Three Growth Opportunities to Increase Donor Lifetime Value

Nonprofits are leaving billions on the table. GivingTuesday’s Data Commons estimates the sector could raise an additional $52 billion – $79 billion per year by changing three things about how it asks. Specifically, they argue for year-round fundraising, increased recurring giving, and reaching people nobody has asked.

Expand Giving Beyond Year-End

Nonprofits raise about a third of their annual online revenue in December, according to M+R Benchmarks. GivingTuesday, as an event, works because it gives donors a specific reason to act, and it happens right at the start of the holiday giving season.

GivingTuesday’s Data Commons estimates that if fundraising were as active throughout the year as it is in the fourth quarter, the sector could raise an additional $23 billion annually.

Smart nonprofits aren’t waiting for GivingTuesday; they’re creating their own events. The Alzheimer’s Association created END ALZ Day around its own cause, giving donors a reason to act that isn’t rooted at the most competitive calendar date. And Christian Appalachian Project repurposed an owned week for fundraising. Learn how these organizations and GivingTuesday are creating their own giving moments during our upcoming October 28 webinar, Building a Day That You Own: How Nonprofits Are Spreading Out Giving.

Grow Recurring Giving 

Since 2019, the share of all donors making recurring gifts rose from 3.76% to 6.23%, according to GivingTuesday’s Data Commons. What hasn’t moved is the share of new donors signing up as recurring donors, which has held just under 2%.

Nonprofits are pushing harder for sustained giving because it means paying once to acquire them for years. In our 2025 Benchmark Report, a monthly donor acquired through DRTV cost $249 and gave $26.92 per month, breaking even at 10 months. Of those sustained givers, 61% were still giving at 13 months, meaning the average campaign paid for itself in the first year.

We can expand sustained giving both as an option for new donors and current ones. GivingTuesday estimates an acquisition opportunity of $10 billion per year if the sector increased that 2% recurring donor acquisition by five percentage points. But new sustainer acquisitions have been flat for more than five years.

You already have a lever in your donor file. SimioCloud sustainer modeling analyzes giving behavior across the largest donor data co-op in the world to identify which donors have the capacity and willingness to become sustainers. And for smaller nonprofits, SimioAccelerate scores your donor file to identify who are most likely to become a sustainer. Ask those donors first to increase your share of recurring gifts, then make sustained giving the default for those you acquire next. 

Acquire the Donors No One Is Asking

Half of Americans say they don’t recall anyone asking them to give, and that number has held for two years, according to GivingTuesday’s 2025 GivingPulse survey.

GivingTuesday estimates about 10% of those unsolicited people would have given had they been asked, putting their untapped generosity between $19 billion and $46 billion per year. They point to younger donors, diverse communities, and those who don’t match the traditional donor profile, but don’t say where to start. Donor acquisition strategies can answer that question.

An effective acquisition strategy must look at people, not demographics. That means scoring individual donors based on their likely value over time and matching them to the channels they are most likely to respond to.That’s why these groups aren’t getting attention. As we found in our 2025 Benchmark Report, these donors look unpromising when viewed through a single-channel lens. But analyze their activity across every channel, and they become high-potential prospects. Tools such as SimioCloud Omnichannel Acquisition find those donors by reading giving signals across channels, then modeling who to reach and how.

Increasing Donor Lifetime Value Starts with You

If you’re looking to increase donor lifetime value, you now have three levers. Build year-round fundraising through events you own, acquire new donors as sustainers instead of converting them later, and reach donors no one is asking.

Each of these requires deliberate effort and modeled data. Learn how to increase donor lifetime value at our October 28 webinar, Building a Day That You Own: How Nonprofits Are Spreading Out Giving. We will show you how nonprofits are creating their own giving events and putting the first lever into practice.