What the smartest email teams are acting on in 2026

The inbox isn't what it was a year ago.

Gmail started cracking down on non-compliant emails. 

Donor retention keeps sliding. 

SMS is no longer a side channel. 

AI went from novelty to necessity, and most organizations still haven't built a policy around it.

If your 2026 email strategy looks like your 2025 strategy, you're already behind.

Here are six shifts to build into your planning now, before the year gets away from you:

1. The deliverability reckoning is here
You probably sorted out your SPF, DKIM, and DMARC back in 2024 when Gmail and Yahoo first started enforcing authentication requirements.

But as of November 2025, Gmail began cracking down on non-compliant messages, and Microsoft began enforcing similar requirements earlier in the year.

Engagement matters. 

Inbox providers are paying closer attention to whether people actually open and click. If you're blasting your full list every time, you're training the algorithms to treat you as noise.

The move: When's the last time you suppressed or removed unengaged subscribers? If the answer is "never" or "I'm not sure," that's your Q1 project.

2. Retention pressure is reshaping email's job
The Q2 2025 Fundraising Effectiveness Project report shows donor retention at 26.3%, down slightly from the year before. New donor retention sits around 19%. 

But repeat donors? They retain at nearly 70%.

The gap between those numbers is the whole game. And email is where you close it.

The organizations that retain donors are sending emails that make donors feel like partners: thank-yous that reference the specific gift and what it made possible. Impact updates that show real results, not just program descriptions. Opportunities to take action.

The move: Look at the emails a first-time donor receives in their first 30 days. 

Do they hear what their gift made possible? Do they understand your mission? Do they feel appreciated? 

If your early emails are just more asks without intention, your retention may suffer.

3. SMS isn't a side channel anymore
Email now drives about 11% of online nonprofit revenue, down from 14% the year before.

Meanwhile, SMS lists grew by 8%.

The story here isn't that SMS is replacing email. It's that multichannel is winning. Feathr's 2025 State of Nonprofit Marketing found that campaigns using three or more channels significantly outperform single-channel efforts on both response rate and ROI.

The organizations getting this right aren't running email and SMS as separate programs. 

They're coordinating them. Texts boost email open rates. Emails drive SMS opt-ins. It works both ways!

The move: If your SMS program lives in a different silo than your email program, 2026 is the year to fix that. Start with one integrated campaign and build from there.

4. AI adoption outpacing AI policy
I know, I know. We have to talk about AI.

The usage numbers are clear: 82% of nonprofits are now using AI informally, mostly for drafting donor emails and brainstorming subject lines.

But the governance hasn't kept up. Only 15% of nonprofits disclose their AI use. And 69% of nonprofit marketers using generative AI haven't received any formal training.

The 2026 question isn't whether your team uses AI. It's whether you've built guardrails before something goes sideways. 

The move: If you don't have a written AI policy for your communications team, draft one this quarter. It doesn't need to be elaborate. It just needs to exist.

5. Open rates are finally losing their grip
Apple’s Mail Privacy Protection has been muddying open rate data for years. And yet 15% of email marketers still treat open rates as their primary measure of success.

Thankfully, that number is dropping and smart emailers are moving toward click-through rates, click-to-open rates, and deliverability metrics that actually reflect whether people are engaging.

Unfortunately, most boards and leadership teams still ask the most about open rates. Changing that conversation takes time and repetition.

The move: Start building the case for the metrics that matter now. 

When leadership asks about open rates, show them why those other numbers tell a clearer story.

6. Automation is becoming a powerful retention engine
Staff capacity is stretched. Donor fatigue is real. More emails don’t always equal more giving.

But the answer isn't sending less, either. It's sending smarter: welcome series, lapsed donor re-engagement, recurring gift upgrade prompts, and abandoned donation cart follow-ups. 

The sophistication is in the segmentation. 

The organizations winning aren't blasting everyone with the same cadence. They're building behavior-triggered journeys that feel personal without requiring someone to hit send every time.

The move: Identify one automation gap in your current program. Maybe it’s a lapsed donor sequence that doesn't exist, or a sustainer upgrade prompt you've been meaning to build. 

The bottom line
The inbox is getting harder to reach, and the rules for staying there just got stricter. 

But the programs that win in 2026 will treat email as part of a coordinated strategy, not a standalone broadcast tool.

The good news: none of this requires a massive budget or a new platform. It requires focus, smarter automation, and a willingness to update your playbook.

Check our events list for more or reply to this email to submit one for consideration.

'Til next time!
Sara

P.S. We want to hear about your year-end fundraising wins! Reply directly to this email if you’re interested in sharing tactics or tests that worked with our readers.