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Top Nonprofit Cloud Tools That Drive Data-Backed Decisions

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Nonprofit Cloud offers an enormous breadth and depth of specialized tools for nonprofits and grantmaking organizations. Built on Salesforce core, It leverages the power of Salesforce CRM to help nonprofits effectively manage and analyze data.

As Fíonta explains, Nonprofit Cloud is ideal for measuring your impact, tracking program progress, and generating reports and visuals communicating your success to key stakeholders. Its tools allow nonprofits to forecast trends and campaign performance, providing the insights needed to make data-driven decisions.

We’ll explore some of the top ways Nonprofit Cloud helps nonprofits track and analyze data effectively. Let’s begin.

Benefits of Using Nonprofit Cloud Tools

Double the Donation’s guide to data collection highlights some of the key benefits of leveraging donor and campaign data, such as:

  • Providing an accurate impact measurement
  • Helping organizations effectively allocate resources
  • Promoting informed decision-making rather than guessing

Nonprofit Cloud empowers your organization to reap these benefits by managing each core part of your operations, including fundraising, program management, and case management.

Top Nonprofit Cloud Tools

The following tools and features are designed to help nonprofits easily and accurately track data, keep data clean and organized, and quickly gain useful insights that inspire wise decisions.

Fundraising Tools

The Nonprofit Cloud for Fundraising module unites fundraising teams on a single platform, offering purpose-built tools your team can use to strengthen donor relationships, improve efficiency, analyze data, and more. The module includes apps tailored to different roles, including fundraising strategy, donor engagement, philanthropy and partnerships, and general fundraising operations.

When it comes to fundraising data, these tools simplify and enhance tracking and analysis:

  • Flexible gift entry: Nonprofit Cloud offers your organization the flexibility to accurately track various types of donations. Enter standard one-time gifts made by individuals or set up recurring gift tracking. Your team can also create a batch to enter a large number of gifts at once, saving time and reducing the chance of human error.
  • Source codes: Source codes are unique codes included in specific links. The source code is activated when a supporter or participant clicks one of these links. Your team can then track campaign performance, understand donors’ communication preferences, calculate ROI, and personalize future communications. As a part of the Salesforce Summer ‘24 release, you can manage outreach source codes using the campaign flow in Marketing Cloud Growth Edition.
  • Custom donor scores: Build custom scores for your donors based on recency, frequency, and monetary (RFM) values. These scores provide a cumulative, at-a-glance RFM score for each donor. Donor scores can be viewed on the donor’s profile along with demographic data and other key insights to quickly gauge the supporter’s affinity and responsiveness to a certain cause or campaign.

These flexible tools ensure that your data reflects your nonprofit’s unique needs and practices, enhancing your data’s accuracy and clarity.

Program Management Tools

Nonprofit Cloud for Programs helps nonprofits plan, deliver, and track their programs. This module improves participant experiences, streamlines staff workflows, and yields the insights needed to improve offerings.

Some of the tools that offer these insights are:

  • Participant profiles: If your nonprofit works with individuals, you likely set goals for participants, assign them to programs, disburse benefits, and manage tasks related to that individual. These details and notes from your sessions are stored within a single participant profile. This gives anyone working with the participant a detailed overview of their history with your nonprofit, goals, and progress so your staff can make the best choices for that individual.
  • Program Management Home Page: This out-of-the-box home page is another product of the recent Summer ‘24 release. It is designed to give your team a comprehensive overview of your nonprofit’s program delivery and allow staff to monitor the status of your programs closely. From this single page, you can quickly assess whether programs are on track to meet organizational goals, get a simple overview of your programs and benefits, and track new referrals.
  • Cohort objects and fields: Group your program participants together using the new Program Cohort object. Then, move those participants through the program together and easily compare cohorts or measure an individual’s progress against their cohort. Nonprofit programs can vary widely and have unique needs, and this method of data collection helps your staff account for those needs and idiosyncrasies.

Managing programs is demanding and has many moving parts. Nonprofit Cloud’s unified platform provides comprehensive overviews of your programs’ health, promoting informed decision-making that drives long-term success.

Case Management Tools

Nonprofit Cloud for Case Management is housed within the Program Management module and emphasizes providing better participant outcomes. This solution remedies heavy case manager workloads, disjointed systems, and barriers to transparent communication and collaboration across your teams.

Additionally, Nonprofit Cloud’s case management tools offer the following features for enhanced data collection and management:

  • Easy, streamlined note-taking: Allow staff to quickly capture detailed notes from sessions with participants. Populate notes with additional information like attendance records, timestamps, and supporting documents for the most comprehensive records possible. These notes can be shared with other case managers, making participant transition simple and keeping data consolidated.
  • Dynamic assessments: Use these assessments during intake to ensure staff ask new participants the most relevant questions. Additionally, staff can easily add necessary documents to the assessment and allow participants to navigate the process at their own pace. This ensures the participant’s intake is efficient and pleasant and organizes all necessary information in a single location.
  • Adaptable data tracking: Your staff will use the Case object to plan care for the participant. Cases can span across multiple programs, and staff can loop in multiple individuals, such as caretakers or other team members at your organization. This flexible tool can conform to any program structure, making it easy to record and report your progress.

Accurate data collection is critical for case management. It influences quality of care, resource allocation, and long-term planning for your programs. In the context of fields like healthcare, your data collection methods must be secure and ethical to comply with regulations.

Other Salesforce Tools and Features

Remember to stay cognizant of and try out other options within Salesforce. With Nonprofit Cloud, your organization can access common features for Industries, apps from the AppExchange, and tools belonging to other Industry Clouds. These solutions can extend Nonprofit Cloud’s capabilities to assist with data hygiene, security, and efficiency.

Consider looking beyond Salesforce for additional assistance for larger organizations or those with very complex needs. Working with a Salesforce tech consultant can help you implement the solution, clean up and migrate data, and maximize your investment in this powerful CRM. If needed, research other services that can enhance your data quality to drive more accurate insights, like appending missing information or enriching your first-party data with third-party, market-level insights.

Collecting, managing, and cleaning your nonprofit’s data is key. After all, if your database is flawed or biased, the insights you glean from it will be, too. Nonprofit Cloud offers powerful, flexible tools that revolutionize how your nonprofit records and analyzes data about your donors, campaigns, and programs.

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How Your School Can Leverage Donation Tracking: 4 Data Tips

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As a school, charitable gifts from parents, students’ families, and other members of the community are what help you offer the best, most enriching educational experiences possible. This funding helps make things like fun field trips and school-wide events and celebrations possible.

But, are you doing all you can to secure as much funding as possible? In addition to choosing fundraising ideas that align with your audience’s preferences and promoting your campaigns, accurately tracking data can help make your fundraisers successful.

In this guide, we’ll explore a few tips your school can use to accurately track donations and gain insights to boost revenue.

Use the right fundraising software.

A key part of fundraising is accepting as many payment methods as possible, giving your supporters the flexibility and convenience to choose what works best for them. However, this can quickly become complicated from a financial and data-tracking standpoint.

For example, how can you consolidate data from multiple sources like the donation form embedded on your school website, third-party payment apps, and more? The answer is to select specialized school fundraising software that will track and aggregate your donation data. 

Solutions like 99Pledges offer reports that reveal highlights like total donations and number of participants as well as more granular, line-by-line details about individual donors. In addition to these reports, 99Pledges’ guide to kids’ fundraising ideas recommends using this fundraising tool because it:

  • Leverages digital fundraising, helping organizations offer more flexibility to how donors give.
  • Can expand your school’s fundraising potential by reaching geographically remote donors.
  • Allows for a lot of flexibility and creativity when choosing a fundraising idea.

Combined, these benefits mean that your school can launch creative, successful campaigns all while keeping a handle on its fundraising data.

Consider data appends.

Once you have the right solution in place and start seeing your donor data roll in, you might notice some gaps in the information. While you’ll be able to see basic details about donors, like their name and preferred giving method, you may not be privy to other information without performing a data append.

Data appending simply adds new information to your database, either by correcting and updating your existing file or supplementing it with information from external sources. Some of the most common types of data appends include:

  • Contact information appends: Collect donors’ contact information, including phone numbers, email addresses, and home addresses.
  • Employer appends: Learn who your donors’ employers are. This can be particularly helpful for securing matching gifts and other corporate gifts from their employers.
  • Demographic information appends: Append information like donors’ age, gender, income, marital status, and more to build more targeted communication strategies.
  • Social media appends: Update and add information about donors’ social media usage. Then, you can use this information to learn more about them through their profiles, engage them via their preferred platform, and invite them to follow you.

So, what would using data appends look like for your school? Let’s say your school’s baseball team needs to fundraise to travel to an out-of-state baseball camp, and you decide to perform demographic and employer data appends. The former helps you choose the perfect baseball fundraising idea to excite and engage your target audience. The latter identifies donors who work for companies with matching gift programs so you can remind them to apply for a matched gift.

