In case your nonprofit is searching for a method to maximize its fundraising efforts, there’s one avenue you won’t be paying sufficient consideration to: prospect analysis.
No matter your group’s dimension, gathering the suitable donor knowledge by way of prospect analysis can have a big impact in your nonprofit’s income. These funds might help you serve your mission, fund necessary initiatives, and work towards your objectives.
On this information, we’ll define a number of necessary items of data you’ll have to efficiently leverage prospect analysis, together with:
From studying the fundamentals to soliciting your first prospects, absolutely understanding prospect analysis is usually a game-changer in your group. Let’s get began!
The Fundamentals of Prospect Analysis
What Is Prospect Analysis?
Prospect analysis is a course of carried out by a nonprofit’s improvement staff to collect knowledge about donors, volunteers, and different supporters. The method analyzes every particular person’s giving capability, motivations, and affinity for the trigger. It helps decide a person’s skill and need to help that particular trigger in addition to how you can enchantment to their pursuits.
Key elements nonprofits search for throughout prospect analysis embrace previous giving, wealth markers, enterprise affiliations, and philanthropic tendencies. Nonprofits can even use software program or flip to prospect analysis corporations to collect this knowledge.
Wealth Screening vs. Prospect Analysis
You will have heard the time period wealth screening along with prospect analysis. Whereas the 2 phrases are sometimes used interchangeably, wealth screening is just one element of prospect analysis.
Wealth screening analyzes the monetary features of a donor’s profile, equivalent to actual property possession, inventory possession, and political giving. Whereas it’s a necessary a part of prospect analysis, this solely signifies a person’s skill to present.
Prospect analysis goes a couple of steps additional and makes use of each wealth indicators and philanthropic indicators to find out a donor’s willingness and capability to present. This presents nonprofits with a full image of every donor and helps make extra educated solicitations. We’ll discover the entire vary of information it’s best to gather in the subsequent part.
Who Makes use of Prospect Analysis?
Quite a lot of organizations use prospect analysis to spice up income and drive extra significant relationships. These embrace:
- Academic establishments: Thorough analysis can pinpoint alumni and fogeys with a powerful monetary capability and historical past of philanthropy. Academic establishments can then tailor fundraising appeals to advertise scholarships, amenities upgrades, and particular applications.
- Healthcare organizations: Prospect analysis helps discover donors who’ve private connections to particular medical causes or beforehand donated to health-related initiatives. This enables these organizations to give attention to potential donors more likely to fund state-of-the-art gear or affected person care amenities.
- Arts and cultural organizations: Arts organizations can determine patrons with a eager curiosity within the arts and a historical past of supporting cultural initiatives. This info is essential for concentrating on campaigns for exhibitions, performances, and academic workshops.
- Environmental teams: These organizations can determine donors who’re obsessed with conservation, local weather change, or particular regional environmental points. Efficient prospect analysis can result in focused campaigns that resonate deeply with donors’ values, driving funding for essential initiatives and advocacy efforts.
- Religion-based organizations: Prospect analysis helps find people who’ve proven generosity to non secular or religious causes, enabling faith-based organizations like church buildings to personalize solicitations for funding new amenities and mission work.
- Advocacy teams: Prospect analysis helps uncover supporters who’re financially succesful and deeply dedicated to particular causes like civil rights, training reform, or well being coverage. This perception helps mobilize sources for lobbying and public consciousness campaigns.
- Greek organizations: Fraternities and sororities can use prospect analysis to attach with alumni who’ve fond reminiscences of their membership and is likely to be concerned with funding scholarships and chapter home renovations.
Prospect analysis might help all of those organizations (plus others!) turn into extra targeted of their outreach.
The Worth of Thorough Prospect Analysis
40% of B2B salespeople say prospecting is essentially the most difficult a part of the gross sales course of. In relation to fundraising, nonprofits expertise that very same actual ache level. Prospect analysis might be extremely useful in sourcing and qualifying results in keep away from losing time pursuing people with out the affinity or capability to present.
