The importance to International NGO’s of emergency givers is well established and many International NGO’s will be very aware that their importance is growing.
We wanted to look into emergency giving in more depth, because as the volume of emergency givers increases so does the potential benefit of gaining greater insight into their behaviours and motivations for supporting emergency and disaster appeals.
In Part 1 we look at donation behaviour to give some context to emergency giving and share some general findings from large datasets curated by Adroit.
Then in Part 2 we summarise the findings of some excellent research papers that we think would help fundraises better understand why and when people give to emergencies, and which factors are most important when motivating emergency giving.
Acknowledgments
Adroit would like to thank the IFL Forum who have given permission to publish some general findings and trends.
Part 1
“The number of disasters has increased by a factor of five over the 50-year period, driven by climate change, more extreme weather, and improved reporting.”
The fundraising world is arguably dealing with a perma-crisis of disasters and emergencies as the volume of ‘natural’ disasters is steadily increasing overtime.
Adroit tracks natural disasters – where and when they occur – using mapping technology and the OCHA Reliefweb open data source and even without including all man-made emergencies and conflicts such as Ukraine or Gaza, we see the volume steadily increasing overtime.
Cause matters
If we look at the most recent years we can see that the increase in the volume of emergencies is primarily due to the increase of epidemics across the globe and floods.
Why does this matter? Because we know that the public’s liklihood to donate towards an emergency is heavily influenced both by where the emergency occurs, and also the type of emergency!
Size matters more!
While the location of an emergency and its cause influences the motivation to donate, the impact of the emergency is vitally important – as we’ll come on the see later! There are two commonly used approaches to measure the impact of emergencies – impact (which takes into account the economic impact), and the loss of life.
Below we can see that if we band natural disasters together based on their impact from small to large impact, we see that the greatest rise has been the number of emergencies classed as having medium impact. The volume of reported disasters which cause a large impact has increased but at a lower rate.
It’s now well established that the number of deaths caused by an emergency directly impacts the amount donated to an appeal. So tracking the number of emergencies by the number of deaths provides an insightful view on how this is changing overtime.
From the graph below we can see that 2022 was not only an exceptional year in the number of reported natural disasters but also the proportion of disasters causing the death of over 2000 people rose – a trend we’re seeing from 2000 onwards. The proportional change is seen on the second graph below.
Reporting disasters – a cautionary note
With regards the number of disasters each year we should be mindful that reporting methods have dramatically improved since the mid 80’s, and historically many of the smaller disasters would not have been registered in offical figures.
The Volume of Emergencies is increasing…so is funding to deal with them?
The major humanitarian organisations get income from both public sources, such as governments, corporations & foundations, and private sources such as individual giving.
Adroit analyses all the annual global giving data for the IFL Forum and for participating NGO’s we can see that Public Funds grew proportionally in 2022 but in 2023 fell back to previous levels seen in 2020/21. The 2022 spike is largely down to the Ukraine war, which caused a large surge in funds from both public and non-public sources.
Public Funds
Private sector income
It is notable that whilst private sector income (donations from the general public) exhibits a similar spike in 2022, in contrast to public funds income, it has in fact continued to grow in 2023, up over $1bn on 2021.
The information above is based on the IFL Forum Peer Review data and focuses on a range of organisations – we would note that certain organisations like the Red Cross and the UN agencies will represent the large majority of this income, and other organisations do not specify separately all of their “emergency” giving, and may classify different. However the classifications by organisation is consistent over time.
Falling short?
For an excellent, ‘deep-dive’ analysis of humanitarian funding we recommend reading the report ‘Falling short? Humanitarian funding and reform’, published by development initiative in October 2024. You can download the publication below.
Adroit, on behalf of the IFL Forum, presents a series of market webinars each year that explore individual giving trends and behaviours across 20 or so major fundraising markets globally in Europe, North & South America, Asia & Africa. The analysis presented in the webinars is based on anonymised donor and gift records over the preceding 6 years, from a combined dataset of nearly a billion donations globally, including emergency gifts and representing around 90 million individual donors.
