3 Strategies to Secure More Major Gifts for Your University

Major gifts can be real game changers for any institution. We’ve heard the stories of how alumni or donors made a major gift, which led to the creation of something marvelous for the institution. However, not many recognize the effort and time it took for the team to cultivate such a generous amount.

To understand one such incredible journey, from a student to a major alumni donor, we spoke to Adam Platzer, the AVP for college advancement at Rochester Institute of Technology. Adam developed, cultivated, and closed a $50 million gift – in collaboration with university leadership – delivering the largest philanthropic donation in RIT’s history!

📖The Story Behind the $50 Million Gift

Here's some quick context before we dive into the story: RIT is one of the finest institutions in upstate New York with a focus on technology, computing, design, and art. Furthermore, it promotes entrepreneurship and innovation.

It all started when Adam's career services team introduced him to Mr. X, a young RIT alumnus, who never really focused on academics when he was in college but always had a true entrepreneurial spirit. He’d started his own tech company upon graduating.

⏩Fast forward a few years, he was visiting RIT to recruit interns for his company. After a brief introduction, the team at RIT took a two-pronged approach by tapping into his passion and supporting his professional work.

A Step-by-Step Engagement Plan

Here are multiple ways in which they meaningfully engaged Mr. X -

1. Invited him as the keynote speaker for an entrepreneurial conference at the university.
2. The alumni relations team invited him for Homecoming events.
3. They held recruiting events where his company could meet students and potentially hire.
4. Got him onboard to mentor businesses under RIT’s entrepreneurship program.
5. His company would sponsor hackathons and he would personally travel there to work with the students as a mentor.
6. The Engineering School at RIT offered complete assistance using their lab to test his products.
7. The Government Community Relations team assisted him in opening an office in Rochester, which facilitated more recruitment from RIT. This eventually become one of their larger offices.
8. The team would host exclusive luncheons for RIT alumni at this office. In order to converse with them and provide updates on what the university is doing, they would also be accompanied by the president and a faculty member.
9. He was also appointed as a member of the Board of Trustees, where he actively participated by offering ideas and inputs.
10. The president developed a remarkable friendship with him. Small actions like writing him a personalized email and being resourceful helped the relationship go a long way.
11. He was invited as the commencement speaker once.

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Give value before you seek value.

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All this value-driven engagement, coupled with the amazing relationship the entire team built with him, eventually helped them make an ask.

When he sold his company, he was more than happy to give 10% of the value of his company — a whopping $50 Million!

This enormous amount went towards developing the Global Cybersecurity Institute and professorships at RIT, and the construction of the Students Hall for Exploration and Development (SHED).

The generous and humble person he is, Mr. X didn’t want anything named after him, but rather after his elementary school teachers who played an integral role in shaping his initial years. A dream donor indeed!

In retrospect, this wouldn’t have been possible if not for the various teams across functions - from Career services to University leadership, collaborating to engage with him meaningfully.

Key takeaways from the session💡

A major gift is a long-term game — it’s not possible to engage everyone. It’s important to focus on the top 20% of the donors and design a plan to meaningfully engage with them with the help of various departments across the advancement office.

Meaningful engagement can begin by tapping into a prospective donor’s passions and being resourceful. Help them further their career and pursue their passions in any way possible. Plan your programming around the top 20% — you could invite them as speakers, help them recruit, make them an active member of the board or do anything that would be of value to them.

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“We play a small role in the donor’s lives, so it’s important to be lightning fast with your response.”

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Want to become an efficient Major Gift Fundraiser?

Here’s an action plan that Adam has drafted which you can start implementing right away!

About the speaker

Adam Platzer, the AVP for college advancement at RIT is an experienced university fundraiser who has secured transformational funding from alumni, corporations, and parents. Adam has traveled extensively throughout the country with the president, deans, and VP of Student Affairs. He specializes in developing creative engagement strategies that are matched with targeted solicitations – leading to maximum gift potential. He also started Forward Fundraisers in 2018.

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Is your university making the most of matching gift fundraising opportunities? Unfortunately, the answer is probably not. The truth is that matching gifts are a significantly underutilized form of funding for all sorts of schools, universities, and institutions. That means that to maximize your school’s revenue, the way you view and promote matching gifts to donors could likely use a revamp.

Matching gifts have the potential to fuel any organization’s fundraising efforts and help you secure the most revenue possible. Ready to drastically improve your matching gift marketing strategies and bring in more corporate dollars? Check out these five best practices if you’re looking to up your matching gift marketing strategies to encourage corporate giving participation among your university donors.

