We just wrapped up another Independence Day celebration in our country, but that doesn’t mean that the declarations have to stop. In fact, this point in the summer is the perfect time to declare your church’s independence from outdated online giving solutions, or from the bad design that could be keeping potential givers from supporting your ministry.
If you’re not seeing the amount of giving you’d like coming through your online solution, it could be a sign that your online giving tools are the equivalent of socks with sandals. Here some telltale signs you need to declare independence from outdated online giving:
- No one knows where to find your online giving page on your site. The online giving link should be immediately visible when your page loads on any device. Mobile online giving is growing exponentially, so think about how your page looks on all kinds of devices.
- You’re not inspiring people to give. When someone clicks the ‘Give Now’ link, they should see a story about how their gift is going to change a life. A quick statement about your vision for ministry, a video clip from someone your church has helped, or a before/after photo showing a change your ministry has helped make (funded by gifts) should immediately show people how their gifts are going to make an immediate impact.
- Givers have to click multiple times to make a donation. Don’t require people to dig several pages deep into your site to enter their information. Once they click ‘Give Now’, it should be immediately apparent how they make that happen.
- One-time givers have to create an account or ‘log in’ to give. If someone is inspired by something they’ve heard or read about your ministry and wants to financially support it, nothing will kill that desire faster than making them create an account or log in. This is something your regular givers and members would do, of course, but you need to be able to easily accommodate the one-time, ‘drive-by’ kinds of gifts. You’ll be collecting enough information on them during the donation to be able to follow up afterward, so creating an account adds unnecessary steps and complexity that discourage giving.
- Your donor registration form is longer than a tax return. Donors want giving to be safe, secure, and simple — your registration form should be all those things. Minimize the amount of text and required fields as much as possible.
Your ministry is too important to rely on outdated online giving solutions to finance it. An updated, easy-to-use site makes for more gifts from more givers — and that’s something worth some fireworks, right?
What are your online giving pet peeves? What roadblocks are you struggling to overcome when it comes to encouraging online giving?