Nonprofits use Text Your List to thank donors, rally volunteers, and share campaign milestones with a personal text from a real number, so every supporter feels like more than a line item in your CRM.
Bulk emails with a first-name merge field no longer feel personal. Donors can tell the difference, and the feeling that they're one of thousands erodes the relationship over time.
A donation acknowledgment letter that takes two weeks feels like a tax receipt, not gratitude. A personal text the same day feels like genuine appreciation.
Group chats create confusion about who's responsible for what. When every volunteer gets a personal message with their specific assignment, the response rate and follow-through go way up.
"Donors who receive personal outreach give 42% more over the following 12 months than those who only receive email communications."Bloomerang Donor Retention Research
Four moments where a personal text from your staff outperforms a Mailchimp blast or a generic donor portal notification.
Your spring gala had 140 attendees, each with a table assignment and a self-reported interest area written on the registration card. The day after, your CSV gives every attendee a personal thank-you text from your development director with their name and what they expressed interest in merged in. First-touch personal outreach within 24 hours converts to a first gift at 3-4x the rate of an email-only follow-up.
280 donors gave to your organization in 2024 and have not yet given in 2025. December 28 is two days from your fiscal year-end. A personal text from your ED with each donor's last gift amount, last gift date, and a suggested ask (often 1.1x their last gift) goes to the segment that produces most year-end recovery revenue. The donors who got a real text from a real person give again at roughly 2x the rate of those who only got the email appeal.
The 25 households giving $5K+ a year produce a majority of your operating revenue. They want to feel like the organization remembers them specifically. A quarterly check-in with each donor's interest area and a relevant program update merged in goes from your director's personal phone, not a CRM blast. The right hour every quarter on this segment is the highest-ROI hour you can spend.
Your volunteer list is 60 people. 20 of them have not signed up for a shift in 60+ days. The day before each event week, send each active volunteer a confirmation with their shift time and role merged in. Same day, send the lapsed segment a different template that references their last shift and the upcoming opportunities. Volunteer churn is silent. A personal text from the program coordinator reverses most of it within one cycle.
Three approaches most nonprofits cycle through before they land on personal-text-at-scale.
Open rates on nonprofit appeal emails sit around 22%, click-through around 2%, and a single year-end appeal often generates fewer real opens than a smaller list reached personally. Useful for newsletter cadence and program updates. Not the tool for closing a year-end gift from a $1,000 lapsed donor.
Most donor CRMs added SMS as a feature in the last two years. The texts arrive from a 5-digit code or a generic 555 number, which donors read as marketing and dismiss. Useful for compliance-mandated receipts and tax-time confirmations. Not the channel for a personal touch from your development director.
Right voice, wrong economics. An ED who tries to call 280 lapsed donors personally in year-end week burns the entire week on phone tag. Phone calls remain the right tool for the top 25 major donors. For the next 250 households, a personal text reaches them in their pocket and converts at a rate phone calls cannot match at that scale.
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