The Future of Fundraising
Welcome to the Future of Fundraising.
In fundraising, building meaningful relationships is the foundation of long-term success. Cultivation—the relationship-building journey that leads to an eventual ask—is about consistently nurturing a prospect or donor, inspiring curiosity, understanding their interests, and aligning their passions with the organization’s mission.
Higher education institutions have a natural cultivation event annually during Homecoming. This week, we refined the autonomous fundraiser’s AI cultivation algorithms to test its effectiveness of Homecoming invitations with our early Innovation Partners.
Effective cultivation requires thoughtful, well-timed touchpoints that inspire action and build trust. Whether it’s personalized emails or engaging event invitations, every interaction is a step toward deepening that relationship. By taking the right steps during the cultivation phase, we ensure that when the time comes to make the ask, it feels like a natural progression within an already established cadence.
Translating this deeply human process into an AI-driven algorithm presented a unique challenge. While other outreach stages—like introduction, qualification, stewardship, and solicitation—follow clear patterns and timing, cultivation does not.
We realized that cultivation was becoming “the absence of the need for another significant move”—essentially a default action between asks and thank-yous. This approach felt incomplete, as if we hadn’t fully captured the true importance of cultivation. We knew that building strong relationships requires more than routine check-ins; it requires authentic, engaging touchpoints that keep donors inspired and invested.
That led us to rethink how to approach cultivation with intention. We asked ourselves: How do we translate the thoughtful, nuanced interactions of human relationship-building into an algorithm that keeps outreach fresh and meaningful?
After listing out the various interactions we may pursue as human fundraisers, we identified five distinct categories of cultivation: event invitations, educational opportunities, introductions to people or programs, birthday wishes, and general engagements. And, while we learned this by working with higher education institutions, the same is true for all fundraising shops.
By creating sub-categories of cultivation and coding them, we created a structure that allows our AI-powered algorithm to classify and recognize different opportunities for engagement to ensure that each interaction feels purposeful and aligned with the donor’s interests, rather than just another touchpoint.
As we look ahead to this week, we’re testing how we can refine these cultivation touchpoints in ways that build deeper relationships. My team and I recognize that these five categories are only a starting point, and as a part of the R&D process, we will learn from the results and build from here.
I hope you have a great week.
[Podcast] The Nonprofit Lab, Episode 41: Autonomous Fundraising Revolution
Host of The Nonprofit Lab Podcast and CEO of MatchNice , Pooya Pourak sat down with Givzey CEO Adam Martel to record Episode 41 of The Nonprofit Lab.
This conversation explores how AI is enabling nonprofits to do more with fewer resources while fostering meaningful donor relationships in this new era of philanthropy. Discover how nonprofits can leverage these tools to thrive in the future of fundraising. (LISTEN HERE )
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Recent research, released by CCS Fundraising, analyzes the giving history of donors between their first gift and their first major gift.
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See our guide to get the data that will help you drive strategy. (DOWNLOAD NOW )
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In this Givzey Guidance, a frontline fundraiser asks about pledge installment payments.
Should you send an acknowledgement to donors for each pledge installment they make towards a larger committed gift?
“We’ve been going back and forth on this issue. Do you send an acknowledgement for pledge payments? For example, if someone makes a multi-year pledge, do you send an acknowledgement letter every time a payment is received or just for the initial pledge? What about for donors set up for monthly giving?”
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Fundraising Jobs
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