Accepting donations online: Best practices for nonprofits

In a world where payments are increasingly made digitally, every nonprofit professional recognizes the importance of being able to accept donations online. Digital donations are quickly becoming the standard, with 63 percent of donors preferring to give online with a credit or debit card. For organizations of all shapes and sizes, effective online giving channels can help make it easier for constituents to contribute, increase your organization’s funding and provide a more accessible collection of donor data.

What does it take to help create an effective online fundraising strategy? Technology alone isn’t enough to completely optimize the giving experience – you’ll need to leverage proven best practices for online giving to make it convenient, safe and seamless for your donors to contribute. But before that, your nonprofit organization will need to invest in effective online donation tools, such as those with options for secure payment processing, organized donor data storage and multiple payment methods. This guide explores that first step to a seamless digital donation journey – let’s dive in.

The basics: An overview of the online donation process

Before creating an efficient online donation process, you must first understand the fundamentals, including things like decisioning and workflow; here’s a quick review:

Benefits of online fundraising

When it comes to running a nonprofit, every dollar counts. Many organizations have learned the power that digital fundraising holds. For one, it’s incredibly convenient. Donors can contribute at any time, whether they’re inspired to give at 2 p.m. or 2 a.m. In an increasingly digital world, they can also donate from anywhere so long as they have their smartphones with them.

Furthermore, going digital empowers your organization to break down geographical barriers, enabling you to reach a global audience rather than being confined to people in your immediate vicinity.

Not only does it streamline your donors’ processes, but it also saves your staff’s time. Investing in modern online donation tools empowers your team to automate tedious backend processes. There’s no need for your team to be glued to your devices to facilitate your donation intake process if your software collects donations for you on your website. 

Online donation platforms will also streamline data collection since your donors will naturally need to share their names and contact information when filling out your donation form. That empowers you to follow up with a customized thank-you message and send appeals that are tailored to their preferences, so you can kickstart relationships without manual data entry.

How online donations are collected

While accepting online donations sounds like a simple concept, there’s a lot that goes on in the background to keep everything running smoothly. Here’s a quick step-by-step look at how you can empower your donors to give with help from your online donation tools:

1. Find a payments processing partner. Effective payment processing is vital to nonprofits in helping catalyze growth and progress. Find a partner who understands your industry and the specific needs of processing donation-based revenue.
2. Create an online donation form. Your donation portal – the last bridge donors cross before contributing – should be straightforward. Once you define what information you’d like to gather, embed the form into your website in areas of high site traffic, easily accessible for your donors to find it whenever they need it.
3. Send prospective donors a link to the form. Whenever your outreach team sends fundraising appeals, include a link to your donation form. Be sure to leverage a multi-channel approach to maximize your form’s visibility across various marketing platforms, including email, social media and text. You can even incorporate it into your physical appeals by adding a QR code linked to the form on any direct mail pieces or flyers.
4. Donors fill out the form with contact and payment information. Through a secure donation acceptance tool, donors will input their name, contact details, payment method and any other information you’ve requested (this additional data can later be used to analyze your donor pool and optimize your giving strategies).
5. The donation tool processes the payment to your nonprofit. If the donation is made via debit or credit card, the payment processor contacts the card association that issued your donor’s credit or debit card. The card association passes that information along to the donor’s bank, who then confirms or denies the payment. The process is also similar if the donor has donated via ACH or digital wallet.
6. Use donor data to inform future donation strategies. Supporter data is funneled into your donor database where your nonprofit can use it to stimulate further donations. Start by sending an initial thank-you as a first step to retaining their support, then follow up at a later date to request future donations that match the amount and frequency of their past gifts.

These six steps outline a straightforward online donor journey that will help leave a positive image of your organization in your donors’ minds. While a lot of the process will be automatically handled by your fundraising tools, it’s crucial that you understand these steps so you can revisit them down the line and pinpoint any opportunities for improvement as they arise.

Tips to help improve online donations

Now that you have a solid understanding of the basics of online donation acceptance, it’s time to perfect your online fundraising strategy. How will you create an experience that inspires prospects to donate now and in the future? Here are four tips to help strengthen the donor-nonprofit relationship:

1. Optimize your online donation form

Your giving form defines the entire online donation experience. A streamlined form that pushes visitors through the process will help you maximize gifts. On the flip side, a poorly designed form with too many fields or distracting elements will inhibit the donation process, leading to form abandonment.

