A 2025 fundraising study by OneCause found that 96% of organizations surveyed held at least one online fundraiser in 2024, and 55% of nonprofits reported generating 21% or more of their annual operating revenue through online and event fundraising. For many organizations, having an online fundraising strategy can mean the difference between reaching potential donors no matter where they are and losing out on much-needed support.
Your strategy has to consider all the moving pieces: your organization’s mission and goals, your fundraising team, your software, and your community of supporters. Before reaching out to donors or leaping into campaign planning, consider these steps for building a strong online fundraising strategy.
1. Assess your organization’s fundraising abilities
The first step to creating an effective, sustainable fundraising strategy for your nonprofit is to understand where you’re starting from. Without an accurate picture of your team’s abilities and historical performance, you won’t be able to set realistic goals for the future or improve upon your previous efforts.
There are four primary organizational challenges that nonprofits struggle with:
- Internal alignment: The fundraising team, management staff, and board members have different goals and expectations.
- Fundraising performance: A nonprofit isn’t able to raise the funds it needs through its efforts.
- Fundraising methods: A nonprofit’s methods of reaching out to potential donors are ineffective, inefficient, or uninspiring.
- Donor management: A nonprofit is not able to steward its donors effectively, leading to retention issues and a lack of recurring donations.
Misalignment in any of these categories can lead to issues like decreased productivity, high rates of fundraising staff turnover, or low levels of donor retention, but improvements in these areas can grow your organization’s capacity to fundraise online. You can assess your fundraising on your own or bring in an outside expert for additional support.
Once you have a clear view of your organization’s overall fundraising health, you can take the necessary steps toward online fundraising success.
2. Analyze previous online fundraising efforts
There are plenty of metrics you can use to understand your online fundraisers’ performance. Go beyond dollars raised and emails sent by analyzing Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) that align with your strategic priorities.
For instance, if your current focus is acquiring high-value donors, you might analyze past online campaign data to identify which giving levels performed best, which messages drove the highest conversions, or which donation pages had the most engagement. Use metrics like donation form conversion rates, average gift size, mobile vs. desktop usage, and donor retention to assess where you’re seeing the strongest results and where there’s room to grow.
Quantitative metrics are important for analysis, but they aren’t the only way to learn from previous campaigns. Personal experience can also provide insights. Consider hosting roundtable conversations with any of the following groups:
- Your fundraising staff, both senior and new
- Online and in-person event attendees
- Top peer-to-peer fundraising participants
- Board members
All of these people have a unique connection to your organization’s mission, as well as opinions on the most important or useful ways to support your cause. By including them in your analysis, you reap the benefits of their personal stories and strengthen their relationship with your nonprofit through new forms of engagement.
The goal of this step is to improve upon your previous experiences, so that you can do more of what works and stay away from those that don’t. These insights can also help your nonprofit to set realistic and achievable goals for your next fundraising effort and give your team a clear target to aim for.
3. Decide on your online fundraising tools
Once you understand your organization’s fundraising capabilities, determine which tools will be most effective for helping you reach your goals. There are a lot of options when choosing an online fundraising software solution, so it’s important to consider the specific needs of your organization.
If your organization relies on social fundraising, for instance, you need peer-to-peer software that is easy to use and motivates your supporters to fundraise on your behalf. They should be able to create their own fundraising pages, customize them with their stories and personal connection to your mission, and share them easily with friends and family.
Another common type of online fundraising tool is nonprofit event planning and management software. Whether you’re hosting a virtual 5K race or an online charity auction, you need to be able to track attendees, communicate effectively, and process online donations. This type of software is even more important when you host a hybrid event, since both your online and in-person attendees deserve a thoughtful and engaging experience.
If you need help deciding between tools, there are plenty of resources that will help you weigh the differences between fundraising software options based on your nonprofit’s requirements.
4. Plan your marketing and outreach strategy
The last step in building your online fundraising strategy is determining how you’re going to get your campaign in front of the people most likely to donate to your cause. Think back to everything you learned from analyzing your previous fundraising efforts. Where were you the most successful? What avenues did not work out the way you expected? These questions will help you build a better marketing plan today.
Your previous experiences should guide how you prioritize different channels, but don’t let them cut you off from something entirely. If your email marketing efforts didn’t provide the return on investment you expected, that doesn’t mean you should never send another email. It means it’s time to change something up.
Your marketing efforts may include any of the following options:
- Paid advertising
- Search engine optimization
- Social media marketing
- Email newsletters
- Digital greeting cards
- Direct text messages
- Blog posts
Once you’ve decided on your approach, set SMART goals (specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound) and decide on key performance indicators (KPIs) to track your progress.
It takes more than one touchpoint to earn the trust of a potential donor, so consider offline opportunities for engagement to support your online fundraising efforts. Direct mail, in-person events and interactions, and physical reminders of your mission are all great ways to build awareness and appreciation for your nonprofit’s work in your community.
Adapting Your Fundraising Strategy
As you build out your strategy, remember to be flexible and adaptable. Don’t be afraid to change course if something isn’t working. Your experiences in fundraising are one of the most powerful learning tools for your nonprofit!