Past time financial savings, listed here are an important advantages of researching supporters:
- Improved Fundraising Effectivity: Prospect analysis helps nonprofits determine essentially the most promising donors, focusing efforts on those that are probably to contribute.
- Tailor-made Appeals and Advertising and marketing: By understanding potential donors’ giving capability, nonprofits can tailor asks to completely different supporter segments primarily based on particular person wealth indicators and giving historical past.
- Higher Supporter Relationships: Complete prospect analysis permits nonprofits to know supporters’ pursuits and passions, enabling personalised communication that resonates with every particular person’s values and retains help.
- Strategic Planning: Perception into supporters’ capabilities and preferences helps nonprofits plan their initiatives extra strategically.
- Extra Dependable Information: Prospect analysis helps nonprofits collect correct and complete knowledge about potential donors, together with correct cellphone numbers, demographics, wealth indicators, and philanthropic pursuits. Dependable knowledge is essential for making knowledgeable choices and staying related with supporters.
Prospect analysis is important for nonprofits trying to optimize their fundraising initiatives and construct lasting relationships. Be sure you’re working with dependable instruments and corporations to collect supporter knowledge, and also you’ll set your staff up for achievement.
Information Factors To Collect Throughout Prospect Analysis
Since prospect analysis includes gathering each wealth and philanthropic indicators, it’s necessary to know the widespread knowledge factors that fall beneath every umbrella class.
1) Philanthropic Indicators
Philanthropic indicators characterize a person’s willingness to present to your group. These embrace:
Earlier Donations to Your Nonprofit
Previous giving is one of the best indicator of future giving as a result of it means the supporter is concerned with your trigger and has already contributed. Prospect analysis helps uncover these earlier donations so your group can attain again out.
Donations to Different Organizations
In case your donors are philanthropically minded, they in all probability aren’t solely giving to your nonprofit. Let prospect analysis unveil previous giving to organizations with causes much like yours.
Nonprofit Involvement
Giving isn’t the one indicator that a person is philanthropically minded. With prospect analysis, you possibly can determine different forms of nonprofit involvement, equivalent to advocacy work, volunteerism, and board membership.
Private Info
Gathering private knowledge gives you a extra holistic understanding of who every donor is and how one can join with them on a deeper degree. Craft extra focused appeals and ship these appeals efficiently by gathering this donor knowledge:
- Full and most well-liked identify and title
- Gender
- Marital standing
- Contact info, like electronic mail addresses, cellphone numbers, and postal addresses
- Hobbies and pursuits
- Dates of beginning
A lot of this info might be collected on-line or by way of knowledge appending companies and might help you determine preferrred prospects.
2) Wealth Indicators
Wealth indicators characterize a person’s skill to present to your group. These embrace:
Actual Property Possession
The standard and amount of actual property somebody owns is a wealth indicator your fundraising staff ought to take note of. People with notable actual property have giant giving capacities that you would be able to capitalize on in your nonprofit’s fundraising initiatives.
Enterprise Affiliations
Prospect analysis might help you detect current enterprise connections amongst your donors. This analysis consists of particulars a couple of donor’s profession equivalent to wage estimates, which might point out wealth and skill to present. You may additionally uncover details about a donor’s employer’s company giving program, which might present insights into potential matching present alternatives.
Inventory Possession/SEC Transactions
Understanding a couple of contributor’s inventory possession can provide you much more perception into their wealth and capability to donate to your group.
Political Contributions
Likelihood is that a person who has made sizable donations to a political marketing campaign additionally has the giving capability to donate main items to your nonprofit. Through the use of prospect analysis to focus on this group, you possibly can give attention to successful over prospects with the potential to make beneficiant contributions.
Main Makes use of of Prospect Analysis
Prospect analysis can influence a number of areas of your mission. Let’s discover widespread methods nonprofits use the information they collect.
