Moving recognition to digital platforms gives foundations the ability to recognize gifts in real-time.
A massive growth market
Digital donor walls have become a massive growth area because the costs associated with updating traditional static name recognition pieces, often in high-end materials to reflect gratitude, are extremely high. The labour expenses alone can be never ending, having to hire a crew to remove, replace, or add any donors. A massively reduced time-to-recognize-donors is key to the modern foundation. In some cases, a foundation may need to wait weeks or even months—depending on the materials—to arrange the addition or replacement of a donor name on a physical wall. Digital allows hospitals to recognize a donor in minutes.
Moving recognition to digital platforms gives foundations the ability to recognize gifts in real time; a combination of unattended kiosk donations and a digital donor recognition wall gives a hospital foundation the ability to immediately recognize a donation as it is made. Sunnybrook installed a double-sided tap payment device within 4.6 m (15 ft) of the donor wall to allow the potential to have the main wall celebrate even small donations immediately and gamify the experience of donating.
“Any institution that relies on donations to maintain and grow operations should consider switching from static donor walls to digital walls, whether direct view LED (light-emitting diode) or large LCD (liquid-crystal display) as these walls allow for much more detail on programs, events, and donors themselves,” said Dot2Dot Communications’ general manager Andy McRae. “Integration with various triggers and even a payment portal can make them interactive. The ROI (return on investment) will be impressive. We are seeing these digital walls deployed beyond hospitals, too. Universities and arts centres are using these digital donor walls as well.”
Some may think early digital donor recognition walls were basically a PowerPoint presentation; however, this is not the case. Like any digital signage deployment, it is about custom creative and the ability to change content on the fly via a content management system (CMS) in alignment with the goals and objectives of the network. Using PowerPoint is an accident waiting to happen. Having experiential design, content strategy, software development, content capture, and motion graphics teams to build out these more complex experiences is paramount.
Digital donor walls offer the opportunity to integrate directly into the hospitals’ donor management software to build integrations that allow them to define directly in the databases they work in every day which donors should be recognized and where.
A content strategy is mission critical
What will define success? Messaging must be tailored to drive relevant behaviour, a.k.a. the call to action. Defining business goals and user needs is the content bridge that will lend itself to success. Bringing all key stakeholders to the table is a must in addition to having a clear road map established. This can sometimes be challenging in the unique health-care environment, where facilities, foundations, and the hospital’s own branding teams will be lobbying for airtime.
Hospitals have found digital donor walls to be a viable investment because of the impact, ROI, and limited physical wall space to expand. A large array of bright colourful displays will always get more attention than an understated brass or wooden physical fixture. Often, however, a hybrid approach, recognizing big or naming rights donors who will not change (in high-end materials) remains a ‘static’ constant. This can be complimentary and even add to the allure of the digital component and vice-versa.
Digital donor walls offer the opportunity to integrate directly into the hospitals’ donor management software to build integrations that allow them to define directly in the databases they work in every day which donors should be recognized and where. This efficiency is critical for time management as foundations do not want to manage multiple donor lists when they work in one every day.
