In case your nonprofit is on the lookout for a solution to maximize its fundraising efforts, there’s one avenue you may not be paying sufficient consideration to: prospect analysis.
No matter your group’s measurement, gathering the correct donor information through prospect analysis can have a huge effect in your nonprofit’s income. These funds might help you serve your mission, fund essential tasks, and work towards your targets.
On this information, we’ll define a number of essential items of knowledge you’ll have to efficiently leverage prospect analysis, together with:
From studying the fundamentals to soliciting your first prospects, absolutely understanding prospect analysis could be a game-changer on 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 growth workforce to collect information 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 capacity and want to help that particular trigger in addition to tips on how to 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 information.
Wealth Screening vs. Prospect Analysis
You’ll have heard the time period wealth screening together 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, corresponding to actual property possession, inventory possession, and political giving. Whereas it’s an important a part of prospect analysis, this solely signifies a person’s capacity to provide.
Prospect analysis goes a number of steps additional and makes use of each wealth indicators and philanthropic indicators to find out a donor’s willingness and capability to provide. This presents nonprofits with a full image of every donor and helps make extra educated solicitations. We’ll discover the whole vary of information it’s best to gather in the following 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 concentrate on 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 focusing on campaigns for exhibitions, performances, and academic workshops.
- Environmental teams: These organizations can determine donors who’re enthusiastic about 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 tasks and advocacy efforts.
- Religion-based organizations: Prospect analysis helps find people who’ve proven generosity to spiritual or non secular 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 desirous about funding scholarships and chapter home renovations.
Prospect analysis might help all of those organizations (plus others!) grow to be 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 terms of fundraising, nonprofits expertise that very same precise ache level. Prospect analysis will be extremely useful in sourcing and qualifying results in keep away from losing time pursuing people with out the affinity or capability to provide.
Past time financial savings, listed below are crucial advantages of researching supporters:
- Improved Fundraising Effectivity: Prospect analysis helps nonprofits determine essentially the most promising donors, focusing efforts on those that are most certainly 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 grasp 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 tasks extra strategically.
- Extra Dependable Information: Prospect analysis helps nonprofits collect correct and complete information about potential donors, together with correct cellphone numbers, demographics, wealth indicators, and philanthropic pursuits. Dependable information is essential for making knowledgeable selections and staying linked with supporters.
Prospect analysis is crucial for nonprofits seeking to optimize their fundraising initiatives and construct lasting relationships. Be sure to’re working with dependable instruments and firms to collect supporter information, and also you’ll set your workforce up for fulfillment.
Information Factors To Collect Throughout Prospect Analysis
Since prospect analysis includes amassing each wealth and philanthropic indicators, it’s essential to grasp the widespread information factors that fall underneath every umbrella class.
1) Philanthropic Indicators
Philanthropic indicators symbolize a person’s willingness to provide to your group. These embrace:
Earlier Donations to Your Nonprofit
Previous giving is the perfect indicator of future giving as a result of it means the supporter is desirous about 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 just like yours.
Nonprofit Involvement
Giving isn’t the one indicator that a person is philanthropically minded. With prospect analysis, you possibly can determine different sorts of nonprofit involvement, corresponding to advocacy work, volunteerism, and board membership.
Private Data
Amassing private information offers you a extra holistic understanding of who every donor is and how one can join with them on a deeper stage. Craft extra focused appeals and ship these appeals efficiently by gathering this donor information:
- Full and most well-liked title and title
- Gender
- Marital standing
- Contact info, like e mail addresses, cellphone numbers, and postal addresses
- Hobbies and pursuits
- Dates of beginning
A lot of this info will be collected on-line or via information appending companies and might help you determine superb prospects.
2) Wealth Indicators
Wealth indicators symbolize a person’s capacity to provide to your group. These embrace:
Actual Property Possession
The standard and amount of actual property somebody owns is a wealth indicator your fundraising workforce ought to take note of. People with notable actual property have massive giving capacities you could capitalize on in your nonprofit’s fundraising initiatives.
Enterprise Affiliations
Prospect analysis might help you detect present enterprise connections amongst your donors. This analysis contains particulars a few donor’s profession corresponding to wage estimates, which might point out wealth and skill to provide. You might also uncover details about a donor’s employer’s company giving program, which might present insights into potential matching present alternatives.
Inventory Possession/SEC Transactions
Realizing a few contributor’s inventory possession can provide you much more perception into their wealth and capability to donate to your group.
Political Contributions
Chances are high 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. By utilizing prospect analysis to focus on this group, you possibly can concentrate on successful over prospects with the potential to make beneficiant contributions.
Main Makes use of of Prospect Analysis
Prospect analysis can affect a number of areas of your mission. Let’s discover widespread methods nonprofits use the information they collect.
Main Giving
Prospect analysis is the right software for locating hidden main present prospects in your present donor database. It might provide help to uncover previous giving and involvement and monitor giving patterns which will predict main giving.
As an example, you may 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 determine the perfect 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 venture, corresponding 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 throughout the “quiet part” earlier than fundraising is opened to everybody in what’s often known as the “public part.” Prospect analysis might help uncover superb 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 be capable to full your day-to-day operations.