The best way to safely enrich your data—and keep it clean and organized—is to work with a professional service. Research and meet with candidates before selecting one to ensure you choose the right option for your school.

Keep data clean and organized.

“Garbage in, garbage out,” is a commonly used phrase in the computer science world that sums up the impact of using low-quality data. In other words, if your data is flawed, outdated, or poor quality, any insights or output from that data will be too. 

Proper data management and data hygiene practices can keep the garbage out of your database. Frequently audit your donation data to resolve issues like:

  • Duplicated entries for the same donor or donation
  • Incomplete information about donations
  • Outdated information (e.g., a donor moves and their address has changed)
  • Data formats not being standardized

Once you’ve corrected these issues, you can use your clean, accurate donation data in many ways. For example, use your average daily donation amount to make accurate predictions about whether you’ll reach your fundraising goal—and, if you’re not on track, make an effort to course correct. Or, follow Double the Donation’s advice and gamify the process by using a fundraising thermometer to publicly track your progress toward the goal.

Set up automated processes.

Finally, use your fundraising software and donation data to take some of the repetitive fundraising tasks off your plate. Automation can streamline repetitive, rote tasks like sending:

  • Donation receipts: These receipts are legally required for any cash gifts over $250, making them a pain point for many schools. However, automation ensures that donors receive accurate receipts immediately following their donation. Make sure the receipts include key information such as the donor’s name, the amount they donated, and whether the donor received anything in return for their gift.
  • Reminders to pay pledged donations: With pledged donations, donors pledge to give a certain amount at a later date. For example, you might hold a walk-a-thon and collect pledges based on how far participants walk. Automated reminders can prompt donors to donate the pledged amount or simply remind them that you’ll be billing the donation to them.
  • Thank-you messages: Cultivate long-term relationships with donors by sending them heartfelt thank-you messages. Choose an action, in this case donating, that will trigger a thank-you message within 24 to 72 hours. Don’t forget to make these messages genuine, personalized, and authentic. Greet the donor by name, mention their specific gift, and tell them how their individual donation will make a difference at your school.

When using automation, always remember to balance efficiency and convenience for your fundraising team with personalization. The last thing you want is for your school’s communications to feel cold or robotic.

While tracking your donations may seem like a minor step you could skip over, it’s critical to successful fundraising. To truly understand and efficiently engage with your supporters, make sure to choose a tool that will do the heavy lifting for you. Then, you’ll have easy access to data that reveals who your school’s supporters are, their giving habits and motivations, and ways to inspire them to give again and again.

Donor Segmentation 101: Tips for Better Nonprofit Analysis

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Nonprofits looking to step into the world of fundraising data analysis often begin with donor segmentation. Segmenting donor data enables nonprofits to understand their audiences on a deeper level and form more meaningful relationships.

This guide will cover what you need to know to get started with donor segmentation, from common segmentation strategies to software tools that help streamline the process.

What is Donor Segmentation?

87% of businesses say at least some customers expect personalized content. However, developing personalized content for every single one of your supporters would be a major drain on time and resources, especially for large or growing nonprofits.

Donor segmentation is the process of grouping your nonprofit’s donors based on characteristics they have in common. Using segmentation, your nonprofit can develop personalized communications for specific audiences, rather than specific individuals. This can save time while still delivering the personalized experience today’s supporters are looking for.

Strategies for Segmenting Donors

You can group donors in any number of ways, but some categories are more helpful than others for your nonprofit’s strategic decision-making.

For example, recency, frequency, and monetary value (RFM) segmentation is a common tactic. RFM segmentation is a great place to start if you’re looking to explore ways to improve your fundraising outreach because it breaks donors down into categories based on their giving habits.

With this segmentation strategy, you’ll group donors based on the following donation criteria:

  • Recency: Recent or lapsed donors
  • Frequency: Monthly, quarterly, annually, sporadic, etc.
  • Monetary value: Small, mid-tier, or major donors

Of course, RFM segments aren’t the only donor groupings you could create. You may also choose other segmentation strategies, such as dividing donors according to their:

  • Donation type: In-kind or monetary donations
  • Preferred communication platform: Email, direct mail, social media, text, phone calls, or face-to-face meetings
  • Reason for giving: Experience as a volunteer or beneficiary, a family connection to your mission, having a job within the same field as your nonprofit, etc.
  • Preferred program or campaign type to support: Peer-to-peer fundraising, volunteer program, or other specific programs
  • Demographics: Age, gender, location, profession, etc.

 

Develop your segmentation strategy based on your fundraising goals. For example, if you want to increase donor retention, segmenting donors by recency can be a great way to identify those who are likely to be retained and those who are at risk of lapsing. Furthermore, if you want to develop personalized outreach ahead of a capital campaign, grouping donors by reason for giving will allow you to craft impactful messaging to drive your campaign.

What Kind of Tools Do You Need for Donor Segmentation?

You’ll need two things to start segmenting your donors: accurate data, and the tools needed to gather it. Let’s explore some common data-gathering tools and the types of information you can collect using these solutions.

Fundraising and Nonprofit CRM Software

Your fundraising platform and nonprofit CRM system can work together to gather information about donors’ giving patterns. Your fundraising tools are the solutions you use to accept online donations, such as your donation form or peer-to-peer fundraising pages. Your nonprofit CRM, also known as donor management software, is the platform you use to store donor data.

According to Bloomerang’s fundraising software guide, these software platforms help streamline the fundraising process by “[managing] all fundraising campaigns, communications, and reporting from one central system.” With these tools, you can collect data such as:

  • Average donation amount
  • Date of last donation
  • Donation type
  • Donation frequency
  • Past involvement in peer-to-peer fundraising
  • Past volunteer experience

Using this data, you can segment donors by donation amount, recency, frequency, and past involvement.

Wealth Screening Tools

Wealth screening solutions are tools or services that analyze donor data to pinpoint supporters who reflect the characteristics of a major donor. These solutions can help identify the following wealth and warmth indicators:

  • Giving capacity
  • Past donations to other organizations
  • Profession
  • Business affiliations

Wealth screening data will allow you to build a detailed profile of who your major donors are. This can help determine the best communication channels and strategies to use to recruit more major donors.

Donor Surveys

Donor surveys are an effective way to gather any data that is difficult to collect automatically using your software solutions. These surveys allow you to ask donors questions to fill any gaps in your database. With the help of donor surveys, you can gather data such as:

  • Demographics, including age, gender, geographic location, and level of education
  • Preferred communication platform
  • Giving motivations

Donor surveys can help provide more context and background information on each of your segments, helping you understand donors on a more individualized level.

To create donor segments, filter the data in your CRM based on your chosen criteria, and then save each grouping as a unique segment. Once you have several groupings, you can easily reach out to each segment using different marketing channels, like email, direct mail, or phone calls.

Tips to Make the Most of Donor Segmentation

Segmenting donors is just the first step of a larger data analytics process. After developing segments, you can leverage them in multiple ways to further your marketing and fundraising efforts. Use the following tips to make the most of your segmentation:

Create user personas

Personas are fictionalized representations of different segments within your donor base. As you build donor personas, you’ll give each one a unique name, overarching characteristics, unique motivations, and recommendations for how to engage with them.

Here’s a brief example of a persona for an environmental nonprofit that uses tech to mitigate the negative impacts of climate change:

  • Name: Daniel Vega
  • Age: 38 years old
  • Location: Seattle, Washington
  • Level of Education: Master’s Degree in Computer Science
  • Job: Senior Developer at a Tech Agency
  • Lifestyle: Daniel is a working professional with a deep interest in technology as well as the outdoors. He enjoys outdoor activities like hiking, mountain biking, and photography.
  • Reason for giving: Daniel wants to support organizations that use innovative tech solutions to solve environmental issues. He also wants to give to organizations that he knows for sure will make good use of his donation.
  • Communication preferences: As a tech-savvy individual, Daniel prefers digital communication platforms like email and social media over other platforms like phone calls or in-person meetings.

The purpose of developing personas is to make them as realistic and specific as possible. Develop between three and five personas to ensure you’re targeting your core audience groups.

Develop personalized messaging

Take your personas a step further by designing personalized messaging for each segment. Expanding on the previous example, here are a few types of messages that might resonate with Daniel:

  • Impact stories: Daniel wants to ensure his donation will be put to good use. Impact stories that include data and success stories from beneficiaries will be useful for showing Daniel that his gift made a real difference.
  • News about innovations: Daniel is also interested in advancements in the environmental tech sector. Sharing recent studies or innovative technology our nonprofit is using will pique his interest and show how our organization is on the cutting edge.
  • Opportunities to engage: As a tech professional himself, Daniel may be interested in using his skills to support your mission. Invite Daniel to engage more deeply with volunteer opportunities, pro-bono work opportunities, and educational events like webinars.

