Convio has provided an excellent ‘must read’ review of 2010 online fundraising stats and trends. Heaps of useful benchmarking data here for online fundraisers.

The data is drawn from the nearly 600 nonprofits that used the Convio Online Marketing platform in 2009 and 2010. Collectively, these groups raised $1.15 billion online in 2010 and have over 171 million email addresses.

Just a few teasers …

• Online giving up 40% in 2010 over 2009 … a product both of more gifts and higher average gifts (median up from $83.44 to $91.94);
• Median growth rate in online giving was 20%, with 79% of organizations raising more money in 2010 than 2009; and,
• Click-through rates on fundraising appeals was 1.76%, with response rates at 0.16%.

But plenty more for you to analyze, with data organized by 16 nonprofit subgroups, or verticals. This includes a cross-vertical group of ‘National Nonprofit Mailers’ — organizations with more than 250,000 online constituents.

I was struck, however, by some of the stats that, while not fundraising-specific today, could have important impact on future online fundraising growth.

Looking at the 180 organizations whose websites they host, Convio notes that web traffic grew at a snail’s pace, 2%, for 2010 (a second consecutive year of single-digit growth). This downward trend was true for almost all verticals.

Website registrations (i.e., converting visitors to email files) were also 2%, down from the previous year’s 2.2%. Keeping in mind that many visitors could be donors who have previously registered, this declining rate is still worrisome, especially in the context of lower traffic. These rates used to be as ‘high’ as 3.5%.

Couple these stats with Convio’s observation:

“Website traffic is, for most nonprofit organizations, the best source for growing their email files. In the seminal research about the online behavior of mid-level and major donors, The Wired Wealthy Study, we learned that 49 percent of online mid-level and major donors will always visit a nonprofit’s website before making a first-time gift online or offline.”

Convio notes that some traditional web traffic might be siphoned off by groups’ social network sites, or by donors relying more on email contact alone (including via mobile).

I hope that positive spin is true. But I’d be mighty worried if my nonprofit showed sinking web traffic and registrations. Overall, email files did grow on average by 22%, but a lot of this was driven by the Haiti earthquake (the Disaster vertical grew by 31%).

Personally, I’d treat growth (or not) in email file as one of the most important fundraising metrics for my nonprofit. For Convio’s clients, the average dollars raised online per usable email address across all verticals is $12.48, compared to $11.68 in 2009. Plus, all you integrated marketers out there know that many email donors are great direct mail donors too!

In any event, Convio has done online fundraisers a terrific service with this 2010 benchmark report (as well as online advocacy and communications managers … there’s plenty of data for you too). Thanks folks!

Tom