Going Global: 5 Technical Considerations for Your Charity

Expanding your charity into new locations is a hot topic at the moment.

As organisations look for new markets to increase fundraising or to expand their presence, it's clearly on an upward trend.

According to the GivingTuesday State of Generosity 2024-2025 report, global philanthropy now reaches $2.3 trillion worldwide, with $1.5 trillion attributed to individual giving. In the United States alone, total charitable giving hit a record $592.5 billion in 2024, a 6.3% increase from 2023, and the first time in three years that giving outpaced inflation (Giving USA 2025).

Across Europe, the philanthropic landscape is similarly expansive. An estimated £87.5 billion is donated across Europe annually, with approximately 2.8 million charitable organisations operating across EU countries, backed by over 180,000 foundations, most of which have emerged in the last 20 years. In the UK specifically, people gave £14 billion to charity in 2025. (CAF UK Giving Report 2026)

As a result, UK-based charities are registering entities in locations like the US, Canada, or Europe as part of their growth strategy. In fact, at N3O, we regularly speak with non-UK charities seeking advice on setting up new fundraising entities here in Britain.

With this in mind, apart from legally registering the charity, opening a local bank account, and choosing a suitable governance model, what technical considerations are needed?

1. Ensure a Strong Foundation From the Get-Go

If fundraising in a new location, a priority is to ensure you have the relevant systems and infrastructure to manage the data collected. This is important to ensure you comply with local laws and regulations (e.g., GDPR), but also to maximise your fundraising efforts.

It is very likely that charities will hold physical fundraising events in key locations, visit high-net-worth donors, and generally establish a grass-roots presence.

Having a system ready means the charity in the first 3 months of fundraising can:

• Ensure all donors and contact details are recorded from every interaction (event, website visit, HNW-donor, etc).
• Send immediate thank-you letters to all contacts or gift certificates to your £500+ donors.
• Get immediate visibility on what projects you've raised for. Be quick off the mark when allocating projects abroad.
• Distribute sponsorship packs for regular donors, hitting their email minutes after they have donated.

Without a system, donor interactions can be haphazard and growth sluggish, which can impact the small window of opportunity with new donors. This is particularly consequential given that, according to the Fundraising Effectiveness Project's 2025 data, only 19% of first-time donors return to give again, making that initial engagement and follow-up critical.

From the beginning, therefore, it is advised that new entities have:

1. At least one individual as an administrator
2. A robust/centralised CRM to collect and analyse key data.

In our experience, this will help charities comply with local rules and regulations whilst also fuelling growth.

2. Consider Your Payment Gateways

Your CRM must be able to connect with the payment gateways used in each market, because without that integration, collecting donations smoothly simply isn't possible. .

The payments landscape has evolved significantly. While Stripe remains widely used globally, the way donors prefer to pay has changed considerably. 52% of all nonprofit website visits in 2025 came from smartphones, meaning mobile-optimised payment flows are no longer optional. Digital wallets are now mainstream: “79% PayPal was the most widely-used alternative payment method of nonprofits made this option available on donation pages. Google Pay (58%), Apple Pay (57%), and Venmo (44%) were also common." (M+R Benchmarks 2026)

Beyond that, regional gateway requirements remain just as relevant as ever. In Canada, an Opayo gateway cannot be opened, while in France or Germany, local gateways may need to be integrated. Ensuring you have a CRM provider with the flexibility to cater for and integrate these different gateways is essential.

One additional trend worth planning for: 27% of charitable revenue collected online in 2025 came from monthly subscriptions, a sign that donors increasingly prefer a recurring giving model. Your payment infrastructure needs to handle this smoothly across different markets and currencies. (M+R Benchmarks 2026)

3. Utilise an Out-of-the-Box Charity-Centric CRM

Whether an organisation has just started or has surpassed a £8 million yearly income, both need relatively the same core functionality to operate efficiently.

It's important to source a CRM that can provide a robust system for collecting donations, manage your water-well programmes and handle donor communication effectively in any new market.

We don't advise trying a custom build in a new market; costs can spiral very quickly. Ideally, a charity-focused CRM can be up and running in a new location at a fraction of the cost of a custom build. Examples include our own Engage CRM at N3O or Donorfy's offering.

The commercial logic is straightforward: onboarding costs will be lower with no data to migrate, and as the number of users and income will be initially modest, this directly reduces the monthly subscription cost. Only if fundraising begins to flourish and grow would monthly subscription fees increase. Explore our pricing based on your organisation’s income here.

4. Uniformity Is Important as You Expand

For CEOs and senior management, uniformity is a critical element during expansion. From a governance and reporting perspective, it is much safer to have similar systems and processes followed globally.

A classic example is using the same website platform and CRM integration infrastructure across different locations. If you use different content management systems (WordPress for the UK website and Umbraco for the German website), it can quickly become difficult for your IT support team to manage bugs and reconcile reporting discrepancies.

Consistent systems strengthen your organisational operating model, staff use the same tools, report on the same income metrics, and can train teams internally. Key elements to consider:

• Multi-currency: Ensure your systems are multi-currency to report in local and other currencies as necessary.
• Avoid one system for all countries: Some organisations may have registered entities in multiple countries but feed all donor data into one system. We advise against this. It is best to stand up separate, low-cost CRMs for each registered entity and manage them independently. They would use the same infrastructure (CMS, CRM, etc.), but as independent subscriptions.
• Data security and compliance: Nearly 68% of donors say it is essential (9 or 10 out of 10) to trust a charity before donating (Give.org Donor Trust Report 2026). Consistent, well-governed systems across all entities are your best protection, reputationally and legally.

We have found from experience that if done well from the outset, organisations also avoid a number of compliance issues.

5. Supplement With Training and Processes

Technology alone is not the silver bullet. For organisations that want to ensure synergy with the 'parent' HQ, or simply transfer good practice to an independent entity, investment in process workflows and training is key.

Ensure you establish the following from the HQ office:

1. Pre-defined MOUs and Funding agreements.
2. TORs between the HQ and the new entity (e.g., clear nature of the relationship).
3. Process flows for key activities: starting new projects, sending/receiving funds, co-funding a project, etc.
4. The delegation of authority (DOA), if applicable.
5. If it's a large entity, RACI matrices help to solidify roles and responsibilities.

Once the above is formulated, all relevant team members should be trained. Ideally, each entity should have 1-2 CRM champions who are comfortable with most admin functions of the system. They will also act as trainers for new staff members and work closely with the HQ.

Regular bi-monthly meetings should take place between entities, with minutes and action points recorded.

One final note worth highlighting: according to the Charity Digital Skills Report 2025, 35% of charities rate themselves as poor at digital fundraising, and leadership gaps are a key driver, with 28% reporting their boards have poor digital skills and 1 in 5 CEOs (21%) falling into the same category. The good news is that this is improving, down from 41% the previous year, but the gap remains wide enough that structured training and internal knowledge transfer are still among your strongest assets as you scale. 

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At N3O we are helping a number of charities expand their global presence. This accelerates fundraising and establish a presence generating new fundraising opportunities.

Feel free to get in touch at https://n3o.ltd/contact-us/ and hear how we can help your organisation.

Alternatively, you can ring us on +44 333 0165 225.

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