Whether you love it or just thinking about it exhausts you, it’s undeniable that Giving Tuesday has been a powerful force of philanthropic giving since it was launched by Henry Timms and others at the 92nd Street Y in 2012. That first year, over $10 million was given through Blackbaud alone. A mere eleven years later, philanthropy on the 5th day after US Thanksgiving was over $3 billion, and Giving Tuesday is now a stand-alone spin-off nonprofit.
Inspired by this kind of opportunity, this year Mitch Stein, Head of Strategy at Chariot and others organized the first DAF Day, which debuted on October 10th. Chariot’s widget, DAFpay, allows donor-advised fund donors to make grants directly on a nonprofit’s website, meaning that the nonprofit can begin a relationship directly with the donor right away (unless the donor prefers to give anonymously).
Was it a success?
According to Chariot’s blog, over 1,250 nonprofits participated in DAF Day and the company processed ten times the year-to-date daily median number of donations, and the dollar volume was eight times the daily medium.
The article reports that DAF sponsors also reported increased giving:
“The Donor’s Fund, a [sponsor] that recently surpassed $1 billion in total grant volume, saw their daily giving increase by 4x on DAF Day, resulting in a $3 million surge. Daffy, a high-growth, mobile-first DAF provider, saw a 440% increase in their daily donations on DAF Day.”
According to Forbes, “The ACLU Foundation saw more digital DAF giving than any other nonprofit after they rolled DAFpay out to their full donor audience for the first time on October 10th, and their average DAFpay gift was $1,200.” This success may have been in part due to a $1 million matching fund created especially for DAF Day.
DAF Day is an exciting new opportunity for nonprofits to connect with current and prospective donors. Widgets like DAFpay allow nonprofits to customize the giving platform, allowing much more transparency (and immediacy) than receiving a check from a sponsor.
Chariot has said that they plan to release more details about the inaugural DAF Day’s success, and we’ll let you know what we hear!
