Report: Donations Continue to Grow With Social Media Tools

With the world’s finest online tools at our disposal, one of the most integrative tools is social media. Social media plays a huge part in growing our online presence. We wouldn’t have the capabilities to spread our outreach so far without it—email can only get us so far.

Of course email has its benefits, but it is a solitary conversation between you and the donor. On the other hand, social media provides us with a sense of community. Instead of one conversation with you and one donor, it allows for one conversation with a cornucopia of donors—better yet, multiple conversations with even more donors who want to chime in on the conversation. Social media brings us all closer together. Whether we’re engaging with donors, nonprofits, agencies or vendors, social media gives us the opportunity to work and collaborate together.

According to DonorDrive’s 2017 State of Peer-to-Peer Fundraising report, there has been significant growth in the charitable sector with the help of social media. Here are some statistics from the report:

• Since 2012, there has been an 81 percent increase in donor dollars that have come directly through a link on social media.
• Approximately 46 percent of all participants received dollars through social media.
• Social media plays a role in 35 percent of all donations.
• An estimated 93 percent of direct donations come through Facebook, 5 percent come through Twitter and 2 percent come through Reddit.

While there has been criticism on the use of social media because of the lack of response on its platforms, the report notes:

“Social media is a tool best used by supports, not organizations. What really gets the donations pouring in is when participants share the story of why they’re involved in the event and ask their family and friends to give.”