We all have our own motivations for donating to nonprofit organizations. Sometimes we’re moved by a particularly emotional commercial or video (anyone else cry when they hear Sarah Mclachlan and see a sad dog), and others we’re moved to give at times of crisis because we know we’d want others to do the same if the tables were turned. The point is, we’re always moving around on the spectrum that is donor giving.
Voices for Good, Brand Federation’s inaugural index that benchmarks donor behaviors and motivators, has uncovered a wealth of insights that create a picture of today’s nonprofit donor. Generated from the insights of over 500 nonprofit donors from around the country, Voices for Good provides nonprofit leaders and executives with proven findings and tangible action items for navigating the economic uncertainty of today, ensuring that donor relations and expectations aren’t just met, but exceeded.
In this year’s Voices for Good report, we discovered:
For the reactive donor, they’re often triggered by crises, matching campaigns, and social media asks. Their donations are smaller and often one-off. For the strategic donor, there is a preference toward structured recurring support, within planned budgets that are generated from a deep vetting of an organization.
Our take? This means crises, personal asks, and matching campaigns ignite the impulse to give, while transparency, trust, and budgeting discipline keep support alive once the moment passes. The nonprofits that thrive will satisfy both donor types at once—evoking empathy while delivering evidence.
Voices for Good uncovered three primary motivators for donors: emotion, logic and peer influence.
When emotions are involved, there is an immediacy to a donor’s empathy. To stir up emotions across the donor base, nonprofits could tell real stories of the families, animals, or communities at the end of their support.
On the other hand, logically driven donors need assurance that their gift is making a difference. We know that 39% of donors are giving less than they were a year ago. This economic strain is shifting donor focus to smaller, but more scrutinized gifts.
Merging local and emotional motivators, we found a social validation aspect that is driving donor gifts. When peers make requests and when an organization is endorsed by a given community, there is a proven bridge between caring and committing to a cause. That said, belief in the mission and proof of impact continue to be the key factors in deciding whether or not to give (says 46% and 28% of donors, respectively).
Donors are not divided between logic and emotion—they are fluent in both. About half give reactively, a quarter strategically, and the rest mix the two. Emotion ignites generosity, but logic sustains it through proof, planning, and trust. Economic pressure makes transparency even more decisive. The strongest fundraisers honor both impulses at once: they trigger empathy, deliver evidence, and build repeatable pathways.
To better understand today’s nonprofit donor, download our Voices for Good report.
Brand Federation fielded 512 in‑depth, semi‑structured interviews on EmpathixAI’s CultureChat
platform. Built and overseen by PhD‑trained social scientists, CultureChat conducted large‑N qualitative interviews using a 17‑question guide that blended open‑ and closed‑ended prompts. Interviews totaled 213 hours of conversation. Transcripts were systematically coded and cataloged, combining expert-designed code frames with model-assisted classification to generate structured aggregates and prevalence estimates, which were reported in the Voices for Good Report. This approach preserves qualitative richness (what donors say and why) while enabling statistically defensible summaries across key demographics (e.g., gender, age, income, education, and religion/denomination).
Rian Chandler-Dovis is an accomplished researcher and brand strategist with two decades of experience helping organizations define what they stand for and deliver meaningful experiences. She has developed strategies for some of the world’s best-known brands, including MIT, Harvard Medical School, GM, American Express, Mercy Corps, Samsung, PepsiCo, the World Wildlife Fund, AB InBev, and Colgate.
