Online giving to nonprofits rose by 32 percent in 2020, reflecting extraordinary growth during a year marked by the pandemic, protests against racial injustice and white supremacy, and a historic presidential election. Organizations working to address hunger and poverty saw a stunning 173 percent increase in online revenue — a critical influx of support as these groups worked to help those most impacted by the pandemic. The data is part of the 15th annual M+R Benchmarks Study.

While online revenue for nonprofits increased across the board last year, the gains were particularly pronounced for organizations directly engaged with COVID relief efforts. Groups working on efforts related to the pandemic saw, on average, a 41 percent increase in one-time giving online, compared to a 21 percent increase for groups not doing COVID-specific work.

Text messaging continued to gain steam in 2020 as a successful avenue for nonprofits seeking to boost engagement and fundraising. Nonprofits mobile audiences grew by 26 percent in 2020, compared to a 3 percent average increase in email list size. And mobile message clickthrough rates are also far higher than comparable email metrics — 6.3 percent for mobile fundraising messages and 10 percent for mobile advocacy messages.

Below are six other top takeaways from the M+R Benchmarks Study. 

  • Fundraising: Overall, 41% of 2019 online donors were retained to make another online gift in 2020. Revenue from monthly gifts increased by 25%, while revenue from one-time gifts increased by 37%. Monthly giving accounted for 19% of all online revenue in 2020.
  • Email: Email list sizes increased by 3% in 2020, the same growth rate reported for 2019. For every 1,000 fundraising messages sent, nonprofits raised $78. This marks a 35% increase over 2019. Nonprofits sent an average of 59 email messages per subscriber in 2020, a 17% increase in volume.  
  • Web Engagement: Half of all nonprofit website visits came from users on mobile devices. The traffic share for mobile devices increased by 9% in 2020. The average gift made on a desktop device was $80; for mobile users, the average gift was $42.
  • Text Messaging: Nonprofit mobile audiences grew by 26% in 2020, compared to a 3% average increase in email list size. Nonprofits had 50 mobile list members for every 1,000 email subscribers. Mobile message click-through rates were 6.3% for fundraising messages and 10% for advocacy messages. Both figures are far higher than comparable email metrics.
  • Social Media: Revenue from Facebook Fundraisers increased by 14% overall, with Hunger and Poverty nonprofits seeing a 946% increase in Fundraisers revenue; Facebook Fundraisers accounted for 1.3% of all online revenue. For every 1,000 email addresses, nonprofits had an average of 817 Facebook fans, 291 Twitter followers, and 149 Instagram followers.
  • Digital Ads: Nonprofit spending on digital ads increased by 33% in 2020, with nonprofits spending an average of $0.10 for every dollar raised in online revenue. Return on ad spend was highest for search ads ($4.78), followed by social media ($1.05), display ($0.38), and video ($0.27). Digital ad spending was concentrated toward the end of the year, with almost a third of all spending occuring in December.