Main Giving
Prospect analysis is the proper device for locating hidden main present prospects in your current donor database. It may provide help to uncover previous giving and involvement and monitor giving patterns which will predict main giving.
As an example, you might need a devoted donor whose contributions have steadily elevated over the previous 5 years. With prospect analysis, you possibly can study that donor’s historical past and work out one of the best technique to ask for a serious donation.
Capital Campaigns
A capital marketing campaign is a long-term fundraising effort that’s normally tied to a big mission, equivalent to the development of a brand new constructing or the event of an endowment.
Capital campaigns usually depend on a set variety of main items through the “quiet section” earlier than fundraising is opened to everybody in what’s referred to as the “public section.” Prospect analysis might help uncover preferrred donors for each the quiet and public phases.
Annual Giving
Annual giving is what retains your group’s wheels turning. With out it, you wouldn’t have the ability to full your day-to-day operations.
Whereas your group seemingly already asks all supporters to contribute to your annual fund, now you can seek for new annual donors by way of prospect analysis instruments.
As well as, you’re extra more likely to uncover potential supporters by wanting into somebody’s previous giving to organizations that align with your individual.
Company Giving Alternatives
Prospect analysis is instrumental in figuring out and understanding potential company companions whose philanthropic pursuits align along with your nonprofit’s mission. Gathering employer knowledge additionally helps pinpoint current alternatives which have gone untapped. Examples embrace:
- Matching present alternatives: Many corporations match their workers’ donations to eligible nonprofits. Understanding the place your supporters work might help you determine match-eligible donors, so you possibly can observe up and double these people’ contributions.
- Volunteer grants: Companies additionally present volunteer grants to nonprofits the place their workers volunteer commonly. Prospect analysis might help pinpoint these alternatives.
- In-Form Donations: Corporations can present non-monetary help within the type of items or companies. Prospect analysis helps determine potential donors who can provide in-kind contributions related to your nonprofit’s wants, equivalent to expertise, workplace provides, or skilled companies.
When you determine these alternatives, your nonprofit can attain out to supporters who’re eligible to take part of their corporations’ company giving applications.
Deliberate Giving
Establish donors who’re ready to make important long-term commitments, equivalent to bequests, trusts, or annuities.
Researching a donor’s monetary background and giving historical past permits your nonprofit to tailor conversations round legacy alternatives that resonate on a private degree, so you possibly can safe future funding and make sure the donor’s lifelong engagement along with your mission.
How Matching Items and Prospect Analysis Work Collectively
Matching items and prospect analysis are each highly effective methods that, when mixed, can considerably improve your fundraising efforts.
As talked about, prospect analysis helps determine donors who’re affiliated with corporations that provide matching present applications, probably doubling their donations with out requiring additional effort from the donors themselves. This synergy not solely boosts your fundraising capability but in addition deepens donor engagement, as donors really feel their contributions have a better influence.
Listed here are some key ways in which matching items and prospect analysis can work collectively to dramatically improve your fundraising success:
- An identical present search device might help you determine company and particular person prospects from a listing of people that have already made matching items to your nonprofit.
- Matching items can encourage prospects to present extra to your group after being impressed by the possibility to double their influence. In truth, one in three donors is extra more likely to donate if a match is obtainable.
- Prospect analysis and matching items can develop your company engagement efforts by pinpointing corporations with beneficiant applications.
- Specializing in people with matching present potential doubles the worth of that donor’s potential help.
To handle this technique successfully, think about using specialised instruments like 360MatchPro by Double the Donation. This software program simplifies the method of monitoring and verifying matching present eligibility and submissions, making certain you profit from each donation alternative.
Tips on how to Analysis Donors and Different Constituents
When you’ve determined to carry out prospect analysis, you is likely to be questioning the place it’s best to begin. Listed here are the final steps you possibly can take to collect supporter knowledge.
