to your nonprofit’s processes to improve your fundraising efficiency.