No matter which persona you’re communicating to, remember that compelling true stories tend to be the most impactful messages. According to nonprofit statistics gathered by NPOInfo, 42% of donors said personal stories from a nonprofit’s beneficiaries influenced their decision to give.

Use your donor research to determine the types of stories that will resonate with each segment. For example, monthly donors may be interested in how their regular donations help keep your volunteer program going, while major donors want to know how you used their gift to refurbish your volunteer supply room.

Update segments regularly

As your audience grows and changes over time, regularly update your audience segments to ensure they reflect your donor base. Review your segments at regular intervals, such as once a year, to check in and update personas as needed.

Use this time to ensure you’re following data management best practices to ensure that your segments are based on accurate, reliable data. Incorporate data hygiene measures like:

  • Regularly auditing your data
  • Identifying duplicate, outdated, or inaccurate information
  • Eliminating or merging data securely

Also, check in with your data collection tools, like your donation form or donor surveys, to verify they’re gathering only useful data. Too much information can clog up your database, so streamline these forms as much as possible by just asking the necessary questions. For example, knowing donors’ favorite local restaurants isn’t as essential as knowing their contact information, favorite program to support, and preferred payment method.

Track engagement metrics across segments

Review key metrics to understand the effectiveness of your segmentation and personalization efforts. For example, you can track relevant engagement metrics like:

  • Email open rate
  • Donation page conversion rate
  • Donor retention rate
  • Average gift size
  • New donor acquisition rate
  • Donor upgrade rate (how often donors increase their giving amount)

Analyzing these metrics will help you adjust your strategy over time to continue connecting with donors in ways that resonate. For instance, if you notice a drop in your email open rate, you can refresh your personas and targeted marketing messages to ensure your communications are tailored to your audience’s interests.

With the right tools and data strategy, donor segmentation can be a lot more straightforward than you might think. All you have to do is develop a smooth transition from your data collection tools to your nonprofit database and segmentation filters. Then, you can start grouping donors based on shared traits and reaching out to them on a more personal level to address their unique needs and motivations.

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4 Data-Driven Fundraising Trends: Staying Ahead in the Field

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Staying on top of the latest and greatest in fundraising is essential for improving your nonprofit’s strategy and continuing to raise enough money to support your cause. In today’s fundraising climate, many of the hottest trends have one thing in common: data.

When you put data at the forefront of your strategy, you can dive deeper into your donor base’s specific preferences to create fundraising campaigns they’re likely to engage with. Check out some of the current data-driven fundraising trends and tips for how your nonprofit can stay ahead.

1. Predictive Analytics

Predictive analytics refers to the use of algorithms and machine learning to analyze data and make predictions based on that information. In the context of fundraising, predictive analytics can help you transform donor data into important insights that guide your fundraising decisions.

According to BWF’s guide to AI fundraising, there are three main types of predictive models nonprofits can use:

  • Giving behavior models. These models can predict factors like individual donors’ preferred giving channels, likelihood of renewal, and likely next gift amounts.
  • Predictive scoring. You may use predictive analytics to assign your donors engagement scores and categorize them based on recency, frequency, and monetary (RFM) value.
  • Giving program success models. Predictive analytics can also help you determine how successful different giving programs could be, such as annual giving, major giving, and planned giving.

Perhaps one of the most common use cases of predictive analytics for fundraising is donor prospecting. You can use predictive analytics tools to streamline the wealth screening process, identify potential major donors, find which donors are most likely to upgrade their giving, and more.

To successfully incorporate predictive analytics into your fundraising strategy, follow these tips:

  • Determine your goals. Before you dive into predictive analytics, choose fundraising goals to guide how you’ll use this technology. For example, the model you create will look very different based on whether you’re focusing on donor retention, prospecting, or planned giving.
  • Clean your data. The more accurate your data is, the better your predictions will be. Follow data hygiene best practices, such as auditing your database, appending missing data, and standardizing data entry, to prepare it for predictive analytics.
  • Choose the right tools. To implement predictive analytics, you’ll need to rely on the appropriate tools and technology to get the job done. Research your options, or outsource the process to an AI fundraising consultant for help.

2. Segmentation and Personalization

Donors crave personalized experiences. They want to feel special and know that your organization values their individual contributions to your cause and community.

The best way to personalize your communications is through segmentation. Segmentation is the process of grouping donors based on similar characteristics to better personalize your messaging to them. Nonprofits may segment their donors based on:

  • Average donation amount
  • Donation frequency
  • Donation recency
  • Donor lifecycle stage
  • Demographics
  • Communication preferences
  • Engagement level
  • Interests related to your cause

When segmenting your donors, it’s important that your nonprofit:

  • Defines its segmentation criteria. As you can see above, there are so many different ways you can segment your donors. Determine which segmentation criteria make the most sense based on your current goals, campaigns, and data.
  • Tailors its campaigns. Once you’ve successfully grouped your supporters, put your segments to use. Let’s say you’re running a discount card fundraiser. ABC Fundraising recommends this type of campaign because it allows you to gather support for local businesses and raise money for your cause. To maximize the success of your discount card fundraiser, you can use your donor demographic segments to help you choose businesses to partner with that reflect your target audience’s preferences. For instance, you could add a toy store to your discount cards if many of your supporters have children.
  • Updates its segments over time. As your donor base grows and changes, so should your segments. Reassess your segmentation strategy regularly to ensure it still reflects your supporters and their needs, and make adjustments where necessary.

3. Automation and Artificial Intelligence

AI can be a controversial topic, but when used correctly, it can help automate nonprofit fundraising processes and allow you to focus on more mission-critical tasks.

In addition to predictive analytics, your nonprofit can use AI for:

  • Donor segmentation. To more efficiently segment your donors, you can use AI to identify patterns in your donor base and group your donors accordingly.
  • Donor stewardship. Let’s say you’ve just wrapped up your school fundraiser and have a ton of tasks still on your plate but want to ensure you thank donors as soon as possible. You can use AI to automate thank-you messages to your donors before sending them more heartfelt notes once you have the time.
  • Donor support. If your inbox is full of donor questions, you may benefit from embedding an AI-powered chatbot on your website. This tool can help provide donor support by answering simple questions, guiding donors through the donation process, or giving them information about upcoming programs or events.

Using AI carefully and ethically is key. Follow these tips for responsible AI use:

  • Protect data privacy. You should store any donor data you’re collecting and using to power your AI fundraising efforts in a secure database or constituent relationship management (CRM) system. Make sure your platform has features like two-factor authentication, access controls, and SOC 2 Type II compliance.
  • Be transparent. Donors may be wary when they hear you’re using AI to process their data. Make it clear how exactly you’re leveraging their data to maintain donor trust, and let donors opt out of having their data used in your AI tools if they wish.
  • Hold your organization accountable. To keep your nonprofit accountable for responsible AI use, develop internal AI policies and guidelines for your team to follow. You should also have procedures for addressing any donor concerns about your AI use.

4. Impact Reporting

Donors want to know that you’re using their gifts responsibly. Many donors are happy to continue supporting your cause—under the unspoken caveat that you’re using their hard-earned funds to help those in need and drive your mission forward.

Keep donors updated on the facts and figures that demonstrate the outcomes of your fundraising efforts by:

  • Creating and sharing an annual report. An annual report is a document that summarizes your nonprofit’s activities for the past year. Include all important data points that illustrate the impact of donors’ contributions, and share the report with all stakeholders.
  • Using visualizations. Make the data in your annual report easy to digest by developing accompanying visualizations. Use a variety of charts and graphs to accurately depict your fundraising results and impact.
  • Incorporating storytelling. In addition to data, feature stories in your report that demonstrate exactly how your donors have allowed you to assist your beneficiaries. For example, an environmental conservation organization may explain that their flower fundraiser allowed them to move forward with their efforts to rescue endangered species like the Sumatran orangutan. They may highlight that one of the orangutans they rescued named Rue is now being rehabilitated at a local zoo thanks to donors’ generosity.

At the end of the day, your nonprofit aims to make a difference and help its beneficiaries as best it can. When you implement the most current data-driven fundraising trends, you can optimize your fundraising operations and maximize the support you gather for your mission.

Explore data-backed strategies that nonprofits can use to increase matching gift participation.

4 Data-Driven Strategies to Boost Matching Gift Revenue

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Matching gifts have the power to skyrocket your nonprofit’s fundraising potential. For every dollar a donor gives, another dollar could be waiting to be matched by their employer. However, many nonprofits struggle with limited donor awareness of matching gift programs and inefficient processes for identifying eligible donors.

These challenges often result in missed opportunities to double contributions and maximize revenue, but fear not! We’re here to shed light on data-backed strategies for identifying more match-eligible donors and driving matching gifts to completion.

Chances are, you just need to take a closer look at your donor data, clean up your identification processes, and be proactive with marketing. With some simple adjustments, you can level up your matching gift game and increase your cause’s revenue.

Employ multiple approaches to identify match-eligible donors.