A complementary study INDIGO Digital tracks digital metrics and activity of around 100 NGOs globally collating search and social activity. Digital is typically the largest channel for gaining emergency gifts and responding to crises and we draw on these two studies to illustrate the next section.
Using the INDIGO dataset we’ve been able to identify some key global trends and themes emerging in the sector. And a key theme that stands over the last two years last years has been the increasing importance of ‘emergency donors’, and how they differ to non-emergency donors.
1. Supporter profiles
If we look at who is being recruited as a Single Giving supporter from 2022 to 2024, we can see that those recruited via a Non-emergency appeal had a significantly different profile to those recruited via an Emergency appeal.
As the graphs below show, Emergency giving recruits tend towards a higher proportion being Male, and significantly younger in age.
Non-emergency single giving recruits. 2022-24, percentage composition
Emergency single giving recruits. 2022-24, percentage composition
2. Higher first gift values
As you may expect the majority of ‘disaster’ recruits are recruited as Single Givers, rather than on a Regular Gift, so today we’re focussing on Single Givers. The Indigo study tells us that on average the first gift value of ‘disaster’ new recruits is around 30% higher than the first gift value of non disaster recruits – although the size of the uplift differs by recruitment channel and across different markets.
While on average the value of first gifts is higher for emergency donors, it’s not true for all charities – some generate lower first gifts from emergency donors than non emergency donors.
The graph below shows how the index for the value of the recruitment donation from emergency recruits in 2023 differs to non emergency recruits. We can see that for charities whose average first donation from emergency donors is under $50, that for the majority this represents a lower value than they receive on average from non emergency recruits, with the index <100.
In contrast for the majority of charities who receive first donations from emergency donors on average higher than $100, the value of emergency donations achieves a much higher index.
3. Does brand relevancy make a difference?
Many factors may impact whether the gift value from emergency recruits is higher or lower than non-emergency recruits. One factor we explored was whether a brand’s perceived relevancy to emergencies may have an effect.
To do this we categorised each organisation taking part in the Indigo 2023 study by whether we felt the public would perceive their main focus as emergency / disaster related, or not. Those we felt would have been perceived as having their main focus as emergency / disaster related we classed as ‘strong’ and those whose main focus would not have been perceived as emergencies or disasters were classed as ‘weak’
For the analysis we only included those organisations who had recruited both non emergency recruits and emergency recruits.
The graph above shows that in 2023 those charities who we categorised as having a weak brand relevancy to emergencies enjoyed a greater increase in the first gift value for those donors recruited due to an emergrency than donors they recruited on non emergency propositions.
This is not to say that the actual gift amounts were higher, only that the difference between emergency and non emeregency values were greater.
4. The growing importance of Emergency Givers
Identifying that on average emergencygivers offer a higher average donation to non emergency givers is important, but perhaps of greater importance is that emergency givers are overtime becoming a higher proportion of the total volume of single giving donors INGO’s are recruiting.
In the graph below each dot represents a different INGO, and the percentage of single giving new recruits to that INGO who were motivated to make their first donation by an emergency or disaster. And as you can see the proportions have dramatically increased since 2018 to 2023.
In 2018 the median proportion of single giving recruits who were categorised as disaster givers was 14%. Jump forward to 2023 and the median value rose to 35% – with 2022 only a whisker under 50% of all new single giving recruits due to the crises in Ukraine.
Delving deeper into disaster recruits
Given the obvious growing importance of disaster we’ll soon be looking into these donors in greater detail by exploring how they go on to behave post recruitment. So please keep an eye out for future posts on this topic.
Part 2
Understanding disaster fundraising
During the webinars it’s been clear that there was an appetite among participants to learn more about the general topic of disasters and help to inform how to improve their fundraising activities at the time of disasters.
