The evolution of face-to-face fundraising

2016 was a pivotal year for Australian Face-to-Face fundraising. Allegations of sham contracting were rife. Unions were circling. The NSW Government was taking a close look at the channel. Behaviours associated with a high-pressure sales culture were dominating the conversation. We did not know it yet, but retention rates were also about to fall off a cliff.

Ten years is a long time in fundraising. What has changed?

In the last decade, Fundraising Partners has been at the heart of compliance and operations for face-to-face (F2F) fundraising. We have mystery shopped more than 200 fundraisers and audited around one thousand verification calls (follow-up phone calls to people who recently signed up to a regular gift via a F2F interaction). Few organisations have had a better view of the sector’s evolution. It’s been an insightful journey, and I want to share what we’ve learned.

Things needed to change

Face-to-face fundraising has been a cornerstone of the Australian charity sector for more than two decades, generating hundreds of millions of dollars each year for causes ranging from medical research to humanitarian relief. Yet for much of that time, the method operated under a patchwork of regulations, inconsistent standards and no central body to address concerns when they arose.

Recognising that the long-term sustainability of the channel depended on stronger accountability, six charities established the Public Fundraising Regulatory Association (PFRA) in 2015: Amnesty International, Australian Red Cross, Cancer Council NSW, Greenpeace Australia Pacific, Médecins Sans Frontières Australia and The Fred Hollows Foundation.

“Over the following decade, the PFRA grew into a membership of more than 60 charities and agencies committed to a common standard covering fundraiser behaviour, identification, consent and complaints handling,” says Jenny Kearney, Board Chair of the PFRA. “The association also became a leading advocate for fundraising law reform, contributing to the development of the National Fundraising Principles introduced in 2023.”

Government recognition followed. Sue Woodward AM, Chair of the ACNC, Privacy Commissioner Carly Kind and Assistant Minister for Charities Dr Andrew Leigh have all appeared at PFRA events, recognising the role the organisation plays in strengthening standards across the sector.

At the PFRA’s tenth anniversary, many reflected that Australian face-to-face fundraising may not have survived without it. Whether or not that is true, few would dispute the role the organisation has played in improving compliance, accountability and public confidence.

COVID changed everything … for a while

The pandemic exposed how reliant many charities had become on Face-to-Face fundraising for Regular Giving acquisition. When lockdowns emptied streets, shopping centres and doorsteps, organisations were forced to reconsider both their fundraising mix and their assumptions about donor acquisition.

The PFRA moved quickly, instructing members to suspend face-to-face activity. The decision received unanimous support and demonstrated the value of coordinated self-regulation during a period of uncertainty.

As programs gradually resumed, charities and agencies introduced COVID-safe operating procedures including physical distancing, contactless sign-up processes, enhanced hygiene measures and masks where required.

Mystery shopping during this period became less about fundraising conversations and more about public safety. Fundraisers adapted remarkably well – carrying a six-foot distancing mat from door to door in the Sydney summer heat was hardly a task anyone anticipated when they entered fundraising.

The period demonstrated the resilience of the channel. Fundraisers embraced new technology and new ways of working to keep programs running while maintaining public confidence.

The disruption also created space for the sector to ask more fundamental questions. Were declining retention rates, rising acquisition costs and increasing commercial pressures temporary challenges, or signs of something deeper?

Something seemed irregular

One of the most important initiatives to emerge during this period was The Irregular Giving Project.

Fundraising Partners launched the project after concerns that face-to-face fundraising was becoming increasingly difficult to sustain. If current trends continued, there was a genuine risk that one of the charity sector’s most important donor acquisition channels would become economically unviable.

More than 150 charity leaders, agencies, consultants and suppliers from Australia, New Zealand and other major fundraising markets contributed their views. Traditional assumptions around costs, employment models, fundraiser training standards, donor onboarding and accountability were challenged and difficult conversations encouraged.

The resulting white paper, released in July 2020, concluded that face-to-face fundraising was not broken. Rather, it could remain the cornerstone of high-quality regular giving acquisition if the sector was prepared to evolve.

Among the recommendations were stronger outsourcing standards, supplier business model review, a common framework for attrition reporting and the creation of sector benchmarking. Together, these initiatives aimed to improve accountability, consistency and decision making.

Perhaps the most important recommendation was the need for better data. For too long, success had largely been measured through volume. The number of sign-ups often mattered more than the sustainability of the supporters acquired. The sector could no longer afford to rely on assumptions. Decisions needed to be driven by evidence.

The Benchmarking Project was created to provide the data needed for better decision making, while the PFRA’s accreditation framework strengthened accountability across the channel.

This shift in thinking would go on to influence everything from recruitment strategies to payment schedules and commercial agreements and agency remuneration models.

I’m more likely than ever to be stopped in the street

I’m 45 years old. With Zoom’s touch up settings, I might pass for 40. This used to make mystery shopping difficult. Younger fundraisers – who comprise the majority of the F2F fundraiser workforce – often approached people within their own age group because those conversations felt easier. What they did not understand was the impact this had on long-term fundraising outcomes.

Now, data from The Benchmarking Project and individual charities analytics teams consistently demonstrates that recruiting donors under the age of 24 can be a high-risk strategy. The strongest long-term results tend to come from donors like me – those aged 35 and above.

Fundraising consultant Mike Stewart of Clear Dynamix believes the advent of charities and suppliers sharing data on donor quality has been one of the most significant developments of the past decade and has changed the way we fundraise.

“Charities are placing greater emphasis on donor lifetime value and retention, which has led to increased focus on engaging older donor demographics,” says Mike. “We’ve responded by training fundraisers to have more relevant, engaging conversations with people aged 45 to 65, helping them build stronger connections and ultimately acquire higher quality supporters.”

Rethinking the business model

While the growing availability of retention data challenged long-held assumptions about what constitutes success and encouraged the sector to focus on what actually creates a valuable long-term donor, better data also challenged the commercial and employment models underpinning the channel.

As expectations around compliance, workforce welfare and quality increased, many agencies found themselves investing heavily in governance, training and management structures. The question was no longer simply how donors were acquired, but whether the business models supporting acquisition were sustainable in the long term.

For Michele Wilkinson, CEO of The FIN Agency, the evolution of the employment model in Face-to-Face fundraising stands out as one of the most defining changes of the past decade.

Prior to 2016, the industry was split evenly into three camps. The first was where fundraisers were employed directly as staff by a third-party supplier. In the second, they were all employed as staff by a charity. The third was an independent contractor model where suppliers hired contractors to fundraise for them.

For the suppliers, the type of employment model engaged with directed their business model – and the culture and working practices.

While fundraisers are now typically employed by specialist fundraising agencies, the success of the model relies on charities, agencies and suppliers working together to meet employment, WHS and compliance obligations.

“We viewed this shift early as an opportunity to lift standards across the channel, investing in robust compliance frameworks, structured training, behavioural expectations, and leadership capability,” says Michele. “The result has been stronger culture, improved quality, higher tenure, and greater long‑term stability.

These outcomes come with real costs, including the governance and audit requirements needed to operate responsibly, often demanding full‑time resourcing – but any move toward a fractured or hybrid model of contracting risks undermining the progress we’ve made and would likely set the sector back to the challenges it worked hard to overcome a decade ago. 

“As a sector, continuing to normalise these conversations and share accountability is essential to protecting the progress we’ve made because long‑term value is only created when fundraising is ethical, transparent and sustainable for everyone involved,” says Michele.

The end of in-house in Australia

One of the competing origin stories of Australian face-to-face fundraising is the creation of the Greenpeace in-house team.

At their peak, large in-house programs represented organisations such as Australia for UNHCR, UNICEF, Oxfam and The Wilderness Society.

Their culture was often very different from some of the agency environments operating in 2016. In-house fundraisers sought to balance donor acquisition with a deep connection to the cause they represented. Whilst agency fundraisers cared about the causes too, they often operated within higher-pressure commercial structures and cultures.

Commercial realities ultimately favoured the higher volumes delivered by the sales-focused models. In-house programs either refused to adopt those approaches or were unable to match the economics. One by one, they disappeared. They are missed.

Debit dates that suit me, not you

Another area where data began changing behaviour was payment processing.

The most common reason for early cancellations has not changed. On the street, potential donors say, “I can’t afford it”. On a charity’s payment gateway report, it appears as “insufficient funds”.

Two possible solutions emerged. The first was to stop recruiting donors living pay cheque to pay cheque. The second was to better align donation schedules with when donors receive income.

The first has largely not happened. Location schedules have changed little over the past decade, and Fundraising Partners continues to observe significant recruitment activity in lower socioeconomic areas through mystery shopping and verification call audits.

