46 Real Nonprofit Email Receipt Subject Lines Made Better

In our most recent $5 Donor Communications Experiment, we examined how often and in what format 50 random nonprofits communicated to the donor after an online gift. Now, we want to dive deeper into the content of those touches.

Setting aside confirmation pages for a moment, email receipts are typically the first outbound communications pieces that a donor will receive from a nonprofit they donate to. The content of these emails, from subject line to message body, can set the stage for how the relationship between donor and organization will unfold.

46 out of 50 of the organizations we donated to immediately sent us an acknowledgement via email. Here are the subject lines of those 46 emails:

• Thank you for your gift
• Thank you for your donation!
• Donation Receipt from (ORGANIZATION)
• Your support to (ORGANIZATION)
• Donation Confirmation from (ORGANIZATION)
• Thank you for your donation to (ORGANIZATION)
• Thank You!
• Donation acknowledgement
• Thank you from (ORGANIZATION)
• Thank you for your gift to (ORGANIZATION)
• Thank you! Your donation of $5.00 will advance pediatric medicine and research
• Thank You!
• Donation to (ORGANIZATION)
• Thank you for your donation!
• Thank you for your donation!
• Welcome to the (ORGANIZATION) online community
• Thank you for supporting (ORGANIZATION)
• Thank you for your donation to (ORGANIZATION)
• Thank you for your donation!
• Receipt (ORGANIZATION)
• Thank you for your support!
• (ORGANIZATION) Customer Receipt/Purchase Confirmation
• Thank you for your recent gift!
• Thank you for supporting (ORGANIZATION)
• Your Order at (ORGANIZATION)
• Thank you for your donation
• Confirmation – Donation Received
• Thank you for your gift
• We Thank You for Your Donation (Confirmation & Tax Receipt)
• Thank You for Making a Donation to (ORGANIZATION)
• (ORGANIZATION) – Donation Confirmation
• Thank you for your generous support!
• Thank you for your donation!
• (ORGANIZATION) Customer Receipt/Purchase Confirmation
• Thank you for supporting (ORGANIZATION)!
• Thank you for your generosity!
• (ORGANIZATION) Would Like To Thank You!
• (ORGANIZATION) Customer Receipt/Purchase Confirmation
• Thank you for your gift to (ORGANIZATION)!
• Donation Receipt
• (ORGANIZATION) Thanks you for your support!
• Thank you for your donation!
• Thank you for supporting (ORGANIZATION)
• Thank You!
• Thank you for your donation
• Thank you for your Donation to (ORGANIZATION)!

Do these subject lines matter?

When it comes to marketing emails, like newsletters and appeals, a good subject line can make or break the campaign. Email subject lines are a book cover, and people definitely judge a book by its cover.

But with receipt emails, whether from a donation or purchase, you can probably get away with being a bit perfunctory. People expect email receipts following an online transaction, and will most likely open the email and save it for their records regardless of what the subject line says (so long as it clearly identifies itself).

However, an email subject line is a sneaky-good place to personalize and communicate impact to a donor, before they even read the body of the message, and do so in a fun and engaging way.

Let’s break down those 46 examples into a few categories (with duplicates and similars merged for the sake of levity):

The Bare-Minimums

• Donation Receipt
• Confirmation – Donation Received
• Donation to (ORGANIZATION)
• Donation acknowledgement
• Donation Receipt from (ORGANIZATION)

The problem: I’ve seen pharmacy receipts that are more enticing.

The Kinda Confusings

• Welcome to the (ORGANIZATION) online community
• (ORGANIZATION) Customer Receipt/Purchase Confirmation

The problem: the first doesn’t really look like a transaction receipt, and the second looks like it’s having an identity crisis.

The Basic Thank-Yous

• Thank you for your donation!
• Thank you for supporting (ORGANIZATION)
• Thank You!
• Thank you for your Donation to (ORGANIZATION)!
• Thank you for supporting (ORGANIZATION)!
• Thank you for your generosity!
• (ORGANIZATION) Would Like To Thank You!
• Thank you for your gift

The problem: Getting better, but still not communicating impact.

The Impacts

• Thank you! Your donation of $5.00 will advance pediatric medicine and research

The problem: Now we’re talking, but could it be more specific?

In general, most of these are very generic. Being generic is problematic for two reasons:

1. Someone just gave you money to support your mission. Why is your thank you so boring and unexcited?
2. Spammers try to make their emails look legit, and they’re getting better at it. “Thank you for your purchase” and “Thank you for your donation” are used often by spammers to make you open their fake emails. Being unique (while specific) will make your emails stand out from spammers.

So here are a few ideas for making your subject lines really pop:

• Don’t be afraid to write a long subject line: According to a study by Adestra released in 2012, subject lines of 150 characters in length outperformed those in the 50 – 60 character range.
• Ditch your organization name: because it probably already appears in the “From” field, so why waste any of your precious characters?
• Communicate impact: what did the donation do, specifically? Try “Your gift just fed a family of four for one week!”
• Get excited: this isn’t a thank you note to your aunt for the pair of socks she got you. Someone is helping to fund your mission!

So don’t sleep on your subject lines – they are the first and perhaps the best chance to delight your donors.

Have you seen any unique email receipts? What do yours look like? Let me know in the comments below!