Bringing Digital Into The Spotlight: A King's College London Digital Giving Story

Where Their Story Begins

At King’s College London (KCL), the Direct Marketing or Annual Giving team primarily focused on fundraising for student support appeals using telephone and direct mail. Despite past success, new donor acquisition rates had begun to decline, signaling the need for change.

While traditional channels remained valuable for retaining and upgrading existing donors, new donors were not responding at comparable rates. The team evaluated how digital activities could address declining new donor acquisition. Jessica Atherden, Direct Marketing Manager within the Fundraising & Supporter Development team, shares the institution’s journey into digital fundraising.

Bringing Digital Forward

Hubbub: What were your initial plans for integrating digital activities into your wider programme, and how did that change in the early months of 2020?

Jessica Atherden: Initially, we planned to run a giving day in autumn 2020. We had witnessed the success other institutions achieved with giving days, particularly regarding new donor participation, making it the logical first step.

However, when the UK entered lockdown, we reassessed our fundraising channels and appeals. With limited options to mail or phone our community, we accelerated the integration of digital activities into our wider programme. This allowed us to request support from our alumni for King’s response to COVID-19, encouraging predominantly online gifts.

H: Why did you feel confident that launching your emergency appeal was the right decision?

JA: In 2015 we ran a successful fundraising campaign addressing the Ebola epidemic in Sierra Leone. From managing that appeal, primarily through direct mail and email, we believed the COVID-19 emergency appeal would resonate similarly with our community.

Putting Donors First

H: What were the main considerations you had when deciding how donors would make their gifts and how did the Causes platform complement this?

JA: We needed to launch quickly, reach a large audience with minimal expenditure, and ensure the experience complemented the donor’s overall journey. Using the Causes platform was straightforward to set up, and the Hubbub team provided excellent technical and strategic support.

From a donor journey perspective, we highlighted each funding area separately, allowing donors to choose where their donations went. The live totals displayed on the site communicated the collective impact of giving. The platform’s layout enabled us to embed images and videos showcasing different support areas, something our standard donation form couldn’t achieve.

The donor wall allowed supporters to see their combined impact, which we believed would motivate further giving. While a central donation form existed on the KCL website, we recognized it couldn’t provide the same experience as Causes. For new donors, the donation experience proved essential to their journey.

Creating a Case for Support

H: How did you decide which areas of the institution your digital appeal would focus on?

JA: As a research-led institution with close NHS ties, our teams conducted vital research across multiple faculties directly supporting pandemic response efforts worldwide. We felt donor support could accelerate delivery of this critical research, making it an obvious appeal focus.

We consulted teams leading research and response projects to understand where donor gifts could provide additional support. We identified four key areas: Research, Mental Health, Global Impact, and Students. We also created a central “King’s COVID-19 Response Fund” to ensure each main fund received necessary support.

Getting the Team on Board

H: How did the team prepare to launch the campaign?

JA: Speed was critical to getting our message out alongside other institutions and charities. From the initial kickoff meeting with key research team members, we had five working days to launch.

The fundraising department provided excellent support, demonstrating what could be accomplished in such a short timeframe. While the direct marketing team remained the main point of contact, it was genuinely a cross-team effort.

We were also fortunate to have buy-in from senior university leaders. Prof Sir Robert Lechler, Senior Vice President (Health) at King’s College London and Executive Director of King’s Health Partners, served as our primary signatory and was highly engaged. His involvement ensured quick sign-off from all team members, making our launch timeline possible.

H: What was the team’s reaction to the success of the appeal?

JA: This was our first platform experience tracking live donation totals, making the incoming results genuinely exciting. It exemplified the combined impact a mass giving appeal could achieve. As our first predominantly digital fundraising campaign, it demonstrated how this activity could complement our traditional channels and reach new audiences.

Until Next Time

H: What’s next in terms of this appeal, as well as longer-term?

JA: Email and social media drove the majority of the appeal, both for initial donation requests and progress updates. We concluded our planned email updates but sent a direct mail appeal in early June to those with postal addresses who weren’t included in the original email outreach.

We’re sending stewardship mailings to all appeal donors in August, containing updates on all four areas and serving as a welcome pack for our many new donors. We’re also evaluating email and social media response to apply learnings to future digital appeals and our autumn giving day.

“If we wanted new donors to give, the experience they had making a donation would be essential to their journey.”

Jessica Atherden, Direct Marketing Manager