One of the first steps your team should take when accepting donations online is to create a form that’s optimized to drive conversions. Here are a few places to start:

• Gather only essential information. Overloading your form with too many fields will slow down the process. As a general rule of thumb, keep your form embedded into one page. The more clicks it takes to fill out your form, the more likely it is that your donors will grow frustrated. Request only the essential details like their name, contact information, donation amount and billing information. If you include additional fields, make sure to mark those as optional.
• Ensure it’s mobile-optimized. Mobile giving is growing each year, with mobile giving increasing by 14 percent in 2023. Ensure your form is accessible on mobile devices and will automatically resize the page’s elements to fit different screen sizes. This will empower your donors to easily give without having to zoom in or out to view the page’s content.
• Allow for guest checkout. While ideally all of your donors would be open to creating an account to allow for future communication, don’t create barriers for those who are willing to give.
• Brand it to your organization. Donor engagement is at its highest when someone’s donating. Correlate those positive feelings with your nonprofit by connecting your form to your cause. Your donation form should include your organization’s logo, colors, typography and any other recognizable elements – even the banner photo you choose should align with your nonprofit’s brand.

Spend time optimizing your nonprofit’s donation form, so your donors don’t feel like it’s a chore to give to your organization. 

2. Offer multiple ways to give

Each donor has their own giving preferences so the options you offer should accommodate the wide range of ways your donors like to give, including:

• Recurring donations: Build a steady stream of revenue for your organization by enabling sustainer giving, aka recurring gifts. Your donors should be able to easily opt into your recurring giving program by simply clicking a checkbox on your form. When you can automatically charge your donors regularly, they won’t have to return to your giving form each month or so to submit another donation.
• Multiple payment options: Make sure your payment processing tools empower you to accept donations online via various payment methods. At a minimum, this should include debit cards, credit cards and ACH direct deposit.
• Matching gifts: This form of giving empowers your donors to multiply the gifts they’re already giving. Gift matching is a type of corporate giving program where companies offer to match their employees’ charitable donations, and research has found that 84 percent of donors say they’re more likely to donate if they know their donation will be matched. If possible, integrate a gift-matching tool in your donation form to help donors determine their eligibility.

By offering multiple ways to give, your donors will recognize and appreciate the accommodation to their preferences, spurring more donations for your cause.

3. Improve your donation CTAs

When you spend time perfecting your giving form, you naturally want people to be able to find it. That’s where your donation CTA (call to action) come into play. Well written and smartly placed CTAs will maximize your donation form’s visibility.

Start by including a button in your navigation menu to ensure it appears on every page of your site. From here, include buttons in various marketing collateral as a way to guide your donors to the appropriate next action (aka donating) when they feel inspired by your messages.

To catch prospects’ attention, use colors that pop with a font that boldly stands out. The language should also be short and impactful, immediately conveying intent. CTAs like “Donate Now” let people know exactly what they’re clicking. You might even vary the phrase based on the appeal to inspire action. For instance, your donate button might say something like ‘Join the Fight Against Hunger’ or ‘Donate to Support Clean Water Initiatives.’ 

4. Invest in a secure payment processor

Anytime you exchange information online, security should be a top concern, especially with payment information. First and foremost, your payment processor should be PCI-compliant, meaning that it complies with a set of standards set forth by the Payment Card Industry Security Standards Council. Some of these standards include: 

• Maintaining a firewall to protect cardholder data
• Encrypting data transmission across public networks
• Restricting physical access to cardholder data
• Regularly testing security systems

Ideally, built-in fraud protection and advanced tokenization and encryption should come at no extra cost to your organization so you can securely accept online donations without spending too much of the revenue your team works so hard to earn.

Tools for accepting donations online

Your online donation tool is the driving force behind your digital fundraising efforts, and the entire reason why you can accept donations online in the first place. As such a pivotal piece of your donation strategy, spend time thoughtfully researching the best option for your organization before making a commitment.

Deluxe Merchant Services for Nonprofits

If you’re looking for a payment processor that’s exclusively built for the nonprofit space, Deluxe Merchant Services for Nonprofits is created with your organization’s goals in mind. Because this tool is dedicated to ensuring philanthropic success, it’s designed with an emphasis on driving your mission forward. 

As a nonprofit professional, you recognize that high security measures and seamless CRM integration are paramount to a successful online donation tool. A breach in these items can mean a tarnished reputation for your team and lost donations for your cause. With this in mind, Deluxe offers:

• Essential security measures such as tokenization, encryption, Level 1 PCI compliance and customized fraud protection measures
• Integrations with hundreds of technology partners (like Salesforce) to centralize your nonprofit’s work
• Online forms designed to accept donations online, including one-time or recurring gifts
• An end-to-end solution designed to accept payments wherever and whenever

With more than 20 years of experience processing nonprofit donations, Deluxe recognizes that nonprofits like yours need to invest as much money as possible into their missions – that’s why we offer competitive rates, no hidden fees and a flat monthly rate. 

By fully understanding the basics of digital giving and implementing the right tools to accept gifts online, your organization can launch more effective donation strategies to reach your fundraising goals and increase donor retention.