June 22, 2010 | Read Time: 2 minutes
In large part because of the generous response to charities providing relief to victims of the Haiti earthquake, some of the nation’s largest charities saw increases in the gifts made in response to direct-marketing appeals grew in the first three months of the year, according to a survey released today.
But direct-marketing appeals are still not seeing much of a bounce as the economy improves, the study found.
Contributions of $5,000 or less to 81 nonprofit institutions rose by a median of 2.4 percent—meaning that half of the organizations had a greater increase and the other half had less—from January through March of this year compared with the same quarter in 2009.
It was the first increase in more than two years in the survey conducted by Target Analytics, the research arm of the software company Blackbaud.
Most of the growth was concentrated at animal-welfare and international relief organizations, causes that drew many donations because of the Haiti castastrophe. Advocacy groups had increases as well, but they were smaller.
All other types of charities in the survey—arts, environmental, health, human-services, and religious organizations—reported flat or declining contributions. Apart from the disaster-related gifts, there was little sign of a resurgence in donations this year.
Fewer New Donors
Gifts raised from direct-marketing appeals slowed in the first three quarters of 2008, followed by steeper declines in the last quarter of that year and throughout 2009, according to Target Analytics.
The latest survey examined first-quarter contributions, as well as other indicators such as the amount given per donor, the number of new donors recruited, and the number of donors who have made multi-year gifts.
The study analyzed records of 38 million donors who contributed more than $2-billion from April 1, 2009, through March 31, 2010.
Organizations in the survey have seen declines in the number of donors for at least three and a half years, a trend that accelerated during the recession. The number of new donors has been shrinking faster than the total number of donors since 2005.
