Nonprofit: Teardown Pack

Load this pack for charities, advocacy groups, foundations, and membership nonprofits. Nonprofits grow through donors, not customers, and US nonprofits publish their finances every year, so a teardown can line up fundraising moves against real revenue.

Contents

• How to recognize it
• What drives growth here
• Signals to collect
• Going inside
• Rules that limit copying
• Plays that usually transfer
• Metrics to ask about

How to Recognize It

• "Donate", "Give monthly", "Fundraise", and "Ways to give" pages, often on a donate. or give. subdomain
• Donation platforms on the donate page (Classy, Givebutter, Donorbox, Blackbaud, Fundraise Up, Bloomerang, Funraise, Every.org). teardown.mjs stack flags Classy, Givebutter, Donorbox, and Fundraise Up; check the donate page and its subdomain for the others
• A 501(c)(3) or EIN line in the footer, and "tax-deductible" language
• Peer-to-peer fundraising pages (/fundraise, personal pages under a campaign)
• teardown.mjs detect <domain> flags those donation platforms and nonprofit language

What Drives Growth Here

• Monthly donors are the base. Recurring giving is steadier and more valuable than one-time gifts, so the monthly ask and its placement matter.
• Campaign moments drive spikes. Giving Tuesday, year-end, disasters, matching campaigns, and anniversaries create most one-time revenue.
• Peer-to-peer turns supporters into fundraisers. Events, challenges, and birthday fundraisers reach networks the organization can't reach directly.
• Major gifts and grants dominate many budgets. Visible marketing may be a small share of revenue. Read the financials before crediting marketing.
• Free ad credits change the math. Google Ad Grants gives eligible nonprofits up to $10,000 a month in search ads, with rules attached (an account-wide click-through rate of at least 5%, among others).

Signals to Collect

Going Inside

• Make a donation only with the user's explicit approval and budget, under their real identity. Then log the thank-you sequence, receipts, and the next ask.
• Subscribe to emails and SMS to record appeal cadence, especially around year-end and Giving Tuesday.
• Start a peer-to-peer fundraising page only if the user will actually fundraise. Don't create fake campaigns.

Rules That Limit Copying

• Charitable solicitation registration: many US states require registration before asking residents for donations. Check with counsel before running a national campaign.
• IRS rules govern donation receipts, quid pro quo disclosures, and political activity limits for 501(c)(3) organizations.
• Google Ad Grants policies set eligibility (government entities, hospitals, and schools are excluded), account structure, and quality requirements. Copying a paid-search structure into a Grants account can break them.
• Cause marketing laws: some states regulate commercial co-ventures, where a business promotes that a purchase benefits a charity.
• Email and SMS consent rules (CAN-SPAM, TCPA) apply to nonprofits too.

Plays That Usually Transfer

Metrics to Ask About

• Donor retention rate: share of last year's donors who gave again
• Recurring donors and monthly recurring revenue
• Average gift and gifts per donor
• Donate page conversion rate
• Cost to raise a dollar: fundraising expense divided by contributions
• Peer-to-peer reach: donors per fundraiser