1) Select your prospect analysis methodology.
Your first step is to plan the way you’ll strategy your analysis course of by asking your self about your fundraising objectives, present methods, and timeline. When you perceive what you want out of your analysis, select one in every of these strategies:
- Do It Your self: For smaller or newer nonprofits with tighter budgets, a do-it-yourself prospect screening strategy is an efficient possibility. Use free or low-cost prospect analysis instruments to look at donors’ giving and philanthropic histories.
- Prospect Analysis Consultants: Prospect analysis consulting corporations are extraordinarily precious sources for nonprofits. They provide recommendation and full screenings for nonprofits of all styles and sizes.
- Prospect Screening Corporations: Each prospect screening firm is completely different, however most evaluate your donors in opposition to quite a lot of databases to create a complete profile for every supporter. This can assist your group monitor, type, and consider all your supporters.
Be sure you know precisely what forms of knowledge you could gather and the way rapidly you could gather that knowledge to ensure you choose the suitable methodology.
2) Type a prospect analysis staff.
In the event you’ll conduct prospect analysis in-house, you’ll have to construct an efficient prospect analysis staff of people with complementary expertise. The next roles are crucial to your staff’s success:
- Director: This particular person leads the staff, units strategic objectives, and ensures alignment along with your nonprofit’s broader goals. They oversee your entire analysis course of and make sure the staff has the mandatory instruments to conduct analysis.
- Prospect Researcher: This staff member is answerable for gathering knowledge about potential and present supporters. They’re tasked with creating detailed profiles by digging into donor knowledge utilizing varied sources, equivalent to databases, public data, and social media.
- Information Analyst: An information analyst focuses on decoding knowledge and traits from donor databases and exterior sources. They assist the staff perceive giving patterns and determine potential high-value donors.
- Growth Officer: This particular person makes use of the insights offered by prospect analysis to domesticate and keep donor relationships. They’re usually concerned in direct fundraising efforts and use data-driven methods to strategy potential donors, safe donations, and nurture ongoing donor relationships.
- Authorized/Compliance Officer: Given the delicate nature of dealing with private knowledge, having somebody educated about authorized and moral requirements is essential. This staff member ensures that each one prospect analysis actions adjust to privateness legal guidelines and moral fundraising practices.
Every position focuses on a particular side of the prospect analysis course of, contributing to a complete strategy. Whereas the construction of your staff could fluctuate, this urged construction helps focused fundraising efforts and helps construct a sturdy basis for long-term supporter engagement.
3) Clear up your knowledge.
Earlier than conducting prospect analysis, clear up your knowledge to make the method run smoother and guarantee extra correct outcomes. Just a few methods to keep up correct knowledge hygiene embrace:
- Figuring out and eradicating duplicate data inside your database
- Standardizing knowledge entries to keep up consistency throughout your database, equivalent to through the use of uniform codecs for dates, addresses, cellphone numbers, and names
- Figuring out and eradicating outdated or irrelevant info that now not serves your fundraising methods
- Eradicating lapsed donors out of your data
- Scanning your database for typos
Your knowledge doesn’t must be good, however cleansing up your knowledge as a lot as doable will optimize your system for prospect analysis.
4) Examine for accuracy.
When you’ve really performed prospect analysis, confirm the accuracy of the information gathered. This step includes cross-referencing info from a number of sources to verify particulars equivalent to contact info, philanthropic historical past, and monetary capability. Some prospect analysis corporations may have an accuracy examine course of, equivalent to manually checking appended emails and cellphone numbers.
Guaranteeing knowledge accuracy helps forestall miscommunication and fosters belief by demonstrating diligence and respect for every prospect’s info. It additionally optimizes the effectivity of subsequent outreach efforts by decreasing the time spent on addressing inaccurate or outdated info.
5) Analyze and make a plan for leveraging your new knowledge.