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1. Promote matching gift opportunities to alumni

Many alumni enjoy supporting the schools that helped pave the way for their success. Effective fundraising campaigns can be an excellent means for engaging these former students long after they leave your campus. And taking things a step further is matching gifts.
According to statistics from Double the Donation, more than 18 million individuals are employed by companies with matching gift programs. More than likely, a good amount of your school’s alumni are among those people.
However, the vast majority of match-eligible donors are unaware of the programs offered by their employers⁠ — which often puts it on the organization to market these opportunities effectively. If you’re looking to promote matching gifts, consider the following powerful marketing and outreach avenues to use:

• Email
• Newsletters (physical or electronic)
• Social media
• Direct mail

While it’s certainly a good idea to inform all sorts of people about the wide availability of matching gifts, taking an alumni-centered approach can be a great way to focus on these types of generous supporters and target your efforts accordingly.

2. Create a dedicated matching gifts page on your school website

Many donors use your university’s website to learn more about how to get involved and where to give as well as additional opportunities for support. As such, it’s important that you provide ample information about matching gifts on your site.

We suggest crafting a dedicated matching gifts web page with the following tips in mind:

• Incorporate a company search tool for users to quickly and easily research their employers’ matching gift programs.
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• Provide users with employer-specific next steps for completing the match request submission process. This might include links directing donors to their company’s online forms or downloadable PDFs.
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• Ensure it’s easy to navigate to this web page from your home page, menu, and more. This way, supporters interested in matching gifts will know exactly where to go to find additional information.

Then, direct supporters to this informative resource by linking to it in your matching gift emails, school-wide newsletters, social media posts, and other fundraising materials.

3. Incorporate matching gifts in the online donation process

Whether you’re looking to plan for a dedicated giving day or other fundraising occasion or simply optimize your long-term strategy, corporate matching gifts are a great way to go. When you integrate matching gift fundraising into your existing donation process, it allows donors to determine their own eligibility for a matching gift without ever having to leave your donation page.

Here’s how it typically works:

1.  A donor fills out your school’s online donation form.
2. The donor is provided with a simple company search widget embedded in the page.
3. The donor fills in their employer’s name and submits the donation.
4. The donor is provided with guidelines for their employer’s matching gift program on the confirmation screen.    

Supporters are usually at the peak of their engagement while completing your online donation form, so it makes sense that you’d want to incorporate matching gifts at this time. Plus, research shows that 1 in 3 donors report that they’d likely make a larger gift if they know it will be matched by their employer, which makes it an impactful strategy for increasing donation sizes as well.

4. Keep track of companies with matching gift programs

When it comes to matching gift fundraising for universities, one of the best things you can do to set your team up for success is to keep a detailed record of companies with especially generous matching gift programs. Then, you can compare this information against the companies that your alumni are working for to get a better idea of your existing match-eligible prospects.

After all, a significant part of effectively leveraging matching gifts depends on having and using the right data to drive your fundraising strategies. For matching gifts, donor employers are the most important metric there is.

5. Encourage match-eligible donors to submit their requests

Following up with supporters after they’ve made their gifts is one of the best ways to take your donor relations to the next level and maximize the number of donors who request corporate matches. We recommend segmenting donors by their likely eligibility for a match (based on information collected during the donation process) to ensure your messaging is as tailored and relevant as possible. Consider these examples:

• For a donor who is likely eligible for a match, you might provide them with direct links to their employer’s program guidelines and online submission forms.
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• For a donor who is likely ineligible for a match, you might encourage them to reach out to their employer to double-check for the existence of any matching gift programs.
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• For a donor who has unknown match eligibility, you might ask them to select their employer from a company search tool to determine whether they offer a corporate match.

Luckily, if you’d like to streamline this process and save time and resources for your school, you can automate the follow-up process from beginning to end. All you have to do is invest in a matching gift automation tool, and the software will do the rest!

Failing to promote matching gifts to supporters is essentially throwing away free donations. When you take a strategic approach to marketing, however, you allow your generous donors to make an even larger impact on your school, establish corporate partnerships with businesses in your network, and secure additional revenue for your university’s needs.
Just remember to inform alumni and other supporters of these exceptional giving opportunities, promote matching gifts through your school website and donation page and follow up with donors to drive match requests to make the best of your fundraising efforts.

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As part of the higher education sector, your university likely depends on social campaigns like peer-to-peer fundraising and crowdfunding to fund its projects and initiatives. ‍While these campaigns have the potential for a wide reach, they require effective promotion to maximize alumni support.

How can you retain alumni support long after they receive their diplomas? Let’s explore the top marketing practices your university should employ when planning your outreach strategy.

1. Actively promote matching gifts

Your alumni may be eager to support your university, but many are unaware of the opportunities available to help them maximize their contributions—namely, matching gifts.

Matching gifts are a type of corporate social responsibility initiative wherein businesses match donations made by their employees. Double the Donation defines corporate social responsibility as “a company’s efforts to improve society” in a multitude of ways, from directly donating to supporting employee giving. Matching gifts combine both of these efforts and represent a major revenue opportunity for universities.

