Through text-to-give, you can reach wider audiences than ever before, introducing new donors to your mission and making it easy for them to support your work.

However, to build a foundation for long-term fundraising success, you need a plan to retain your donors. Let’s walk through the top recognition tips you can implement in your next text-to-give campaign to nurture lasting relationships and build a loyal community around your nonprofit.

1. Send prompt, personalized acknowledgments

Due to the portability of smartphones, texting has become one of the fastest ways to contact someone and receive a response. When donors feel inspired to contribute to your text-to-give campaign, all they have to do is text a keyword to your number to instantly access your donation page.

Your thank-you text messages should be just as prompt to comply with donors’ expectations, maintain transparency, and ensure they feel immediately appreciated for their support. Start by automating a donation acknowledgment message, then follow up with personalized SMS updates that align with their engagement history.

For example, an environmental nonprofit raising funds for its most recent renewable energy initiative might send this text acknowledgment to a donor: “Pierre, thank you for your generous donation of $45! Because of donors like you, we’ve installed over 200 solar panels in lower-income communities in your area. We appreciate you for joining our journey toward clean energy!☀️”

As you continue engaging with your text-to-give donors, use your nonprofit’s database to store essential details about their communication preferences and interests, such as areas of your mission they’re most passionate about and how frequently they want to hear from you. Use these insights to tailor your messaging going forward.

2. Follow up with exclusive invitations and opportunities

Bring your text-to-give donors closer to your nonprofit by sharing exclusive invitations and opportunities after they donate. NXUnite by Nexus Marketing suggests planning a VIP experience with free food, a tour of your facility, and one-on-one conversations with leaders or board members.

Depending on your specific goals and resources, you might also consider:

• Inviting text-to-give donors to participate in a special volunteering opportunity.
• Sending free or providing discounts on limited-edition branded merchandise.
• Asking text-to-give donors to join an exclusive focus group to provide input on your upcoming initiatives.

Plus, to build a stronger sense of online community among donors, you can encourage them to join a dedicated social media group where they can connect with other individuals who are passionate about your cause.

3. Enhance your messages with multimedia

Beyond simply telling donors how they’re making a difference, use multimedia to give them a complete picture of their role in your impact. By choosing a text-to-give platform that has multimedia capabilities, you can make your donor thank-you messages more eye-catching with:

• Images featuring your beneficiaries, volunteers at work, or a special project's before and after progress.
• Video clips of beneficiaries saying “thank you” or highlights from a recent event.
• Audio clips of your nonprofit’s leaders describing the donor’s impact.
• GIFs that add warmth, joy, and sincerity to your words.

Create a brand guide to ensure you remain consistent across your communications with donors. Clarify elements such as your tone and word choice preferences so your entire team is on the same page. However, it's important that these messages feel sincere and from the heart, so make sure to strike that balance.

4. Direct donors to your other appreciation efforts

While text messages are a powerful tool for donor recognition, don’t limit your efforts to just one channel. Try out various recognition methods to find out which ones best appeal to your donor base.

Some compelling ways to appreciate your donors include:

• Spotlighting your most committed contributors on social media.
• Adding their names to a donor wall.
• Featuring their names and contributions in a dedicated section of your annual report.
• Planning an appreciation party at the end of the year.

To maximize awareness of your recognition efforts, send text messages that direct donors to them. For example, suppose you’re inviting text-to-give donors to an exclusive appreciation event. In that case, you might send the following text along with a link to the registration page on your website: “[Donor’s Name], you’re invited to our special virtual appreciation event on [Date], which is all about celebrating generous donors like you! 🎉 RSVP here to join in on the fun [Link].”

5. Collect feedback to improve the donor experience

Text messaging opens the door for easy, two-way communication between your nonprofit and its donors, so take advantage of it! By sharing post-campaign surveys and polls, you can demonstrate to donors that you’re committed to improving their experience with your organization.

In your surveys, consider including questions such as:

• On a scale of 1-10, how would you rate your experience with our text-to-give process?
• How often do you prefer to hear updates from us?
• What types of content are you most interested in seeing from our nonprofit?
• What improvements, if any, would you like to see in our giving process?
• Do you have any suggestions for how we can better show our appreciation for your support?

Use the responses you receive to adjust your text-to-give campaign and recognition strategies to improve your results over time. According to Tatango’s nonprofit text messaging guide, you should pay attention to fluctuations in your subscriber list each time you send a message to identify whether your content is resonating with your audience.

Stay flexible and keep an eye out for improvements to engage and retain your text-to-give donors for the long term.