GivingTuesday is coming! Whether you’re launching your year-end fundraising efforts or running a one-day campaign, this Global Day of Giving is the perfect opportunity to engage your community, rally your supporters, and raise money for your organization.
But here’s the thing—none of that happens if people don’t know about it.
That’s where your emails come in.
While social media is the star of GivingTuesday, email is an important player, too. You’ll use email to engage and recruit personal fundraisers, inform your community about your campaign, and inspire donors to give. It may not have the star power of social media, but GivingTuesday wouldn’t work without it.
For your campaign, you’ll need three specific kinds of GivingTuesday emails:
- Informational Emails – These set the stage. They let your community know what’s coming, why it matters, and how they can be part of it
- Personal Fundraiser Emails – These empower your most passionate supporters to step up and share your message with their own networks
- Day-Of Solicitations – These are your main event emails…the ones that inspire immediate action and remind everyone that today’s the day to give
Let’s take a look at each kind of GivingTuesday email and what it is, who receives it, and how it works in your campaign game plan.
Informational Emails: Spread The Word
If you launch a campaign in the forest and no one knows it’s there… do you raise any money? This is not a Zen koan, this is a very easy question, and the answer is “no.”
It sounds obvious, but it’s worth saying out loud: people can’t support a campaign they don’t know exists. Awareness is step one.
GivingTuesday is in the thick of the holidays, shopping season, and what I will lovingly characterize as a fundraising melee, with every nonprofit vying for donor attention. Cut through the noise and put your campaign front and center with an informative and inspiring email.
- What They Are: Emails that inform people about your campaign. (Think of these are your campaign’s friendly “save the date”
- Who Receives Them: Your general audience of supporters (i.e. your entire email list).
- Content: Information about your campaign-when it’s happening, what you’re raising money
for, the impact donations will make - Sending Schedule: About ten days before GivingTuesday (November 21 looks good for 2025’s event), and then send a reminder on Cyber Monday
- Send Them Because: People need to know your campaign is happening and how they can help
Personal Fundraiser Emails: Recruit And Rally
Personal fundraisers volunteer to raise money on behalf of an organization. They share their time, social networks, and passion with nonprofits. They make GivingTuesday happen. Keep them in the loop with personal fundraiser emails.
- What They Are: Communications with peer-to-peer fundraisers, designed to inspire, inform, and encourage them to fundraise
- Who Receives Them: Potential and committed personal fundraisers
- Content: Recruiting messages, inspiring stories, logistics, updates, and encouragement
- Sending Schedule: You’ll need to communicate with your personal fundraisers quite a bit.
- Before the Campaign:
- Send your first recruiting email about six weeks before GivingTuesday (early October is good)
- Send a reminder about a week later and as needed to recruit fundraisers
- Send a welcome email as people join the campaign (this can be automated)
- About three weeks before the campaign, send your fundraisers their campaign toolkit
- While not strictly necessary, I personally would send a “thankful for you” message on Thanksgiving
- Send one more “Wooo, here we go!” encouragement message on Cyber Monday.
- During GivingTuesday:
- Update them on major milestones
- Congratulate fundraisers who have reached personal goals
- Encourage them to keep sharing their campaigns
- After GivingTuesday:
- Thank them
- Report final results
- Before the Campaign:
- Send Them Because: Fundraisers are volunteers who need support and encouragement
Day-Of Solicitations: Inspire And Ask
Last, but certainly not least, you’ll send some emails asking for money on GivingTuesday. These direct asks and updates make giving easy for donors.
- What They Are: Messages that inspire and request giving
- Who Receives Them: Your general audience (segment your peer-to-peer fundraisers out)
- Content: Stories that demonstrate the impact of donors, and requests for donations
- Sending Schedule: Send three; one in the morning, afternoon, evening. If you can, segment out people who give during the day, so they don’t keep getting asked. If it’s nine o’clock and you’re almost to your goal, you can send a fourth one announcing this fact and asking for a final push
- Send Them Because: People need to be asked and inspired in order to give
Five Elements Of An Excellent GivingTuesday Email
Whichever kind of email you’re sending, include these five elements to supercharge its impact:
1. Results-Focused
People want to know their gift makes a real difference. Show them the change you’re working toward and what their support can accomplish.
For example, share how a $25 donation helps a student get the books they need, or how $100 funds a week of tutoring. When donors can see the direct results of their giving, they feel more connected to your cause.
Reading Partners did this beautifully with a GivingTuesday inforgraphic that showed exactly what each donation level could achieve: 
2. Donor-Centric
Make the email about your donor, not your need. After all, the email is in their inbox with their name on it; it’s not weird that they’d want to know what it has to do with them. In addition to making sure it actually is addressed to them (no more “Dear Friend” emails! I mean it!), center the donor in the message itself.
Check out this update from Beyond Borders. While it tells about Miracia and her family’s material needs, it’s about the donor by the fourth paragraph: “She needs someone who will stand with her…” This is a message about being a person who helps.
3. Urgent
GivingTuesday is a whirlwind. That built-in time limit already creates a sense of urgency, but it’s up to you to amplify that feeling through your messaging.
People are busy, distracted, and juggling a hundred things, especially during the holidays. A strong sense of urgency helps your message cut through the noise and reminds supporters that their window to make an impact is right now.
Use clear, time-sensitive language that conveys immediacy and momentum. Try phrases like:
- “Donate now before midnight!”
- “Just three hours left to make your GivingTuesday gift!”
- “Help us reach our goal before 5 PM!”
- “We’re so close; your gift today can push us over the top!”
Urgent language isn’t about pressure, it’s about focus.
4. Tell A Story
Stories are memorable and moving. Telling a quick story about people who benefit from your cause, or the way a change makes the world a better place, engages emotions, activates empathy, and inspires giving. Your story doesn’t have to be long or detailed to be powerful. Look at this story from World Bicycle Relief: it’s short and simple, but we see the impact a bicycle can have.
5. Call To Action
The point of all these emails is to encourage action. Whether that’s making a donation, becoming a personal fundraiser, or sharing your campaign with their friends, your message should clearly guide them toward the next step.
Make sure each email features a clear call to action, like, “Join the Campaign,” or “Donate Now.” To boost your call to action, make it easy to do. Link directly to your donation page, embed the video you want supporters to watch, or put a share button at the end.
The easier it is to give, share, and join, the more likely someone will actually do it.
Templates For Your GivingTuesday
We called you to action, so now, to take our own advice, we’ve made it really easy. We wrote the GivingTuesday emails for you.
Okay, so we didn’t write every single email. You’ll need to add the specifics. But we did create email formulas for your GivingTuesday campaign, along with timelines for sending them.
