Set up partner tiers

Partner tiers turn "people who give monthly" into a program with names, levels and thank-yous. DonorFinch places every donor in a tier automatically from what they give, keeps it current as gifts come and go, and can send each new partner a welcome email, a digital download or something in the mail.

Needs Admin or Owner to set up. Anyone with a Staff role sees tiers on donor records.

Before you start

Decide three things:

• The levels. Three or four is plenty. Give them warm names ("Friend", "Sustainer", "Champion") rather than dollar amounts; the amounts can change later without renaming anything.
• How giving is measured. Most organizations use monthly giving: a $25/month plan is $25, a $300/year plan counts as $25. If many of your supporters give one larger gift a year, choose total giving over the last 12 months, divided by 12, or whichever is higher to include both kinds.
• What each level gets. Keep it light at first. A welcome email costs nothing; a mug has to be bought, packed and posted.

Steps

1. Open Settings → Partners.
2. Under How tiers are measured, pick the basis (monthly giving, trailing 12 months, or whichever is higher). Set a grace period for failed payments: a partner whose card fails keeps their tier for that many days while they update it.
3. Click Add a tier. Enter the name, a short donor-facing description ("Keeps the lights on at our after-school program"), a color for the badge, and the minimum monthly amount. Leave the maximum blank on your top tier. The count of donors who would fall into the tier updates as you type.
4. Repeat for each level. Drag to reorder if needed; the order is how they appear on forms and in the donor portal.
5. Tick Show this tier to donors on the tiers you want donors to see (on donation forms and in their portal). An internal "Major donor" level can stay hidden.
6. Save. Every donor is placed in a tier immediately; from then on tiers update whenever a gift succeeds, a recurring plan changes, or a payment fails, and once a night as a catch-all.

Add benefits to a tier

Open a tier's Benefits section and click Add benefit. The kinds:

• Welcome email: a message from one of your email templates (or the built-in default) when a donor enters the tier.
• Welcome letter: a printed letter that lands in your shipping queue as a PDF, ready for an envelope.
• Digital download: an e-book, audio file or video from your file library, delivered as an expiring link. See Digital gifts.
• Physical gift: a mug, a print, a calendar. Creates an item in the shipping queue with the donor's address. See Printing shipping labels.
• Recognition and Note: a reminder to your team (donor wall listing, a personal call), fulfilled by hand.

Each benefit fires once per donor when they enter the tier (or once a year on their anniversary, if you choose that trigger). Moving up a tier earns the new tier's benefits; moving down never takes anything away.

Pinning a tier by hand

On a donor's page, Pin to tier places someone in a level regardless of their giving, for a board member, a major donor who gives through a foundation, or a volunteer you want to honor. Pinned donors keep that tier until you unpin them. Pinning counts as entering the tier, so welcome benefits are sent unless you untick that option.

Using tiers on your donation form

In the form builder's Amounts & frequency tab, tick Use partner tiers as the preset buttons. Each public tier becomes a button at its monthly minimum, with its name and description, and Monthly is pre-selected. Tiers with a $0 minimum can't be a button and are skipped.

Where tiers show up

• A badge on the donor list and donor page, with a filter by tier and a history of every change.
• On the hosted thank-you page and the receipt email ("You're now a Champion partner") when Mention the partner's tier on receipts is on in Settings → Partners.
• In the donor portal: tier, since when, benefits with download links, and shipments with tracking.
• Reports: Partners by tier, Tier changes and Gifts waiting to ship.