Hustle’s 2026 End-of-Year Fundraising Guide

From the 2026 End-of-Year Fundraising Guide

The giving calendar, planning questions, strategies, and scripts below come straight from the guide. Download the full PDF for the complete success stories, every example script, and the thank-you flow.

When does the 2026 year-end giving season start?

The 15th annual #GivingTuesday falls on December 1, 2026, the Tuesday after Thanksgiving. It also opens the year-end giving season, which runs through midnight on December 31. Plan it as the first ask of the season, with more to follow.

#GivingTuesday is a global day of giving. In 2025 it raised an estimated $4.0 billion for charitable causes in the US, with 38.1 million Americans taking part, up 13% and 6% from 2024. Giving keeps moving to the phone, too. According to M+R Benchmarks, 45% of online donations were made on a mobile device in 2024, and overall online revenue grew by an average of 15% in 2025. Supporters are already on their phones when they decide to give. Reach them there.

Why do the last five weeks of the year matter?

Sources: GivingTuesday Data Commons, M+R Benchmarks, Blackbaud Institute, Neon CRM, The Chronicle of Philanthropy.

Why use texting for year-end fundraising?

Direct mail and email will carry most year-end asks again this year. Both work. Both also compete with every other organization mailing and emailing in the same two weeks. A text from a real person stands out and can be what moves a supporter from “I meant to give” to a completed gift.

Hustle video and MMS work alongside your direct mail and email programs. A mailer introduces the campaign, an email carries the detail, and a text from a named person prompts a gift. Each channel lifts the others. And because your texting program runs on conversations, it is repeatable. The supporters you talk with this December are the same people you will pick up with in the spring, and everything they tell you stays on their contact record.

What can Hustle do for a year-end fundraising campaign?

Hustle is a mobile communication platform for all of your messaging (conversational, broadcast, automated, API-based, video, and calling). Your staff or volunteers can start or schedule thousands of conversations, reply to engaged donors in real time, and follow up by phone from the same thread. These are six things your campaign can do this year.

1. Audiences. Segment donors into audiences such as Long Lapsed, LYBUNT, SYBUNT, Annual Gift, and Major Giver, with no limit on audience size. Target by the last time someone gave or by gift amount, and personalize messages with audience fields, like thanking supporters for their most recent contribution.
2. Automations. Hustle’s visual journey builder runs message-series drip campaigns triggered by your Audience data, such as calendar dates and donation amounts. Welcome new donors, thank recent ones, and automate pledge chasing leading up to #GivingTuesday or December 31.
3. RCS and branded links. RCS lets you send messages under your brand’s name and logo instead of a bare phone number, so donors know who is texting before they open it. Branded links are delivered more often, and Hustle records who clicks each one so you can retarget people who did or did not.
4. Salesforce Marketing Cloud (coming soon). Add a Hustle Custom Action as a step in Journey Builder, so texting runs inside your year-end campaign alongside email, with Salesforce merge tags to personalize each message.
5. API messaging. Trigger a Hustle text from your own systems the moment a gift is recorded, a form is submitted, or a pledge is made. A donation confirmation by text gives donors confidence they played their part.
6. More integrations. Hustle offers bi-directional integrations with Salesforce, EveryAction, and Blackbaud Luminate Online today, with GoFundMe Pro, Raiser’s Edge NXT, and Action Network coming before #GivingTuesday.

How has a nonprofit used texting to raise more at year-end?

A national food relief organization

One of the largest hunger relief organizations in the country runs its biggest fundraising push between #GivingTuesday and December 31. The team synced its donor database to Hustle and split year-end outreach into two tracks. Broadcast Texting handled the full list, scheduled by time zone so every supporter got the #GivingTuesday and December 31 texts in their own morning. P2P Texting sat on top for major donors, with staff who already knew them texting from their own names. Every text carried a matching-gift or meal-count frame, so the ask read as “fund 40 meals” instead of “give $20.”

What should you plan before sending year-end fundraising texts?

The most successful year-end campaigns start well before the holidays, and the first text should ideally land before #GivingTuesday. Start by reviewing last year’s campaign, including what worked, what fell flat, who gave, and who stopped giving. Then answer these questions with your team. The answers become the outline for your scripts, your segments, and your calendar.

• Who will you text, and who will you deliberately leave out this year?
• When will you text them, and how many messages will each person get in November and December?
• What will your scripts say for texts, calls, and personalized video?
• How will you target your asks, by gift history, by issue, or by relationship?
• Which tactics will you use, such as video, GIFs, a match, or a limited-time thank-you gift?
• What mix of calling and texting will you test, and when does a call beat a text?
• How will you keep people engaged after #GivingTuesday through December 31?
• How will you know what worked, and which forms and source codes will you track?