Insights can come from many places but an often overlooked resource are research papers, and so we wanted to help spread knowledge of disaster giving by picking out a few papers that we think you and your colleagues may find valuable. And whether you’re a fundraiser, analyst or part of an insight team hopefully something will be of interest to you.
If you’re interested in reading any of these papers in full, or would like to know of other research papers that may help with your fundraising then please get in touch with me and I’ll be happy to help. And if you’ve read something that they think others may benefit from reading then I’d love to hear from you.
The donation response to natural disasters
Sarah Smith. Institute for Fiscal Studies Working Papers, No. W17/19. 2017
Summary:
The study reinforces the notion that donors are more responsive to disasters with high death tolls and strong media coverage. It also suggests that appealing to the emotional and immediate aspects of disaster impacts through publicity can significantly increase donations, though the effect diminishes over time.
This research highlights the challenges in ensuring that aid is directed based on actual need rather than donor perceptions influenced by media and the visibility of death tolls.
Key Insights
Effect of Fatalities vs. Survivors: While both the number of deaths and affected individuals influence donations, donors respond much more strongly to the number of deaths than to the number of people in need.
Outliers: The study highlights that the largest disasters, like the 2004 tsunami, disproportionately affect overall findings. For example, in some cases, removing these “outlier” disasters from the analysis can halve the estimated relationship between the number of fatalities and donations.
Publicity: Donor responses are strongly linked to publicity campaigns and appeals, more so than to the date of the disaster itself. High-profile campaigns, particularly those linked with major humanitarian organizations, trigger significant increases in donations.
Main Findings:
Importance of Scale: The study confirms that both the number of fatalities and the number of people affected play crucial roles in determining whether aid is given, but fatalities have a stronger effect on the magnitude of donations.
Media Coverage: Media coverage, particularly during times of low competing news, plays a significant role in triggering donations, especially when it shows graphic images that make the disaster more relatable to donors.
Public Appeals: Disaster Emergency Committee (DEC) appeals have a powerful effect on donations, with donations spiking immediately after an appeal, even more so than after the disaster itself. However, the effect tends to be short-lived, lasting about two months before returning to baseline levels.
‘Controlling for natural disaster type (floods, earthquakes, storms, etc.) and geographical area, a 10% increase in the number of people killed and in the number of people affected both increase the amount donated by 3-4%’
Emergency Disaster Database (EM-DAT)
It could have been me: Proximity motivates disaster giving
Hanna Zagefka. International Journal of Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Marketing · September 2017
Summary
The objective of the study was to investigate the effect of physical proximity to a disaster location on counterfactual thoughts and willingness to help the victims, and to explore whether hypothetical proximity can also trigger such counterfactual thoughts
The study concludes that physical proximity to a disaster location increases counterfactual thoughts, which in turn increase willingness to help the victims, and that hypothetical proximity can also trigger such counterfactual thoughts, leading to increased donations. The findings have important practical implications for designing effective donation appeals.
Key findings
The key findings of the study are that physical proximity to a disaster location increases counterfactual thoughts, which in turn increase willingness to help the victims, and that hypothetical proximity can also trigger such counterfactual thoughts, leading to increased donations
The study found that counterfactual thoughts are positively associated with donation proclivity, and that proximity to a disaster location, whether actual or hypothetical, increases counterfactual thoughts and subsequently donation proclivity. The findings were consistent across different types of negative events and for fictitious, imagined, and real-life events.
The findings show that counterfactual thoughts, i.e. potential donors thinking that they themselves could have suffered from a disaster if the circumstances had been a bit different, are positively associated with donation proclivity
Space, Time, and Hurricanes: Investigating the Spatiotemporal Relationship among Social Media Use, Donations, and Disasters
J. Sylvester. BIGDATA Conference, Stanford University, May 27-31, 2014
Summary
The objective of the study is to investigate the relationship between social media data, web donations, and traditional media coverage in the context of Hurricane Irene, examining the temporal, spatial, and spatiotemporal patterns of these activities. It provides insights into how firms can evaluate the impact of traditional media stories on consumer behavior in the social media era.
