About soft credits 🎖️
Soft credits are used to attribute donations to individual or company contacts who played a role in influencing transactions made to your organization (but did not directly contribute themselves). They can help you better understand a donor's level of influence and participation, track transactions credited to multiple contacts, and provide better visibility into fundraising efforts and referrals. Example use cases include:
Donor stewardship: A board member cultivates a relationship with a potential major donor. When the donor submits a transaction, the board member can be given a soft credit, as their efforts contributed to securing a solicited gift.
Household gifts: Mr. and Mrs. Butter donate to your organization together, but use Mrs. Butter's contact information for the transaction. Soft credits can be given to Mr. Butter so their joint gift is tracked accurately.
Matched donations: Mr. Butter donates $50 to your organization and a corporate sponsor matches his donation with a second $50 gift. The first $50 is a hard credit from Mr. Butter – actual funds from the donor. The matched $50 is a soft credit to Mr. Butter, as he influenced the second donation (but didn't contribute it himself).
Most instances will involve a single soft credit. However, you can also add soft credits for multiple contacts, whether they are individuals or companies.
Soft credit vs. peer-to-peer credit ⚖️
Soft credits are not attributed automatically, and cannot currently be added/credited by the donor themselves within the checkout flow. They must be manually added to existing transactions (hard credits) in your Givebutter dashboard. There isn't a public element to soft credits. This information is kept in your dashboard and is not visible to donors.
Peer-to-peer credits are tallied automatically as donors select team members to credit for their donations. The team member credit aspect is built into the public campaign, including a leaderboard. Peer-to-peer credits are usually selected by the donor themselves as they complete their transaction. Learn more about peer-to-peer fundraising →
Adding soft credits ➕
One or more soft credits can be added to any transaction in your Givebutter dashboard, including those paid using alternative methods (e.g., in-kind, stock, property). You can apply a soft credit to an existing individual or company contact or create a new contact in the soft credit interface.
Soft credits must be added manually in your Givebutter dashboard. A donor cannot add them within the checkout flow.
Head to your Transactions page and click on the transaction you'd like to add a soft credit to. A sidebar will appear on the right side of the page.
Scroll down to the bottom of the sidebar to locate a section called Funds & credit. Under the Soft credit heading, click Credit a contact.
First, select a contact for the soft credit. You'll have the option to select an existing contact or create a new contact within the soft credit interface. You can select either an individual or company contact.
Next, enter the amount of the soft credit. By default, the soft credit will auto-populate to the full transaction amount (before processing fees). You can also soft credit partial amounts by editing the pre-populated transaction amount.
Lastly, click Add a note to enter an optional, internal note to this soft credit.
Click Save to add the soft credit.
Multiple soft credits 👪
To add multiple soft credits to a single transaction, add your first soft credit, then click Credit a contact to add another existing or new contact as a separate soft credit.
You can continue to add additional soft credits in the same manner.
Soft credit amounts are not bound to the total transaction amount. This means it's possible to add soft credits for more than the full transaction amount.
Example: Pat O'Butter makes a $100 transaction to an organization as the result of an introduction from Mr. and Mrs. Butter. Mr. and Mrs. Butter can both be soft credited with $100 each because they influenced the transaction together. You can also soft credit them $50 each – it's up to your tracking preferences.
Editing soft credits ✏️
If you wish to edit an existing soft credit, you can do so from the transaction, in the same sidebar where you added the soft credit. Click the edit icon and make the necessary changes, including the credited contact, credit amount, and internal note. Click Save when you're done!
Deleting soft credits ❌
You can delete a soft credit at any time, without affecting the transaction. To remove a soft credit from a transaction, click the edit icon next to the soft credit you wish to delete.
Below the soft credit contact, amount, and internal note, click the Delete credit button.
Viewing soft credits 👀
There are two areas you can view soft credit information and totals.
Transactions page: For viewing a list of transactions that have attached soft credits (excluding soft credit amounts). Includes links to the contact profiles of the soft credits.
Contacts page: For viewing a list of contacts that have been soft credited by others, including soft credit totals for each contact.
For either option, you'll need to first ensure the Soft credits column is added to the data table. To add the column, click the table icon in the upper right corner of your Transactions or Contacts page and add Soft credits.
From the Transactions page
You can add a filter on your Transactions page to view transactions that have soft credits. Click More filters near the top of the page.
In the list of options, select Soft credit, located near the bottom of the list.
Check the box next to With soft credits to view all transactions with soft credits. (You can also filter by Without soft credits.) Click away or hit enter to apply the filter.
Only transactions that have associated soft credits will be shown. You can further sort or filter your transactions from here.
From the Contacts page
To see the total number of soft credits earned by each contact, click More filters and add the Total soft credits filter. To view contacts with any soft credits, you can enter "greater than $0".
Importing soft credits ⬆️
You can only import soft credits for transactions that already exist. You cannot create new transactions by importing soft credits.
You can import soft credit data to existing individual or company contacts (with an existing contact ID) or new contacts created using the import process (with first and last name, and no existing contact ID). You can import multiple soft credits to a single transaction, as long as they are for different contacts.
If you are importing transactions before importing corresponding soft credits, add an internal note ("soft credit") for the relevant lines in the transactions import. This will allow you to filter transactions for easier soft credit data input.
Example: You import a $100 transaction from Mr. Butter and add a "soft credit" internal note. After import, you can export your transactions, filter them by internal note, isolate the necessary transaction IDs, add your soft credit information, and then use that data for a soft credit import.
To import soft credits, go to your Settings page and click on the Imports tab.
Click the New Import button on the right side of the page, and in the dropdown list, select Soft credits.
You'll be given the option to Upload a file or Manually enter data. If uploading a file, your CSV spreadsheet should include the following columns:
Transaction ID (required)
Contact ID or First Name and Last Name (required)
Amount (required)
Email (optional)
Note (optional)
Select the correct file from your computer. Supported file types include .csv, .tsv, .xls, .xlsx, .xml, and .txtfile. After selecting your file, data will automatically be extracted. Click Import to import your data.
Confirm mapping for your data. If Givebutter assigned your Incoming Field data to a Destination Field that isn't a match, click the dropdown arrow to assign your column to a different Givebutter field/attribute.
When you're done matching the data fields, click Continue in the upper right corner, and click Submit to import your transactions. The importer will begin processing.
You'll be notified by email when your import is complete, and the import will appear as Completed in your dashboard.
If any import records have failed, they will be indicated in the import log, along with the reason for failure. You'll have the option to download failed records in order to correct them.
FAQ 🤔
Can I credit more than one individual or company contact using soft credits?
Yes – you can add multiple contacts to a single transaction using soft credits.
Can I use soft credits to credit a partial amount to another contact?
Yes – when adding a soft credit, the interface will default to crediting for the full amount of the transaction (before processing fees). If you would like to credit part of a donation instead of the full amount, you can enter a custom amount instead.
What's the difference between soft credits and in-kind donations?
Soft credits are a way to credit those whose influence resulted in a processed transaction, even if they didn't make the contribution themselves. In-kind donations allow you to track actual donations of goods or services instead of transactions with a direct monetary value. In-kind donations can be logged by selecting "in-kind" as the payment method when entering a transaction manually. We also support Stock, Property, and Other.
Are soft credits a free feature?
Yes – soft credits are available to all Givebutter users for free.
Can you add a soft credit without an existing transaction?
No – soft credits must be added to an existing transaction on your account, also known as a "hard credit".