WaterAid Supporter Research Findings

94% of supporters are committed to supporting WaterAid for the foreseeable future.

Credit: WaterAid

Thank you to all of you who took the time to respond to our recent supporter research. We greatly appreciate the feedback that you gave us, and wanted to take this opportunity to share our findings with you. This is the first such research that WaterAid has commissioned. 

This exercise has been very timely. As we approach times of economic uncertainty it is incredibly valuable that we understand more about the levels of commitment to WaterAid amongst those members of the public on whose generous support we are so dependent.

Over 4,000 participated

First of all we spoke to small groups of supporters to understand their general feelings, not just about WaterAid, but about other charities that they supported. 

As well as giving us valuable insights into what the public expect of the charities that they support, these research groups also helped us to develop a research questionnaire using the types of language that our supporters use themselves when they think about charities.

94% of supporters trust that their donations are used effectively

We sent out over 30,000 questionnaires by both post and email to a sample of our supporters and received back over 4,000, which gives us high levels of confidence in our findings.

We also now know that, if we wish to repeat this exercise in the future, we can simply rely on the relatively inexpensive method of just sending out questionnaires by email to give us accurate findings.

The following are the key conclusions from nfpSynergy, the research specialists who helped us undertake this exercise.

Key findings

• Overall this is a success story for WaterAid. There is much validation of WaterAid's approach to engaging with supporters.
• The findings from both the qualitative and quantitative research suggest that WaterAid is in a strong position and highly regarded by its supporters.
• The clarity of a single, indisputably important issue emerges as one of WaterAid's greatest strengths – A belief that water and sanitation are basic human rights is the main reason respondents cite for supporting WaterAid.
• Trust and confidence in WaterAid are very high – 94% of supporters trust that their donations are used effectively.
• Supporters are also confident that their support is important to WaterAid and that their donations are having an impact.
• WaterAid performs very well in the area of supporter care, particularly in the highly important areas of appreciating all donations and not asking supporters to increase their donations too often.
• This high performance in areas related to drivers of satisfaction is reflected by exceptionally high levels of commitment – 94% of supporters are committed to supporting WaterAid for the foreseeable future.

The results showed very few significant differences between supporter types, suggesting a consistency of experience with WaterAid irrespective of how people first came into contact with us and regardless of how they support us.

Brian Garvey, director of nfpSynergy, stated, "We conduct a lot of research amongst charities and, although supporter trust and confidence always feature as important issues, the levels that we have seen for WaterAid are remarkable."

We will work hard to maintain these levels of support

Our supporters have levels of trust and confidence in the organisation which are humbling and which place a huge responsibility on all of us to continue to deliver to the expectations of our supporters.

People will continue to need reassurance that we use their donations effectively and efficiently. This is the top concern of donors to all charities.

Our supporters are happy to receive information about our work, but need to be confident that the vast proportion of their donations goes to our work. Their priority, like ours, is to see safe water, sanitation and hygiene education reaching those whose lives are currently blighted because of their lack of access to these fundamentals of life.

In the light of this research we will be reviewing our communications with you, our supporters, including the way we can use the internet to communicate more efficiently with those who are happy to receive communications in this way.

So we would like to say a big 'thank you' to all of our supporters who took part in this research. We will strive to continue to merit your support.