Whereas your group possible already asks all supporters to contribute to your annual fund, now you can seek for new annual donors through 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 personal.
Company Giving Alternatives
Prospect analysis is instrumental in figuring out and understanding potential company companions whose philanthropic pursuits align together with your nonprofit’s mission. Amassing employer information additionally helps pinpoint present alternatives which have gone untapped. Examples embrace:
- Matching present alternatives: Many corporations match their workers’ donations to eligible nonprofits. Realizing the place your supporters work might help you determine match-eligible donors, so you possibly can comply with up and double these people’ contributions.
- Volunteer grants: Companies additionally present volunteer grants to nonprofits the place their workers volunteer repeatedly. Prospect analysis might help pinpoint these alternatives.
- In-Sort Donations: Corporations can present non-monetary help within the type of items or companies. Prospect analysis helps determine potential donors who can supply in-kind contributions related to your nonprofit’s wants, corresponding 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
Determine donors who’re ready to make important long-term commitments, corresponding 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 stage, so you possibly can safe future funding and make sure the donor’s lifelong engagement together with your mission.
How Matching Presents 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 supply matching present applications, doubtlessly 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 affect.
Listed below are some key ways in which matching items and prospect analysis can work collectively to dramatically improve your fundraising success:
- An identical present search software might help you determine company and particular person prospects from an inventory of people that have already made matching items to your nonprofit.
- Matching items can encourage prospects to provide extra to your group after being impressed by the possibility to double their affect. In actual fact, 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, guaranteeing you take advantage of each donation alternative.
Learn 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 below are the final steps you possibly can take to collect supporter information.
1) Select your prospect analysis technique.
Your first step is to plan the way you’ll strategy your analysis course of by asking your self about your fundraising targets, present methods, and timeline. When you perceive what you want out of your analysis, select certainly one 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 companies are extraordinarily useful sources for nonprofits. They provide recommendation and full screenings for nonprofits of all sizes and styles.
- Prospect Screening Corporations: Each prospect screening firm is completely different, however most examine your donors towards quite a lot of databases to create a complete profile for every supporter. This can assist your group monitor, kind, and consider your whole supporters.
Be sure to know precisely what sorts of information you could gather and the way shortly you could gather that information to ensure you decide the correct technique.
2) Kind a prospect analysis workforce.
In the event you’ll conduct prospect analysis in-house, you’ll have to construct an efficient prospect analysis workforce of people with complementary abilities. The next roles are crucial to your workforce’s success:
- Director: This particular person leads the workforce, units strategic targets, and ensures alignment together with your nonprofit’s broader aims. They oversee the complete analysis course of and make sure the workforce has the required instruments to conduct analysis.
- Prospect Researcher: This workforce member is chargeable for gathering information about potential and present supporters. They’re tasked with creating detailed profiles by digging into donor information utilizing numerous sources, corresponding to databases, public information, and social media.
- Information Analyst: An information analyst focuses on deciphering information and tendencies from donor databases and exterior sources. They assist the workforce 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 information, having somebody educated about authorized and moral requirements is essential. This workforce member ensures that every one prospect analysis actions adjust to privateness legal guidelines and moral fundraising practices.
Every function focuses on a selected facet of the prospect analysis course of, contributing to a complete strategy. Whereas the construction of your workforce might fluctuate, this advised construction helps focused fundraising efforts and helps construct a sturdy basis for long-term supporter engagement.
3) Clear up your information.
Earlier than conducting prospect analysis, clear up your information to make the method run smoother and guarantee extra correct outcomes. Just a few methods to keep up correct information hygiene embrace:
- Figuring out and eradicating duplicate information inside your database
- Standardizing information entries to keep up consistency throughout your database, corresponding to by utilizing 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 information
- Scanning your database for typos
Your information doesn’t have to be excellent, however cleansing up your information as a lot as potential will optimize your system for prospect analysis.
4) Examine for accuracy.
When you’ve truly performed prospect analysis, confirm the accuracy of the information gathered. This step includes cross-referencing info from a number of sources to verify particulars corresponding to contact info, philanthropic historical past, and monetary capability. Some prospect analysis corporations may have an accuracy test course of, corresponding to manually checking appended emails and cellphone numbers.
Making certain information 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 information.
After integrating the information into your CRM, sift via the outcomes to determine essentially the most promising prospects by analyzing elements corresponding to giving capability, alignment together with your nonprofit’s mission, and probability of giving. Following this evaluation, create an in depth plan on tips on how to greatest use this information for outreach.
This plan ought to define who to strategy, the perfect methods to achieve out to them, and the correct time to take action. It includes deciding whether or not to fulfill somebody in individual, invite them to a particular occasion, ship them a personalised letter, or join via 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, corresponding to:
- Donation Stage: Group donors primarily based on the quantity they contribute, corresponding to main, mid-level, and low-level donors. This enables for tailor-made communication methods that acknowledge the extent of help.
- Donation Frequency: Determine who provides repeatedly versus those that donate sporadically. Common givers will be approached for recurring giving applications, whereas sporadic givers will be inspired to provide extra constantly.
