Donor Retention: Why Donors Leave and How to Make Them Stay
The average charity pours new donors in the top while most of last year's quietly drain out the bottom. A few points of retention are routinely worth more than a whole acquisition campaign.
A fundraising resource for nonprofits
Digital Fundraising advice, best practice and tips for Professional Fundraisers
NFP Playbook publishes in-depth guides for fundraising professionals on planning campaigns, asking for donations, writing to donors and choosing the right platforms. Guides are updated as the tools and benchmarks change.
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Ideas & Campaigns
Fundraising ideas, giving days and crowdfunding, and how to plan campaigns that reach their targets.
5 guidesAsking for Donations
How to ask for donations in person, in writing and online, with letter templates you can adapt.
3 guidesDonor Communications
Guides to writing appeal letters, fundraising emails and the thank-you letters that keep donors giving.
4 guidesRetention & Regular Giving
Guides to keeping the donors you have, from retention strategy to building a regular giving program.
2 guidesDigital & Social
Social media fundraising, Meta's giving tools, and the marketing plan that holds the digital program together.
3 guidesPlatforms & Tools
Choosing an online fundraising platform, optimising your donation page, and getting the most from tools like the Google Ad Grant.
3 guidesAll guides
50 Fundraising Event Ideas Ranked by Effort vs Payoff
A worrying number of fundraising events lose money once staff time is counted honestly. Fifty ideas ranked into four quadrants by the only ratio that matters.
Peer-to-Peer Fundraising 101: Turning Supporters Into Tiny Fundraising Machines
Supporters ask their friends, friends give because a friend asked, and the charity meets hundreds of donors it has never met. The whole machine turns on one number: activation rate.
Grant Writing for Beginners: How to Write Applications That Get Funded
Grant-makers are donors with paperwork, and unlike individual donors they publish what they want. Fit beats prose, and eight well-matched applications beat forty generic ones every year.
47 Fundraising Email Subject Lines (With the Data on Why They Work)
Five to eight words decide whether the appeal gets read at all. Forty-seven subject lines organised by the job each one does, with the psychology behind every group.
How to Build a Regular Giving Program From Zero
A regular giver is worth several one-off donors. The program is product design first and campaign second: a name, a price, a promise, and retention engineered from day one.
Social Media Fundraising: What Actually Raises Money in 2026
Social is not your donation channel. It is your acquisition, activation and atmosphere channel, and judged on those jobs it is one of the best tools you own.
Facebook and Instagram Fundraising Tools: The Complete Guide
Billions raised, much of it through birthday fundraisers, and still the largest fundraising machine most organisations neither control nor fully understand.
How to Write a Charity Marketing Plan (Template Included)
Most marketing plans are either 40-page mausoleums or no plan at all. The one-page version is built in a day, reviewed monthly, and actually used.
Donation Page Best Practices: The 15-Point Checklist
Every email, ad and QR code funnels through one page, and at most organisations it is the least loved page on the website. Fifteen points that give every future campaign a pay rise.
Crowdfunding for Nonprofits: When It Works and When It Flops
The difference between Celeste Barber's $51 million bushfire summer and the campaign that stalls at 12 per cent of target is neither luck nor magic. It is five checkable conditions, and most of them are settled before launch.
How to Write a Fundraising Letter That Doesn't Go Straight to Recycling
Repeatedly declared dead and still delivering some of the strongest response rates in fundraising, provided the letter survives the eleven seconds between letterbox and recycling bin.
Best Online Fundraising Platforms Compared (Fees, Features, and Fine Print)
The platform you pick decides what fees leave with every gift, what data you own, and how painful your life becomes when you want to move. Four questions that matter more than any feature list.
GivingTuesday Playbook: How to Not Get Lost in the Noise
Simultaneously the easiest day of the year to raise money and the hardest to be noticed doing it. A week-by-week plan, the mechanics that move totals, and a tour of the mistakes museum.
The Complete Guide to Google Ad Grants ($10,000 a Month of Free Ads, Seriously)
One of the largest in-kind philanthropy programs on the planet, and most accounts use a fraction of it. Eligibility, the fine print, and a strategy in three layers with a 30-day starter plan.
How to Write a Donor Thank You Letter People Actually Keep
Retention is largely decided in the first 48 hours and the first 90 days after a gift, which means the thank-you letter is not admin that follows fundraising. It is fundraising.
Fundraising Email Templates for Every Occasion (Including Mild Panic)
The six emails every program actually sends, written out in full with subject line options: appeal, reminder, deadline, win-back, emergency and the thank-you that donors notice.
Donation Request Letter Templates You Can Steal (Legally)
Four letters with line-by-line commentary: warm individuals, local businesses, corporate sponsors and in-kind asks. A template gives you the skeleton; only your charity can supply the pulse.
How to Ask for Donations Without Sounding Desperate (or Robotic)
The number one reason people give is that they were asked. The craft is asking so the donor feels powerful rather than pestered, whatever the channel and whatever the gift size.
101 Fundraising Ideas That Actually Raise Money (Not Just Vibes)
Every idea here is scored on effort, cost and realistic income, with the charities that proved each model named. Start at the top of each category and steal accordingly.