Corporate giving research indicates that 78% of donors are unaware if their employer offers matching gifts and what the program’s guidelines are. This means it’s up to your nonprofit to educate donors.

According to that same resource, using multiple methods to identify match opportunities leads to a 77% increase in the number of match-eligible donations identified. Here are some efficient ways to identify these opportunities:

  • Collect employer information from donors. Make sure you know where your donors work. Ask for employers’ names in donor surveys, event registration forms, and donation forms. That way, you can directly look into those companies’ matching gift policies.
  • Invest in matching gift search tools. These tools enable donors to easily search for their employers’ matching gift programs and find guidance on submitting match requests. In the next section, we’ll explore ideal ways to integrate these tools into the donation process.
  • Host donor outreach events. Host in-person or virtual events focused on matching gifts where your nonprofit provides information and answers questions about matching gift programs. These events can also serve as opportunities to securely collect donors’ employer data.
  • Look for CLMA-certified employers. Keep an eye out for any donors in your network who work for CLMA-certified companies (Certified Leaders in Matching Automation). These companies, awarded for their seamless auto-submission functionality, are going to be some of your best matching gift opportunities. And the certification ensures the process is a quick and easy one for your supporters!

Above all, be proactive about marketing matching gifts. While you can look into companies that employ many of your donors, it’s impossible to research every donor’s match eligibility manually.

Instead, share informational posts on social media, mention matching gifts in all fundraising appeals, and post testimonials about the impact of matching gifts on your website. Urge supporters to check if their employers offer matching gifts, create helpful infographics, and share links to a matching gift search tool where supporters can research their eligibility. You can even tap into paid advertising to amplify your website’s dedicated matching gift page.

Integrate matching gifts into the donation process.

360MatchPro’s matching gift research indicates that 84% of donors are more likely to donate if a match is offered. Meanwhile, 1 in 3 donors will give a larger donation if they know their employer will match it.

There’s no better time to encourage donors to check into their eligibility than when they’re in the middle of donating! Simplify donors’ research as much as possible by integrating a convenient employer search tool into the donation process.

With the tool, donors can search for their employers and receive information about their matching gift program’s requirements for donation amounts, employee eligibility, and nonprofit eligibility. They’ll also see the rate at which eligible donations are matched, such as 1:1 (which is a dollar-for-dollar match) or 2:1 (which means an employer will donate twice as much as the original donation).

Here are some key places to embed this tool into your website and encourage participation:

  • Donation page. That same list of matching gift statistics states that 73% of donors will use a matching gift search field on a donation form. Embedding a search tool may even convince supporters to increase their contributions before hitting the “donate” button.

Embed an employer search tool into your donation page to encourage donors to research their employers’ programs.

  • Donation confirmation page. Give donors another chance to research their eligibility by embedding your search tool in your donation confirmation page. Knowing they have the chance to double the contribution they just made can encourage them to pursue a matching gift.
  • Post-donation follow-up. Encourage anyone who hasn’t submitted a request or verified their eligibility to do so with follow-up emails. For anyone who has submitted a request, send them updates as you track the progress of their match. Some matching gift software will even send automated emails, reminding eligible donors to submit their forms and donors with unknown match statuses to research their eligibility.

Highlighting matching gifts during the donation process shows donors that they can potentially double their impact. These reminders serve as a powerful incentive for donors to give and keep giving, because they know their gift will make a bigger difference than normal if it’s matched.

Use matching gift auto-submission to increase participation.

A tricky part of securing matching gifts is convincing donors to complete the match request form. They may want to multiply their contributions, but manually filling out a form for their employer can deter them. That’s where auto-submission steps in!

Offered exclusively by Double the Donation, auto-submission is the latest innovation in matching gift technology. Your software will do the heavy lifting by automatically completing donors’ match request forms. When donating online, all donors need to do is click a checkbox to opt into auto-submission. If eligible, the donor will be prompted to answer a few additional questions, such as providing their work email addresses, and the software will automatically submit their request form. That means less work for donors and more matching gift revenue for your nonprofit!

Auto-submission cuts down the matching gift process into three easy steps.

According to corporate giving software research, this technology is expected to help nonprofits yield an 80% increase in matching gift revenue. Be aware that this feature only works if companies use CSR software that integrates with 360MatchPro by Double the Donation.

Luckily, 360MatchPro is partnered with some of the most popular CSR software vendors, like Millie, POINT, Givinga, and Selflessly. Talk to your corporate partners who use these platforms to ensure they enable auto-submission, helping increase matching gift participation.

Append employer information for more accurate match identification.

Your nonprofit CRM houses valuable data, including donors’ employment details. You should collect donors’ employer information whenever you can do so naturally, such as through donor surveys, event registration forms, and donation forms.

However, people constantly change jobs, and their first thought isn’t necessarily to update their employer information with the nonprofits they support. That’s where data appending can help.

NXUnite’s data append guide explains the process of turning to an appending service provider who pulls data from external sources to correct incorrect and supplement incomplete data. They use supporter information you provide, such as contact information, to identify the correct individuals and pair them with their missing data.

Luckily for nonprofits, these services extend to employment information. By appending employer information to donor records, your nonprofit can identify donors who work for companies with matching gift programs. This enables your team to target these donors with matching gift outreach, increasing the likelihood that they’ll get their gifts matched. Not to mention, this means you can avoid reaching out to previously match-eligible donors whose new employers don’t offer matching gifts.

Final Thoughts: Start Using A Data-Driven Approach

Now that we’ve shared our favorite strategies, it’s time to put them into action. Take the first step by incorporating matching gift information into your outreach and integrating helpful software into the donation process. Soon enough, more matching gift dollars will start rolling in.

Remember, every dollar matched has the potential to make a greater impact on your organization’s fundraising goals. Get started and unlock the full potential of matching gifts to support your mission!

This guide shares data-backed ways to improve employee morale at nonprofits.

3 Data-Backed Strategies to Motivate Employees to Excel

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Nonprofits operate in a landscape where resources are limited and stakes are high. This makes it tough to set aside time to prioritize employee engagement. However, ensuring your team remains dedicated can directly influence your organization’s impact.

Fortunately, we have an abundance of nonprofit data and software available to understand the intricacies of employee engagement, and we’re here to share exciting opportunities for motivating your team.

Basing your employee engagement efforts on research can help unlock their full potential, driving them to excel in their roles and more effectively contribute to your organization’s mission. Now, let’s dive into our first strategy.

1. Use eCards As A Personalized Motivational Tool.

Employee recognition research indicates that 80% of employees are motivated to work harder when they feel recognized by their superiors, so recognize those who face challenges head-on and make the most of opportunities with our favorite strategy: eCards.

Also known as digital greeting cards, eCards allow you to recognize employees with a personalized, visually engaging virtual message.

Let’s look at how eCards can motivate your employees:

  • Celebrate milestones and achievements. eCards are versatile. Whether the eCard acknowledges a work-related accomplishment, birthday, or personal life event, sending thoughtful eCards demonstrates your nonprofit’s investment in employees’ well-being.
  • Create eCards that emphasize your organization’s mission. Your nonprofit operates with a strong sense of purpose, and eCards are an opportunity to promote your organization’s core values and appreciate employees who demonstrate them. By connecting an employee’s contributions to your nonprofit’s broader impact, you’ll create a deeper sense of fulfillment. Here’s an example of an eCard that does just that:

This employee appreciation eCard is branded with the organization’s colors and says, ‘Thank you for committing to our value: Compassion.’

  • Encourage peer recognition. Allow team members to send eCards to colleagues to acknowledge each other’s efforts. Not only will this boost morale, but it’ll also foster a culture of mutual support.

By infusing eCards into your everyday recognition strategy, you can create a work environment where employees feel valued and inspired to excel.

2. Create a rewards program.

Take your recognition strategies one step further with a rewards program. Around 75% of employees experience higher job satisfaction for 3+ months after receiving a thoughtful gift, and rewards programs help employees feel like they’ve earned those gifts.

Tangible rewards add an extra layer of motivation and don’t need to be extravagant. eCardWidget’s employee gift guide shares several thoughtful ideas for rewards that can motivate your team:

  • Gift cards to a restaurant, retailer, online marketplace, or entertainment service like Spotify
  • Company merchandise like t-shirts, hats, water bottles, and mugs
  • Health and wellness benefits like a stipend for a gym membership or fitness classes
  • Tickets to a sports event, concert, or cultural activity

You can manage this program manually, but we recommend automating the work with employee recognition software. These platforms help track employee performance and enable managers to identify and reward high-performing employees.

Try combining your recognition efforts by following up eCards with a tangible reward. For example, the individual who received the most recognition eCards during a performance period will receive a gift basket, or management may pick a few standout individuals to reward with branded apparel.

3. Streamline time-intensive tasks.

Repetitive and tedious work takes away employees’ time to focus on bigger projects that are more meaningful to your mission. Worse, it can even lead to employee burnout. Luckily, nonprofit technology is advancing every day and can eliminate this demotivator.