The second has seen genuine innovation. Four weekly payment cycles and instant debits were introduced to better align giving with donor pay cycles and identify supporters who may not be financially ready to commit. Four weekly giving offered two advantages – it aligned donations more closely with income patterns and generated a thirteenth payment over a twelve-month period. Instant debits identify supporters who cannot afford to give immediately, discouraging them from entering a commitment they are unlikely to maintain.

Benchmarking data paints a complex picture. Without split tests, we cannot know for sure the impact these innovations have in isolation. The key drivers of their success seem to be how the agency engaged in fundraising trains their staff to communicate these messages to our donors.

Competing KPIs, siloed cultures

While the availability of donor quality data has changed who we recruit, how we recruit and how we evaluate success, one significant challenge remains – the siloed way many organisations approach acquisition and retention.

Acquisition teams are often measured on volume, cost per acquisition and short-term return on investment. Retention teams focus on attrition, lifetime value and long-term engagement. Both objectives are valid, but they do not always encourage the same behaviours.

The challenge is that acquisition costs appear immediately, while donor value emerges over years. This creates natural tension between short-term and long-term decision making.

Agencies may excel at recruiting large volumes of supporters, while account managers focus on maintaining strong client relationships. Rarely is there a dedicated retention function sitting between the two. The result can be a disconnect between those responsible for recruiting donors and those ultimately accountable for long-term donor value.

The sector now has more data than ever before. The challenge is ensuring everyone is working towards the same outcome. The next step may be aligning acquisition, retention and supporter care teams around shared measures of success. When all three functions share responsibility for lifetime value, organisations are more likely to achieve sustainable growth and stronger supporter relationships.

Long-term messaging leads to long-term donors

We’ve come a long way but here’s a last, sobering, note from the field. I heard these phrases in 2004. I also heard variations of them during the past 12 months.

“Just try it for a month.”

“Nothing starts until you get a welcome call.”

“Give it a go for a few months and call to cancel.”

Short-term messaging, often incorrectly described as ‘soft selling’, is used by fundraisers under pressure to secure sign-ups without understanding the long-term consequences of their words. If approached correctly, a person whose values align with a cause and who is financially able to commit can become a long-term donor. Any deviation from honest, long-term messaging risks undermining that relationship before it has even begun.

The transformation can continue

The last decade has transformed Australian face-to-face fundraising.

The PFRA has provided stronger guard rails around compliance, conduct and accountability. COVID tested those systems and demonstrated the sector’s ability to adapt under pressure.

Perhaps the most important change has been the growth of retention and benchmarking data. For many years, success was measured largely through acquisition volume. Today, charities and suppliers have a much better understanding of the factors that drive donor quality, retention and lifetime value.

That evidence has already influenced recruitment strategies, payment schedules and commercial models. It has challenged assumptions, reshaped behaviours and encouraged more informed decision making.

There is still work to do. Organisational silos remain, and long-term donor value is not always the primary measure of success. Yet the direction of travel is encouraging. The sector has shown a willingness to confront difficult truths and evolve when the evidence demands it.

If that willingness continues, supported by robust data and a commitment to collaboration, the future of face-to-face fundraising remains strong.

After all, the objective has never been simply to secure a donation. It is to begin a relationship.

If I were starting an F2F program now from scratch, I would…

Start with clear objectives, realistic financial expectations and strong internal ownership. I would ensure those objectives are reflected in supplier contracts, performance measures and financial incentives so that everyone is working toward the same outcomes. I would choose partners carefully, invest heavily in training, establish robust compliance and quality assurance processes, and build reporting from day one. It is vital that I focus on supporter quality, retention and lifetime value, not simply acquisition volume.

If I was reviewing my F2F program now, I would…

Look beyond headline acquisition numbers and examine quality indicators including retention, cancellation rates, verification call outcomes and supporter feedback. I would mystery shop regularly, review training and coaching standards, assess supplier culture and transparency, and compare performance against sector benchmarks. The goal is to work in partnership with my suppliers and internal teams to meet everyone’s expectations.

About the author 

Adam G. Watson MFIA is the founder of Fundraising Partners and a respected voice in the fundraising sector. He is also a co-founder of The Benchmarking Project and The Irregular Giving Project. His career spans the UK, Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand, working with dozens of charities to improve regular giving and supporter engagement. Adam brings a rare mix of field experience, strategic thinking and a deep understanding of the operational realities of fundraising teams.