NAICS 81331Industry · 5-digitlocal market

Social advocacy organizations

SoftwareDonor Management & Online Fundraising — the Giving Layer Every Cause Buys 813

This industry comprises establishments primarily engaged in promoting a particular social or political cause intended to benefit a broad or specific constituency. Organizations of this type may also solicit contributions or sell memberships to support their activities. — Statistics Canada, NAICS 2022A

Establishments · CanadaA: 2,688
Under 10 employeesA: 67%
Establishments · USA: 20,255
Employment · USA: 204,147
Payroll · USA: $12.8B

Size and shape

How many businesses there are and how small they are. Fragmentation is the first thing an entrant — or anyone selling software into this industry — needs to know, and it is one of the few things that is actually measured.

Canadian establishments by number of employeesA

1–41,11541%

5–968025%

10–1947518%

20–4930411%

50–99793%

100–199241%

200–499110%

500+0—

Of 2,688 Canadian establishments with employees, 67% have fewer than ten — mostly small operators.

Where they areA

Quebec1,10541%

Ontario66725%

British Columbia28911%

Alberta2238%

Largest four provinces by establishment count. Establishments with employees only — sole operators with no payroll are not in this table, so in trades and personal services the true number of businesses is higher.

How many new establishments are still tradingA

Other Services (except Public Administration), US · opened 2020

85.2%

1 year

71.8%

3 years

60%

5 years

42.1%

10 years

opened 2015

Measured, not forecast: the share of US establishments opening in one year that were still active later. It counts good operators and bad ones together, which is exactly why it is the honest answer to “what are the odds”. It is for the whole sector rather than this market, and the ten-year figure comes from an older cohort because no younger one has reached ten years.

How businesses here compete

The structural profile of subsector 813, which every industry beneath it inherits. This is analyst judgment from how the subsector is organised — not research into this industry, and not a measurement.

local competitionlow capitalUNVERIFIEDinherited from 813 Religious, grant-making, civic, and professional and similar organizations

Non-profit membership bodies. They are customers rather than entry markets; association management and fundraising services are the businesses built around them.

Who sets the price: Members and donors, voluntarily.
The software it runs on: Membership, donor and congregation management.

Market screens and studies

Market-entry records filed along this branch of the hierarchy. A record at or beneath this code is about this industry; one above it is about something wider that contains it.

Screened one level up. Nothing is filed at this exact code; the screen for 8133 Social advocacy organizations covers it.

Operating businessScreenedfiled at 8133

Social Advocacy OrganizationExecution decides

binding constraint: willingness to pay

An advocacy organisation exists to change a policy or a public attitude, and is funded by people who want that outcome — members, donors and foundations. There is no customer and no price: nobody buys advocacy, they give to it. That makes this a buyer of services rather than a market to enter, and the record exists to say so. The field is sizeable — 2,688 Canadian establishments, 67% with fewer than ten employees [A], and 20,255 in the US employing 204,147 on a payroll of about $62,500 each [A], noticeably higher than the civic and social clubs at 8134 because advocacy employs professional policy, legal and communications staff. What an entrant can sell to it is what those staff use: fundraising and donor software (8132), association management (8139), campaign and digital services. Both of those records found the same constraint from the other side — a budget set once a year by a board, out of money that was given rather than earned. An organisation funded by conviction is a loyal client and a poor one at the same time.

NAICS 81334 vendors named10 sourced figuresOpen →

Software serving this industry

The vertical software markets filed along the same branch — who sells to these businesses and who they would have to displace — and then the generic categories every business buys whatever it does.

Sold across the wider branch

Cross-industry softwareScreenedfiled at 813 Religious, grant-making, civic, and professional and similar organizations

Donor Management & Online Fundraising — the Giving Layer Every Cause BuysOne thing must be true

binding constraint: willingness to pay

Incumbent Blackbaud (NASDAQ: BLKB) — Raiser's Edge NXT, Blackbaud Integrated Payments, JustGiving

The bottom of this market is priced at zero, and the top is held by a 40-year system of record that earns as much on the money moving through it as on the licence. Blackbaud reported FY2025 revenue of $1,128.4M, of which $384.3M was transactional — about 55% of that donation processing and 20% JustGiving consumer giving — and its Raiser's Edge NXT is the donor CRM a hospital foundation, a university and an arts charity all run [A]. The 2020 ransomware breach did not dislodge it: it paid a $3.0M SEC penalty, $49.5M to 49 states and DC, about $6.8M to California and took an FTC order, and revenue kept growing [A]. Underneath it, private equity has rolled up the mid-market — Apax's Bonterra (EveryAction, Network for Good, Social Solutions, CyberGrants; OneCause added October 2025) and JMI- and Warburg-backed Bloomerang (Kindful 2021, Qgiv 2024, 23,000 clients) [B]. At the small end the price has gone: Zeffy says it is 100% free, funded by optional donor contributions; Givebutter charges 0% platform fee with tips on, 3% with them off; Donorbox has a free plan at 2.95–3.95% [C, vendor]. A new entrant sells against free forms below and against the gift history above. The tax receipt is the hook that keeps both ends sticky — IRS acknowledgements for gifts of $250 or more, quid-pro-quo disclosures above $75, and CRA official receipts with serial and registration numbers [A]. This record is the cross-industry layer; the vertical records sit beside it — nonprofit fundraising at 8132, university advancement at 611310, churches at 8131, associations at 8139 and advocacy groups at 8133. 813 is the navigation anchor: hospital foundations, public media and political campaigns buy the same software from outside it.

NAICS 81316 vendors named8 sourced figuresOpen →

And what every business buys · 33 generic categories

Sold to every industry rather than this one, so they are filed against the software industry's own code. The same few vendors recur across most of them.

Who works here

The occupations employed in Other services (except public administration), most concentrated in it first. The share is measured against the whole sector, not this industry — the published cross-tabulation stops there.

Concentrated in this sectorA

Hairstylists and estheticians One industry 88.3%

Support occupations in personal services Mostly one sector 64.5%

Automotive service technicians Mostly one sector 56.8%

Home care provider occupations One industry 23.3%

Social and community service professionals Mostly one sector 21.7%

Managers in social, community and correctional services Mostly one sector 18.4%

Machining, metal forming, shaping and erecting trades Mostly one sector 12.9%

Practitioners of natural healing One industry 11.1%

Specialized occupations in services Mostly one sector 8.8%

Program leaders and instructors in recreation, sport and fitness Mostly one sector 6.8%

These jobs are mostly done here. An operator in this industry is competing for them against others in the same industry, not against the whole economy.

And the jobs every business has

Shoe repairers, shoemakers and upholsterers Across the economy 27.9%

Technical occupations in electronics and electrical engineering Across the economy 7.8%

Legislative and senior managers Across the economy 6.6%

Other technical trades Across the economy 5.7%

Office administrative assistants - general, legal and medical Across the economy 5.2%

Administrative, property and payroll officers Across the economy 4.7%

Accounting, insurance and related business administrative occupations Across the economy 4.3%

Building maintenance installers, servicers and repairers Across the economy 3.7%

Financial, insurance and related administrative support workers Across the economy 3.3%

Customer and information services representatives Across the economy 3.2%

Found across at least fourteen of the twenty sectors. In a small establishment several of these are usually one person, or an outside provider.

All 162 occupations →

Inside this industry

1 row sits directly beneath 81331. Each has a base report of its own.

Code	Industry	Establishments · CA	What is known
813310	Social advocacy organizations	2,688	screened at 8133