66% of employees claim they spend at least 2 hours per week handling less-than-productive tasks like sending project status updates. On the other hand, those who use automation tools and strategies can save a notable 3.6 hours per week.

Ultimately, choosing the right solutions and automating tasks when possible empowers employees to be more productive and successful in their roles, fostering a sense of accomplishment and motivation. Here are two solutions we recommend:

Data appends

Your nonprofit collects a lot of donor data, which can become outdated as people move, change their phone numbers, and get new email addresses. That’s where data appending comes in handy.

Instead of contacting donors to update their data, your team can outsource the work to a data appending provider. These services involve correcting outdated, void, or inaccurate data and supplementing existing data with information you don’t already have.

Here’s how data appending works with a service like NPOInfo:

  1. Select your services. Consider what gaps need to be filled in your database. This could include email addresses, phone numbers, postal addresses, birthdates, or employer information.
  2. Upload your records. Securely send your records to us with as much information as you can provide. We’ll use this information to identify your donors within our comprehensive database, so we can correct missing, outdated, or otherwise inaccurate details.
  3. Receive your appended records. We’ll return the updated information to your team and can even help you import the appended data into your CRM.

Enriching donor data provides your team with comprehensive, accurate donor profiles, empowering them to cultivate stronger donor relationships. Then, they can better tailor their fundraising strategies and do their jobs more efficiently, ultimately boosting employee morale.

Matching gift automation

Corporate giving is a powerful revenue source, and software makes it easy for your team to automate the matching gifts process. 360MatchPro’s nonprofit fundraising automation guide explains how matching gift software removes menial tasks from your team’s plates, empowering them to do more with their time and see a larger return on their fundraising efforts.

In particular, matching gift automation accelerates the process of identifying and claiming matches through powerful features, such as:

  • Automated match identification. Instead of manually researching and verifying matching gift eligibility for each donation, automation software instantly identifies potential matches based on the information donors provide.
  • Automated follow-up. Set trigger emails based on donors’ match status, reducing the manual outreach your team needs to conduct. The software will continue following up and drive matches automatically.
  • Auto-submission. Your donors can skip the process of submitting a match request altogether thanks to auto-submission, the latest innovation in matching gift technology. By clicking a checkbox while donating online, donors enable the software to fill out their requests automatically. That leads to more donors submitting their requests accurately and more revenue acquired.

Nonprofits Source’s online giving research has found that leveraging matching gift software leads to 77% more donations flagged as match-eligible, which can double or even triple your nonprofit’s donations. Even better, new auto-submission functionality is projected to yield an 80% increase in matching gift revenue. That means your fundraising team can accomplish more with less work!

These features ensure that matching gift opportunities aren’t overlooked, ultimately increasing your fundraising team’s impact and leading to greater job satisfaction.

Wrapping Up

From expressing gratitude to leveraging software to develop stronger donor relationships, you can boost employee morale at your nonprofit in several ways. When choosing strategies, take your employees’ preferences into account. You might even survey them to learn what ideas they’d find most impactful.

In any case, showing recognition and streamlining menial tasks are some of the most common ways modern organizations improve their workplaces. Start there and build an organization your employees are passionate about supporting.

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How to Protect Donor Data During Online Fundraising Events

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Online fundraising events have revolutionized charitable giving, enabling donors from around the world to contribute to causes they care about with ease. However, these events come with a significant responsibility—protecting sensitive donor data.

There are stringent regulations in place to protect an individual’s privacy online, and failing to secure donor data can result in legal consequences.

In this guide, we’ll explore four strategies for protecting donor data during online fundraising events. Whether you’re hosting a virtual silent auction, walkathon, or gala, these insights will help you take a responsible approach to fundraising and foster trust with your supporters.

Use Secure Platforms

The first step in hosting an online fundraising event is to invest in secure platforms that can facilitate giving while protecting sensitive information. These solutions may include:

  • Event hosting platforms and websites: The platforms and websites hosting online fundraising events are susceptible to various cyber threats. Implement web application firewalls (WAFs) and encryption (HTTPS).
  • Payment processing systems: Payment processing technology is at the heart of online fundraising, handling credit card transactions and other payment methods. It’s crucial to ensure that these systems encrypt data and are PCI-compliant.
  • CRM software: A Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system stores sensitive donor information, including contact details and donation history. To protect this data, conduct regular software updates.

Contact your software provider’s customer support team to inquire about their specific security measures. Understanding their security protocols will allow you to assess potential vulnerabilities and make informed decisions about your investment.

Implement Strong Access Controls

Access controls serve to safeguard donor data by regulating who can access, modify, or view sensitive information within your nonprofit’s systems. Take these steps to implement strong access controls:

  • Use strong, unique passwords: Encourage staff to use a password manager to generate and store unique passwords. Additionally, when asking donors to create login information for your event, ask them to create passwords that are difficult to guess by combining upper and lower-case letters, numbers, and special characters.
  • Implement two-factor authentication (2FA): Require donors, as well as your fundraising team, to use two-factor authentication when accessing donation portals or event management systems. This additional layer of security helps prevent unauthorized access, even if login credentials are compromised.
  • Restrict access: Only authorized personnel, such as administrators and trusted staff members, should have access to donor records. Conduct a thorough audit of your team to identify who requires access. Next, categorize donor data based on sensitivity, assigning appropriate permissions to each user role.

To ensure the continuity of fundraising efforts, establish procedures for emergency access in case of unforeseen circumstances or personnel changes. For example, before hosting an elementary school fundraising event, you might designate all permissions to the principal in the event that the fundraising team is out sick.

Educate Your Team

When it comes to data security, it’s important to ensure that your team understands the importance of safeguarding sensitive data and knows how to prevent breaches. Provide guidance on how to:

  • Avoid phishing. Train staff to recognize phishing attempts, which are often used to steal login credentials or distribute malware. Emphasize the importance of verifying the legitimacy of emails and links, especially those requesting financial information or login details.
  • Maintain data hygiene. Clean and up-to-date data is easier to monitor and analyze for signs of suspicious or unauthorized activity. Implement data hygiene best practices, including removing duplicate, outdated, or inaccurate records, to maintain data accuracy and integrity.

It can also be beneficial to conduct hands-on training sessions for your specific software. School Auction.net recommends designating a software lead to provide insight into each tool’s security features before and during the event.

Limit Data Collection

During the event, avoid collecting extraneous information that could put donor data at risk or complicate your data management processes. In most cases, you will only need to collect:

  • Contact details: Gather the donor’s contact information, such as email address, mailing address, and phone number. These are essential for sending donation receipts, event updates, and future communications.
  • Payment information: For processing donations, you’ll need the donor’s payment details, such as credit card number, expiration date, and security code. Ensure that you use secure payment processing methods and comply with PCI DSS standards to protect this sensitive information.
  • Donation amount: Record the specific donation amount or contribution made by the donor. This is essential for accurately acknowledging the gift, maintaining financial records, and cultivating relationships with donors.
  • Gift designation: If donors have specific preferences for how their contributions should be used (i.e. for a particular program or project), collect this information to ensure their wishes are honored.

According to NPOInfo, you may also need to collect information about donor communication preferences. Be sure to obtain explicit consent from donors if you plan to use this information for marketing purposes or share it with third parties. This is especially important in regions with strict data privacy regulations.

Remember, protecting donor data is not just a legal requirement; it is a testament to your organization’s integrity. Remain committed to data security before, during, and after hosting a nonprofit event and you will gain the trust of your donor base.

The Power of Data: KPIs for Your Nonprofit’s Next Event

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Events are a fundamental part of the nonprofit world. Whether they’re raising money, spreading awareness, engaging volunteers, providing education, or giving back to your community, events can be incredibly powerful. However, as nonprofit professionals like you know, events take a lot of time, energy, and money to execute, so you definitely want to do everything you can to ensure success and improve year over year. Collecting and acting upon data during the event planning process is crucial, as is monitoring important metrics that correspond to your nonprofit’s goals by establishing key performance indicators, or KPIs.

Let’s review some common KPIs for nonprofit events in four major categories: attendance, fundraising, marketing, and impact.

Attendance

Attendance KPIs help you better understand the overall draw of your nonprofit’s events, both among your regular supporters and the general public, and track it year-over-year. It’s also useful to help you compare the response to the various offerings in your nonprofit’s event portfolio and inform decisions about continuing or discontinuing certain events. There are a number of KPIs to track related to event attendance, including:

  • Registration numbers. The sheer number of attendees for each of your events gives you a good idea about where your supporters’ interest lies in terms of event type and format, and where you should invest your time and effort moving forward.
  • RSVP response rate. Track the number of invitations you sent and the number of responses you received, in addition to the actual number of event attendees. This can give you valuable insight into the strategies you employ to invite potential registrants, your ticketing and RSVP process, and price points for registration.
  • Attendee demographics. The demographics you target versus those that actually attend paint a more detailed picture of your donor base for future marketing and donor cultivation purposes. For instance, let’s say you’re organizing a charity golf tournament. If you find that you get the best response from recurring donors or corporate partners, you can aim your future marketing efforts at these groups to boost your turnout.

