A couple of months back, we created a checklist for a high-converting year-end donation page. The tips in that article apply regardless of your campaign theme or goals. But it’s also important to customize your year-end donation page(s) and forms to align with the goals and overall look and feel of your campaign.

Here are the most common types of year-end campaigns, with specific tips to create consistency between your content and the donation page itself:

1. The Current Event Campaign

If your year-end campaign is in direct response to a current event, be it a political situation, a natural disaster, or something else that feels urgent, your campaign page should carry that same sense of urgency. This can look like:

• A succinct recap of the current event and the immediate need for support.
• A Call for Support that reflects prospective donors’ values and sense of responsibility to respond to the situation, e.g., “We all have a duty to send help to the people who are suffering right now because of <XYZ current event>. Thank you for being on the right side of history!”
• Gift equivalencies with tangible outputs, so a donor quickly understands how their money will be used.

The more urgent the situation, the more motivated people are to give—and give fast. So if this is the nature of your campaign, make sure your donation form is short, easy to complete, and highly visible on all devices.

2. The Special Project Campaign

Some year-end campaigns raise designated funds for a special project or program. People love donating to something specific and tangible, so make this known on your campaign page!

• Your headline and supporting text should emphasize exactly what campaign funds will be used for and how this will benefit your community. 
• If you have an image or video that helps people visualize the project or program improvements, include it on the page.
• For this type of campaign, add a progress bar with your fundraising goal right above the donation form. You can use progress milestones to motivate people along the way, even updating your page headline to include “we’re halfway there!” or “we’re so close!” 

If there’s a blog post, article, or webpage with more information about the project or program, add a link below the donation form for supporters who want deeper details. Just make sure that the secondary page includes a donate button to loop people back to your campaign donation page once they’ve been persuaded!

3. The Emotive Storytelling Campaign 

Most year-end campaigns fall into this category. You’re sharing one or a series of emotive success stories from the year to raise undesignated funds. 

If this is your campaign, your donation page should feel like a continuation of the story, with:

• A photo or video of someone featured in your storytelling (you can even swap this out throughout the campaign to match the story you’ve most recently featured in email communications).
• At least one testimonial from a client featured in the campaign, a staff person, or a volunteer describing their transformation. 
• A Call for Support that matches the emotional level and tone of the content you’ve been sharing, explaining how donations directly translate into more stories like these. 

Though this style of campaign page may have more text and visuals on it, make sure the donation form is still simple and prominent right at the top of the page. 

Across any of the campaign types above, you might focus on recruiting one-time or monthly gifts… 

Your campaign page will be more effective if you make a choice! 

If your focus is to bring in large one-time gifts at the holidays, set “One Time” as the default gift type and suggest gift amounts that are reflective of what people typically donate at year-end. You can use the average gift amount from year-end 2024 as the middle suggested amount, with at least two higher options. 

If your focus is on recruiting monthly donors, make it known! Set “Monthly” as the default gift type and add a visual callout that says something like, “monthly giving powers our work!” or “monthly gifts make the biggest difference!” 

In this scenario, set your average monthly gift as the middle suggested amount, with at least two higher options. And make sure you’re repeatedly sharing what you can achieve together in 2026 with more monthly donors behind you. If you can set a goal for new monthly donors and share progress along the way, this social proof will help motivate more people to support your mission.

Whichever course you’ve chosen, consistency is the name of the game here. Make sure your campaign donation page matches the tone, look, and feel of the content that leads people there. It should all blend together and take the donor on one smooth ride!