How one alumni association drove 18x larger gifts with DAFpay

About the organization

This organization is an Alumni Association with more than 50,000 alumni worldwide. The association has a vision to be the most highly connected alumni body in the world and its philanthropic pursuits provide support for student activities, cultural immersion programs, scholarships and facilities.

The challenge: Increase alumni participation through a modern giving experience

For alumni associations, their alumni participation rate is a more important metric of success than solely focusing on the dollar amounts of gifts. To continue to increase their alumni participation rate and meet donors where they are, this alumni association sought to remove barriers of traditional giving methods and provide a more modern giving experience.

In parallel, the team noticed an increase in giving from donor advised funds (DAF) yet knew that the process to make a gift that way can be cumbersome. To better meet the rising expectations of donors who prefer to give via DAF, they sought to include DAF payment acceptance as an option through their digital giving page. By expanding the available methods for making a gift, they hoped to enhance accessibility and encourage greater donor participation. 

The solution: Enable DAFpay — easy DAF payment acceptance — within their digital fundraising platform

In addition to Gravyty’s QuickGive feature built into its digital fundraising platform which provides access to giving through all major mobile wallets, the alumni association added DAFpay – an integration through Chariot that allows donors to give via a donor advised fund – as a payment option during their giving day. This was a strategic move to modernize the giving experience. DAFpay allowed donors to effortlessly make gifts from their donor-advised funds, streamlining the process and eliminating the delays associated with the traditional check-based donations. 

The team promoted this new feature ahead of their giving day challenge through a direct mail campaign and an informative FAQ document, ensuring widespread awareness. The five-day giving challenge further amplified the reach and impact of the DAFpay option. Implementing DAFpay proved to be a seamless process, demonstrating the association’s commitment to innovation and accessibility in fundraising.

The outcome: Increased alumni participation and gifts from DAFs

The integration of DAFpay during the giving day challenge showed great results, and notably, an increase in donations from donor-advised funds. Gravyty’s integrated DAFpay feature not only facilitated larger gifts, with 13% of donors making their largest-ever donations, but it also attracted new donors to give from donor-advised funds – 34% of DAF donors made their first-ever DAF donation using DAFpay. 

Additionally, DAFpay gifts averaged 18x larger than non-DAF gifts. DAFpay also allowed the team to easily reconcile gifts daily, streamlining their fundraising operations and providing donors with a seamless experience. The ease of use of DAFpay during the giving day even prompted donors to inquire about the ability to make a DAF gift this way outside of the giving day challenge. These outcomes highlight the value of DAFpay as a strategy for donor acquisition and increased giving.

Solution spotlight

Gravyty’s digital fundraising platform lets you create fully customizable giving sites and crowdfunding campaigns, amplified by best-in-class texting, email, and video stewardship tools. Retargeting campaigns, recurring giving options, employer matching gifts, DAF payments, and transaction fee coverage convert more donors on any device.