At the 2025 CIOF Convention, the Social AF team attended a session called “AI and Machine Learning in the Charity Sector – What You Need to Know,” presented by Alex Holt and Marc Dallimore from the Salocin Group. This beginner-friendly talk was designed for charities just starting to explore artificial intelligence (AI), or for those feeling increasing pressure to integrate it more deeply into their roles.

Understanding AI in a Practical Context

Alex Holt set the tone with a relatable analogy: imagine building a tea-making machine. One approach would be to program it with exact, step-by-step instructions (“if this, then that”). But what if the type of tea, teabag brand, water temperature, or mug size changed? A rule-based system would struggle with all those variables.

That’s where AI comes in. Unlike traditional programming, AI, particularly machine learning, enables machines to make decisions based on data patterns, not fixed rules. It can adapt to nuance and complexity without needing every possible scenario pre-programmed.

A Brief Tour of AI Types

The session touched on several types of AI:

• Rule-based AI: Traditional systems that follow a clear set of instructions
  
• Machine Learning (ML): Algorithms that learn from data to make predictions or decisions
  
• Generative AI (GenAI): Models that can generate content like text, images or strategy suggestions based on data patterns. This is currently the most talked-about type of AI, and powers tools such as ChatGPT

Fundraising Use Cases for Machine Learning and AI

Marc and Alex shared compelling ways AI and ML are already being used by charities, particularly in fundraising and supporter engagement. Examples included:

• Supporter clustering to better segment audiences
  
• Legacy propensity modelling to identify potential legacy donors
  
• “Next best ask” predictions to personalise fundraising requests
  
• Attrition prediction to flag supporters likely to disengage
  
• Lifetime value modelling to guide long-term supporter strategies
  

They also explained how generative AI can enhance these insights by translating them into human-friendly outputs, such as drafting emails, generating campaign ideas or providing simplified summaries for fundraising teams.

Other use cases specific to the charity sector included:

• Copy and content ideation
  
• Meeting summaries
  
• Document creation
  
• Pen portraits of donors or audiences
  
• Summarising large datasets
  
• Querying data using natural language
  
• Code creation to assist developers and data scientists
  

Real-World Examples in Action

Marc shared three specific examples of how charities are already leveraging AI:

1. An animal charity used machine learning to build detailed supporter personas. These insights informed their strategy for tackling attrition and improving donor retention.
   
2. A humanitarian organisation used AI to predict which supporters were likely to become mid-value donors, allowing them to tailor stewardship and communications.
   
3. A third charity applied AI to score donors on their likelihood to leave a legacy gift, helping them focus legacy marketing efforts more effectively.
   

These examples illustrated how AI, when grounded in real data and focused on specific problems, can generate meaningful, actionable results.

AI Isn’t Magic, Context Matters

One of the most important messages from the session was the need to use AI responsibly and realistically. While the potential is huge, Alex warned against assigning human traits to AI. “AI doesn’t think,” he said. It doesn’t understand nuance unless we provide it and doesn’t have intuition or emotional intelligence.

He shared his own AI prompts used to create parts of his presentation, demonstrating how GenAI can speed up workflows with the right input. However, he also cautioned about risks, including:

Bullet points replaced by visual: Banner image: AI and Machine Learning 2: 

The key is specificity. Providing clear prompts and relevant context dramatically improves outputs and reduces risks.

A Word of Caution on AI in Moderation

As an agency that champions the need for real, human interactions at every turn, it should come as no surprise that we have reservations about charities exploring AI as a solution for improving social media moderation. Genuine community engagement, empathy and nuanced judgment will always require human oversight, especially in spaces where safeguarding and tone matter deeply, the value of a trained human moderator cannot be replicated by a machine.

Cutting corners with stewardship isn’t a long-term solution and a charity’s biggest assets will always be the real people in it.

In our recent blog, we decided to conduct an experiment and ask AI to suggest some replies to posts found within our Facebook challenge groups. We then compared their suggestions against those produced by our expert moderators. You can see the examples in the blog here: https://socialaf.co.uk/using-ai-charity-moderation/

Getting Started with AI as an Individual

For those looking to explore AI in a personal capacity, the speakers gave three practical suggestions:

1. Don’t apply human characteristics to AI. It’s a tool, not a person
   
2. Start in low-risk areas where you already have expertise so you can spot errors and refine your prompting skills
   
3. Use AI both in and outside of work to build confidence and experience
   

Getting Started with AI as an Organisation

For charities ready to take organisational steps toward AI adoption, Marc and Alex offered these strategic tips:

• Develop a documented AI policy and framework to guide ethical and effective use
  
• Experiment in low-consequence areas to learn what works and build internal understanding
  
• Provide training opportunities so staff can gain confidence and develop practical skills
  
• Establish an internal AI working group to coordinate exploration, share learning and manage risks
  

This session cut through the hype and provided grounded, realistic advice for charities exploring AI. The key message was clear. AI is not a replacement for human intelligence or empathy, but it can be a powerful tool when used responsibly. With thoughtful adoption, charities can improve fundraising, decision-making and operational efficiency, without losing sight of the people who make their missions possible.