How nonprofits can improve AI visibility is quickly becoming a fundraising and revenue question—not merely a marketing concern. As donors increasingly use AI search tools and workplace-giving platforms to decide which organizations to support, nonprofits must ensure their mission, impact, financial credibility, and organizational information can be found and understood.

Catherine LaCour, CEO and Executive Director of the Blackbaud Giving Fund, joins The Nonprofit Show to explain how donor discovery is changing and what nonprofit leaders should do now.

The Blackbaud Giving Fund has distributed nearly $3 billion since 2020 to approximately 300,000 nonprofit organizations worldwide. That experience gives Catherine a broad view of how donors, companies, technology platforms, and nonprofits are connecting.

“If AI cannot find clear and accurate information about the nonprofit organization, then the donor’s not going to find it either,” Catherine explains.

Nonprofit AI search optimization begins with the fundamentals: clear language, current organizational information, credible impact reporting, and consistency across websites, social channels, workplace-giving profiles, and other digital platforms. Catherine recommends writing so that a middle-school student can quickly understand who the organization serves, what it does, and what results it produces.

The conversation also explores AI strategies for nonprofit fundraising. AI can analyze donor behavior, assist with segmentation, strengthen personalization, draft stewardship communications, and reduce administrative work. But Catherine cautions organizations to treat AI like an intern: it can produce a useful first draft, but human review remains essential.

Workplace giving represents another major opportunity. Approximately 27 million donors participate in workplace programs, contributing about $5 billion in 2023. Nonprofits that fail to claim, complete, and update their profiles may be missing donors who are already motivated to give.

Catherine’s advice is direct: start simple, but start now. Test what AI says about your organization, correct information gaps, clean your donor data, and choose one internal task where AI can create immediate capacity.

Key Takeaways:

AI visibility should become an ongoing organizational process, similar to donor stewardship.

Mission, impact, leadership, and program information must remain consistent across every digital channel.

Success stories and impact reports help AI systems understand and prioritize an organization.

Clean donor data is essential for accurate segmentation, personalization, and fundraising analysis.

Completed workplace-giving profiles can unlock employee donations, matching gifts, and recurring payroll contributions.

Use AI to reduce administrative work while preserving human oversight and donor relationships.

 

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