The results show that social media activity is correlated with offline events, such as donations, and can potentially be used as a predictor of these events. The study also finds that social media can be used as an indicator of both spatial and temporal patterns of real-world events, such as donations to a large non-profit organization.
The study finds that Twitter activity is negatively autocorrelated, while web donations are mildly positively autocorrelated. The study also finds significant differences between states, with states directly affected by Hurricane Irene tending to make more donations.
‘We find a variety of evidence showing that social media activity is a leading indicator of donation behavior’
Key findings
The study finds that social media can be used as an indicator of both spatial and temporal patterns of real-world events, such as donations to a large non-profit organization. The results also show that social media activity is correlated with offline events, such as donations, and can potentially be used as a predictor of these events.
The study finds that Twitter activity is an indicator of interest in the hurricane, and that more Tweets and population result in more mobile donations. Additionally, traditional media sources can spawn conversations that lead to additional Tweets and donations.
They investigate the patterns of behavior of these activities in both time and space, as well as time and space together. Though both the temporal and spatial patterns of social media have been investigated in isolation, relatively little attention has been paid to how patterns emerge in both dimensions together
They find that social media is definitely correlative and can potentially be used as a predictor of some offline events, such as donations
This model, allowed the authors to estimate 9 distinct effects and evaluate their importance when examining the dynamic nature of the relationships between different forms of media and the donation behavior of consumers. The step in this analysis is to estimate this model and test that the results are stable. They find that this model explains a substantial amount of both donation behavior and media activity, with R2 values of 0.97 for the change in the number of donations in the hour, 0.93 for the difference in the number of tweets about Hurricane Irene in an hour, and 0.89 for the number of traditional media mentions of the hurricane.
The Psychology of Charitable Donations to Disaster Victims and Beyond
Social Issues and Policy Review · January 2015. Hanna Zagefka & Trevor James.
Summary
This paper summarizes the literature on the psychology of charitable donations to victims of disasters and other unfortunate circumstances. Optimizing donation appeals requires considering five broad factors: Exposure, Marketing strategies, Perceptions of the recipients, Effectiveness concerns, and Image concerns, which interact to affect donor responsiveness.
Key findings
The key findings include the importance of emphasizing the natural causes of a problem, optimizing the cost-benefit ratio of donations, highlighting the effectiveness of donations, and using social norms and reputation concerns to encourage donations.
Research suggesting that donations might be maximized when donors feel good about their own life but bad about the situation of the people in need would suggest that messages that “they are lucky not to suffer from this problem” should be combined with messages emphasizing the victims’ despair
It can be assumed that the five broad factors of Exposure, Marketing strategies, Perceptions of the recipients, Effectiveness concerns, and Image concerns, will interact in their effect on donor responsiveness
They identified factors that are most pertinent for three different issues: Trying to identify whom to target in a large database, face-to-face elicitation, and the design of donation appeals
The study provides tentative recommendations for written donation requests/mailing campaigns, direct face-to-face elicitation, and written donation requests/mailing campaigns/advertisements and internet presence.
The results of the text are the identification of five broad factors that affect donor responsiveness and the provision of recommendations for optimizing donation appeals.
‘Donations are important, but if the main aim of communicating or engaging with the public is to provoke a donation, what we found is that sometimes people donate, but they don’t actually engage with the issue. In fact, they donate in order not to engage’
Caring in Crises?
Unity in diversity: Exploring the effect of oneness with humanity on the willingness to donate to Syrian and Ukrainian refugees
Personality and Individual Differences 222. 2024. Emine Bilgen
Summary
This study explores the effect of oneness with humanity on the willingness to donate to Syrian and Ukrainian refugees, finding that individuals primed with the idea of oneness with all humanity reported heightened oneness with refugees and were more willing to donate.
