How Should Nonprofits Navigate the Online Fundraising Trends in 2025?

The digital landscape is constantly evolving, and so must your nonprofit’s fundraising strategy. In today’s day and age, online fundraising is not an option anymore – it’s a must-have. However, navigating the digital space effectively and making the fundraising efforts count can be a challenging endeavor, especially for nonprofits that are just embarking on this digital journey.

In this blog, we outline the top 6 trends shaping the online nonprofit fundraising landscape in 2025 including the importance of social media, the growing emphasis on recurring giving, the criticality of segmentation, personalization, and transparency, and more. Keep reading to learn how to adapt, navigate, and thrive in the ever-evolving digital fundraising space. 

• The Rise of Social Media in Nonprofit Fundraising 

Social media is more important than ever for online fundraising success – it is a nonprofit’s superpower to convert their online campaigns into funds. Data suggests that 55% of individuals who engage on social media with nonprofits take action, with 59% of them making a donation and 53% becoming volunteers. Another statistic suggests that 57% of traffic to fundraising pages is driven by social media. 

In fact, 71% of nonprofits across the globe believe social media is effective for fundraising. But only a small proportion of nonprofits have realized its potential to raise awareness and unlock fundraising success. 

In 2025, the use of social media in nonprofit fundraising is only bound to increase. Why? Because that’s where a sizeable proportion of millennial and Gen Z donors are. 

Through platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, X (formerly Twitter), TikTok, Pinterest, and more, nonprofits can: 

Reach a wider audience

Through targeted campaigns including influencer marketing and compelling content creation on the right social platforms, nonprofits can reach a much wider audience than through face-to-face campaigns and fundraising events. 

Engage socially conscious donors

Nonprofits can effectively reach and engage socially conscious donors through the power of social media. To this end, make your messaging appealing and compelling to your target audience. 

Enable peer-to-peer fundraising

One of the biggest advantages of running social media campaigns for fundraising is ease of sharing. Through the power of sharing, nonprofits can enable peer to peer fundraising – wherein individuals fundraise on behalf of the nonprofit. This will be possible only when your socially conscious donors are effectively engaged, and they are motivated to be an active part of the campaign. 

Build authentic relationships with prospects and donors

Nonprofits can share compelling stories, inspiring and eye-catching content, and build meaningful relationships with potential donors on these platforms. They can help their prospective donors see how the money or resources they donate would make an impact on real people and how it would change lives. 

Here are some tips and best practices on effectively using social media for fundraising success. 

• Create authentic, inspiring and engaging content: 

The content you post on social media should not be generic or simply AI-generated. Of course, you can use AI tools to draft content, find keywords, and write catchy titles and captions but if the content is not authentic, heartful, and warm, it will not have the impact you desire. It needs to have your unique touch, not just flowery words and keywords. 

Remember in a flood of AI-generated content, it will be the unique, thoughtful ones that will stand out. 

• Leverage video stories: 

Create and post short, impactful videos that demonstrate the impact of your work and success stories. You can even include behind-the-scenes and other videos of your team that humanize your nonprofit to help establish a connection with prospective donors. 

Data suggests that 57% of individuals who watched nonprofit videos ended up donating to the campaign. Further, campaigns containing personal videos raise 1.5X more funds than campaigns that don’t. 

• Consistency is key: 

It is critical that you post consistently on relevant social media platforms. Consistency helps in boosting your organic reach and engagement. Create a content calendar and put your heart into creating inspiring and compelling content in multiple formats including written content, audios, podcasts, videos, photos, and so on. 

Post about your nonprofit including your vision, mission, principles, etc., your work and its impact, your beneficiaries and how your nonprofit is helping them, your team, how funds will help your beneficiaries, and so on. 

• Leverage cause-aligned influencers: 

Influencer marketing is a growing trend in nonprofit marketing and fundraising. Find influencers who are socially conscious and align with your organization’s cause to widen the reach of your messaging. Given that a large number of millennial and Gen Z users follow these accounts, influencers can be powerful motivators for giving. 

Not just that, you could leverage the help of influencers to start charity challenges such as the (ALS ice bucket challenge) that help raise both awareness and funds for critical causes. 

• Social Sharing: Fueling Organic Reach and Donor Engagement

Closely related to the above trend on the rise of social media is the growing importance of social sharing. As mentioned earlier, Gen Z and millennials don’t just use social media for personal sharing but for social good too – they are thoughtful and purposeful about their social presence. 

In fact, 50% of Gen Zs share causes or fundraisers at least once a week while 50% of millennials and gen Xers share causes or fundraisers once a month. 

And this trend is bound to increase in 2025. This presents a unique opportunity for nonprofits. By equipping supporters with easy-to-share tools and recognizing their role as advocates, organizations can harness the power of social media to:

• Expand their reach: Tap into the vast networks of their supporters.
• Boost engagement: Drive organic traffic and foster deeper connections.
• Build a movement: Inspire a community of passionate advocates who share your mission.

To capitalize on social sharing to boost your organic reach and donor engagement, you must focus on 3 key things: 

• Making your content resonate with such socially conscious donors. If they don’t feel engaged and inspired, they will not want to share your content and fundraisers. 
• Create shareable content with a neat and polished look. People will not be inspired to share content that looks cluttered and difficult to understand. 
• Make sure your fundraising page is shareable across social platforms with ease. 

• Need to Evolve Year-Round Fundraising Strategies

Nonprofits often tend to engage sporadically in fundraising either focusing solely on year-end appeals or making urgent appeals for funds. Several nonprofits, especially the small and medium sized ones, don’t have a consistent, year-round approach to fundraising. 

However, having such a year-round approach to fundraising is vital to create and maintain sustainable, predictable sources of income in 2025. Not just that, a year-round approach enables nonprofits to boost donor engagement and ensure better resource allocation. 

Here are the best practices and tips to create your year-round fundraising strategy: 

• Define your revenue needs and set your fundraising goals as this helps in planning your strategy and activities.
• Create a monthly or recurring giving program as they provide a stable, guaranteed source of income with higher donor retention and lifetime value with lower fundraising costs.
• Develop a fundraising calendar with diverse activities such as peer-to-peer fundraising, hybrid fundraising events, seasonal opportunities for giving programs in addition to year-end appeals, charity challenges, and more. 
• Leverage technology tools to make fundraising and donor management hassle-free. 
• Invest in donor engagement and retention as engaged donors become brand ambassadors for your nonprofit in addition to making repeat donations and staying longer with the organization. It also helps you to reduce the cost of new donor acquisition and repeated, sporadic fundraising. 
• Continuous evaluation and feedback to see what’s working and what’s not and accordingly making changes to your strategies. 

• Mobile Giving is Non-Negotiable 

In today’s mobile-first world, a seamless mobile giving experience is no longer a luxury – it’s a necessity. Donors expect convenience and immediacy while making their donations. This trend demands a mobile-first approach to all your fundraising efforts:

• Ensure that your website and fundraising pages offer the best experiences users on mobile devices.
• Embrace mobile-specific fundraising channels.
• Provide a frictionless giving experience with easy-to-use mobile payment options.

With online fundraising platforms like TALGiving, you can make mobile giving a breeze for your donors. In fact, it takes less than a minute to make a donation with our platform and absolutely free of commissions and hidden charges. 

• Multichannel, Flexible Methods Key to Boost ROI

Sticking to traditional fundraising methods will not yield the best ROI in 2025. Nonprofits need to leverage multichannel, flexible methods to amplify reach to the largest possible pool of donors across diverse demographics, helping you maximize your fundraising efforts and revenues. In fact, multichannel marketing yields 2X higher conversion rates in fundraising than single channel marketing. 

• Transparency and Impact Reporting 

Donors expect greater transparency and timely impact reporting from nonprofits – it is no longer just a good practice but a non-negotiable necessity. Donors want to know that the money they give is being used for the intended purposes and that it is making a tangible impact. This helps build donor trust, confidence, and loyalty and enables you to improve your donor retention rates and lifetime donor value. With platforms like TALGiving, you can offer regular updates to donors and prospects while the fundraising campaign is still active. 

In conclusion, the landscape of online fundraising is constantly evolving. By embracing these key trends – from the rise of social media to the critical importance of mobile giving and transparency – nonprofits can navigate the digital age with confidence.

By adapting to these trends and prioritizing donor relationships, your organization can maximize its fundraising potential, build a loyal supporter base, and ultimately achieve a greater impact.

With TALGiving, creating and running fundraising campaigns is simple and free of cost. We make giving super easy for your donor base, which is an important factor in improving conversions on fundraising campaigns. We empower you with a suite of free marketing tools to help you to boost your ROI. Explore the platform now: https://www.talgiving.org/solutions/nonprofits