What happens when you move your online donors offline?
For years, the Wikimedia Foundation has relied on a uniquely effective pipeline for donor acquisition and renewal: digital donors engaged through email outreach and banners on Wikipedia.org. However, the way people search for and engage with information is changing, fuelled by AI advancements and evolving online behaviours. As a result, the funnel that has sustained Wikimedia’s donor base is narrowing, and relying heavily on this channel could present risk.
To diversify their revenue streams, the Wikimedia team embarked on a bold experiment to convert online donors into engaged mail donors. Alongside this, SMS is being tested as a complementary tool to reinforce engagement, creating a layered approach that deepens donor connection beyond banners and email alone.
This session will take you on a journey through the first year of the Wikimedia donor engagement expansion project. You’ll explore the data-driven approach that includes a tiered donor selection model and test designs across ask strings, cadence, and creative elements, and discover key learnings about introducing novel offline opportunities to a digitally native audience.
You’ll leave with actionable insights on using multi-channel diversification to increase donor retention and lifetime value, discover the role of mail in sustaining digital donors, and explore strategies for launching direct mail programmes—even when starting with a purely online base.
Learning outcomes
- Understand the importance of multi-channel diversification and how introducing new pathways can increase donor stickiness and long-term value.
- Gain insights into audience segmentation and selection and how data contributes to efficient targeting from online to offline giving.
- Learn how to structure and evaluate a first-year testing calendar.