How to Select the Right Type of Donation Form For Your Charity

CanadaHelps offers four types of Customizable Donation Forms to help charities process online donations. Charities can choose from Multistep, Full, Securities, or Tribute-first donation forms.   

In our digital-first economy, selecting the right type of CDF is crucial to setting your charity up for fundraising success.

As a charity client, you can create unlimited donation forms. Each form can be customized, branded, and configured to fit your organization's unique fundraising needs. All form types can be embedded into your website or linked to your site using the donation form’s URL. You can also feature unique or emotive background images on your embedded or linked form, regardless of form type.

Use the information below to select the right Donation Form (or Forms) for your fundraising needs. Understanding the benefits of each Donation Form type will help your charity optimize your checkout flow, and elevate your donor giving experience.

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What Type of Customizable Donation Form Should My Charity Use?

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The Multistep Form provides a step-by-step donation experience. It breaks donating down into a three-step checkout flow process, whereby donors click ‘next’ to navigate through the flow.

View the Multistep Donation Form. And here’s an applied example of our Multistep Donation From from Food4Kids Hamilton.

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Data often shows that multistep donation forms are the ideal choice for charities.

This is because choosing a donation form with multiple steps can increase conversions, especially if the form being filled out is long or complex. Multistep forms also provide an optimal mobile user experience.

In a study by Blackbaud, charities A/B tested multistep donation forms against single-page donation forms.

Multistep donation forms were shown to increase donations and conversions in the following big ways:

• 33% more total conversions
• 75% higher conversion rate (conversions per visit)
• 90% more overall donations
• 54% higher average donation

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Charities have the option of creating Multi-step Popup Donation Forms. Popup formatted Donation Forms offer a bold and attention-grabbing user flow. Charities can also make the Pop-up form ‘sticky’ so that the button linking to the Donation Form stays visible on the page, even when prospective donors are scrolling.  

Learn how to add a Popup form donation button to your website. See the example Popup Donation Form below from Na-Me-Res.

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CanadaHelps’ Full Form, also referred to as a ‘single-step’ or ‘one-page’ donation form, offers potential donors a single-page scroll-down process that requires the fewest number of clicks from people donating to your charity. 

The difference between Full and Multistep donation forms is that donors won't need to click any "next" buttons or navigate through multiple pages to finish paying for their donation. Because of this, one-page donation forms are ideal for simple donation forms and for forms with few fields to fill out.

View CanadaHelps Full Donation Form. And see the branded one-page example form below from charity client Mamas for Mamas.

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CanadaHelps Tribute-First form places the ‘Donation Information’ section at the top of the donation form. The placement hierarchy is meant to encourage tribute gifts. If you are trying to incentivize tribute gifts and increase the number of donor dedications your charity receives, the Tribute Form is the ideal choice. 

Tribute Forms highlight the donation dedication box for donors by elevating the placement of “in honour of” or “in memory of” to the top of your form, alongside a variety of e-cards and other customizable dedication features.

‍View the full Tribute-first Form. And see some customizable tribute features, like ecards, in the example from Grande Prairie Palliative Care Society.

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Choose a Securities Form if you are a charity that wishes to have the capacity to process donations in the form of stocks or mutual funds. If your charity does not currently accept donations from stocks or mutual funds, we highly suggest implementing CanadaHelps’ securities donation form on your website. 

You can preview the Securities Form here. And view CanadaHelps' securities donation form in action with this example from Friends of Cortes Island Society.

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Why are securities are the most efficient donation type for Canadian charities?

When appreciated securities are donated to charity the capital gains tax is eliminated. 

‍Had the donor simply sold the same assets, they would have been required to pay capital gains taxes. This is why being able to accept donations of stocks or mutual funds presents a tremendous fundraising opportunity for charities.

When charities use the CanadaHelps security donation form, we take care of the process end-to-end–issuing the tax receipt, keeping the donor informed each step of the way, and transferring the proceeds to the charity’s bank account. CanadaHelps facilitates the sale of the assets, and your charity receives the full market value of the securities.

Learn how to donate securities.

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Selecting the right online donation forms is one of the cornerstones of charity fundraising. After all, offering donors a seamless payment flow experience can make or break your campaign!

CanadaHelps’ four donation form designs offer different donor payment experiences, each with its own set of pros and cons. Choosing the right form, or forms, allows you to control the format donors interact with and decide which aspects of the giving process are prioritized.

Once you choose your donation form and embed or link it on your website, you can start accepting funds and raising capital. Follow these easy steps to embed or link your donation form to your website. 

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Finished selecting your CanadaHelps' Customizable Donation Form? Discover eight of the best CDF features and optimizations designed to make fundraising easier.