The study concludes that enhancing perceived oneness with all humanity can increase individuals’ feelings of oneness with specific groups of refugees, which in turn can increase willingness to help refugees.
The study highlights the importance of promoting feelings of oneness with all humanity as a means of encouraging donations to refugee groups. By fostering a sense of interconnectedness and shared humanity, interventions can effectively promote support for refugees and encourage pro-social behaviour.
Key findings
The study found that individuals primed with the idea of oneness with all humanity reported heightened oneness with refugees, which in turn predicted higher willingness to donate to both Syrian and Ukrainian refugees.
The results showed a significant indirect effect of measured oneness with all humanity on willingness to donate to Syrians through oneness with Syrian refugees, and a significant indirect effect of measured oneness with all humanity on willingness to donate to Ukrainians through oneness with Ukrainian refugees.
Note – The concept of Oneness is hugely important in generating donations to ‘others’ / ‘out-groups’ and is linked with the topic of Values – for more information on the theory of Values look up Shalom Schwartz or Greg Maio, or for practical use go to Cultural Dynamics or Common Cause. In general ‘Oneness’ is a sense of profound connection, typically to large (“self-transcendent”) entities, and may predispose people to prosocial and pro-environmental tendencies in the form of e.g., values, motivations and behaviours.
Do disaster appeals reduce other donations? Evidence from the U.K
Kimberly Scharf & Sarah Smith. Source unknown.
Summary
This paper examines whether donations to overseas aid charities in response to natural disasters come at the expense of other charitable donations, using a unique panel of 130,000+ UK donors.
The study uses a panel of UK donors with detailed information on the timing of donations and the charities they are made to, and exploits multiple exogenous shocks to contributions to one public good that occur in a natural setting.
The study concludes that disaster appeals are associated with a behavioral response in giving to other charitable purposes, but the response is a shift in the timing of giving to other purposes, rather than a substitution.
Key Findings
The study finds that disaster appeals generate an immediate increase in donations to DEC member charities equivalent to 30% of the usual level of total giving, but there is no significant substitution between charitable giving to different purposes.
The study shows the importance of disaster fundraising and that, on average, the appeals generated an immediate increase in donations to DEC member charities equivalent to 30% of the usual level of total giving
Because they observe donations day-by-day, they can measure giving on the day an appeal was initiated and continuously thereafter for a long enough period of time that they can be reasonably sure that any substitution pattern has played itself out and that they have accounted for substitution relationships across a comprehensive set of different charitable purposes
The substitution they find between international relief and other charitable purposes is statistically indistinguishable from zero, they see that the disaster appeals are associated with a behavioural response in giving to other charitable purposes, but the response is a shift in the timing of giving to other purposes
The results show an increase in giving to other charities in the immediate aftermath of the disaster appeal, with average daily donations 8.3% higher during the first six weeks after an appeal, compared to non-disaster periods.
The study concludes that disaster appeals are associated with a behavioral response in giving to other charitable purposes, but the response is a shift in the timing of giving to other purposes, rather than a substitution.
Disasters and Donations: The Conditional Effects of News Attention on Charitable Giving
Jason Martin. International Journal of Public Opinion Research, Volume 25, Issue 4, Winter 2013
Summary
This study examines the relationship between news attention and charitable giving in response to three international disasters: the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami, the 2010 Haiti earthquake, and the 2011 Japan earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear meltdown.
The study aims to contribute to a better understanding of how international news use is associated with charitable giving, and to provide insights into the conditional effects of news attention on donation across replications.
The study concludes that news attention is a significant predictor of charitable giving in response to international disasters, and its effect has increased over time. The study also suggests that the relationship between news attention and charitable giving may be moderated by demographic variables such as age, education, and income.
Key findings
The study aims to investigate the relationship between attention to international news and charitable giving, with a focus on the conditional effects of news attention on donation across replications.
