Do you have the dashboard you deserve?

One of the beauties of sophisticated fundraising software like ClearView CRM is the ability to provide meaningful, usable dashboards. But are you getting the dashboard you deserve? That is, does your dashboard offer you at-a-glance information that actually 1. lets you know if you're on target to meet your goals today, and/or 2. helps you set goals for tomorrow?

First, let's say what dashboards that might achieve one or both of those objectives are not. Dashboards are not portals. If your screen simply shows a group of applications in panels, you're not looking at a dashboard.

Dashboards, at their best, are virtual treasure troves of charts, reports, visual indicators and alerts arranged on one screen in a way that makes sense to you.

They give real-time information that can alert you to operational issues like the quality of information in your database or help you understand how your annual campaign is progressing against last year's results. At the heart of the best dashboard is strategic thinking about, among other issues, the overall goal of the dashboard, who will use it, what its panels should reveal and which data sources you need to tap to get the right information at the right time. 

Many ClearView CRM users are building custom dashboards for their organizations that show precisely the kinds of information they need to stay on top of their key performance indicators (KPIs) and long-term trends. One client has created dashboards for executives, chapters and donor services, each of which accomplishes different goals. The executive dashboard, for instance, features panels on fiscal year gift comparisons, donor count breakdowns and trends, membership alerts and other topics.

As all dashboard panels should be, these panels are interactive. Users can drill down into the data in panels to get at underlying detail immediately, or take action immediately, without leaving the dashboard.

The key to creating a dashboard--a dynamic, relevant work tool--instead of a portal ultimately comes down to your ability to distinguish among useful and productive data and interesting, but non-essential information. If you take the time to get the goals and strategy right ahead of time, you're well on your way to the fundraising dashboard you deserve.

6 Ways to to Grow Your Active Donor Base with Data, Part 3

In Part 3, the final part, of this post, we'll discuss simple ways to optimize your direct fundraising processes to help grow your active donor list.


Selecting and segmenting lists to which you send appeals, as well as direct mail fundraising, are both art and science. Taking a fresh look at how you do them can help grow your active donor list.

• Try segmenting lapsed donors based on preferences like their preferred giving channel and on issues in which they expressed interest. Both provide more targeted appeals.
• Use the “monetary” part of RFM segmentations to make decisions on approaches to lapsed donors. For instance, begin your ask level based on the donor’s last donation so you’re not asking a former $50 giver for $25.
• Try using philanthropic rating on your lists, importing the screening data to help you select lists for mailings. By doing so, one client organization increased its response rate to acquisition mailings by 67% while decreasing its expenses because it sent fewer appeals to more appropriate targets.

Direct mail tactics are also fair game for experimentation. When you implement your next acquisition campaign, try suppressing only active donors rather than using other more selective criteria. Another possibility is mailing deeply into your lapsed donor file during an acquisition campaign. Organizations that have mailed to past donors who were up to 20(!) years lapsed have seen documented recapture rates of nearly 1.5%.


You can also consider using carefully evaluated outside lists—from other NPOs, compiled lists and consumer-response lists. Although list acquisition is problematic for any organization, and response rates on purchased lists are generally low, exchanging your donor lists with other NPOs can be a fruitful way to obtain names for acquisition campaigns. List exchange names typically cost less than rentals and often perform better. In addition, you can also try comparing your lapsed donor lists with outside lists to determine duplicate donors considered “multi-buyers” who could be your best prospects.


Finally, make sure you’re mailing in sufficient numbers to achieve your acquisition goals. You can do this by determining mail quantities using actual attrition statistics and typical (not wishful) response rates. For instance, say your active donor list is 200,000, and your historical attrition rate of has been 16%. If you want to add 10% more new donors to grow your active base, you need to acquire approximately 5000 new donors. If each acquisition mailing attracts one new donor for every 100 names, you must mail 500,000 pieces each year.

Are Your Databases Asking You to Integrate?

Squealing brakes. Loose steering. Black exhaust.

The message from your car is obvious: “Tune me up!” Likewise, your donor management software, online giving application, volunteer management software and other systems have distinct ways of letting you know that they need to be integrated—or to at least talk to one another. Most organizations have reasonable explanations for keeping dispersed donor databases. The absence of integration, however, always makes itself known and can often manifest in not-so-happy ways.

If you recognize your organization or department in these indicators, your databases just might be telling you to make some connections:

You annoy donors

People give you money; ergo, they like you. But how do they feel if you misspell their name in an appeal letter? Call them by phone when they’ve told you they want email? Send event invitations to deceased family members? You probably already know the key reason for errors like these. They insinuate themselves into your data primarily when your organization houses donor information in multiple databases.

Really, we all know that effective management of one donor list is difficult enough without adding other, disconnected lists into the mix. The predictable result is disgruntled, irritated and disturbed donors. When your data sources don’t talk, you run the risk of hurting the relationships you most want to nurture--and of raising less money.

