The State of Donation Matching

Read time: 3 min

👋🏾 Hey! I’m Sid and this is The Philanthropy Futurist, a weekly advice column preparing you for the future of the nonprofit sector. Each Friday, I tackle reader questions about measuring impact, driving growth, and managing your nonprofit.

This Week’s Newsletter at a glance:

• The State of Donation Matching

• Philanthropy News From This Week

• Sid’s Book Recommendation

The State of Donation Matching

Donation matching is one of the most proven ways to increase donor engagement and revenue. Research shows up to $4 billion in social donation matching goes unused every year. Note: I am not talking about Employer Matching— I’m talking about Social Matching.

Social Donation Matching (aka Social Matching) is when individuals, foundations, or businesses make a commitment to directly match donations for your cause. This strategy is deeply relational. And it works: campaigns with matches see a 51% increase in gift size, 19% more revenue on average, and a 22% higher conversion rate with a 1:1 match.

So what’s holding us back?

Nonprofits report 3 main challenges: a lack of time and resources, difficulty finding matchers, and lack of donor awareness— among others. See below.

Another page of the report said: only 31% of Nonprofits feel very confident that they're maximizing donation matching. That means 69% of Nonprofits are unsure, underutilizing it, or not using it at all.

So now I’m going to ask you…

Which group are you in… the 31% or the 69%?

If you're in the 69%, you're not alone. But now’s the time to change that. Matching isn’t just a tactic— it can be a genuine multiplier for your fundraising.

Matching doesn’t have to be complicated either, nor does it need to be initiated only by large funders.

Anyone Can Be a Matcher

Nonprofits can turn to major donors, mid-level supporters, and even everyday givers to fuel matching campaigns. And let’s not forget the $251 billion sitting in Donor Advised Funds (DAFs)... that’s a massive pool of potential just waiting to be activated.

If you’re a Nonprofit leader, here’s your invitation:

Start treating donation matching not as a bonus, but as a core growth strategy. Educate your board and strategize with your teams. Be transparent with supporters about how matching works. Create match opportunities year-round.

And most importantly… find creative ways to make it easy for donors to say yes.

What You Can Do Next

1. Review The State of Donation Matching Q1 report, there’s a lot I wasn’t able to cover in this short newsletter

2. Educate your team and board about the benefits of Social Matching, then strategize

3. Identify potential matchers among your current donors, especially mid-level and major givers (e.g. individuals, foundations, businesses etc)

4. Check out tools like MatchNice.org to explore how to make donation matching easy, transparent, and scalable

5. Test a small campaign using a basic 1:1 match strategy to learn what resonates with your audience (FYI: a 1:1 match means that for every $1 a donor gives, another $1 is contributed by a matcher)

Last but not least, I’d like to give a huge shoutout to the team over at MatchNice!

Pooya Pourak, Ibraheem Saleh, and the team put together a truly insightful report. I’m excited to continue following their journey.

Until next time y’all. See you next week! ✌🏾

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Philanthropy News From This Week

• Total U.S. giving in 2024 topped $592.5 billion, outpacing inflation

• How Foundations Are Using AI to Vet Grantees

• Bank of America awards $5 million to Special Olympics

• Gates Foundation commits $1.6 billion to Gavi over a 5-year period

Sid’s Book Recommendation

Each week, I recommend a book or film that has impacted my life in a positive way. My recommendation this week is:

Lean Analytics by Alistair Croll & Benjamin Yoskovitz

This book is a guide for leaders and innovators who want to use data to build better products and programs. It’s a cornerstone of the Lean Startup movement, focusing specifically on the "Measure" phase of the Build-Measure-Learn cycle, and provides a practical, actionable framework for making data-driven decisions at every stage of your company's journey. Learn more.

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