In the event you’ve labored within the nonprofit sector for a while, that your group’s fundraising potential will depend on its means to grasp and have interaction its donors. The significance of realizing your donors will increase with their giving stage—potential main donors, specifically, will solely wish to contribute to organizations that make them really feel like an integral a part of furthering the nonprofit’s mission.
Prospect analysis is one of the best ways to realize perception into these high-impact donors’ giving capacities, motivations, and preferences. On this information, we’ll reply a few of the most typical questions nonprofit professionals have about prospect analysis when getting began so you possibly can take advantage of this course of. Let’s dive in!
What’s prospect analysis, and the way is it used?
DonorSearch’s prospect analysis information defines this time period as “a method utilized by nonprofit fundraisers, main present officers, and improvement groups to establish high-impact donors inside and past a corporation’s present donor pool. By this course of, nonprofits collect an immense quantity of information—details about donors’ backgrounds, previous giving histories, wealth indicators, philanthropic motivations, and extra particulars that assist decide prospects’ chance of giving.”
Prospect analysis is helpful for locating donors for a large number of initiatives that depend upon massive items, together with:
- Launching new mission-related neighborhood applications or increasing current ones.
- Securing the estimated 60% of annual fund income that comes from main items on common.
- Finishing your present vary chart through the quiet section of a capital marketing campaign.
- Constructing out your group’s legacy giving program.
Whereas most nonprofits use prospect analysis primarily to establish new potential donors originally of a fundraising initiative, it’s simplest when it’s an ongoing course of. When you’ve discovered a viable prospect, proceed researching to remain up-to-date on their wealth and philanthropic particulars as you domesticate relationships with them and solicit items. Plus, periodically screening your donor database may also help you discover main donor candidates amongst your current supporters.
What info are you able to study by means of prospect analysis?
One of the vital frequent misconceptions round prospect analysis is that it’s synonymous with wealth screening. In actuality, prospect analysis is extra complete, bearing in mind not solely potential donors’ monetary capability to provide but in addition their willingness to make a major contribution to your particular group based mostly on their philanthropic tendencies and affinity to your mission.
As you display screen prospects, search for the next information factors (additionally referred to as markers or indicators):
- Capability indicators: Actual property possession, inventory holdings, enterprise affiliations, political giving historical past
- Philanthropic indicators: Earlier donations to your nonprofit or different related organizations
- Affinity indicators: Connection to or ardour to your trigger; nonprofit involvement historical past (occasion attendance, volunteering, board service, and many others.); private info comparable to pursuits, values, and household ties.
In your group to think about somebody a viable prospect, they need to exhibit indicators from all three classes, demonstrating that they’d give you the option and prepared to make a serious present.
What instruments do it’s essential to conduct prospect analysis?
Typically talking, there are two forms of software program it’s essential to conduct prospect analysis: databases and AI fundraising options. Let’s have a look at each classes in additional element.
Databases
These options kind the spine of prospect analysis, permitting you to seek out capability, philanthropic, and affinity details about potential donors. Guarantee your crew has entry to the next instruments earlier than you start:
- Prospect analysis database: Supplies entry to third-party wealth and philanthropic information by compiling info from varied trusted sources, starting from actual property information to different nonprofits’ annual experiences.
- Inside donor database: Serves as a place to begin for studying about current supporters’ main giving potential and a centralized place to retailer and arrange prospect analysis information in particular person donor profiles.
- SEC funding information and FEC political contribution information: Complement wealth information on potential donors with a deeper dive into their inventory holdings and political giving historical past.
- Matching items database: Lets which prospects might have their contributions matched by their employers in addition to supplies extra perception into donors’ skilled connections.
Along with leveraging these platforms, merely googling your prospects and trying out their social media profiles can provide you a greater sense of their pursuits and values.
AI Options
When you’ve gathered your prospect analysis information, AI instruments may also help you kind by means of it extra effectively and improve your outreach. One of the best forms of nonprofit AI options to leverage for prospecting are:
- Prospect generator instruments: Make lists of prospects who’ve supported related causes to your group’s and create experiences summarizing an important, actionable info on every prospect.
- Predictive modeling options: Fee prospects’ chance of responding to outreach and turning into donors, arrange your prospect lists accordingly, and make strategies about which potential donors to succeed in out to first for effectivity.
- Content material era instruments: Assist you create tailor-made outreach messages for every prospect based mostly on predictive modeling insights.
Though analysis reveals that nonprofits are integrating AI into their operations even sooner than for-profit corporations, nonprofit AI continues to be an rising discipline. Work with trusted suppliers, observe finest practices for information safety and ethics, and be clear together with your neighborhood about how your group makes use of AI to forestall dangers and maximize the advantages of those instruments.
What are the following steps to take after conducting prospect analysis?
As NXUnite’s donor relations information explains, prospect analysis lays the inspiration for constructing a human-centered relationship with every potential donor. Whereas you may get a way of prospects’ motivations for supporting your mission and the initiatives they’d be concerned with contributing to, one of the best ways to make sure about this stuff is to listen to straight from the donor. Plus, cultivation reveals that your nonprofit values its donors as particular person individuals reasonably than simply pondering of them as income sources.
After you’ve recognized potential donors by means of prospect analysis, begin cultivating them by:
- Assembly with them one-on-one to get to know them personally and introduce them to your group
- Establishing an everyday communication cadence to maintain your nonprofit high of thoughts and share related sources on present initiatives.
- Providing different engagement alternatives to provide prospects a firsthand have a look at your group’s work by means of volunteering, attending occasions, or consulting on tasks.
Maintain every prospect’s profile up to date in your donor database as you study extra about them by means of these relationship-building actions and your ongoing analysis. This manner, when the time involves solicit a serious present, you should use all of this info to request an quantity and recommend a designation that aligns with their distinctive giving capability and motivations.
As with different new processes at your nonprofit, getting your method to prospect analysis proper will seemingly take time and apply. Monitor the usefulness of the info you discover and the effectiveness of your research-driven outreach efforts. This manner, you possibly can hone your course of over time and finally carry in additional main items to your mission.
Concerning the Writer
Sarah Tedesco
Sarah Tedesco is the Government Vice President of DonorSearch, a prospect analysis and wealth screening firm that focuses on confirmed philanthropy. Sarah is chargeable for managing the manufacturing and buyer assist division regarding shopper contract achievement, growing retention fee and buyer satisfaction. She collaborates with different crew members on quite a lot of points together with gross sales, advertising and product improvement concepts.