Fundraising

The majority of nonprofit events are held with fundraising in mind, whether it’s the sole focus or just a component of another effort. To better understand how the fundraising outcomes of each event are affecting your organization’s bottom line, keep these fundraising KPIs in mind:

  • Total funds raised. This is perhaps the easiest metric to track, and helps you determine if you met or surpassed your fundraising goal for the event. Continuing with the golf tournament example, you’ll want to aggregate the dollars raised from golfer registrations, sponsorship sales, on-course games and contests, mulligan sales, raffle tickets, live or silent auction proceeds, and straight up donations to determine your gross funds raised.
  • Donation conversion rate. The donation conversion rate is the number of donations per number of attendees. The more attendees that responded to the ask to make a contribution to your cause, the higher your conversion rate. This metric helps you understand how engaged attendees are in the event and your cause and how you can make better asks during the event.
  • Average donation size. Look at the average size of the donations made during your event to glean whether your development team should focus on stewarding a few major donors or if you should more broadly target many, smaller donors.

Marketing

Successfully marketing your nonprofit’s event is crucial to its success. Tracking metrics to help you better understand the effectiveness of your marketing strategy lets you grow and scale your event year over year and make improvements to reach even more people. Consider using UTMs in any online marketing, which are a way of tracking where folks come from in online marketing campaigns, and tapping into analytics to get additional data about your marketing efforts. Here are a few marketing KPIs to consider:

  • Social media conversions. Social media has several KPIs you can track, such as post impressions, number of followers, and conversion rate. Impressions and number of followers can indicate how big of an online reach your event marketing has, while conversion rate can tell you how many of your followers feel inspired to take a desired action from your posts.
  • Email open/click-through rates. Email marketing is extremely effective if you can make your messaging compelling and inspire action, which is what your click-through rate measures. These metrics tell you the number of people that opened your and how many people click on your email’s calls-to-action.
  • Registration sources. Look at where folks are coming from to register for your event. Compare paper registration forms to phone calls to online registrations to determine the most effective ways to collect registrations in the future. Consider the time it takes for staff to process registrations and payments through the various methods to determine the most efficient ways moving forward.

Impact

The ultimate goal of your nonprofit’s events is to create an impact that furthers your mission, so it’s important to track metrics that show the direct results of the event. These KPIs could include:

  • Tangible outcomes. Determine how the dollars raised from the event will directly impact the populations you serve or the cause you champion. For example, the number of people helped, projects funded, or other specific outcomes achieved. If the event raised money for a specific project or initiative, be sure to share that information with donors so they better understand how their attendance contributed to the impact.
  • Donor retention. Measure how many donors who contributed to the event have continued to support the organization in subsequent months or years. A high donor retention rate indicates a successful event in terms of building long-term donor relationships.
  • Comparative analysis. Compare the event’s performance to previous events or similar initiatives to identify trends and areas of improvement.

How to Monitor KPIs

If collecting and tracking the above KPIs feels overwhelming, not to worry—technology makes it much simpler to monitor KPIs while keeping your data clean and up-to-date. A simple way to start collecting this important information is through feedback and surveys from event participants, donors, and volunteers and pulling information from your CRM or event management platforms.

Look for a powerful software solution that fits your nonprofit’s specific needs. For instance, charity golf tournament organizers should consider using golf tournament management software, like GolfStatus, so they can not only track the most relevant data, but streamline their event management strategies.

No matter what tech tools or software your nonprofit utilizes, ensure you keep data hygiene best practices in mind, such as regularly auditing your records. NXUnite suggests completing your dataset by appending missing information so you always have the best understanding of where you stand.

Final Thoughts

Data is powerful, and when collected and analyzed properly, can tell a story about your nonprofit’s events that sets you up for continued success. If you don’t have software in place to manage your nonprofit’s events, start by researching options tailored to the specific event and how the platform will help you collect and manage data. Next, do a deep dive into data hygiene practices and implement recommendations. Finally, determine a strategy for collecting the important data that inform KPIs that help your nonprofit reach its goals.

Learn more about how data analytics can be used in the financial management of your nonprofit.

How Donor Analytics Inform Nonprofit Financial Management

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Your nonprofit likely collects many different types of data on its supporters. Between the donor profiles in your CRM, your online donation page, registration forms, feedback surveys, and marketing conversion data, there is a wealth of information available for your organization to use when making strategic decisions.

However, all of this data contains untapped potential unless you draw applicable conclusions from it. These insights are collectively known as donor analytics. Jitasa’s guide to donor analytics divides these insights into four major categories: giving, engagement, demographic, and predictive analytics.

Donor analytics can inform many areas of your nonprofit’s operations, including financial management. To help you get started, this guide will discuss four major areas of your organization’s financial management strategy that can benefit from data-driven insights, including:

  1. Measuring Fundraising Effectiveness
  2. Evaluating Expense Budgets
  3. Cultivating Major Gifts
  4. Improving Donor Retention Rates

As you adapt the tips in this post to your organization’s needs, keep in mind that financial management and fundraising are closely linked. A data-driven approach to bringing in and handling funding maximizes your nonprofit’s ability to further its mission. Let’s dive in!

1. Measuring Fundraising Effectiveness

You’ve probably heard the saying, “Begin with the end in mind.” When your nonprofit plans a fundraising campaign, you should consider how you’ll determine if you succeeded after the fundraiser ends.

Donor giving and engagement analytics from past campaigns can help you figure out what concrete metrics to use to measure your fundraising success. In addition to the total amount of revenue you generate, some common data-driven fundraising metrics include:

  • Donor participation rate. You can either measure this on an overall level or break down participation rates by supporter segment to gauge donor engagement.
  • Average gift amount. While it’s helpful to know your overall average, you could also categorize your donations into small, mid-level, and major gifts to find the average amount in each tier.
  • Lifetime value. Analyzing information about each of your donors allows you to better understand the efficiency of your fundraising efforts per donor. You should calculate your overall fundraising return on investment (ROI) after each event or campaign, but also measuring your ROI per supporter can help you determine who your most valuable donors are.

Although giving analytics are discussed most often when it comes to fundraising success, keep in mind that monetary donations aren’t the only way supporters provide value to your organization during a campaign. Donor engagement analytics, such as volunteer participation, event attendance, and in-kind donations, provide a more complete picture of how supporters help further your organization’s mission. So, your fundraising campaign goals should take both giving and other forms of engagement into account.

2. Evaluating Expense Budgets

Your nonprofit’s operating budget is one of the most important documents for effective financial management because it predicts your revenue and expenses for the coming year. Most organizations categorize their predicted revenue by source and break down expenses into program, administrative, and fundraising costs. Your administrative and fundraising expenses together make up your nonprofit’s overhead.

You might have heard of the 65/35 rule of expense budgeting, which states that nonprofits should plan to spend at least 65% of their revenue on programming and no more than 35% on overhead. In reality, this breakdown will look different for every nonprofit. 

It’s best to treat the 65/35 rule as a flexible guideline and instead focus on leveraging donor analytics to expand your organization’s program spending and reduce overhead. This process could take many forms, including:

  • Analyzing engagement rates for various communication methods. You can lower your organization’s spending on marketing by focusing on the channels with the highest conversion rates and taking the communication preferences donors have expressed into account.
  • Exploring corporate philanthropy opportunities. Appending employer data lets you know what companies supporters work for and what philanthropic programs those companies have. This information can help you take advantage of corporate sponsorship opportunities to offset event planning and administrative costs.
  • Playing to individual donors’ interests. To allocate more resources toward your programs, consider asking supporters to donate to initiatives that align with the individual interests listed in their donor profiles. For instance, if an environmental nonprofit knew that one of their supporters was passionate about education, they could ask that donor to contribute to their initiatives to teach elementary school students about recycling.

As you consider these data-driven strategies to allocate your expenses more effectively, keep in mind that your spending still needs to align with available cash flows. A nonprofit accountant or outsourced chief financial officer (CFO) can help predict cash flows and create a range of possible scenarios to ensure your estimates for overhead and program expenses are realistic.

3. Cultivating Major Gifts

Another commonly cited guideline when it comes to nonprofit finances is the 80/20 rule, which states that 80% of individual donation revenue comes from the top 20% of donors. While these percentages may vary for each organization, they show that major gifts are critical for your nonprofit to bring in funding.

The main purpose of predictive donor analytics—data-driven conclusions that provide insight into donors’ future involvement with your cause—is to help identify potential major donors through prospect research. DonorSearch’s guide to major gifts recommends analyzing both wealth and philanthropic indicators to identify major donor prospects:

  • Wealth indicators demonstrate that a prospect is capable of making a major gift and include data points such as net income, stock ownership, political giving, and real estate holdings.
  • Philanthropic indicators show whether the prospect would be willing to support your cause. These indicators include past donations, volunteer hours, event attendance, and board membership either at your organization or with other similar nonprofits.