- Geographic Location: Segmenting donors by location might help in organizing native occasions, understanding regional pursuits, and tailoring communications that resonate with area people values or wants.
- Pursuits: By understanding what particular tasks or features of the group’s work a donor helps, nonprofits can tailor outreach to replicate donors’ pursuits.
- Sort of Help: Differentiate between sorts of supporters corresponding to volunteers, advocates, company sponsors, and particular person donors.
- Demographics: Segmenting primarily based on demographics helps select messages and outreach methods which might be extra more likely to resonate with completely different teams.
- Communication Preferences: Some supporters might desire digital communication whereas others may worth conventional mail or private calls. Segmenting by communication desire ensures that supporters obtain info in the best way they discover most accessible and fascinating.
An efficient plan ensures that your workforce is aware of precisely what steps to take to have interaction every prospect, serving to to show potential curiosity into precise help. From right here, put your plan into motion and begin reaching out!
Varieties of Prospect Analysis Instruments and Software program
Whereas the considered performing prospect analysis might sound daunting, there are a number of prospect screening corporations and platforms that nonprofits and academic establishments can use. Let’s discover a number of beneficial companies and instruments.
Information Enhancement
Additionally referred to as information appending corporations, information enhancement companies enhance the standard and depth of present donor databases by pulling further info corresponding to:
- Contact info like e mail addresses, postal addresses, and cellphone numbers
- Demographics like ages, birthdates, and geographic location
- Employer information like firm names and function titles
These companies leverage exterior information 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 knowledge on potential donors, together with private backgrounds, giving histories, wealth assessments, and affiliations.
These databases compile information from a number of public and proprietary sources, permitting fundraisers to shortly collect detailed insights about potential donors’ capability and propensity to provide. Utilizing the sort of prospect analysis software 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. One of these software program usually contains options for researching matching present applications and volunteer grant info. Listed below are two sorts of instruments which might be most useful:
- Matching present databases include info on corporations that supply matching present applications. They retailer necessities for worker eligibility, nonprofit eligibility, and donation quantities. Plus, they supply related submission info corresponding to out there varieties and deadlines.
- Volunteer grant databases present particulars on corporations that supply grants to nonprofits the place their workers volunteer. This prospect analysis software shops information on particular person corporations’ applications, together with volunteer hour, worker, and nonprofit necessities in addition to directions and hyperlinks to software varieties 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 supply beneficiant company giving initiatives, which might open the door to strategic partnerships.
Your Nonprofit’s CRM
Your nonprofit’s CRM is a basic software for managing interactions with donors and monitoring engagement historical past. It shops crucial information corresponding to donation information, occasion attendance, volunteer exercise, and communication preferences, which will 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 information present details about the funding actions of people and establishments, which will be significantly useful in assessing the monetary capability of potential main donors.
By inspecting public filings corresponding to insider buying and selling studies and inventory holdings, nonprofits can gauge prospects’ wealth stage 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 information and predict future donor behaviors. These instruments assist nonprofits anticipate which prospects are most certainly 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 numerous information factors corresponding to actual property possession, inventory holdings, previous charitable contributions, and different public monetary info. That manner, you possibly can concentrate on prospects with the means and propensity to provide considerably.
As a prime beneficial prospect analysis service, DonorSearch blends philanthropic and wealth metrics so your group could make knowledgeable selections about prospects and plan efficient outreach. Plus, the corporate affords a number of decisions of instruments in relation to conducting prospect analysis:
- Charitable giving database. DonorSearch’s charitable giving database is complete and continuously rising, housing tons of helpful philanthropic information.
- DSGiving search software. DSGiving is a free prospect analysis software that provides entry to a smaller-scale model of DonorSearch’s philanthropic and political contributions information. Merely kind in a person’s title, state of residence, and present kind, and the software will pull helpful information.
DonorSearch helps your nonprofit study 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 supply strong information append companies as a solution to empower organizations to boost their donor information with contemporary new insights!
Right here’s an summary of every answer and its advantages for prospect analysis:
- Bulk Information Append Providers: Seeking to fill in some gaps in your present donor information? Our information enhancement companies, which embrace appending employer particulars, cellphone numbers, e 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., title, contact particulars, giving historical past, and so on.), and we’ll display screen towards our complete database to offer the data you want.
- 360MatchPro: Utilizing Double the Donation’s matching present fundraising software program, organizations can uncover useful matching present prospects by amassing employer info inside the donation course of. From there, the answer screens for matching present eligibility and populates the correct varieties and tips to submit a match. Plus, 360MatchPro affords a real-time employer appends add-on that immediately scans donor information and robotically provides firm info if out there. Try this video for a more in-depth take a look at 360MatchPro:
Need to study extra about how our cutting-edge expertise can help your prospect analysis and drive better fundraising outcomes? Attain out to our workforce 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 information evaluation and strategic donor segmentation, your group can unlock new alternatives and maximize the affect of its fundraising efforts.
In the event you’re on the lookout for extra details about prospect analysis, try the extra sources under:
