If/When/How: Retaining Surge Donors  

If/When/How, works at the intersection of law, policy and advocacy to transform reproductive justice in the United States. They believe everyone should have the power to decide if, when, and how to define, create, and sustain their families—and they are committed to transforming the legal and policy landscape to make this vision a reality.

Project Overview 

After the Dobbs decision, If/When/How launched a project to improve donor retention and re-engage lapsed surge donors through targeted email campaigns. The goal was to build a stronger fundraising foundation by refining donor communication strategies and testing targeted email campaigns.

Key Strategies and Successes

If/When/How focused on two key strategies:

1. Re-engaging lapsed "surge" donors who contributed less than $2,500.
2. Retaining new and current surge donors who responded to the Dobbs decision.

To achieve these goals, the organization implemented a customized welcome email series, state-specific policy action communications, and integrated policy updates with development messaging.

By segmenting donors into targeted groups, including lapsed and surge donors, If/When/How crafted tailored outreach that resonated with each group’s motivations. The organization ran two key email experiments:

• Experiment 1: Re-engaged lapsed donors through a welcome series paired with state-based policy updates.
• Experiment 2: Tested different email sequences to encourage additional gifts from current supporters.

The team also increased communications with a year-end campaign, more stewardship emails, and a welcome series targeting surge donors to introduce them to If/When/How’s mission.

Lessons Learned

The project revealed key lessons. Content matters—emails highlighting organizational successes received the highest open rates, showing the value of sharing impact with donors. Stewardship works, too: even without donation asks, emails focused on updates and stories still generated contributions.

Flexibility was essential as some planned initiatives had to be adjusted due to shifting strategies. The project also revealed a need for better data management, especially around donor segmentation and tracking. Lastly, building infrastructure takes time; setting up the necessary systems for running experiments took longer than expected but proved an essential investment.

Despite challenges with their CRM system and concerns around frequent email outreach, If/When/How achieved solid results:

• Increased donor retention rates among surge and lapsed donors.
• Raised $12,000 more than anticipated over the campaign period.
• Stewardship emails that didn’t ask for donations still generated additional gifts.

By The Numbers

If/When/How recaptured 41 surge donors—fewer than the target of 135—but the average gift size was significantly higher, $1,469 compared to the projected $235. 

Over 12 months, the project raised about $12,000 more than anticipated, raising a total of $35,500. A 0.91 ROI on a $55,000 investment

Looking Ahead 

These efforts proved that consistent communication with donors can build long-term support, even when immediate fundraising isn’t the goal. The insights gained will help strengthen If/When/How’s fundraising strategy moving forward. Automated email journeys triggered at key points in a donor’s lifecycle are already proving effective, and the organization is well-positioned to scale these strategies. 

By embedding these lessons into their approach, If/When/How is building a sustainable revenue strategy that ensures they can meet the moment whenever reproductive justice issues arise.