The AI Shift: Why Donors Are Changing Their Minds

A year ago, when we first introduced Virtual Engagement Officers to the nonprofit sector, we saw cautious optimism and doubt about how donors would perceive a VEO. Development directors would lean in with interest, then pull back with questions: "Will donors really engage with AI?" "What if they feel like we're replacing the human touch?" The concern was completely understandable.

What immediately surprised us was the incredibly low opt-out rate, just .1%, which still holds true today with over 80,000 donors managed. But what's even more interesting, is how rapidly perceptions about AI have evolved over a single year.

We’re not just seeing acceptance, we’re seeing genuine enthusiasm and a sense of pride from donors that the organizations they support are using AI to advance their missions.

The shift didn’t just happen because of the thousands of positive engagements and experiences that donors are having with autonomous fundraising. It’s because of how quickly AI has become a part of our everyday lives (85% of people say their personal usage of AI has increased over the last year), and the broader understanding of how it’s changing the future. So much so that these early concerns about perception are often now swapped with widening eyes thinking about the vast possibilities of where to start and where to go next.

Perception is changing so rapidly, that we sometimes see it happen right before our eyes. Recently, an Innovation Partner’s VEO engaged with a supporter who initially expressed hesitation about interacting with AI. However, the donor came back a few minutes later, telling the VEO that he had changed his mind, because his children were fascinated by the concept of an autonomous fundraiser and wanted to test it out.

What we've seen across 80,000+ donors this year is a fundamental rewrite of expectations. Organizations have moved from "let's try this carefully" to "how did we ever manage portfolios without this?" The fear of donor backlash never materialized. Instead, donor retention improved. Response rates are increasing. And organizations gained the capacity to nurture relationships they simply couldn't maintain before.

Perhaps most telling: when nonprofits talk about their VEOs, they don't whisper it. They share it with pride. They're innovators who positioned their organizations for a strong future and expanded capacity. With the pace of AI development and the shift in perception in just one year, the entire question has flipped. It's no longer what donors think about using AI, but what they'll think about organizations that aren't.

---

Now is the time to expand your team with trusted digital labor.

Schedule a demo and see how VEOs can accelerate your fundraising strategy.