While your donor database can serve as a starting point for finding major donor prospects, you’ll likely need to use specialized wealth screening and prospecting tools to build an accurate list. Predictive analytics can also be useful once you start soliciting major gifts, since they help you tailor each fundraising ask to the individual donor.

4. Retaining Donors Over Time

Donor retention has multiple financial benefits for your organization. Not only is it more cost effective than acquiring new donors, but it also provides more sustainable funding for your organization.

There are several ways to use supporter data to refine your nonprofit’s donor retention strategy, including:

  • Sending personalized thank-you messages that include donors’ preferred names, giving amounts, and other details about their history with your organization.
  • Providing recommendations for future involvement based on each donor’s past engagement.
  • Regularly updating supporters’ contact information so they never miss your emails, phone calls, texts, or direct mail messages.

By regularly reaching out to donors in a personalized way, you’ll let them know that your organization values them as individuals. This allows you to build stronger relationships with each of them, leading to higher retention rates.

While donor analytics can inform various aspects of your nonprofit’s operations, financial management is the most essential way to apply these conclusions. This is because financial management is the foundation of all of your nonprofit’s activities, including fundraising, marketing, supporter engagement, and more. Whether you’re planning next year’s budget or looking for more sustainable funding methods, make sure your efforts are data-driven.

Explore the fundamentals about donor cultivation in this comprehensive guide.

Donor Cultivation 101: How to Build Lasting Relationships

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Your nonprofit works day in and day out to bring its mission to life. A big part of that is inspiring supporters to donate, attend events, and volunteer for your cause. Although, it doesn’t stop there. From there, you have to steward them and inspire them to stick around for the long term. As a fundraiser, you need to know the donor cultivation cycle inside and out, including everything from locating prospects to inspiring them to continue giving.

At NPOInfo, we understand the importance of establishing relationships and then effectively leveraging donor data to fuel those connections. We know it takes a lot of patience and persistence. For new and seasoned professionals alike, cultivating donors can be challenging. After all, every donor is different!

Our goal with this guide is to demystify the process, so you can build genuine relationships that last. To help, here’s what we’ll cover:

Your prospects and current supporters deserve a positive experience with your organization. Taking steps to establish and steward lasting relationships will go a long way in building a sustainable future for your nonprofit. Let’s dive in.

Get a quote for our data append services to cultivate donor relationships.

Donor Cultivation FAQ

Before diving into the nitty-gritty details of the donor cultivation cycle, let’s explore the fundamentals of what cultivation is and why it’s vital to your everyday work. That way, you’ll have the foundational knowledge you need to craft a comprehensive plan.

What Is Donor Cultivation?

Donor cultivation is the process of establishing and strengthening relationships with prospective and current donors over time. The term describes how you identify potential donors, inspire them to give, and steward meaningful relationships with them.

Effective cultivation involves a range of activities, including personalized communication, effective donor recognition, engaging events, and volunteerism. Every stage of the cycle is fueled by insightful data your nonprofit collects, such as donors’ wealth capacities, giving histories, and contact information.

The ultimate goal of donor cultivation is to create a sustainable base of loyal donors who support the organization’s overall mission and goals.

What Are The Goals of Donor Cultivation?

While each nonprofit pursues a different mission, every organization’s reason for cultivating donors remains the same: they want to establish and deepen relationships with those who believe in their cause.

Let’s break down that overarching objective into a few key goals:

  • Engage donors: The cultivation process helps create engagement opportunities that encourage interaction with your organization to learn more about your mission, programs, and impact.
  • Build trust: Your donor cultivation efforts will build rapport with donors when you demonstrate your organization’s commitment to transparency, accountability, and responsible stewardship of donations.
  • Retain donors: Effective cultivation means you can retain donors and inspire them to stay engaged in your activities. The cycle involves maintaining regular communication and recognizing their contributions.
  • Boost donor lifetime value: As fundraisers, we all know that donor attrition can be costly. Instead of letting new donors churn, following the donor cultivation cycle religiously will allow you to inspire donors to stick around. By convincing them to give again and give large gifts over time, you’ll increase their lifetime value.

The core goals of donor cultivation include engaging donors, building trust, retaining support, and boosting donor lifetime value.

Overall, thoughtful donor cultivation means you can establish a reliable foundation of support.

How Long Does The Donor Cultivation Cycle Take?

The length of donor cultivation varies depending on your organization’s goals, each donor’s interests, and the level of engagement.

Donor cultivation can take several months or years based on these facts. Know that it’s an ongoing process, so donor cultivation never really “ends.” It’s essential to understand that cultivating strong relationships with supporters is a long-term investment that requires patience, commitment, and consistency.

What’s The Difference Between Donor Cultivation and Solicitation?

Donor cultivation is the process of building relationships with potential donors, while solicitation is the direct request for a donation. Cultivation precedes solicitation and focuses on engagement, education, and relationship-building, while solicitation is the ask for a gift.

Think of cultivation as the fun stage where you get to personally know your donors and what drives them to give. Once you understand their motivations and gain their trust, you can make a tailored ask based on their needs.

Breaking Down the Donor Cultivation Cycle

As professional fundraisers, we’re always chasing the coveted “golden” donation. Even once someone donates, we must continue building relationships and maintaining trust. That often means repeating stages, which turns donor cultivation into a cycle. We’ll break the donor cultivation into 5 steps.

It’s important to note that the cycle is ongoing, and donors can move in and out of each step depending on their interests and engagement level. To properly cultivate donors, your organization should continuously assess where each individual is in the cycle and adjust engagement strategies accordingly.

This graphic breaks down the donor cultivation cycle into 5 steps.

Step 1) Identification

The first step in the donor cultivation cycle is to identify potential donors. This stage requires finding people who have the capacity and interest to support your cause.

To create a list of prospects, consider everyone in your network who might support your mission. They might support your work via volunteering or some other method. You can also assess board members’ and donors’ networks to generate this list.

Step 2) Research and Qualification

Once potential donors are identified, your organization qualifies them by assessing their giving capacity, philanthropic interests, and likelihood of supporting the organization. This step in the donor cultivation cycle helps you prioritize which donors to engage with more deeply.

Heavily dependent on thorough prospect research, this stage allows you to determine whether the prospects you’ve identified will be high-capacity donors for your mission. Donorly’s prospect research guide explains you should look into two types of data during this stage:

  1. Capacity (wealth) markers: These data points indicate a donor’s financial position and help predict whether they’d be a high-capacity donor for your nonprofit. Examples of capacity markers include real estate ownership, stock holdings, and business affiliations.
  2. Affinity (warmth) markers:  These data points show whether a donor might be interested in supporting your mission based on their experiences or values. Examples of affinity markers include political involvement, and demographics.

If you find that you’re missing any of this information, that’s a strong indication that you should conduct a data append. You’ll be able to fill in information that’s inaccurate or missing from your CRM, whether you need to append demographic details, wealth indicators, or contact information. Doing so will help you paint a complete picture for each prospect.

Step 3) Cultivation

Here comes the fun part: getting to know your prospects! This step in the donor cultivation cycle is where you begin forming a relationship with each potential donor. This might involve activities like:

  • Sending personalized communications that appeal to their interests
  • Inviting them to your nonprofit’s events or tours
  • Promote volunteer opportunities

The goal of this stage is to educate the prospective donor about your nonprofit’s mission, programs, and impact. To cultivate donors, you’ll need to use this stage to build trust and rapport, positioning your organization as trustworthy and impactful.

Step 4) Solicitation

Once you’ve sufficiently cultivated a relationship with a prospect, it’s time to make a direct ask for a gift.

This may involve making a face-to-face request, sending a fundraising letter or email, or making an online appeal. It all depends on the individual’s communication preferences.

In any case, the solicitation should be personalized and aligned with the donor’s interests and giving capacity. Take a look at the philanthropic and wealth indicators you found during the research stage. Then, tailor your ask to fit their budget and appeal to what draws them toward your organization.

Step 5) Stewardship

You’ve successfully acquired a donation. Wonderful! The work isn’t done yet. After all, it is a donor cultivation cycle.

After receiving a gift, your nonprofit should engage in stewardship activities, including:

  • Thanking the donor with a personalized thank-you email, handwritten letter, or a gift for impactful donations
  • Acknowledging their gift’s impact on your beneficiaries
  • Reporting back on how the funds were used to further your mission

One of the biggest considerations in your cycle is how you’ll sufficiently steward donors since this directly impacts retention. The key is timely, consistent, and genuine communication. After all, they clearly already believe in your mission.

Even after you steward donors, you’ll need to enter them back into the donor cultivation cycle, so you can upgrade them. Over time, you’ll strengthen your financial stability and build a reliable base of donors.

