Donor Demographics

The day after Thanksgiving, the holidays hit full-force. And it’s not just the radio stations blasting “Here Comes Santa Claus” every half hour—it’s the shopping frenzies of Black Friday and Cyber Monday. Thankfully, (no pun intended) for the past four years, we’ve had a day to shift the focus away from materialism and back to the true spirit of the holidays: Giving Tuesday...

Learn from others. Measure what matters. Start out right. Live out thankfulness. This old dog knows that it takes more than these four things to be a successful and fulfilled fundraiser, but this isn’t a bad place to begin for anyone new to the profession or looking to hit the reset button on his or her career in the nonprofit sector...

Just as many nonprofit organizations have one-size-fits-all fundraising appeals, they also tend to treat all their donors the same. “What’s wrong with that?” you say. “Are they supposed to give the big guys special treatment?” Well, yes—and no...

When people engage with brands on social media, it’s usually because they are looking to build a relationship or some kind of connection. Don’t miss this opportunity. An engaged social-media audience is priceless for your organization because these connections provide the potential for increased organic growth and recurring donations...

There are a number of studies and reports floating around the online space every single day, and these studies and reports are on a variety of topics—science, health care, marketing, technology, communications, statistics—you name it...

Your organization’s current fundraising programs may be getting results. They’re working—or so it seems. But what if your results could be getting better… and better and better? The highest performing nonprofits continually test their appeals programs to optimize programs...

In our grant applications, we are careful to select the best statistics to set out our need statement. We are careful to use the best descriptions about the demographics of those our organization serves each day...

FrontStream recently announced the launch of Panorama, an integrated fundraising platform that includes FirstGiving and Artez for peer-to-peer and online fundraising, BiddingForGood’s online and mobile auctions and GiftWorks Cloud, the company’s donor database...

Are annual reports important to your nonprofit? I would say definitely so. It provides the past, present and hints of the future for your organization in a very succinct way. Make sure you understand the purpose of the annual report and how you intend to utilize the annual report before launching this program...

I’ve been thinking a lot about the C-level donors on your portfolio lately. Why? Well, I was reviewing a mid-level program the other day and tracking all the donors that have moved from mid-level to major-gift portfolios… It was quite impressive...