The study found that news attention was the strongest predictor of charitable giving in all three disasters, and its effect increased over time. Demographic variables such as age, education, and income also played a role in predicting donation, but their significance varied across the three disasters.
The study found that international news attention has a significant effect on charitable giving, with consistent conditional effects demonstrated for three disasters.
International media coverage promotes donations to a climate disaster
Cassandra M. Chapman. Disasters Vol 47, Issue 3. 2022
Summary
The objectives of the study were to understand the relative influence of news coverage on individual giving decisions in response to a climate disaster, and to examine which attributes of a disaster the news coverage highlights in order to learn about how media coverage may affect giving behavior.
This study examines the influence of international media coverage on public donations in response to the 2019-2020 Australian bushfire crisis and concludes that media coverage plays an important role in shaping public responses to disasters, including charitable giving. The study suggests that the media coverage of the Australian bushfires may have served an attribute agenda-setting function by drawing the public’s attention to attributes of the crisis and the response that related to active helping and donations.
Key findings
The study found that people perceived news coverage of the event to be a strong influence on the amount they donated to bushfire appeals, and that media coverage was more influential in participants’ charity selection than both peer influence and direct communications from the charities.
The study found that news coverage significantly influences individual giving decisions, with participants reporting that news footage uniquely explained the value of their disaster giving. Additionally, stories of victims and the scale of the disaster also uniquely predicted donation value.
The key findings of the study are that media coverage influences both the value of donations and the choice of charity, with a focus on themes of support and money. The study also found that words related to “support” and “emergency” were the most frequently used themes in media coverage, and that words associated with “money” were used at almost double the typical rate found in general written language.
The results of the study suggest that the media plays an agenda-setting role in determining how and to what extent people give to disaster appeals.
The study found that demographic controls, past giving value, and self-reported influences on donation value all significantly explained variance in donations to bushfire appeals. The addition of self-reported influences on participants’ decision to give explained an additional 55% of the variance in bushfire giving value.
Further Reading
If these papers were of interest to you they we would strongly recommend getting hold of the following books:
Numbers and Nerves- Information, Emotion and Meaning in a World of Data, by the amazing Paul Slovic.
It’s super helpful at explaining how we respond to quantitative information and tackles topics such as psychophysical numbing, compassion fatigue, the power of ‘One’ and narratives.
Caring in Crises? Humanitarianism, the public and NGO’s by Irene Bruna Seu and Shani Orgad.
This is a fantastic resource to help explore what the general public think of NGO’s (and specifically INGO’s). This book will tell you more than countless focus groups!
The issues raised by the book include:
The limitations of the “hit and run” approach to fundraising, where donors are bombarded with traumatic images designed to elicit financial donations without opportunities for further engagement
The challenge of not only increasing the overall value of donations from within the existing part of the public which donates, but also the propensity of the wider public to become involved at all
How to best respond to the desire for connectedness with the recipients of aid, which many participants in the research for the book expressed.
Paul Vanags, then Head of Public Fundraising at Oxfam GB said, “The findings of this book hit home so hard and true, it should be compulsory reading for any communications professional serious about promoting social justice”.
States of Denial – knowing about atrocities and suffering by Stanley Cohen
A hugely powerful book that explores compassion and the lack of it – it’s 20 years old but still highly relevant and thought provoking.
Indigo
The value of joining Indigo
Each year Adroit works with the IFL Forum to develop the Indigo benchmarking study – a unique project that enables participates to benchmark their performance against other NGO’s in markets around the World.
Using transactional data, the study compares performance by numerous fundraising metrics, including metrics around emergency / disaster giving, and provides an unrivalled view of the market.
For more information about Indigo benchmarking please click the link below
The INDIGO Study from the IFL Forum comprises a number of major humanitarian NGOs and selectively other NGOs who participate. This year 24 separate organisations in 21 different markets or countries participated.
Many thanks to Martina Favaretto from IFRC for bringing our intention to the ‘Falling short? Humanitarian funding and reform’ report.
