Sample donor cultivation plan: 3 tiers for engaging nonprofit donors

Increased need during the pandemic brought massive surges in new donors and dollars for many nonprofit organizations in 2020 and 2021. But holding onto those donors hasn’t necessarily been easy.

Since Q2 last year, there’s been a 7% drop in donor retention. This means donor cultivation and stewardship is more important than ever for your organization — especially for planned giving and major giving, which relies on big gifts from loyal donors. To help you prioritize your biggest donors and engage supporters across all levels of giving, it can help to have a donor cultivation plan.

But what is donor cultivation & stewardship, exactly?

Donor cultivation is the relationship-building process leading up to a gift, and donor stewardship is the relationship-strengthening process after the gift is made.

Effective cultivation and stewardship plans will overlap and work together, moving new and recurring donors on to making bigger gifts or legacy donors onto annual giving.

Why is donor cultivation & stewardship important?

Retaining donors costs much less than acquiring new ones. In fact, a 2019 Fundraising Effectiveness Report showed that for every $100 raised in 2018, $93 was lost to gift attrition.

So if you want to raise the full $100 (rather than $7), having a strong cultivation and stewardship plan is the best way to do that. Creating unique, authentic touch points to engage your prospects and donors will help you strengthen relationships to your organization and cause, and inspire repeat giving.

With the help of one of our nonprofit partners at FreeWill, we’ve put together a three-tiered cultivation and stewardship plan that you can use to engage your donors this year.

Sample donor cultivation & stewardship plan

As much as you would probably love to give attention to every single planned and major gift donor and prospect, most nonprofits just don’t have the time and resources for this. That’s why it can help to identify different tiers of donors within planned and major giving (e.g. splitting giving levels from the smallest to largest gifts), so that you can ensure your biggest donors or prospects get the most of your attention while others aren’t entirely forgotten.

Whether or not your organization already has unique methods for engaging donors, this plan can help you think about the various touch points and timing for engagement.

The biggest gifts: Tier 1 for donor cultivation

In general, for your donors who’ve made the largest gifts, or prospects who have the most potential to give large gifts, your cultivation and stewardship plan should be highly customized for each individual.
Get to know details about these donors — like what their interests are or what they're passionate about — so you can engage them with relevant materials and events and make your outreach more effective.

Per fiscal year, you should plan:

• Two significant points of contact (e.g. one-on-one phone calls, virtual/in-person meetings, emails, etc.)
• One facilitated conversation or meeting with an appropriate staff member, such as an Executive Director
• One private tour or additional stewardship engagement based on their interests
• One to two impact reports emailed or mailed on specific programs of interest
• A minimum of two personal thank-you notes or calls — after a gift, during holidays, etc.
• Two “I know you” communications (e.g. sending articles or updates on a topic they are interested in)
• Personal invitations to any organization events, workshops, speaking engagements, or webinars
• At least four quarterly cultivation mailings or emails

Medium-sized gifts: Tier 2 for donor cultivation

These donors are still making significant contributions to your organization, and, where possible, you should try to customize your stewardship based on what you know about them.

Per fiscal year, you should plan:

• At least one significant point of contact (e.g. one-on-one phone calls, virtual/in-person meetings, emails, etc.)
• One private tour or additional stewardship engagement based on their interests
• One impact report emailed or mailed on specific programs of interest
• Two personal thank-you notes or calls — after a gift, during holidays, etc.
• Two “I know you” communications (e.g. sending articles or updates on a topic they are interested in, or sending a survey to learn more about them)
• Personal invitations to any organization events, workshops, speaking engagements, or webinars
• At least four quarterly cultivation mailings or emails

Smaller gifts: Tier 3 for donor cultivation

These donors may give the smallest gifts within planned and major giving, but that doesn’t make them unimportant to the overall health of your fundraising program. You should still engage them in various touch points throughout each fiscal year:

• At least one significant point of contact (e.g. one-on-one phone calls, virtual/in-person meetings, emails, etc.)
• One personal thank-you note or call
• One “I know you” communications (e.g. sending articles or updates on a topic they are interested in, or sending a survey to learn more about them)
• Personal invitations to organization events, workshops, or webinars
• At least four quarterly cultivation mailings or emails

Interested in learning more ways to engage your donors, increase gift sizes, make smarter asks, and fundraise more effectively? Join one of our upcoming, free webinars for nonprofit professionals.