Product Updates: Stewardship Series Effort and Online Will Tool Add-on

Stewardship Series Effort

When it comes to legacy gifts, many organizations spend a large chunk of their time focused on uncovering hidden gifts or closing more of them. Sure, it’s important to find out who planned a secret gift and to inspire donors to make planned gift disclosures. But, believe it or not, closing legacy gifts is just the beginning of the fundraising process, not the end. That’s because most legacy gifts are revocable and many people change their plans over time. In other words, the key is to make sure your supporters never change their minds (or if they do, it’s to increase their gift for your organization).

Stewardship of legacy donors is absolutely crucial to ensure that the donor keeps the organization in their estate plans. In fact, Dr. Russell James’ research concludes that when stewardship is done correctly, donors’ annual giving amounts grow by +75%. Once an organization knows that a supporter has planned the ultimate gift for their organization, it’s imperative that they steward the relationship in a meaningful way for the rest of the supporter’s life. That’s why we have released a new Effort that will help you steward your donors effectively.

The Stewardship Series Effort gives donors a VIP experience that leads them to disclose the “why” behind their philanthropy so you can have more meaningful conversations.

• Start with a survey: Uncover the “why” behind their generosity
• Send automatic, personalized emails that are highly engaging
• Land meetings with your donors
• Send donors an email on their birthday to let them know you remembered (automatically, of course!)

Online Will Tool Add-on

There is an increase in online will tool popularity and more of our customers have partnered up with online will companies to offer their supporters a way to create their will for free; complimentary of that organization. We have begun to partner with Trust & Will (free for nonprofits) to drive traffic to a free Will offer so that you can uncover more legacy gifts.

We recognize that legacy gift marketing is not just about getting into as many wills as possible, which is why we understand that these tools are supplements to robust strategic legacy gift marketing initiatives, not replacements. And if they are used, stewardship is key to ensuring that donors will keep their gifts in their wills and might consider increasing the size of their gifts or make additional legacy and/or major gifts later. 

That is why MarketSmart customers who have a partnership with an online will tool (we recommend Trust & Will) can simply add this feature to their System, which includes:

• An email blast offering a free online will to your supporters
• Additions to your microsite that drive traffic to the online will tool
• Stewardship of new legacy donors (only available if Stewardship Series is purchased)

The Online Will Tool Add-on is currently only available for US customers.