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6B | Building Donor Loyalty

Wednesday, Sept. 27
12:30 - 2:00 PM

Sector
Suitable for all sectors

Experience Level
Suitable for any level

Shop Size
Suitable for any size shop

Category
Donor engagement

In this session we'll explore why retention is such a huge issue for the nonprofit sector in the United States and review current patterns of performance. We'll then outline what difference to strategy an approach based on donor lifetime value can offer, what we mean by the term, how to calculate it, and how to implement change as a consequence.
The session will also explore key reasons donors terminate their support, drawing on learning from the commercial sector as well as 25 years of research specifically in the charity context. We will outline the three big drivers of donor loyalty -- satisfaction, commitment, and trust -- and explain how each can be measured and enhanced. The session will conclude by examining sector best practices and the particularly creative practices of a few really innovative nonprofits who have achieved extraordinary retention performance.

 

Dr. Adrian Sargeant

Professor Adrian Sargeant is the world’s foremost fundraising academic, holding a Chair in Fundraising at Plymouth University and directing the Centre for Sustainable Philanthropy. He was formerly the first Hartsook Chair in Fundraising at the Lilly Family School of Philanthropy at Indiana University. He also holds visiting appointments at Avila University and the Australian Centre for Philanthropy and Nonprofit Studies, Queensland University of Technology. He has received many awards for his services to the profession, notably being named to the prestigious Nonprofit Times Power and Influence List in the United States in 2010. In the UK he received a Civil Society Award for his Outstanding Contribution to Fundraising. Professor Sargeant is one of the world’s leading authorities on how to achieve growth in philanthropy.

In 2011 he ran Growing Philanthropy summits in Washington DC and London drawing together leaders from the nonprofit communities in both countries to discuss the role that the sector itself might play in growing philanthropy. He also helped facilitate a philanthropy summit for the Rockefeller Foundation and the Resource Alliance in Bellagio, Italy, the primary goal of which was to improve the flow of philanthropy in the development system. He is a prolific author and educator. He has published over ten books and around 150 peer reviewed academic publications in the domain of individual giving, fundraising and nonprofit marketing. Most recently he has designed new qualification frameworks for fundraising professional bodies across the world. In the UK, for example, he designed the new Certificate/Diploma in Fundraising courses that are now offered by the Institute of Fundraising. He is doing similar work in the United States working with the AFPand has recently been commissioned to design a new higher level qualification that will be shared internationally. Professor Sargeant is considered a world class and motivational speaker, regularly delivering plenary presentations in a variety of different international venues. Topics include donor retention/loyalty, philanthropic psychology, bequest giving and digital fundraising. He works now on both sides of the Atlantic having become a naturalized American citizen in November 2013.