With the Donation service, you can now have donors make a donation on behalf of another and send an automatic eCard acknowledging their gift. This new eCard functionality is included in your Donation service at no extra cost -- just in time for the holidays!

Adding eCards donations to your website is a great opportunity to spread your message to a wider audience and engage a new group of donors.

See Example

How does it work?

The donor chooses an image that your organization has created, enters a brief message, and schedules when the card should be emailed. The donor can send as many eCards as they want, adding a different eCard for each recipient. eCards will be scheduled for automatic emailing, once the donation has been successfully processed.

By including a link back to your site in the bottom message of the eCard, you can spread your message and encourage more donations or newsletter sign-ups with a strong call to action for all eCard recipients!

How do I setup a donation appeal form with eCards?

The easiest way to setup a donation appeal form specific for eCards is to use the Copy function to create a new draft. Then modify this new draft by making sure that the In Tribute is disabled and adding the eCards section instead. On the Pages tab, you can determine which order to display the sections, and whether to split the donation form onto several pages. Note that when adding a new section to an already-saved donation appeal form, it is automatically added to the bottom of the form, which can be changed on the Pages tab.

In the above example:

1. We have split this donation appeal form onto 2 pages on the Pages tab of the appeal setup, adding STEP 1 & STEP 2 in the section titles of the Sections that appear at the top of each page.

2. We have uploaded e-card images that have the same dimensions, for the best results in the image carousel.

3. When creating an appeal with eCards, we have disabled the In Tribute section as eCards will not be automatically sent when using the In Tribute section.

4. We have setup 3 donation pages which are displayed in the left navigation:

   • Donate Now
   • Donate & Send an eCard
   • Join our Monthly Giving Club

   This gives you the opportunity to link to different donation pages from your website or email campaigns in line with your marketing strategy.

What if I am already using the In Tribute section?

If you wish to automate the sending of eCards, make sure to disable this In Tribute section, and setup the eCards section instead. When setting up eCards, you can offer "In Honour", "In Memory", "In Celebration" eCard options, in addition to other options.

Only include the In Tribute section, if you prefer to have your organization manually send out an acknowledgement card. With In Tribute donations, the collected information will be listed in your reports, as well as, in the donor profile so that your organization can manually send out the acknowledgement card. When using the "In Tribute" section, the GiftTool system does NOT automatically send acknowledgement cards.

How will the data be reported?

Donors will be able to see their list of eCards to be sent in their on-screen confirmation message & email thank you message.

Additionally, the list of eCards sent will be included in the following:

• Order Profile: The data includes the name of the eCard sent, the recipient name & email address, the scheduled date/sent status.
• Total Orders report: The data is displayed in the Additional Items columns, and currently includes the name of the eCard sent, the scheduled date/sent status. The recipient name & email address will be added shortly to this report.