5 Donor Cultivation Strategies

While understanding the general donor cultivation cycle is certainly helpful, you need some concrete strategies that tailor your plan to your audience. Let’s walk through five of our favorite ideas.

This graphic outlines some of our favorite donor cultivation strategies, like eCards and data appending.

• Offer Unique Fundraising Opportunities.

One of the keys to inspiring donations is to offer unique fundraising opportunities. Our favorite option is donation eCards. Everyone loves receiving a greeting card, even more so when the proceeds go to a good cause!

You can create eCards branded to your mission that donors can send to their loved ones, either letting them know they gave in their name or challenging them to donate too.

Alternatively, create cards for special occasions that anyone can buy. That way, you can help supporters celebrate birthdays, say thanks to their loved ones, or send well wishes with holiday donation cards.

Sell fundraising eCards like this one to cultivate donors and inspire them to donate.

Then, you have a few ways to sell them to donors. Fundraising Letters’ charity eCards guide explains you can offer them in three ways:

  1. Use eCards as integrated donation forms. Add eCards directly to your site’s donation process. With this approach, a donor selects their preferred eCard, chooses a donation amount, adds the recipient’s contact information, and supplies their payment details.
  2. Sell eCards as fundraising products. If you have an online fundraising store, add your eCards and sell them for fixed rates. Donors can browse your collection, personalize the eCards, and send them to loved ones.
  3. Add eCards to your donation confirmation page. Embed your eCards into your giving confirmation page. While you can promote the reward before someone donates, it can be a fun surprise if a donor doesn’t know they can send an eCard until it pops up on the confirmation page.

The key to this donor cultivation strategy is to leverage a strong eCard creation platform. We recommend eCardWidget for its user-friendly design tools and fundraising features. The platform makes it incredibly easy to sell digital greeting cards for your cause. Plus, it’s a fantastic way to incentivize donors to give (and keep giving)!

If you're looking for unique fundraising and donor cultivation strategies, create and sell eCards to donors.

• Ensure You Have Updated Donor Data.

Your donor data is crucial to the donor cultivation cycle. Beyond your initial research, you’ll need to maintain sufficient data to ensure your communications are delivered and based on accurate information.

Common donor data we recommend consistently monitoring include:

Proper donor cultivation requires robust supporter profiles with accurate data.

  • Contact information: Consistently update postal addresses, phone numbers, and email addresses. Accurate contact details are essential for effective communication and engagement. Otherwise, your messages will go undelivered.
  • Giving history: Track donors’ giving history, including the amount, frequency, and date of their donations. You can then use this data to identify giving patterns and generate targeted fundraising appeals.
  • Demographic information: Collect demographic information about donors, such as age, gender, and income. Knowing this information will allow you to craft appeals tailored to their budgets and programmatic interests.
  • Donor preferences: Your nonprofit should track donors’ interests, values, and philanthropic preferences. Knowing this information can help tailor engagement efforts to each donor’s individual needs and build a deeper relationship.

Note that data appends can help you acquire any missing or outdated information in your CRM. Essentially, this process involves cross-checking the information you have with an external comprehensive database to ensure you have the right information.

Invest in your donor cultivation strategies by getting a quote for our data append services.

• Maximize Impact With Matching Gifts.

One simple yet highly effective way to cultivate donors is with corporate matching gifts. As a form of corporate philanthropy, matching gifts multiply the gifts your donors give. If their employer offers one of these programs, their donation to your nonprofit might be eligible to be matched, effectively doubling their contribution.

Double the Donation’s donation matching guide explains that there are a few key times to promote corporate giving during the donor cultivation cycle:

  • During the donation process: Donating is when engagement is at its pique. Share information about donation matching by adding a snippet about it on your donation form and adding an employer research tool to your confirmation page.
  • Throughout your website: Prospective and current donors alike will turn to your website for updated information about your cause. No matter where they are in the donor cultivation cycle, encourage them to check their eligibility. You can also design a page devoted to explaining matching gifts.
  • Across communications: Donor cultivation requires open communication. From your social media posts to your monthly newsletter, mention donation matching whenever you can!

Regardless of timing, promoting matching gifts is great for inspiring initial donations and encouraging donors to take their existing donations further.

Make sure you have accurate employer information for your donors, so you can follow up with match-eligible supporters and cultivate lasting relationships. Learn more about this process with our guide to employer appends for nonprofits.

• Proactively Thank Your Donors.

Showing appreciation is crucial for inspiring donors to stick around. When you treat your existing donors with respect, the word will get around to prospective ones as well.

Make supporters feel valued by consistently recognizing their generosity. Here are a few donor recognition ideas that work for any organization:

  • Thank-you eCards. While great for fundraising, eCards are also a fantastic recognition strategy. Sending a personalized eCard can help communicate that individual donors are valued and appreciated. Create one or two thank-you card designs you can send whenever someone gives. Then, personalize the message sent with each eCard with the donor’s name, giving amount, and a message from your team.
  • Donor gifts. From branded merchandise to full-out donor appreciation events, gifts can help cultivate relationships with existing donors. Re:Charity’s guide to donor gifts recommends picking gifts based on donation tiers. After all, donors entrust you because they respect your ability to spend fundraising revenue properly. For example, a personalized eCard is great for someone who gives $25, while a gift basket is more appropriate for someone who gives $1,000.
  • Impact reports. Creating an impact report that highlights the organization’s accomplishments and the impact of donors’ support can be a powerful way to show appreciation and cultivate donors. Within your report, include statistics, stories, and testimonials that demonstrate the organization’s success thanks to donors.

Beyond post-donation, reaching out during other times of the year lets donors know you’re thinking about them. Connect with them during the holidays and other special occasions to reiterate your gratitude for their continued support. Remember, timely and consistent communication is key for effective donor cultivation.

• Encourage Other Forms of Engagement.

When it comes to donor cultivation, other forms of engagement outside of donating can be just as meaningful. A couple of ways that can help you build meaningful donor relationships include:

  • Volunteerism: Sharing volunteer opportunities can be an effective way to grow support. Volunteerism allows donors to engage with the organization on the ground level and provides opportunities for them to use their skills and expertise to support the cause.
  • Events: Build a sense of community around your cause by hosting regular events and inviting committed supporters. Hosting events such as tours, volunteer events, or donor appreciation events can help donors feel more connected to your work. Events provide opportunities for donors to meet staff, learn more about your work, and see the impact of their support firsthand.

Overall, getting donors involved in other areas of your organization can help them understand why financial support is so crucial. Plus, they’ll see that your nonprofit views them as more than a funding opportunity.

Aside from asking supporters to get directly involved with your nonprofit in new ways, you can also increase their engagement by reaching your donors and target audiences in more places. This involves expanding your nonprofit’s network of partner organizations and corporate sponsors.

Consider the direct touchpoints that your supporters have with your nonprofit. Right now, they might include hearing about you from friends and family, making a first donation, attending an event, receiving ongoing updates and appeals, giving recurring donations, volunteering, or having one-on-one chats with your development team. But if you can find ways to grow deeper roots in your community and reach supporters outside of these direct interactions, you can become a more meaningful, recurring part of their lives.

For example, consider these indirect touchpoints you might foster through expanding your nonprofit’s network:

  • Establishing workplace giving programs with local businesses
  • Securing event and campaign sponsorships from businesses
  • Partnering with other organizations in the community to co-host programs and events
  • Lending volunteer power to public institutions like libraries and parks with special events
  • Weighing in on public issues and state and local policy developments that relate to your mission
  • Joining debates and roundtables hosted by other groups in the community
  • Offering free educational programming in partnership with peer organizations and community groups

Each of these strategies can grow your audience, strengthen your partnerships, and ultimately make your nonprofit a more central part of your supporters’ lives. When your organization is recognizable as an active player in the community, engaged with businesses, community groups, and governments, you can foster longer-lasting and more meaningful relationships with donors.

Corporate giving programs are among the easiest ways to get started expanding your network and building more touchpoints with donors. That’s because they’re mutually beneficial for both your nonprofit and businesses, which receive public recognition and increased employee engagement as a result of giving back to the community. It’s a win-win!

 

Pro tip: Kick off your relationship-building efforts by digging into your data! If you have records of donors’ employers (or can secure this data through an append service), see if any businesses crop up repeatedly. Research their corporate giving programs, promote relevant opportunities like matching gifts to those donors, and then reach out to the business to express your thanks and discuss additional partnership opportunities.

Final Thoughts on Donor Cultivation

Effective donor cultivation looks different for every organization. Beyond understanding the fundamentals of the cycle, your nonprofit will thrive by experimenting with different strategies like thank-you eCards and data appending.

Remember, the cycle is an ongoing process. It never truly ends. Rather, you need to re-enter donors into the cycle every time they give, so you can maintain those relationships and upgrade their support.

As you refine your donor cultivation strategies, check out these additional resources:

Leverage our data append services to build your donor profiles and cultivate donor relationships.