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Digital Giving is the new normal
Over the last few years, the world has slowly been transitioning towards a cashless society with the emergence of contactless payment and tap and go options. Shopping online and paying bills digitally has become the new normal across all generations especially in the wake of the novel coronavirus pandemic. Moreover, as fewer millennials attend church, it’s becoming critical for churches to improve their online strategy in order to appeal to younger individuals. In this article, we’ll explain what digital giving is before diving into the powerful benefits that have rendered this concept the new normal.
What is Digital Giving?
Digital giving is the action to donate money to charitable organizations online. There are a few different ways to donate online:
Text-To-Give
The charity or organization sends a text to the donor with a link for them to donate. This is a quick and easy way to give to your favorite charitable organizations via mobile phone.
Giving Website Page
You can also offer a giving option through your website by embedding a payment system. Make sure you work with a marketing partner to ensure your website is optimized and your giving page appeals to donors.
Digital Giving App
In this day and age, offering the option to donate via an app can be very efficient. Indeed, an app enables quick and easy access to the donation page as well as recurring payment setups, reminders, messaging options and other useful functionalities.
Benefits of Digital Giving
Cashless society
A study led by DepositAccounts and published in 2019, has shown that 33% of Americans can’t make a $20 purchase unless they go to the ATM. Indeed, people carry less cash than ever before, limiting the donations you can hope to receive on Sundays. As a result of this shift, 49% of church donations in the USA now stem from credit cards. Additionally, the COVID-19 pandemic has precipitated the adoption of cashless payments for health purposes as contactless payments significantly reduce the risk of coronavirus transmission.
Offering online payment options to your parishioners will therefore likely ensure the survival and success of your church. It’ll mitigate the risk of your parishioners forgetting cash and make it easy for them to set up recurring donations so that they can even give when away or on vacation.
People prefer to give online
Trends are shifting and people prefer to give online may it be through a church website or a dedicated app. According to a recent study led by Reach Right, approximately 60% of people prefer to give online. Balancing Everything also released a recent study highlighting that 26% of people who attend Mass on a weekly basis give online. Therefore, churches need to embrace new technologies and harness the power of online charitable giving in order to thrive in the future.
Online giving is more flexible and secure
Online giving, may it be via text-to-give, an app or a website is an extremely convenient way to donate for churchgoers. Indeed, by allowing them to donate online, you also ensure they can give whenever they want and as often as they want. Not only is online giving no longer restricting them to give on Sundays only, but it’s also allowing them to pick the best time for them to do so.
Digital giving is also a seamless process. Not only does it allow parishioners to give at the click of a simple button, but it also makes the whole process hassle-free for you. With online giving, you can easily track your donations and monitor their evolution. That way, you can quickly implement strategies if donations decrease.
Last but not least, digital giving can increase your donation efficiency as it will prevent cash money from being lost or stolen. Working with online payment ensures your donations are secure on a bank account you can easily access!
Smartphone and Internet use is widespread
81% of Americans own a smartphone and chances are they’ll have it with them at church making it easy to donate online before, during or after the service. Moreover, 87% have access to the internet, therefore offering a tremendous opportunity for your church to tap into.
We hope this article sheds some light on the benefits of offering digital giving as an option to churchgoers. If you’re ready to harness the power of technology, click here to contact us or browse around at the solutions we offer!
The benefits of Social Media Marketing for Your Church
Want to increase your contributions and your attendance but not sure where to start?
Marketing has significantly evolved over the last century underpinned by the rise of the Internet and technology. If the wide number of options available to advertise services nowadays gives businesses flexibility, it can also be overwhelming and frankly, daunting. However, the online shift is here to stay particularly driven by the current coronavirus pandemic and the need for most churches to step up their social media efforts, regularly engage with their parishioners and post online masses. As 60% of churchgoers prefer to give online, building a strong social media presence to create a powerful online community is, therefore, key in this day and age. Moreover, 71% of non-for-profit organizations cite social media as one of their most important communication channels.
In this article, we’ll briefly analyze how marketing has evolved over the years (print to digital) before highlighting the importance of social media marketing for your church.
Marketing evolution over time
As a charitable organization, it’s important to understand marketing evolution as it is a great way to prepare yourself and your organization for big changes to come and harness the power of the next big thing in Marketing. From billboards and radio to social media, we’ve highlighted below the chronological evolution of marketing mediums over the last century:
1900-1950’s:
Marketing, as we define it nowadays, has been around since the beginning of the 20th century. As sales slowed down due to political and economical factors, mass production companies originally focused on economies of scale, efficiency and aggressive sales techniques using a door to door approach along with magazines, posters and billboard advertising.
1955-1995:
From 1955 onwards, companies started to embrace the need to assess what individual customers really wanted, therefore offering more choices and options based on marketing segmentation and market research. Radio, TV, Telephone and Direct Mail were the main mediums used as marketing tools for advertising during this period.
1995-Today:
By 1995 the idea that customers came first was widely adopted and relationship marketing started to emerge. Therefore, Marketing campaigns started to become customer-centric. Businesses have, since then, been thriving to ensure customer satisfaction by harnessing the power of the internet. As Digital Marketing allows companies to better target and reach customers across mobile and desktop, some specific fields such as Email Marketing or Social Media Marketing revealed to be powerful sales and customer satisfaction tools.
The importance of Social Media Marketing
With more than 3.8 billion people using social media, according to We Are Social, it’s easy to understand why Social Media Marketing is such a powerful tool for companies, charities and organizations nowadays. With 1 in 4 social media users claiming to follow brands from which they might make a purchase, harnessing the power of social media has, therefore, never been so important for your church to thrive and succeed. But how can social media help your organization?
Brand awareness
Creating a social media account on the right platforms is one of the most cost-effective ways to increase your church’s visibility. Having a social media presence means that you’ll be able to connect with a broader audience and increase your attendance in the long run as well as drive your donations. 91% of marketers claim that spending a few hours a week posting and engaging on social media significantly increased their exposure and improved their users’ experience.
Cost-effective
Creating a social media account and interacting with your loyal and regular parishioners is free. If you want to increase your reach, paid advertising campaigns will see you gain valuable insights and fine-tune your strategy for very little money in comparison to any other marketing tactics.
Market Insights
Being on social media and directly interacting with your parishioners is the best way to understand their needs, their fears and their thoughts. This can help you refine your messages, your content, your sermons and better assist both your online and offline audience as you’ll be able to craft messages that resonate with your audience. This will also help you target suitable content to drive your contributions and broaden your reach.
Display your church’s culture
Social media is a great way to convey your church’s culture and draw people to your church. You can also post messages of hope and give parishioners some well-needed comfort during difficult times.
Drive giving opportunities
Your social media content can be used to drive giving through other Marketing tactics too. Indeed, a study published by Anthony Coppedge has shown that the average click-through-rate is 115% higher for church emails that include at least one social media link.