Double the Love: February is Matching Gift Month

Did you know February is Matching Gift Month? This can be a great way to build awareness around matching gifts for your cause. Research suggests that your donors are more likely to contribute to a cause and make a larger donation if they know their employer will match their gift. Below are several tips on how you can make the most of Matching Gift Month!

Tip 1: Automate your matching gift engagements with Auto Match from HEPdata

  • Seamlessly integrate into your online donation forms.
  • Store and update all matching gift policy information in your CRM in real time.

Tip 2: Give a shout out to your Corporate Donors

  • Take this opportunity to publicly thank all of your corporate donors for their support.
  • Share a story of how a corporate partnership made a difference to your constituents and mission.

Tip 3: Use social media to remind your donors about matching gifts

  • It’s free advertising to those constituents who engage with you digitally (and often!).

Tip 4: Add a Matching Gifts reminder to your email signature

  • Add the following reminder to your email, customizing the link as needed: “Your donation may be eligible for a matching gift from your employer. Click here to search our matching gift database.”
  • The reminder also includes a place for you to insert your HEPdata eMatch Donor Link.

Tip 5: Screen your data for matching gift eligibility

  • HEPdata can not only screen your organization’s data but also identify employment info on your donors first.
  • You can then determine exactly which donors are matching gift eligible. Of course, they can then be loaded into the Auto Match portal for automated engagement.
  • Remember, a well-thought-out strategy for Matching Gift Month is your opportunity to send a well-crafted message to your donors promoting the benefits of matching gifts.

If you are interested in learning more about our matching gift solutions, or how we can fully automate your entire matching gift program, please contact us. The HEPdata team is here to help you meet your goals for Matching Gift Month and beyond.

12 Best Practices for Matching Gifts in Higher Education

1. Create a Strategic Plan for Matching Gifts

If you plan for it, the donations will come. Take time this year to create a Matching Gift strategic plan that includes annual Matching Gift goals, action items on how to meet those goals, and deadlines to keep your team on task. HEPdata’s Matching Gift Solution offers a user-friendly home page that lists the status of all gift-match eligible donations with real-time updates to make keeping up with your strategic plan a breeze.

2. Foster a Regular Dialogue with Donors

How often do you follow up on incomplete matching gift donation opportunities? If you do not have a plan to do this regularly until the paperwork crosses the finish line, you’re leaving a lot of funding to chance. Follow up every month until the paperwork is complete. If this task seems burdensome, remember that platforms like HEPdata’s Auto Match can track, monitor, and follow up on your behalf.

3. Segment and Customize Your Communications

Not all donors are the same. The messages you send to students will be different from the messages going to new alumni, alumni ages 70+, alumni from the top 50 matching gift employers, and donors who have given $100 or less. Take your database and segment each donor based on various factors, then create highly targeted marketing campaigns for each.

4. Stay Up to Date on Matching Gift Companies

Do you know the latest updates on the top Matching Gift corporations? Who is no longer offering Matching Gifts? HEPdata’s Auto Match offers exhaustive tracking of Matching Gift companies with 7,000 more monitored than the nearest competitor (for a total of 20,000!). It also includes direct access to Fortune 500 companies for accurate information and updates on guidelines.

5. Add a Website Feature that Gives Donors a Way to Look Up Employer Matching Gift Info

This is the easiest, fastest way to connect your donors to information without them needing to ask HR or research on their own. Part of the HEPdata’s Match Lookup, the eMatch Donor Link has been a top resource for higher education institutions for the past 20 years.

6. Quantify How a Donation Will Make an Impact

No one wants to imagine their donation going towards the electric bill, however necessary it may be. Inspire donations by letting donors know exactly what their dollars will go to, such as $25 providing 10 meals for a student or $100 going toward books for the new student library.

7. Use Actionable Language During Follow Up

What headline grabs your interest more: “Complete your matching gift paperwork” or “Help us turn your $25 donation into $50?” Write headlines that spark action and offer tangible outcomes.

8. Make Outreach Calls Personal and Conversational

When your fundraising team hits the phones for donations, be sure they make a donor feel recognized and appreciated. How are they doing? Where are they working? How are they involved with the university? These questions can also uncover important database info. If they’re with a company offering Matching Gifts, solicit that on the phone. Also, be sure to recognize that they’re a Matching Gift donor during the call.

9. Celebrate Matching Gift Donors

Recognize and celebrate donors who have their gifts matched. This acknowledgment can encourage others to participate and shows appreciation for their contribution.

10. Educate Your Staff About Matching Gifts

Ensure that all staff members, especially those interacting with donors, are well-informed about matching gift programs and can effectively communicate their benefits.

11. Leverage Technology to Streamline the Process

Utilize software solutions that can automate the identification, tracking, and follow-up of matching gift opportunities, reducing manual effort and increasing efficiency.

12. Regularly Review and Update Your Matching Gift Strategy

Periodically assess the effectiveness of your matching gift initiatives and make necessary adjustments to improve outcomes and adapt to changing circumstances.

Three Reasons Why Matching Gifts Go Unclaimed

Matching gifts offer the opportunity to double any donation received, all for just the handful of minutes required to complete the necessary paperwork.

If it’s so easy, why does an estimated $4-7 billion in matching gift revenue go unclaimed every year?

The reason isn’t a lack of corporate generosity.

In our 25 years of experience, the top three reasons why matching gifts go unclaimed are:

  1. Donors don’t know their company will match a gift;
  2. Organizations don’t follow up with donors after they donate; and
  3. Organizations are working off of out-of-date information.

Here are a few solutions to these challenges that will help boost your revenue opportunities moving forward.

1. Donors don’t know their company will match a gift.

By far, this is the biggest reason behind unclaimed matching gifts. Research shows 80% of matching gift-eligible donors are unaware that their company will match their gift.

Why does this matter? Because approximately 84% of donors say they’re more likely to donate if a match is offered and 1 in 3 donors are willing to give more if a match is offered.

Solution: Your best opportunity to double a gift is to introduce matching gifts at the point of donation. Adding an online search tool such as Match Lookup with eMatch Donor Link in the donation process allows your donors to search their employer before, during, and after a gift to see if their company will match. This tool is configurable to the preferred look and feel of your website, can be placed on as many web pages as needed, and offers metrics to ensure you’re maximizing the tool.

2. Organizations don’t follow up with donors after they donate.

Manually following up individually with donors to ask if they are eligible for a matching gift is a time-consuming process. The same amount of work is required for a $10 donation as compared to a $10,000 donation. We have spoken to organizations with dedicated teams spending upwards of 30 hours per week managing their matching gifts program, only to feel they are barely making a dent in their follow-ups.

Solution: Automating the manual steps in the matching gift process can save countless hours and quickly reap significant revenue increases. Auto Match is a simple, easy-to-use platform that automatically identifies matching gift eligible donors, tracks their donations, and follows up until the necessary paperwork is complete. The system seamlessly integrates with many fundraising platforms and most organizations see an average 53% increase in matching gift revenue the first year.

3. Organizations work off outdated or incorrect matching gift policy data.

With tens of thousands of companies offering matching gift programs, all with policies being updated regularly, keeping track of each change can quickly become daunting. But with 65% of Fortune 500 companies offering a matching gift program, millions of people are eligible, making this a worthy fundraising pursuit.

Solution: HEPdata Matching Gift Solutions offers the most comprehensive and up-to-date matching gift database available. Our team of researchers constantly updates our database of over 23,000 companies, ensuring you have access to the most current information. This allows you to confidently promote matching gifts to your donors, knowing you have accurate and timely data to support your efforts.

By addressing these three common challenges, organizations can significantly increase their matching gift revenue and make the most of this often-overlooked fundraising opportunity.