How to Create a Charitable Gift Guide

For better or worse, we live in a capitalist economy and with that comes the commodification of everything—even philanthropy. Value guides, also known as gift catalogues or gift guides, are an innovative way for nonprofits and service-based organizations to appeal to conscious consumers who want to give gifts that make a positive impact in the world.

This is for you if...

You’re looking for new ways to fundraise
You’ve seen other organizations using gift guides and wonder if they could work for you
You want a simple, visual way to help donors understand what you do and the impact you have

What you’ll learn

We’ll start by defining what exactly a charitable gift catalogue is, why your organization may want to have one, examples of value guides, how to create one and how to market it.

What is a charitable gift guide?

Gift guides are a blending of consumerism and philanthropy, and they’re a unique tool your nonprofit can use to increase donations.

Think of a nonprofit gift guide like shopping, but for a cause. Whether it’s donating $10 to purchase bandages or $100 to fill a chicken coop with hens and roosters, gift guides make it easy for supporters to picture and contribute towards the work your organization does.

Are you wondering if charitable gift guides work, CanadaHelps says they do!

“Unique and impactful gifts are always the most memorable. In fact, 59% of Canadians prefer to receive a charitable gift over a traditional gift.”

If you’re considering creating a gift guide, think about what type of gifts would align best with the work your organization does. When your donors look through your gift guide, they should be able to make an immediate link between the virtual gifts and the tangible impact they will make.

Examples of nonprofit gift guides

You may be thinking that gift catalogues are only effective if your charity is national or a household name, but they can work to inspire support no matter if your charity is big or small, well-established or brand-new.

Here are some examples of charities that offer gift guides and how these guides communicate their cause and why donor’s support matters.

ADRA Canada

ADRA Canada has a year-round gift guide, which is updated each November. Under the featured image, there’s a clear value statement so donors understand why these gifts are important.

The different gifts are simply presented with a suggested donation amount. When a donor selects a product image, a pop-up describes the gift and what it will mean to the recipient, and allows the donor to customize their giving amount. They also have the option to dedicate the donation to someone special.

Ratanak International

The Ratanak International gift guide—available in print and digital formats—presents eight gift options in order of the suggested giving amount. Donors also have the option to enter a customized donation to give where it’s needed most. The Frontier team worked on this gift guide and are thrilled with the results.

A disclaimer at the bottom of the gift guide confirms the gifts in the gift guide are activities the organization intends to undertake in the 2023 project year. This is a simple guide with clear explanations of how each gift will impact recipients.

Take a Hike Foundation

In 2021, the Take a Hike Foundation produced a gift guide with 11 options for donors to choose between. Each item was set up with a featured icon and a hyperlink to a unique checkout page. The gift descriptions outlined the impact of each gift and how it would support the charity’s activities in the next year.

Donors had the option to sign up for monthly giving, or to purchase items with partial proceeds supporting the organization. Financial donations were directed to a CanadaHelps donation page, while product purchases were directed to the partner organization’s page.

Utilizing third-party services such as CanadaHelps is an easy solution for charities that don’t already have an online checkout system. However, there are also platforms that include a checkout experience that are worth checking out, including one our team at Frontier has created. Ask us about it!

Food for the Poor

Food for the Poor set their gift catalogue up like a store, with sidebar navigation and featured products on the main feed. Donors can browse gifts by category, bestsellers and price and the impact of their gift is clear through the graphics and messaging.

Their approach is to purchase a gift in honour of a loved one, so the chosen gift will be sent to where it is most needed, and the donor’s loved one will receive an eCard letting them know about the gift given in their name.

Chalice

Chalice created a physical and digital catalogue, which donors can browse like a magazine. Their gift guide landing page begins with a clear impact statement and call to action, and emphasizes a matching donation, which will double gifts made towards the “Most needed” and “Feed a family for one month” gifts.

It’s possible to choose a specific gift online, and the organization also offers ordering by phone. The checkout uses an older system, although it’s still intuitive to use.

Is there a “right” time of year to offer a gift guide?

The holiday season is a fitting time of year to launch a gift guide, although many charities successfully promote their gift catalogues year-round.

