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Description
SOS Children’s Villages Romania mission is to ensure that no child grows up alone. For this, we depend on support from generous and committed donors and companies. The Covid-19 pandemic made even harder to gain new donor’s support as important fundraising activities were suspended (Face2Face), and the economic crisis dropped revenues from corporate sponsorships. All these, concurring with high donor attrition rates, especially in the first year (50% in the digital channel), indicated it is crucial to allocate resources for strengthening relationships with existing donors and developing their value over time.
The overall project objective is to improve financial sustainability and increase donor retention by: building internal capacity (additional member in the team), developing in-house telemarketing activities and investing in research to understand donors’ need. Through a donor-centered and data driven approach we aim at developing long-lasting donor relationships.
We expect to have an improved fundraising efficiency and return on investment; financial growth by „saving” donors and increasing donations value; increased donor trust, commitment and satisfaction.
The lack of staff and internal resources are now the major challenges we face in order to create a comprehensive retention program. The existing team in place is motivated but lacks the time and funds to develop further these activities. Therefore, investment in the team is highly needed. Our previous experience confirmed that building a skilled fundraising team is more effective and cost-efficient than contracting external services.
The partnership with SOS Children’s Villages Norway is bringing important value as it facilitates knowledge transfer and best practice sharing from an organization with long-term experience and expertise in donor retention. We aim to cascade this know-how and the learnings of the project at sector level, though online events and learning tools for fundraising professionals.