Put your direct mail drop dates, email sends, and digital ad flights on the same calendar as your texts, and schedule each text two or three days after the piece it supports lands. The mailer introduces the ask and the text closes it.

What are the seven strategies to raise more with texting?

1. Collect mobile numbers now

Make phone-number collection part of every year-end plan. If you are building a special giving-season donation form, ask for a mobile number with checkboxes that let people opt in to email, calls, and SMS. Mobile lists are still small next to email lists at most nonprofits, so every number you add this fall keeps paying off for years.

2. Warm up your list before you ask

Your existing supporters are your best year-end prospects, as long as the ask is not the first thing they have heard from you in months. Use October and early November to show up without asking. Send a quick impact story, a behind-the-scenes photo, or a thank-you for something they did last spring.

3. Re-engage lapsed donors

Use your donor history to reach one-time givers and lapsed sustainers. Many of them are still willing to give and only need a nudge with an easy way to give. Set up a keyword such as LINK so a one-word reply sends the donation link automatically, and personalize with the data you already have, like their first name, the impact of a past gift, or their graduation year.

4. Segment your audience

A message written for a specific group outperforms a general request every time. Common ways to segment include donation status (monthly, annual, one-time, lapsed), time since last gift, last gift amount, issue preference, volunteer history, and graduation year or area of study.

5. Track which texts raise money

Use one #GivingTuesday-branded donation form for the whole campaign and track the channel with source codes and UTM parameters on the link, so the same form tells you which gifts came from a text, an email, or a mailer. Hustle’s branded links shorten every link on your own domain and report clicks by goal, so you can see which script, segment, and send time moved people to give while the campaign is still running.

6. Set up Keywords and Automations before Thanksgiving

Schedule your messages ahead of time with Broadcast Texting and Automations. We recommend an introduction before #GivingTuesday, the call to action on the day, and a final follow-up the day after. Use keywords such as DONATE or GIVE so anyone who texts in gets the donation link right away, at any hour. Publish the keyword everywhere (“Text GIVE to your number” on the website, in email, and on social), and pair it with a QR code on print.

7. Automate your thank-yous with Tags and Audiences

Set up a thank-you flow before #GivingTuesday and it runs in the background all season. When a gift is recorded through CRM sync, the API, or a CSV upload, the donor is tagged Donated 2026 and added to the matching Audience automatically. A personalized thank-you goes out with the donor’s name and gift amount, and the donor is suppressed from every remaining ask in your automations. Save a date for personal thank-you videos and texts as well, and write those scripts ahead of time.

How do you make fundraising texts feel personal?

Give away swag. With MMS you can share a GIF of the swag on offer, a video of someone wearing it, or a photo of what a gift pays for. Send videos and images. A well-chosen GIF or video shows there is a person on the other end of the text. Ask for feedback. After you have thanked supporters on #GivingTuesday, try a quick poll about which issue matters most to them or why they support you. Their answers sharpen the next ask and give agents something real to talk about.

Video carries emotion in a way text cannot. With Video Messaging you can send Hustle Clips (up to 30 seconds, playing inside the message with no link), Personalized Clips (a 15-second video for each recipient, recorded in the app), and Hustle Stories (clips stitched into a longer web-based story with clickable calls to action). Use clips for scale and personalized video for your warmest relationships.

How should you write a year-end fundraising text?

A text reads differently from an email. Your texts, call scripts, and videos should sound warmer and shorter than your direct mail, social posts, and website copy, and initial messages should end with a question to encourage conversation.

How do you get more year-end texts delivered?

1. Include opt-out language in every initial message.
2. Send high-volume campaigns earlier in the day.
3. Skip public link shorteners such as Bitly, which carriers filter. Use Hustle’s branded short links instead.
4. Keep messages short. The longer the message, the longer the send time.
5. Use Hustle’s time-zone feature to segment lists automatically so nobody gets a text at 6 a.m.

For the rules behind registration and opt-outs, see our texting compliance page.

End-of-year fundraising texting FAQ

When is #GivingTuesday 2026?

#GivingTuesday 2026 is on December 1, the Tuesday after Thanksgiving. It opens the year-end giving season, which runs through midnight on December 31.

What is the biggest giving day of the year?

December 31 is the single biggest giving day of the year, and 12% of all giving happens in the last three days of the year.

When should nonprofits send their first year-end fundraising text?

The first text should ideally land before #GivingTuesday. Use October and early November to warm up your list without asking, then send an introduction before #GivingTuesday, the call to action on the day, and a follow-up the day after.

Should nonprofits text lapsed donors at year-end?

Yes. Many one-time givers and lapsed sustainers are still willing to give and only need a nudge with an easy way to give, such as a keyword reply that sends the donation link automatically.

Should fundraising texts use link shorteners like Bitly?

No. Carriers filter public link shorteners such as Bitly. Branded short links on your own domain deliver more reliably and report clicks by goal.