Building a Stronger Fundraising Community—Together
At ABD Direct, we believe the strength of our fundraising community lies in collaboration — in sharing ideas, exploring new strategies, and “lifting all boats” in the pursuit of successful fundraising campaigns. This October, our team had the privilege of contributing to that mission in a variety of ways: hosting conversations that drive innovation, celebrating creative excellence with our clients, and sharing insights that help nonprofits thrive.
Our people are the heart of everything we do. Their commitment to excellence, curiosity, and community engagement continues to shape the future of direct response fundraising. We’re proud to highlight their recent contributions and the inspiring work happening across the nonprofit landscape.
Here’s a quick round-up of our October events:
10/3: Awardees, DMAW MAXI Awards
Members of ABD Direct were honored to attend this year’s DMAW MAXI Awards and excited to join our clients Reproductive Freedom for All and Defenders of Wildlife in receiving recognition for our work together.
This year we won Gold in the Special Appeal category for Reproductive Freedom for All’s Post-Election Appeal, a new package that focused on fighting the Trump administration’s assault on reproductive rights.
We took home the Silver award for Defenders of Wildlife’s Wolf Awareness Week campaign, a coordinated, cross-channel effort designed to move people from initial awareness to targeted asks and then hard-hitting, emotive content, to create a cohesive campaign experience across ads, emails, and P2P texts.
To learn more about ABD Direct’s industry awards, visit our page here.
10/3: Hosts, TNPA ADRFCO Council Roundtable
ABD Direct Partner, Cathy Finney, and Senior Account Director, Claire Recalde, hosted The Nonprofit Alliance’s ADRFCO Council Agency & Partner Roundtable at our Washington, DC office. Agency and nonprofit leaders discussed the current fundraising landscape — from inflation and data privacy concerns to the continued strength of direct mail and growth of Donor Advised Fund giving. Despite economic uncertainty, optimism remains strong as organizations “stay the course” into 2026.
10/8: Facilitators, DMFA Webinar
As a DMFA Mid-Level Giving Committee member, our own VP of Decision Science and Strategy, Amy Bobrick, facilitated this annual webinar with Ryan Carpenter of Allegiance + Pursuant Group to share highlights and trends from the Mid-Level Giving Benchmark Summit held earlier in the year. The webinar also featured Gloria Goosby from The Obama Foundation presenting about the exciting work we’ve done together advancing the Friends of The Obama Foundation, their mid-level program.
10/16: Presenters, Engaging Networks’ ENCC 2025
ABD digital experts Matt Medeiros and Ashley Allison partnered with Bridget Panas of Defenders of Wildlife to present a case study on strengthening and expanding the reach of Defenders’ email fundraising program and using it as a foundation for growing the organization’s reach across multiple channels, including digital ads, search, and peer-to-peer texting. Additionally, Engaging Networks presented an exciting 2026 development roadmap. There are some new features that we’re eager to test for clients, including the new cart abandonment feature and improvements to their automation tools.
To learn more, visit this link to watch the full presentation.
10/23: Presenters, DMFA Webinar
Co-hosting with MissionWired, our VP of Digital Marketing, Ben Deutsch, shared ABD Direct’s experience helping nonprofits navigate digital co-ops as a scalable, strategic email lead generation channel. Ben was joined in this presentation by our client partner, Defenders of Wildlife. We were particularly excited about a recent Defenders’ test result that demonstrated a shorter, one-email welcome series outperformed a four-email welcome series, challenging conventional thinking around the duration of onboarding email series for new leads.
It was a busy month, and we loved connecting, sharing ideas, and celebrating great work with our partners and industry peers!
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