State of the sector report 2024 – five key income stats to whet your appetite

If you know it, you love it… and you’ve probably been waiting for it.

If you’re new to our state of the sector reports, then welcome to your one-stop-shop for up-to-date charity sector stats.

These reports come out twice a year and look at the key fundraising trends in the last six months to a year.

Our upcoming annual report will consider trends in income, recruitment and supporter engagement and we’ll do a deeper dive into measures, such as lifetime value, cross-sell and retention. We’ll also look at changes in average gifts and the types of supporters being recruited.

We get this wealth of information from our InsightHub benchmarking reports. They’re made up of raw CRM data from a range of UK-based charities. The data is transformed and standardised, allowing us to aggregate fundraising KPIs up to sector level, illustrating the overall health and status of the charity sector.

InsightHub benchmarks

The benchmarks taken from InsightHub and included in our state of the sector reports can help you:

• Understand your own fundraising performance
• Make better informed decisions
• See how your products and channels compare against real market data
• Spot trends in the not-for-profit space
• Quantify your results against the rest of the charity sector

State of the sector report 2024

The latest report is almost ready, but until then here are five income related takeaways to whet your appetite:

1. Overall income increases by 9%

Overall charity income increased by 9% (including legacy giving) during 2023 compared to 2022, during which there was zero increase on 2021 performance. A fantastic result for the sector following some difficult times to navigate, such as through the COVID-19 pandemic and cost-of-living crisis.

2. Regular giving increases by 3%

Regular giving increased by 3% during 2023, adding to the 4% increase during 2022. Although regular giving retention increased too, the rate of this increase has slowed down compared to the previous year.

3. In memory giving increases by 18%

In memory giving increased by 18% during 2023 and this is a really positive stat after a dip in 2022. It’s great to see more people are honouring their loved ones by supporting a cause that meant something to them.

4. High-value giving increases by 19%

Similarly to 2022, there was a significant increase in income from high-value giving during 2023, indicating charities are stewarding high-value givers increasingly well.

5. One-off cash donations drops by 13%

Conversely to the rise in overall income, cash donations dropped by 13% in 2023 compared to 2022. However, 2022 set a high bar with hugely successful fundraising campaigns for humanitarian aid during the Ukraine war.

State of the sector 2024 webinar

If you can’t wait to get your hands on the full analysis, register for our state of the sector 2024 webinar where live attendees will get an exclusive first-look at the report AND new Wood for Trees branding!

Taking place at 11am-12pm (BST) 30th April 2024, Wood for Trees’ consultant analyst Rob Dyer will begin the webinar by taking you through the annual state of the sector report highlights. A panel discussion will then follow, led by J Cromack, chief growth officer at Salocin Group.

J will discuss what this data analysis means for the not-for-profit sector and charity ‘must-dos’ as a result, with Rob alongside:

• Janet Snedden, principal consultant at Edit
• Phoebe Cooper, senior marketing executive – donor development at RSPCA
• Laure Rigal, director of projects, data and insight at Heart Research UK
• Anna Frodsham, head of engagement, marketing and communications at Pancreatic Cancer UK

Register for the webinar here.

Catch-up on previous Wood for Trees webinars here.