Identify match-eligible alumni by looking into your existing donor base. Specifically, take a look at your alumni and major donors who represent your largest match opportunities. Then, secure matching gifts from alumni by promoting the opportunity to match-eligible individuals through:

• Educational resources for your donors
• A matching gift page on your website
• A matching gift database that conducts automatic email follow-ups to remind donors to submit matching gift requests

As you solicit matched gifts, maintain an open line of communication with major employers who offer matches. Periodically review their policies and ask them to notify you if any changes are made to their matching gift program. Both universities and donors should stay on top of employers’ match guidelines to avoid missing out on matching gift revenue.

2. Market on multiple communication channels

Communication is the foundation of a successful fundraising campaign. While some approaches are more effective than others, the best results come from incorporating multiple channels—especially for larger donor bases.

There are two types of marketing your university can leverage, and each type has a plethora of channels you can use to spread the word about your campaigns:

• Inbound marketing is a method of targeted advertising that involves attracting potential supporters based on their interests in your cause. Inbound marketing includes:
  • Search engine optimization (SEO): Revamp your website to rank more highly on search engine results pages for keywords related to your cause. Many institutions also collaborate with SEO experts like Tanot Solutions, to strengthen their backlink profile and improve domain authority through strategic link-building initiatives.
  • Blogs: Write educational blog content that attracts alumni to your website and inspires them to give.
  • Videos: Create compelling videos that showcase your university’s accomplishments and drive viewers to support your work. Schools can also create ai videos to turn alumni stories, campus updates, and fundraising messages into engaging content more quickly.
  • Podcasts: Invite faculty and industry experts to discuss relevant topics in a podcast to establish your institution as a thought leader.
  • Organic social media posts: Share original, unsponsored content on your social media channels to keep your school top of mind for alumni who follow you.
• Outbound marketing is a broader advertising strategy that focuses on reaching a wide audience through channels such as:
  • Pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns: Use search engine advertising, like Google Ads, to get your website in front of as many eyes as possible.
  • Direct mail campaigns: Send engaging flyers to a large mailing list to appeal to those who respond more positively to traditional direct mail.
  • TV commercials: Create a TV commercial promoting your university and directing viewers to your website. Incorporate QR codes to simplify access to your website without interrupting their watching.
  • Newspaper ads: Place an advertisement in your local newspaper to capture the attention of community members who may not otherwise hear from your school.
  • Social media ads: Boost your social media posts with paid advertisements so your content appears not just to your existing followers, but in the feed of any user who might engage with the post.

Remember, communication is a two-way street. You won’t just want to send messages to alumni, but to stay in touch with them over time. Ensure that alumni and any volunteer fundraisers feel free to voice their feedback or concerns.

3. Leverage nonprofit storytelling

Effective communication is about more than just an open line of communication—it’s about powerful storytelling, too. Stories encourage alumni to form stronger connections with your university’s mission, students, and impact.

As part of your marketing approach, implement the following storytelling strategies into your content:

• Use powerful imagery. Visual elements like photo galleries or clear infographics quickly capture your audience’s attention.
• Incorporate quotes and testimonials. Let your students and faculty do the talking by incorporating their direct quotes into your content. This will be especially effective for reaching alumni with personal connections to those individuals, such as the former student of a featured professor.
• State campaign goals. Explaining exactly what your university needs and how a donor’s contribution will be used draws a direct connection between the supporter and your work.

Storytelling and powerful imagery compel users to share content with their networks, so it’s crucial that you make your storytelling components shareable. For example, you might place a “Share” button next to the content on your alumni website that makes it easy for viewers to repost an article or video to their social media channels.

4. Link to your fundraising page

In all your digital marketing materials, make it easy for viewers to take action by directing them to your donation page. Make the most of clear calls to action, prominent buttons, and QR codes across all the channels you use. To ensure shareability, use an effective social campaigning platform and the right social media platforms.

Additionally, when alumni land on your fundraising page, they should be able to take action easily. Check to ensure your donation form can be quickly completed and doesn’t require any unnecessary steps. With a compelling marketing strategy and simple form, your university can seamlessly convert alumni into dedicated supporters.

Now that you know the best marketing practices, share this information with your fundraising team, and plan your best campaign yet! Then, as donations start to roll in, be sure to show your appreciation for donors’ support and continue to engage them by offering additional involvement opportunities. The more active your donors are in your university’s activities, the more likely they’ll be to continue their support.

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About the author

Adam Weinger is the President of Double the Donation, the leading provider of tools to nonprofits to help them raise more money from corporate matching gift and volunteer grant programs.

Double the Donation's robust solution, 360MatchPro, provides nonprofits with automated tools to identify match-eligible donors, drive matches to completion, and gain actionable insights. 360MatchPro integrates directly into donation forms, CRMs, social fundraising software, and other nonprofit technology solutions to capture employment information and follow up appropriately with donors about matching gifts.

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