You leave opportunities hanging

If you have to jump through hoops to pull a project report for a major donor about his restricted giving, your organization’s relationship with that person can founder. If Visitor Services can’t identify members who are up for renewal when they enter the building, you lose the chance to increase your renewal rate.

Problems like this arise from fragmented data that hinders your ability to recognize trends or situations that can help fine-tune strategy. Ideally, your systems should help you answer hypotheticals like:

• How will a high bounce rate affect donation levels from our email marketing efforts?
• How do major donors behave once projects they supported are complete?
• What is the effect on giving if we coordinate solicitations in our multichannel fundraising?

Getting answers to such queries requires painting a coherent picture from data that is probably stored in more than one system.

You protect your turf

Different departments all have distinct needs that their systems satisfy. The issue arises when these systems aren’t coordinated centrally. What if each department collects and enters data differently? If they have different standards for what qualifies as clean data? If donor or constituent ID numbers aren’t the same in every system? The result is that no one trusts anyone else’s data. Finance sniffs at data from the development department. Info from the volunteer coordinator’s office is suspect. Shadow databases in spreadsheets run amok. Further, no one wants to share their data because they fear it could be compromised in the process.
Department staff often cite their lack of confidence in others’ data quality as justification for keeping their data separate. As well, different departments inevitably need their own systems for various reasons. Finally, any effort to integrate databases is a highly technical, possibly time-intensive, project. These factors show why communication among systems is often lacking when it should be a priority. Achieving system integration and effective, consistent data management across an organization usually takes

• a mandate from above (i.e., from upper management).
• agreement among departments that cooperation and teamwork among staff should extend to their systems.
• commitment from systems vendors that they will facilitate integration with their respective products. If you’re looking at a new system, ask vendors about their APIs, test environments and their history of collaborating with other vendors.

Though none of the above is easy, your donors—and your organization—deserve the right treatment. Don’t miss chances (or, worse still, harm good connections) because you can only see fragmented or less-than-complete pictures.  When the picture is disjointed or if getting the full picture takes undue effort, you miss opportunities and, again, harm relationships. The full view becomes possible only if your systems talk to one another.

Millennial or Boomer--Whom Do You Approach?

Millennials and Baby Boomers: Two massive generational cohorts, both with great opportunity and challenge for fundraisers. Where do you, as a fundraising organization,  focus your efforts?  Of course, you don't need to approach one group to the exclusion of the other, but each can play an important role in your  donor base. This animated infographic compares these two groups--their giving stats, concerns, demographics, etc.--to inform your decisions on how, when and where to make an approach.

6 Ways to to Grow Your Active Donor Base with Data, Part 2

We’ve been discussing ways that your nonprofit can address attrition and generate new donors to help grow a healthy active donor base.   Part 1 focused on tightening up your data management.  This article looks at analyzing your list for active vs. lapsed donors.

Thoughtfully analyze your active donor list

Has your organization taken a hard look recently at which donors in

its current list are active and which are lapsed? Analyzing your list thoughtfully in this way can help you make sure your data reaps the benefits it should.

Exactly what does your organization consider an active donor? Have you specified when donors are considered lapsed? Some organizations say two years without a response to an annual appeal. Others say 18 months. Still others don’t specify at all, and their list of “active” donors actually contains many, many more lapsed donors than active.

Once you determine how your organization has been defining its active donor base, ensure that definition is rooted in reality. Is a donor who hasn’t given in two years truly active? Your historical giving data can help reveal the appropriate time frame for your organization to define a donor as lapsed.  Perhaps someone who hasn’t responded to two cycles of annual appeals is immediately coded as “lapsed” within three months of the unanswered second appeal.

The definition of “active” matters for two reasons:

• First, and most obviously, active and lapsed donors require different appeals and messaging.

• Second, an accurate definition of active donors will offer your organization a realistic attrition rate, which helps with campaign development and resource allocation.

Next up: List selection and segmentation

6 Ways to Grow Your Active Donor Base with Data, Part 1

Without a healthy active donor base, you’re in trouble. That’s a truism all nonprofit fundraisers acknowledge. Growing the number of active donors is a constant process, but you can take steps today to boost that effort. The following strategies focus on reactivating lapsed donors and acquiring new names.  Upgrading current donors is certainly important, but these folks are already active givers.

For most nonprofits, addressing attrition is the key to growing a healthy active list.  Most also recognize the need to generate growth in new donors.  Making sure the data your organization has is working the way it should can address both needs and translate to better results.  And, no, your data doesn't have to be “big.” You can make use of data already in your systems to encourage growth.
  

#1:  Tighten Up Data Management

Data management is the administrative process by which your organization acquires, validates, stores, protects and processes the data it needs. The result of good data management is data that’s accessible, reliable, timely and accurate enough to satisfy the needs of anyone who uses it.
If your data is not satisfying everyone—if it, in fact, gives people heartburn—try a few of these tactics to tighten up your data management.

• Most important and a best practice: Merge all your databases--donor, volunteer and event, even shadow--into one main list.  Also, integrate your online database, if you have one.  So many benefits here: If someone makes a change (e.g., snowbirds indicate their preferred seasonal addresses), everyone has access to the information. Incorrect data due to double entries decreases.  Any information captured online immediately appears in the main database.  The list goes on.
• Standardize how you collect data.  First, determine what donor and prospect information is required when a record enters the system, whether by manual entry or online capture.  Also, require the use of USPS-standard address formats.  A further step is to expand your data collection to include information you might not currently store, such as mail records that show appeals, responses to appeals or giving channel breakdowns.
• Standardized your workflows.  Adopt and communicate a consistent way to code information, and build that into your system.  For instance, make mandatory certain information (say, source codes showing where donors come from) so that anyone who adds a record into the system has no choice but to enter the info.
• Implement a National Change of Address (NCOA) and/or “new move list” service (from companies like SofTrek partner Melissa Data) to ensure that current addresses are always available even on inactive donors.  Since U.S. Census Bureau statistics indicate around 15% of people change addresses in a year, this move alone could greatly increase the quality of your contact data. 

Next:  Thoughtful list analysis

9 Must-ask Questions for Your Nonprofit CRM RFP (Part II)

By Steve Birnbaum

(Part 2)

Last post, we discussed the first five of nine questions you need to ask when you’re developing an RFP for a new nonprofit CRM. These final four questions continue the process of digging deeply into the real and vital (yet sometimes not obvious) strengths and weaknesses of any system you’re considering.

6. How does your system safeguard constituent data in the cloud?

Make sure vendors can specify how their security strategy keeps sensitive donor information safe. Cloud-based systems should help you meet data governance rules, have well-established policies for disaster recovery and PCI compliance and meet all appropriate regulations and standards.

7. Does your system empower multi-channel fundraising?

More and more NPOs are running sophisticated multi-channel fundraising campaigns. Any system you review should not only support large, complex direct-mail segmentation for online and offline campaigns but also offer tools to support major and planned giving, including capital campaign management.

8. How will your system support our national/chapter organizational structure?

Your chapters shouldn’t get less out of a system just because they’re not national headquarters. Ask if vendors’ systems have built-in national/chapter organization functions. Systems you consider should also be able to enforce rules about how chapters share, see and access data.

9. Do you provide a development environment?

A complete development environment should be a mandatory part of any system implementation. Ask vendors if they include all of your data in a test system at no charge, allowing you to test integrations and other system changes without affecting your live data.



Remember, your organization’s goal is not simply to buy a nonprofit CRM or fundraising software. Your ultimate goal is to make sure that your system improves the way you interact with all your constituents and helps you grow their devotion to your cause. Good luck with the process. 
Read Part 1 of this post . . .

Steve Birnbaum is SofTrek’s Vice President of Client Solutions.  He has more than 17 years’ experience in nonprofit management, with particular expertise in organizational planning, technology implementation, and change management.

9 Must-ask Questions for Your Nonprofit CRM RFP

By Steve Birnbaum

(Part I)

When you’re developing an RFP for your new nonprofit CRM system, some questions are more equal than others. In addition to the basics about functionality, make sure you include nine other must-ask questions, five of which we feature in this post. These questions get at some of the most important, but sometimes overlooked, aspects of a nonprofit CRM or fundraising software system. The answers will reveal a great deal about the in-depth capabilities of the systems you’re considering.

1. Can you describe the vision and product roadmap for your system?

The systems you consider might have wonderful features today. Your organization, however, is buying a system for today and for years from now. Make sure vendors can clearly explain their plans for their system in the next several years. Be alert for vendors offering outdated client/server technology today while planning to require your purchase of an expensive upgrade in a few years.

2. Can your system grow with us?

Your organization is not static, so ask vendors if their systems are scalable. Your system’s capacity should easily grow with your organization, accommodating any number of users and constituent records. Even if you never plan to grow that large, you should be confident that millions of records and hundreds of users would never be a problem.

3. Can your system align with our business processes?

You work with constituents and constituent data in the way that makes sense for your organization. Vendors should be able to configure their systems to work the way you do, not vice versa. Look for a platform that accommodates extensive configuration without the downside of having custom software.

4. Are you committed to system integration?

Ask vendors if they have a track record of working closely with other vendors to share data and processes among systems. A look at their current system integrations (finance systems, content management systems and others) will offer a good indication if they actually do. Unless you want to live in your vendor’s walled garden, make sure they play nicely with others.

5. How can you help us improve our major gift effort?

The key to effective major gift solicitation is having a full picture of a prospective major giver’s relationship with your organization. Ask vendors if their system includes a comprehensive constituent relationship management (contact management) platform to support annual and long-term development efforts for major gift programs, including tools for forecasting, reporting and analysis. The system also should run on tablets and other mobile devices on which major gift officers often rely.
 


Next post:  The final four must-ask questions for your nonprofit CRM RFP

Steve Birnbaum is SofTrek’s Vice President of Client Solutions.  He has more than 17 years’ experience in nonprofit management, with particular expertise in organizational planning, technology implementation, and change management.