Newsletters

Closer to Donors with Our Newsletter

AllThingsDAF is Amergent’s newsletter, packed with leading fundraising ideas and proven best practices in donor advised funds. You’ll learn powerful, actionable insights from Amergent president Jack Doyle and our direct marketing fundraising pros. Each issue is connected to a variety of nonprofit client challenges and solutions. Request our fundraising newsletter, and get closer to your donors.

  • Crazy or just an out-there idea?

    June 25, 2019

    By Jack Doyle, Amergent President/CEO   With years of donor advised fund giving behavior in hand, it’s safe to say your average DAF donor makes a gift ten times larger than your average direct mail donor. The average DAF donor gives grants up to/including $1,000; the average DM donor gives gifts up to/including $100. Do […]

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  • Transforming the DAF landscape

    May 10, 2019

    By Jack Doyle, Amergent President/CEO The number of donors with DAF giving accounts more than doubled in 2018. The amount of money in these donor-advised fund giving accounts is now over $110 billion. The tax law changes for 2018 are one reason why so many people with giving accounts put more money into their accounts. The […]

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  • Test drive being a DAF donor, what would you do?

    March 26, 2019

    By Jack Doyle, Amergent President/CEO Last week the Direct Marketing Fundraisers Association (DMFA) hosted a Donor Advised Funds webinar. You can find the recording of the session here. We have secured permission from the DMFA for our clients to access this. Call me or email me with your questions and comments. During the session, we […]

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  • Be careful with your ask amounts

    October 16, 2018

    By Jack Doyle, Amergent President/CEO I just learned not all requested amounts are allowed as grants from Fidelity Charitable, the largest provider of donor-advised funds. Someone had to wait more than two weeks to get a $600 grant because of $0.14. Yes, 14 cents. Longtime readers know my wife Lin’s favorite charity is DonorsChoose. Last […]

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  • Wow! There’s a lot of money here! 

    September 25, 2018

    By Jack Doyle, Amergent President Are you ready for year-end giving? Are you making it easy for your donors to give in all the ways they like to contribute? Recent discoveries confirm that donors with donor-advised fund giving accounts use those accounts for about 65% of their annual giving, more than half of the dollars […]

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  • Donor Advised Funds Strategy: Improving the Donor Experience

    September 6, 2018

    By Jack Doyle, Amergent President This isn’t EASY! Are you holding back on taking action trying to figure out the “best” or “perfect” way to engage with your DAF donors? You don’t need to get it right the first few times you do it. You just need to do it. Here are things we’re working […]

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  • DAF Gift Acknowledgment SELF EXAM

    May 10, 2018

    By Jack Doyle, Amergent President The most unexpected outcome of making $100 grants in February of 2018 — to 17 of Fidelity Charitable’s Most Popular organizations in 2017 — has been the lack of follow-up or attempts at donor engagement. After all, these charities received thousands of grants in 2017 and should know best how […]

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  • The Chronicle of Philanthropy: The Basics of Donor-Advised Funds

    May 3, 2018

    By Jack Doyle, Amergent President Have you seen this article that the Chronicle of Philanthropy posted this week? Our friend Rachel Earl from the St. Labre Indian School discusses best practices and some of the information shared answers some basic questions about donor-advised funds, as well as some of the information I discussed in last week’s DMAW webinar and in previous […]

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  • Donor-advised funds webinar: looking at different ways to ASK

    April 27, 2018

    By Jack Doyle, Amergent President This week, I was invited by the Direct Marketing Association of Washington (DMAW) to present a webinar on donor-advised funds to nearly 100 attendees. I’ve received a lot of positive feedback on this webinar, including: …the two sides of DAFs involve two completely separate teams here (donor stewardship and marketing), […]

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  • We’ll be monitoring these popular organizations for best practices

    February 27, 2018

    The recent session on donor-advised fund giving at the 2018 DMA Nonprofit Federation Conference in Washington, DC was a highlight for the attendees. There was a lot of information provided and a lot learned! As a follow-up, I just made 15 new DAF grants to some of the organizations on the Fidelity Charitable list of […]

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