Ipsos Reid research confirms that Canadian donors respond well to this type of fundraising during gift-giving seasons.

Another consideration when it comes to timing is the toll inflation is having on donors across the country. Angus Reid reported that prices rose by 7.6 percent from July 2021 to August 2022, and as a result many Canadians were cutting back on spending.

More than 30 percent of survey respondents said they were specifically scaling back their donations/charitable giving. Offering creative or alternative ways to support your organization, such as through a charitable gift guide, could provide important options for donors who are impacted by inflation.

How to create a charitable gift guide

Gift suggestions can be curated around a price point, topic, event, season, holiday or pretty much anything else you can think of. Make sure to include a range of price points and highlight the gift’s impact.

Begin by planning your gifts

Think about what makes sense for your organization to offer in a gift guide. These are virtual gifts, with a tangible impact on someone else’s life so the type of gift should be in line with the work your charity does.

For example, if you work in literacy, then your gift could be $50 to donate five library books to a school, or $30 a month to support a teacher’s salary in a war-torn country.

You don’t have to come up with dozens of gifts like some of the larger organizations have. Work up to that! Start with a few options that best represent the impact you have and the work you do.

Design and build a landing page

Whether you integrate your gift guide into your existing website or store or create something new entirely depends on the technology you’re already using. The key here is to design a page that is focused on your gift catalogue and has a heavy visual emphasis.

When designing your web page, think of this more like a product catalogue more than a fundraising appeal. The impact needs to be clear, but images and graphics should be prioritized.

At a glance, donors should be immediately able to understand what the gifts are, the options they have, what impact the gifts will make and how they can contribute.

Additional tips

Sometimes the best way you can help your donors is by making their decisions easy.

Utilize featured gifts

If you have a lot of options, highlight one to five main gifts to help prevent overwhelm. While some donors will have a specific gift in mind, most will want their donation to go where it’s most needed and appreciate the suggestion.

Organize gifts by topics or categories

Categories help people find what they’re looking for quickly, and topics help donors understand the bigger picture of what the gift will support.

Make the checkout process as streamlined as possible

If your gifts are set up online as individual products, then the donor simply has to go through a store checkout in order to complete their donation. The simpler you can make this process, the better. Only collect the information you need in order to process the transaction.

Remember why your donors give

In a report recently released by Barna, they confirmed what many of us already know: donors give because of who they are. Most people truly want to help others, and gift guides make it easy for them to understand how their support makes a difference.

How to market your charitable gift guide

A gift guide is a visually-driven resource, so it’s a smart idea to repurpose the images, graphics and videos created for the guide as part of a multi-channel marketing strategy.

If your existing donors prefer mail, then creating and sending a physical catalogue is likely a good investment. You can also create ads for the gift guide on your other print pieces where appropriate, and make it available for supporters to hand out to their networks.

Online marketing presents a wealth of opportunities to connect with existing constituents as well as reach new ones. Think about where your ideal donors are, and create posts on those platforms in order to push traffic to your online gift guide. Consider posting organically on visual social media platforms such as Pinterest and Instagram, and running ads on Google and Facebook.

Email marketing can also be utilized effectively. Create a campaign to promote the guide as a whole, as well as individual gifts. This can increase the lifespan of your campaign while also creating more touchpoints for donors to help them decide which gift they’d like to support.

Charitable gift guides are exactly what their name suggests—a resource that guides donors towards a support decision based on categories or donation amounts. With gifts that connect to your mission, a strong call to action and a clear understanding of impact, you’ll set your gift catalogue up for success.

For more on presenting new offers, listen to this podcast episode of Frontier FM with Benjamin Johnson and Matt Hussey.

What’s next?

A gift guide is a great way to reach donors in a way they connect with, and it can be a vital part of your charity’s larger vision for growth.

Frontier is a results-oriented marketing team that partners with charities for efficient and effective fundraising growth. For more than a decade, we’ve helped charities across Canada raise more than $10,000,000 in annual revenue.

If you’re looking to chart a path to new donors and sustainable and predictable growth, then we’d like to partner with you.

Connect with Ben at 250-580-4236 or book a meeting when you visit frontier.io/contact-us.