After integrating the information into your CRM, sift by way of the outcomes to determine essentially the most promising prospects by analyzing elements equivalent to giving capability, alignment along with your nonprofit’s mission, and probability of giving. Following this evaluation, create an in depth plan on how you can greatest use this knowledge for outreach.
This plan ought to define who to strategy, one of the best methods to succeed in out to them, and the suitable time to take action. It includes deciding whether or not to satisfy somebody in particular person, invite them to a particular occasion, ship them a personalised letter, or join by way of on-line platforms primarily based on their preferences and previous donations.
Throughout this stage, you’ll wish to phase your supporters primarily based on shared traits, equivalent to:
- Donation Degree: Group donors primarily based on the quantity they contribute, equivalent to main, mid-level, and low-level donors. This enables for tailor-made communication methods that acknowledge the extent of help.
- Donation Frequency: Establish who offers commonly versus those that donate sporadically. Common givers might be approached for recurring giving applications, whereas sporadic givers might be inspired to present extra persistently.
- Geographic Location: Segmenting donors by location might help in organizing native occasions, understanding regional pursuits, and tailoring communications that resonate with local people values or wants.
- Pursuits: By understanding what particular initiatives or features of the group’s work a donor helps, nonprofits can tailor outreach to replicate donors’ pursuits.
- Kind of Help: Differentiate between forms of supporters equivalent to volunteers, advocates, company sponsors, and particular person donors.
- Demographics: Segmenting primarily based on demographics helps select messages and outreach methods which can be extra more likely to resonate with completely different teams.
- Communication Preferences: Some supporters could want digital communication whereas others would possibly worth conventional mail or private calls. Segmenting by communication choice ensures that supporters obtain info in the way in which they discover most accessible and fascinating.
An efficient plan ensures that your staff is aware of precisely what steps to take to interact every prospect, serving to to show potential curiosity into precise help. From right here, put your plan into motion and begin reaching out!
Kinds of Prospect Analysis Instruments and Software program
Whereas the considered performing prospect analysis could sound daunting, there are a number of prospect screening corporations and platforms that nonprofits and academic establishments can use. Let’s discover a couple of beneficial companies and instruments.
Information Enhancement
Additionally known as knowledge appending corporations, knowledge enhancement companies enhance the standard and depth of current donor databases by pulling further info equivalent to:
- Contact info like electronic mail addresses, postal addresses, and cellphone numbers
- Demographics like ages, birthdates, and geographic location
- Employer knowledge like firm names and position titles
These companies leverage exterior knowledge sources to fill in gaps and replace outdated info inside your database. This ensures that your nonprofit has correct and complete profiles for every prospect.
Prospect Analysis Database
Prospect analysis databases are specialised instruments that present entry to a wealth of data on potential donors, together with private backgrounds, giving histories, wealth assessments, and affiliations.
These databases compile knowledge from a number of public and proprietary sources, permitting fundraisers to rapidly collect detailed insights about potential donors’ capability and propensity to present. Utilizing such a prospect analysis device helps nonprofits determine and prioritize high-potential prospects.
Company Giving Software program
Company giving software program is designed to assist nonprofits determine potential company donors. Such a software program usually consists of options for researching matching present applications and volunteer grant info. Listed here are two forms of instruments which can be most useful:
- Matching present databases include info on corporations that provide matching present applications. They retailer necessities for worker eligibility, nonprofit eligibility, and donation quantities. Plus, they supply related submission info equivalent to accessible kinds and deadlines.
- Volunteer grant databases present particulars on corporations that provide grants to nonprofits the place their workers volunteer. This prospect analysis device shops data on particular person corporations’ applications, together with volunteer hour, worker, and nonprofit necessities in addition to directions and hyperlinks to utility kinds and deadlines.
These prospect analysis instruments might help your nonprofit determine donors and volunteers eligible for his or her corporations’ philanthropic applications. Plus, they might help you determine corporations that provide beneficiant company giving initiatives, which might open the door to strategic partnerships.
