Avera Foundation Increases Online Giving and Grows Supporters With Classy and Omatic

The Avera Foundation provides meaningful opportunities to support health and healing in the upper Midwest, currently serving the states of South Dakota, Iowa, Minnesota, and Nebraska. Whether donor contributions come in the form of monetary gifts, supplies, or volunteer hours, the Avera Foundation uses them to their fullest to extend, enhance, and enrich the lives of those in their communities.

The Power of an Integrated Tech Stack

Ahead of the 2022 giving season, the Avera Foundation knew certain components of their tech stack weren’t cutting it if they wanted to reach their ambitious fundraising goals. 

Their top priority was to find a fundraising platform that allowed them to remain closely connected with supporters between events and campaigns and keep in steady contact with their community throughout the rest of the year. Classy made it easy for supporters to give, and Omatic, a tool that helps nonprofits solve integration and data import challenges, made it easy to steward donors afterward. Together, the two solutions rounded out their robust tech stack in a way they were previously lacking. 

The Biggest Giving Tuesday Yet

Giving Tuesday is a pivotal day for nonprofit fundraising. To ensure they made the most of it, Avera created a dedicated Giving Tuesday 2022 fundraising page on Classy, customized to reflect their specific goals and unique audience. With only a few months on the platform under their belts, the Avera team was excited to launch their first major Classy campaign.

Avera built a Classy crowdfunding website to amplify its “A Gift That Grows” campaign theme, connecting donations with local women’s and children’s hospitals. Their emphasis on personal storytelling helped donors establish a deeper connection to the cause, inspiring new and existing supporters to contribute one-time and recurring gifts.

Post-Giving Tuesday, Omatic made it easy for Avera to follow up with donors through segmented communications based on individual donor behavior.

Learnings From Giving Tuesday

Avera is constantly iterating, taking the learnings from previous campaigns and implementing them into upcoming initiatives. From their Giving Tuesday campaign, the Avera team learned it’s important to:

• Know your story and tell it on every page
• Get colorful and show off your branding
• Hold onto tradition but don’t be afraid to step outside the box 
• Hyper engage your donors

Avera also learned how critical it is to keep the donation process simple. What used to require nearly 10 clicks to complete a donation now only takes two or three with Classy. Donors feel like their time is being greatly valued and are less likely to drop off before completing a donation. 

Applying Learnings to an Annual Event

The Avera team then took their Giving Tuesday learnings and applied them to their biggest event of the year, Race Against Cancer. Utilizing Classy’s fundraising event software, supporters could register for the race directly or cover the registration fee by fundraising on the organization’s behalf. The results far surpassed expectations and have set a new standard for their events.

Following the event, Avera has the tools to more easily connect and steward supporters, thanks to Classy and Omatic. The success of the Race Against Cancer event is clear evidence of how great tech can help you raise more to do more.