The Donor You Don’t Know
You thought you “knew” her … the donor who’s given you $200 a year faithfully for the past five years. You’re happy to have her, because she’s loyal and responds to your first renewal notice, saving you money. Aren’t we content?
Then you read she passed away and left $1 million to your competitor.
But suppose I had handed you a piece of paper well before that sad event showing you that specific donor gave substantially more money per year to each of seven specific other organizations … three of them direct competitors of yours. In fact, she had already made a $100,000 bequest to one of them, and supports the other two at the $25,000-$50,000 level.
[Oh … did I say “competitors?” Excuse me. We don’t have competitors in the nonprofit space, do we?]
Are you still content?
The fact is, the tools exist to match your existing donors and their actual giving to your organization against tens of millions of other donors and their actual giving, yielding several rather important insights …
First, for the specific donors matched, you can see exactly what share of their giving wallet you are getting … and what other organizations are getting the larger contributions you might be getting. You might ask: What are they doing right … either programmatically or fundraising-wise? Or, what are we doing wrong?!
Second, looking at the numbers in the aggregate, you can see the full giving potential of your existing donors … not based on some wealth formula or estimate, but on their actual total philanthropic giving to other organizations both inside and outside your “category.” In other words, you’ll see how much money you are leaving on the table. You might want to re-think the fundraising investment you’re not making.
Third, you can also see how those specific donors of yours, who are giving you a pittance, give to the organizations to whom they are more generous. Is it capital campaigns, bequests, special projects, events? Are you making the right asks?
As I noted above, this isn’t a fantasy. The tools exist right now.
Applied recently to two nonprofits, here’s what they indicated …
- For Group A, an advocacy group, 120,000 of 1.4 million donors were exactly matched to a 50 million donor database … those donors gave Group A $74 million over the years; they gave other groups $355 million, which you could examine donor by donor, recipient by recipient.
- For Group B, a nature center, 26,000 of 205,000 donors were exactly matched … those donors gave $36 million to
group B; they gave other groups $172 million, again with “drilling down” to individual donors available.
So I ask you … are you using tools like this? If not, what’s your excuse?
If you’re not aware of these tools, who should find out about them first … You or your competition? You or your boss?!
Tom
11 responses to “The Donor You Don’t Know”
Behavioral Science Q & A
Integrating an individual giving appeal with other communications from a charity can have both positive and negative effects, and the outcome largely depends on how it’s executed. Advantages of Integration Brand Consistency: Maintaining a consistent appearance and messaging across all communications can reinforce the org’s brand identity and strengthen brand recognition and trust among your […]
Read Full Answer
I’m not aware of any in-market tests specifically comparing recurring vs. gift frequency language. I suspect the answer might not be the same with all gift frequencies, nor with all people. It sounds like a great opportunity for you to test and find out what works for your audience. Based on the literature, here’s a couple […]
Read Full Answer
Based on what we know from existing data, those renewal notices can actually be pretty effective in getting people to donate. They tap into our psychology – creating a sense of urgency, reminding us of past support, and using personalization to make the message hit home. They’re playing on our natural tendencies to feel obligated […]
Read Full Answer
Interesting question. I had a quick look at the testing done on this topic. On the positive side, in all cases, over half of donors decide to cover the fee. In some cases, it goes as high as 65%. Not a negligible percentage at all. Here’s another test from iRaiser showing consistent results (see point […]
Read Full Answer
There’s just one thing to consider when designing a supporter journey: the supporter. More specifically, you need to take into account: Who the supporter is i.e. their identity, which is the reason they support this cause, and their personality, which describes the way they “see” and process the world. These will determine the kind of […]
Read Full Answer
I’m not an expert in this but a quick search surfaced this article on the effect of tax reforms on 2019’s charitable giving. The researchers didn’t find a reduction. Actually, they observed an “increase in charitable contributions in 2019, even with the lower tax rates and the dramatically smaller number of taxpayers who itemize their […]
Read Full Answer
What are these tools and where can we find them? Why didn’t you link to them in the post? 🙂
We’re using a number of tools, but I don’t recognize this one. Is the author going to share that with us?
We are using some tools to research donors and their giving history, but are we turning over every rock??? Are their tools we should be using, but are not? It would be great if you would share what steps (and tools) a non-profit should be using to research donors. There are tons of articles saying this should be done, but very few saying how.
OK – please end the suspense. Can you please let us know where to find these tools. Thanks
Nice reminder article, Tom. Thanks for posting it.
I’m interested in the tools that other small organizations have used. What worked the best and the worst for those organizations and why?
Alright, I admit it – I’m new and don’t know all the tools. Give it up, Tom – what are these tools? Our organization has used Target America and plans to run names with them again soon so if there is something better, I’d like to know about it. Target America does seem reasonable – something like $1 a name. That might be why we’ve chosen it. Thanks!
“you can see exactly what share of their giving wallet you are getting” – I say “Hogwash!”
DonorTrends can provide insight concerning published giving information, but it can’t reveal “exactly what share” because it can’t know exactly what they are giving in total.
There is no way to take into account anonymous giving nor giving made to organizations that don’t publish donor information. Additionally, information from the NOZA database may simply be given in a range – no real way to determine where in the range that gift fell.
If your tool is really great, you shouldn’t have to resort to hyperbole to sell it.
One company I’ve heard of offering tools like this is DonorTrends with their TrueGivers GAP Report (among their other products). They are offering webinars to promote these products, but I don’t know of anyone who has used the tools yet.
Has anyone actually used these tools? And how have they leveraged the findings to inform their marketing efforts? I’d love to hear some real stories of implementing the findings.
Tom might be simply feeling bashful, so I’ll pitch in and suggest that the tools and services he refers to are available from DonorTrends!
Thanks everyone for your comments, questions and skepticism. I created this database of actual giving — as opposed to the traditional and speculative wealth screening focus on unproven capacity — because as a fundraiser I want to see what my donors are actually doing with other organizations.
We decided to make the screening and analysis free to all organizations and consultants because we believe understanding competition, or what I call “Mission Competition,” is more important than ever.
To Sam, I acknowledge that this system don’t catch everything, but it is the only data set available that exactly matches the donors on your database with the giving history on ours. Because this “exact match” feature is available no where else in terms of screening files, I would simply remind Sam — imperfections or not — of the adage: “It is better to light one candle than to curse the darkness.”
Since we are offering to screen your entire file, including lapsed donors, free of charge, and provide a Giving Analysis Profile, free of charge, I urge everyone to light the candle of insight.
Roger Craver, Founder
DonorTrends
Roger,
I certainly appreciate lighting a candle rather than cursing the darkness. Perhaps a more fitting analysis of my response would be that I suggest we call a candle a candle and then set it on a lamp stand for folks to see.
In my view, this is far more ethical (and in the long run, more effective) marketing than calling a candle the sun.