Your Nonprofit’s CRM
Your nonprofit’s CRM is a elementary device for managing interactions with donors and monitoring engagement historical past. It shops crucial knowledge equivalent to donation data, occasion attendance, volunteer exercise, and communication preferences, which might be leveraged to construct stronger relationships with supporters. Efficient use of a CRM helps personalize donor interactions and streamline fundraising actions, making it simpler to domesticate and steward donor relationships.
SEC Funding Information
SEC funding data present details about the funding actions of people and establishments, which might be notably precious in assessing the monetary capability of potential main donors.
By inspecting public filings equivalent to insider buying and selling stories and inventory holdings, nonprofits can gauge prospects’ wealth degree and philanthropic capability. That is particularly helpful for figuring out high-net-worth people and understanding their funding behaviors.
Predictive Modeling Options
Predictive modeling options use statistical strategies and algorithms to investigate historic knowledge and predict future donor behaviors. These instruments assist nonprofits anticipate which prospects are probably to donate, their anticipated donation quantities, and optimum instances for solicitation.
Wealth Screening Instruments
These instruments assist nonprofits determine the monetary capability of potential donors by analyzing varied knowledge factors equivalent to actual property possession, inventory holdings, previous charitable contributions, and different public monetary info. That method, you possibly can give attention to prospects with the means and propensity to present considerably.
As a high beneficial prospect analysis service, DonorSearch blends philanthropic and wealth metrics so your group could make knowledgeable choices about prospects and plan efficient outreach. Plus, the corporate presents a couple of selections of instruments on the subject of conducting prospect analysis:
- Charitable giving database. DonorSearch’s charitable giving database is complete and consistently rising, housing tons of helpful philanthropic knowledge.
- DSGiving search device. DSGiving is a free prospect analysis device that provides entry to a smaller-scale model of DonorSearch’s philanthropic and political contributions knowledge. Merely kind in a person’s identify, state of residence, and present kind, and the device will pull helpful knowledge.
DonorSearch helps your nonprofit be taught extra about your donors and create complete donor profiles. As a result of the instruments analyze philanthropic and wealth indicators, this ends in extra certified leads for nonprofits to pursue.
Fueling Your Prospect Analysis With Double the Donation
Double the Donation is the main supplier of matching present options, and our full automation platform can provide your nonprofit the power to maximise donations with matching items and volunteer grants with out lifting a finger. We additionally provide sturdy knowledge append companies as a method to empower organizations to reinforce their donor knowledge with contemporary new insights!
Right here’s an outline of every resolution and its advantages for prospect analysis:
- Bulk Information Append Providers: Seeking to fill in some gaps in your current donor knowledge? Our knowledge enhancement companies, which embrace appending employer particulars, cellphone numbers, electronic mail addresses, mailing addresses, and extra, might help spherical out your donor profiles. All you could do is present the data you’ve got (e.g., identify, contact particulars, giving historical past, and so on.), and we’ll display in opposition to our complete database to offer the data you want.
- 360MatchPro: Utilizing Double the Donation’s matching present fundraising software program, organizations can uncover precious matching present prospects by gathering employer info inside the donation course of. From there, the answer screens for matching present eligibility and populates the suitable kinds and tips to submit a match. Plus, 360MatchPro presents a real-time employer appends add-on that immediately scans donor data and mechanically provides firm info if accessible. Try this video for a more in-depth take a look at 360MatchPro:
Wish to be taught extra about how our cutting-edge expertise can help your prospect analysis and drive better fundraising outcomes? Attain out to our staff for a free demo!
Wrapping Up
Prospect analysis is a useful technique that equips nonprofits with the insights wanted to focus on donors successfully. By harnessing the facility of detailed knowledge evaluation and strategic donor segmentation, your group can unlock new alternatives and maximize the influence of its fundraising efforts.
In the event you’re searching for extra details about prospect analysis, take a look at the extra sources beneath:
