Useful Truths: Apply With Care

Apparently, everything has an upside and a downside. Including useful fundraising truths. Here, I’m going to show you how even a great idea can knock you for a loop when you don’t apply it right.

The useful truth
Here it is: The higher a donor’s first gift to an organization, the higher her lifetime value. You might be saying, “Duh,” but what makes this truth so useful is the strength of the correlation. The lifetime value of a donor who gives a first gift of $10 will be a fraction of the value of a donor who gives $50 the first time around. The difference between the two typically plays out like this: