Blending Data and Heart: How to Grow Major Gifts

Okay, all right. So good afternoon. Welcome to today’s webinar blending data and heart how to grow major gifts with DonorSearch and DonorPerfect. Our presenters today are Tammy zonker and Donna Mitchell. Tammy’s career spans nearly 30 years, and she’s established herself as Read More

Okay, all right. So good afternoon. Welcome to today’s webinar blending data and heart how to grow major gifts with DonorSearch and DonorPerfect. Our presenters today are Tammy zonker and Donna Mitchell. Tammy’s career spans nearly 30 years, and she’s established herself as an author, major gift strategist and fundraising expert. Her credentials include being an association on fundraising professional, certified facilitator, international speaker, author of Calling All Heroes combining the best of donor centered and community centered fundraising for greater impact, and she’s also president of fundraising transformed an international training and consulting firm and president of the modern Institute for charitable giving. Donna’s training career spans 30 years, and we have been lucky to have her as a DonorPerfect trainer for over 10 years now, she finds joy in helping our nonprofit clients make a difference in our world on a daily basis, and is evolving into a fundraising expert. Donna believes that while learning DonorPerfect is serious stuff, the learning process should be fun and empowering. I’m sure there are at least a few of you that have experienced her training style when you attended her webinars with these two great women presenting today, I am confident you’ll all feel empowered when you leave. So before we start, let’s cover some basic housekeeping items. The webinar is being recorded and you’ll receive it in the next few days, and since questions added to the chat tend to get lost in larger webinars, please be sure to add your questions to the Q and A section so that they can be answered. All right. So ladies, are you ready to get started? We are all right. All yours.
All right. So welcome everyone. So good to be with you. We are going to aim to help you understand or affirm your existing understanding of why both data and relationships really matter in major gifts, we’re going to work through how to identify the behaviors and characteristics of your best, top donors, and so that you can identify personas and maybe even find other major donor prospects hiding in your database in plain sight that share those behaviors and characteristics, we hope that you’ll walk away with some skills and some insights in how to use DonorPerfect and DonorSearch to engage, to retain and to upgrade your current major donors. And of course, I don’t think it would be a DonorPerfect webinar if we didn’t leave you with like, here are some actionable things that you can put into play right away so that you really get, you know, the most out of the time that you’re investing here. All right. So next slide, Donna’s driving with two type a women. You know, it’s hard to share the screen. All right. So fundraising, and especially, I think major gift fundraising, of course, is most effective when we are human centered, so in other words, blending the heart and the data together. And I think that that sounds so simple, but we know that it’s not always easy without processes, without systems and without tools, because there aren’t enough hours in the day like you’re trying to prioritize your time and so sometimes developing systems so that you can engage the right donor at the right time with the right project, for the right person, with the right Ask Amount, all of those things, like, you need to really maximize the tools at your disposal. So without those AI powered systems, you could literally spend days, if or weeks, or even months, trying to dig through that database like a needle in a haystack to find the best prospects and to really get the insights you need about your major donors. And don’t even get me started about side spreadsheets. So that’s why I’m so excited to be partnering with DonorPerfect and with Donna, and that we’re here with you today to really talk about how this integration can help you grow your major gifts program. And as I said, you know, the emotion is really important. It’s important that we understand our donors, that we understand their beliefs and their values. I mean, fundraising is really about finding the alignment between those beliefs and values, because those are the folks that are going to be with us for the long haul we want to build. Trust and a sense of belonging. Our donors want to belong to something bigger than themselves, and that’s the opportunity when we bring them into the fold of our organization, and we can, you know, join arm in arm and really deliver on the mission. And in that process, we want to make certain that our donors feel joy, the joy of giving, that they feel the meaning of their philanthropy, of the time that they volunteer, of all the ways that they engage and give to us and really partner with us. And we also want to create a safe environment where they feel safe enough to have those genuine conversations, to maybe even be vulnerable as they talk about their why, and you know why this cause, why your cause means so much to them. So when we do those things, those emotional, heart centered things, donors really feel understood. Now, those things a database won’t necessarily tell you, so we need to blend the heart and the data your database, though, with then the integration with DonorSearch and DonorPerfect can help you understand demographics. What are their ages? Where do they live? Or what are their multiple addresses? What do they do, maybe for a living. What is their marital status, right? Are they divorced, or are they are they married? Do they have children? Are their children young, or are they through college? They’re empty nesters. Now, what level of education, or where did they go to school? And certainly, what is their wealth, capacity and hand in hand with that. What is their inclination? Are they philanthropic? And what potentially could they give to a project, if indeed we engage the emotional side, the beliefs and values in a way? So it really, truly is about blending the data, the demographics, the giving history, the behaviors that that systems can track those insights with the emotional things right, with those beliefs and values and the trust and all of that.
Great. Thanks, Tammy. And so now we’re going to talk about blending the heart and the data, but we’re going to talk about how DonorSearch and DonorPerfect can help you. So clearly, as Tammy mentioned, we have to get that information, and we get that from our database. And of course, DonorSearch would help us do the screenings. DonorPerfect is where you’re going to be able to find the major donors or major donor prospects already in your database. That’s the cool thing. They’re there. We just have to find them. And DonorPerfect will help you do that. And we’re going to show you today how that works. And then we’re going to talk about DonorSearch. This is what the platform that you’re going to use to perform the screenings to discover their giving capacity and affinity data that is so important when people are giving today, they not only want to support you, they want to know and want to be involved. They want to support an organization that resonates with them, for whatever reason that might be, and these tools are what’s going to allow us to create and enhance those meaningful donor journeys and relationships that go just beyond the dollars. Now I’m going to ask you all a question, because if we ask 10 organizations what they define a major donor as? We’d probably get 20 different answers, but we’re going to ask you, put in the chat what you consider a major donor at your organization, and as we go through this, see if your answer changes or if it stays the same. Let’s keep it going.
All right, so identifying your top major donors, those personas and to create those journeys that Donna’s talking about. To do that it’s really helpful to understand, all right, what are the characteristics, what are the behaviors and values and motivations of your current major donors? Right? Because, yeah, there’s the, you know, the principle of social proof. And Dr keeldini, who invented that, he talks about that social proof as kind of in a phrase, and that is, people like us do things like this. So people like your major donors, we want to find others who like, yeah, I want to do things like this. I want to support this amazing cause. So what does, what makes a really great major donor? And it’s not just wealth, it’s helpful if they have a lot of wealth and they are charitable, but truly because it does. Come down to Values alignment. So what makes a great donor, someone whose values align with the values of your organization, someone who has affinity for your organization, they love what you do, and again, maybe they love your organization, your brand. But there also could be donor prospects that love a related cause. So let’s just say that maybe your boys and girls club, or your Big Brothers Big Sisters, you know, one of these fantastic mentoring programs. But again, the it could be their affinity for your brand, it could be the affinity for mentoring, or just youth development, character development. So again, values alignment, affinity for your organization. And of course, as we said, a propensity to give. There are many, many people with incredible wealth who simply are not inclined to be charitable. They’re not generous in that way. And so we want folks who are generous and have that affinity for us. And of course, we want to be able to understand, where do we does the intersection of wealth and giving capacity? Where does it cross with propensity and affinity? That’s the trifecta that we’re looking for. Yeah, are all right. So when we look at these helping to look at identifying these top major donor personas and aligning journeys, creating a donor journey for those personas, the key is really looking at their philanthropic behavior. So in other words, what has been their past giving history, the frequency of their gifts, the size of their gifts, the recency are they lapsed? Are these donors that like to give twice a year, once a year, monthly? So RFM, recency, frequency and size, size of gift. What types of causes Do they support? Do they support those causes with restricted gifts or unrestricted gifts? So those are some examples of philanthropic behavior. Then it when we’re crafting these journeys. We also want to look at those psychographic values, like, what are the core motivations for their giving? Are they giving out of gratitude? Are they giving because they really are inspired and moved by social justice? Maybe they are giving for faith based reasons or paying it forward. Maybe they went to school on a scholarship, or they had an amazing mentor, or they had a loved one that had cancer and was, you know, was was healed, is, has, is living. So they want to pay forward and make certain that others that live have had those lived experiences benefit from your missions as well. So that’s psychographic values. And then, of course, we also want to look at engagement preferences. So how do they like to engage with you? Are they folks who like to meet face to face? Do they prefer email or written or phone calls or text messages? Do they prefer to engage with you at events. So preferred communication channels is another one of those engagement preferences that we want to be able to track in our systems, so that we can engage people in the way that they prefer to be engaged, and when we do that, they will be more responsive. We also want to look at their preferred role in philanthropy. Are they one of those really gregarious folks who likes to really demonstrate their philanthropy and their leadership in the community in big, bold ways? They like the recognition they want to be in the newsletter, they want to be recognized at the event, or are they the more modest kind of, let me give but I want to stay in the background kind of people. I want to have a private conversation with your CEO or your executive director, versus, you know, having a spotlight on me in front of many so maybe they’re just a wonderful volunteer, like they like want to. They’re that repair persona. They want to give back to help others in a way that they were helped. And they want to volunteer hands on as well. Right? So, those are examples of engagement preferences. And then, of course, what is their connection to you? How did they learn about you? How did they fall in love with your mission in the first place? Are they an alumni? Are they a grateful patient? Maybe they are became a board member because, you know, they were encouraged from their corporation or their employer to in their leadership journey to be a. To take on board service, but they found you. They learned more. They heard the stories. They had, perhaps some immersion experiences with those you serve, and now they are hooked like you are their cause. So that’s their connection, and that’s an important part of framing their persona, and then the donor journey that we would craft with them moving forward. And lastly, what are their aspirations and their giving goals? What do they want to accomplish through their giving, and both now and in an intermediate kind of way? And what do they want to accomplish through through their their giving or their philanthropy, long term, those are the personas that we’re looking to identify. And I would say that when we think about those donors, those donors that meet the criteria, the ones that love you, I mean you’re probably as I describe those different personas, different faces of your donors were coming to mind, right? You were thinking of specific names of couples or individuals or young people and older people and middle aged people and people of all walks of life and all, all diverse, wonderful, diverse people. And there are still, believe it or not, there are people that love you, and they’ve not yet expressed their affinity through a major gift yet. But they’re waiting. They’re waiting for you, kind of hiding out in your database, waiting for the right opportunity, the right outreach, the right engagement. And so it’s up to us to discover those hidden major donors that are really hiding in plain sight. And those could be mid level donors. They could be some of your monthly givers. They could be giving a one time gift or even a memorial gift that we haven’t yet, you know, engaged them at that deeper level. So what’s so interesting to me is this whole conversation about donor retention. And you all know, the Association of Fundraising Professionals commissions a report on a quarterly basis. They perform this report. We have this report done. It’s called the Fundraising Effectiveness Project, and they report on a quarterly basis, retention in the US, overall retention, but also segmented by different donor behaviors. So first time donor, for example, and the donor retention right now for first time donors is 19.2% right? Kind of sad. So a great majority of the people who give up their first time gift don’t give again to your organization. The overall donor retention in the US, if you think of all donors, first time and repeat donors, is just under 43%
and it’s important to note that it costs seven times more to acquire a brand new donor than to retain and or upgrade an existing donor, and that’s why it’s so important to mine the gold that’s already in your donor base to look for those donors that are truly hiding in plain sight. And I know DonorPerfect also participates in the AFP Fundraising Effectiveness Project data, so we are very grateful for that. Thank you, DonorPerfect. But the point is, you’ve got a lot of donors waiting to be engaged in more deep and meaningful ways, and they could potentially either now or later be part of your major donor pool right mid level, monthly donors. Monthly donors are the highest probable donors that are going to leave you in their legacy plans. And by the way, they give on average for seven years. So again, these are the greatest prospects that are hiding in plain sight. Let’s mine that and then really look to acquisition, right? All right. Donna talk us about, talk to us about how we can, can do this. Mine, these donors, yes.
So yes, I I’m happy to do that. So one term, acronym we’re going to learn more today, RFM, recency, frequency and monetary value. That is a an industry wide goal, and what we use to see how our donors are giving, right? How recently have they given that most recent gift date that’s going to be something you can access and DonorPerfect. People that give more recently will likely give again. The frequency of gifts shows loyalty if they’re giving. And they’re they’re having many, many gifts that they’re giving to you that shows loyalty. So this is another value that we would use to help us identify potential major donors, and then gift amounts, right? We want to look at the amounts of the gifts, and that’s where the monetary value part comes in. So if they’ve given recently, if they give frequently and if they give larger gift amounts, data show that they are more likely to give again, but we can find this information in DonorPerfect. The fields are there at your fingertips, so RFM in DonorPerfect, and typically industry wide, is aggregate data, right? We’re literally looking at their most recent gift date, the number of gifts, the gift amounts, right? Only three data points are used, and this is not bad information, right? It’s a great way to start, right, perfect way to start. And so we look at these three data points, but we’re talking about heart now, so we need to start getting into what would come, what would have us see their affinity, the three data points they would use, as I mentioned, our last gift date, the total number of gifts they’ve given, or years they’ve given, and their largest Gift Amount, or their last gift amount. And again, all of this data lives in your DonorPerfect system, very easy for you to capture, but I want to talk to you about a new acronym you’re going to learn. I don’t Is it an acronym or an initialism? I never know the difference. My son would tell me, but anyway, we’re going to be talking about MLR, and you’re going to be all abuzz about this after this webinar. DonorSearch has a free AI tool that our DonorPerfect clients, if you are to use DonorSearch, that will calculate their affinity. The donor affinity, MLR stands for most likely to respond. So this number is generated through AI and machine learning to give you the MLR rank, which is the thirds of your database, right? So, number one being the top third, the number three being the bottom third, and then it gives them a score between one and 100 now this is all driven through the data that you give now, this is where it gets exciting, all right, if you’re not excited already, this is where it gets exciting to get this from DonorSearch, you’re going to pull the detailed gift transactions from your DonorPerfect database. It has to be three to five years worth of data, including gift dates and amounts, appeals that they’ve responded to events that they responded to, and several other pieces of data that you’re going to feed into DonorSearch. Then the AI Tool and Machine Learning uses 90 plus data points. 90 plus data points to calculate the MLR the folks that are most likely to respond to your appeal. This is a game changer, folks, it is a game changer because not only are we taking the data that we already know and can easily access RFM, but now we’re looking at numbers where machine learning is figuring it out to help us understand what that donor affinity is with our organization. Let me give you an example of MLR versus RFM and why it is going to be beneficial to you. So let’s take a look. We have our friend Amanda and Roger right? Amanda and Roger have the same data points. They’re both of their last gifts were on a September 1 of 2025 both of them have given 10 gifts. That’s their frequency, and then the monetary value they both given. Both given a total gift amount of $5,000 so in this case, their RFM is exactly the same, right? Exactly the same. But when we find out the affinity that MLR score is going to make the differentiation there. Watch this. So Amanda’s total giving is $5,000 but she’s given 10 gifts of $500 or more each month for the past 10 months. Roger, on the other hand, still gave us 5000 we’re not going to bark at that, but he’s given 5000 across five years in terms of. $1,000 a year. With that being said, Amanda’s MLR, in a 12 month period, she will have given $6,000 whereas Roger will have only given 1000 so due to the velocity of Amanda’s giving her most likely to respond, rank and score will be higher than Rogers that means, and Tammy said it right. Your monthly donors are the ones that are have that affinity already, right? So we already see that that MLR score is really important, and when we find those folks that have that affinity. Those are the ones that we’re going to be able to go after. Those are the ones that we’re going to be able to create those relationships and make those differences. Tammy, yes to you, beautiful.
Thank you. Thank you. That is so it really is a game changer. I mean, talk about more precision philanthropy and the fact that you’re all so busy, this just gives you insight in which you can really know where to focus. I absolutely love this quote, and it’s from Helen Brown, who is an author and one of the most respected prospect researchers across the US, she says prospect research is not about finding rich people to ask for money. It’s about uncovering shared values, capacity and connection, so we can match donors with the causes they care most about. And I love this because it it’s so true. You know, you can have you can know people who have great wealth, but it doesn’t mean that we should pursue them, unless we can ascertain and confirm they have an affinity for our cause and that they are charitable. So I love this, because this MLR will help us discover the behaviors that say, yes, they’re the ones, they’re the ones.
I agree 100% and so now we’re going to talk about and dive into how DonorSearch and DonorPerfect become your partners in discovery. So if you take a look at this, this is our friend, Kevin Plank. This is the and now you should all recognize this. This is the donor profile and DonorPerfect that gives us some general giving information about this donor, right? So we can see their largest gift, their lifetime giving, and all of that DonorPerfect is what you’re going to use to find those major donors. We have several reports that we can run to see our top donors. There’s a one called top donor listing. We have this gift frequency analysis report that actually allows us to see those donors and the frequency of their gifts. We have all types of reports. We have another one. It’s called donors by most recent gift and donors by gift amount. So with that being said, you’re going to be able to use DonorPerfect reports to find those top donors. Let me just show you, really quickly, I’m going to jump into DonorPerfect very quickly. And I’m going to go to Reports. And the Report Center, we have a top donor listing. I all, I recommend that you all check this one out. It’s everybody’s second favorite report. But we’re going to go to the donor, top donor listing. Now this report is cool because I can get a count or percentage of my database of top donors based on any calculated field in DonorPerfect, and I was looking at a lot of your answers. Most of you say they have to have a lifetime gift total of 10,000 or more to be considered a major donor. So I’m going to look up that gift total field. So the gift underscore total field is the gift total field in DonorPerfect, and I’m going to take this down to, I’m just going to take this down to 10, just to be safe. And if I wanted to put a filter in to say, you know, hey, I want to just see folks who have a lifetime total of 10,000 or more. I’m going to totally do that. So I’m going to click on apply, I’m going to add a quick filter, and we’re going to do lifetime gift total is greater than, or equal to $10,000 super duper easy. Now, if you wanted to filter out organizations, you could add the additional layer of individual donors, right? So let’s do that just for because this is, might be what you want to do. And I’m going to say for individuals only, right? And I could save that, but I’m not going to, and now we’re going to run my report, so we’re going to find our top 10 individual donors by the. Lifetime gift total. And if we take a look, here are those numbers, and there’s my friend Kevin Plank, and you’ll see the lifetime gift totals here. So this would be part of the list. Now, clearly you’re going to have way more folks in there, at least I hope so, but this is one way to start that research to find those folks that you’re ultimately going to screen in DonorSearch to get that MLR. Now let’s talk about DonorSearch. So DonorSearch, as we mentioned, is a partner. It’s a wealth screening platform that checks over 850 data points, both the information that you send over right from your DonorPerfect database, as well as any available information that is publicly available to get these values. And you’ll see there’s a DonorSearch rating here. DS one, one. If you go to the DonorPerfect knowledge base in the community. We have a listing of what those ratings mean, so you can understand that. But we can see his charitable giving, the political giving. We can see their annual gift likelihood, and this is out of 300 so that’s pretty awesome. That data, when you do that profile. Now, we’re just talking about the profile right? We’re doing a screening on this person, and you have to do it in batch. And you’ll notice at the bottom of this slide, it says screening. It must be done for a group of records in DonorPerfect. You can also do a screening on a singular record, but you’re not going to get the MLR ranks and score it, just want to make that point. But you’ll see here on the bio screen is where the data lives. So the RFM, as we see here, is calculated from DonorSearch, and there’s the MLR score. So remember that MLR score is between one and 100 our friend Kevin is at 95 that means he has a strong affinity for our organization. That’s a good thing. And we also talked about the rank. Kevin falls in the top third rank of most likely to respond. He is ripe and ready for asking for that major gift. So let’s talk about discovery, determining the criteria for your major donor prospects. And you all were typing away and told us, You know what you thought? It’s lifetime gift total. It’s this much per year, or whatever the case might be. Here are some things that we look at, or can look at outside of lifetime gift total or largest gift, it could be your mid level donors. Our poor mid level donors are so overlooked, and these are folks that are giving, consistently, giving at really nice amounts that could possibly be upgraded. Why couldn’t we tap them and do some search on them if they’re giving to you and they’re mid level donors, that must mean they’re doing something. So they might be worth being in that list, as Tammy mentioned, monthly donors, right? Our monthly donors are gems. I love that gems gives every month, right? I love that because they are clearly showing affinity. I’m a sustaining donor for a couple of organizations, because they mean so much to me, and they haven’t picked me out yet as a major donor, but I don’t think they will, but that’s okay. They know that I have an affinity, and I could likely be talked into a larger monthly gift engagement. Are these folks engaged in some way. Are they volunteers? Are they always at your events, supporting your events all the time, volunteering to help out, you know, to all those types of things. Engagement is important when people care. The most important thing outside of giving you their money, is giving you their time. So if they’re giving you their time, that means those folks are really caring about you. They have an affinity for your organization. And then, of course, we can look at their largest gift. Sometimes that’ll tell the tale as well. So these are things that we want you to think about in DonorPerfect, some of the reports you could run. And I mentioned these, we saw the top donor listing. So again, we can see that by any calculated field, right? Largest gift that’s the max Gift Amount, right? We could look at that. We can look at their last gift amount. We can look at donors by most recent gift and most recent gift and amount. These are very, very interesting reports. They have a lot of great data in them. And again, to get the explanation of how these reports work, just check out the knowledge base in our community. And then the gift frequency analysis I mentioned earlier, this is going to show us how frequently donors are giving. And again, these are all great jumping off. Points for you so that you can build that list to add to DonorSearch and get those screenings done and get that MLR Perfect.
All right, so let’s talk a little bit more about how we engage, retain and upgrade our current major donors. So on the next slide, I want to talk through a couple of points. First, I’ll just say that major donors are the most likely to stay engaged if an increase their giving, when they feel personally connected, when they feel deeply valued and appreciated, when they know that their giving is making an impact, right? So we know these things. So there are four proven strategies for accomplishing that. And so the first is under the heading of deepen the relationship through personalization. I mean personalization says, I see you, I know you, and so that personalization is aligned with the insights that you have and that you’ve tracked and collected in your database, right? So, tailoring the engagement to their passions, to their values, to their past, giving to showing them that you really get what matters to them. If they care about the foster care program, or they care about. You know, a specific program, of course, you’re going to personalize communication with them related to what they care about the most. Next, we want to show impact with both heart and data, right? So we want to tell the stories, so the stories of individuals or families or seniors, whomever you’re serving, tell those heart centered stories that move people, that inspire people, that let them know that you know the progress is being made, that people are better than they were. They feel more empowered. They’ve taken the tools that you have provided to them and they are flourishing, or again beginning to flourish, and then also giving them, of course, outcomes reports. That’s the data piece. So what percentage of the youth in the foster care program are on track to graduate high school on time? What? However you track outcomes, however you measure success, reporting that out, both in the data and in those human stories, clear, simple human stories next, really engage them as partners, not just as funders, and this is really when we expand into truly human centered fundraising and stewardship versus kind of that transactional fundraising that we’ve been taught, which has kind of been best practice, but now we know better. We know better. So invite their input, invite them for vision setting, or share some of your strategic plan with them, to get their their advice about it. Connect them with leadership. Invite them to a town hall or to a, you know, some kind of a executive leadership team brainstorming session, if, again, if they’ve got value to add in that conversation, introduce them to some of the program participants. If it’s appropriate, again, we want to do this ethically, respectfully, honoring the dignity of those who do participate in our programs, but if it’s appropriate, and if it’s equally inspiring for the donor and affirming and inspiring for the program participant. Do it, bring them together. And that really says to our donors, you are with us in this mission. You are not just, not just a source of funding. You’re our partner in all the things. And then fourth, elevate your stewardship like go beyond the thank you letter. Go beyond the gift receipt. You know, surprise and delight folks, whether that’s having board members call and and thank folks or leave even wonderful, warm voicemails, maybe tucking a photograph or something inside that handwritten note, maybe providing some special behind the scenes tours, making introductions to peers again, aligning people with these shared beliefs and values, aligning people so that they do have that sense that they belong in this community, this community of people who love your mission, who are aligned with your beliefs and values, there’s that sense of belonging is so crucial, so crucial, especially in these days and times when we can feel so divided and so.
Separated Absolutely. Tammy, I agree with you. So talking about staying engaged in a forum, I’m going to ask you all a question, another one. I’m full of questions today. How would you like to be automatically informed via email that a major donor just gave a gift. Or how would you like to have a contact record created automatically when a major donor makes a gift and it creates a contact for you to reach out to them. Or how would you like for a field to be automatically updated when your major donors make some sort of gift or do some sort of activity. With that being said, DonorPerfect can help you with all of those things. They are called Smart Actions. Smart Actions and DonorPerfect are our automated workflows that allow you to define a trigger in DonorPerfect, and then when that trigger is met, you can have up to five different actions occur. We’re speaking specifically to email notifications, creating contact records and updating fields. It is very, very cool now, setting them up. Yeah, it’s a little bit of work to set them up, but oh boy, when you get those set up, you’re going to be flying. It’s going to be wonderful. After we go through the rest of this, I’m going to show you a quick, smart action and how it would work, donor journeys. So donor journeys is a an add on feature in DonorPerfect, if you choose to use it. And what it does is it takes you through new donors or your lapsed donors, and it takes you through these different steps to see where your donors are on the journey. It automatically updates information based on using Smart Actions. Really, really neat thing, if you don’t have donor journeys, or you’re not interesting in adding that on, you can still create your own donor journeys by using things like the screen designer and DonorPerfect to create those fields Smart Actions to update those fields when your donors or constituents get to certain thresholds. So please keep that in mind. Also Moves Management right. Old school you Moves Management right. It’s never a bad thing. So that we’d be taking folks through a specific step of contact transactions, taking them through there, and maybe you could assign it to each specific solicitor in your organization. But Moves Management is still tried and true, and then scheduled reports another automatic thing. For example, if you want to say, I want to see all the major donors that gave this week, or I want to see all the gifts that came in that were over this amount, you could have those reports scheduled and dropped into your email box inbox so you can keep track of that automatically. DonorPerfect has those tools really quickly before. Oh boy, we’re getting close to the end. I’m going to skip that, but Smart Actions are very cool. Please join us for our Smart Actions webinar.
Alright, so let’s talk about how we can apply, like some quick wins, how we can blend heart and data. This week, it’s Thursday. There’s still time, so Donna, why don’t we tag team? I’ll take I’ll take the first one. Okay, go back and forth. Be kind of fun. So the first thing is, I want you to use your data to personalize one. Thank you this week. So I don’t care how you do it, maybe you say, Gosh, who joined the monthly giving program in the month of September? Who was like and they go back as far as you can, someone who’s still in the program, but they joined in September, either pick up the phone or write a handwritten note that, like you may not remember, but we remember, this is your give aversary for joining our monthly giving circle. You know you, you helped us launch this, or you’ve been so loyal and so generous and you’re making you’ve continued to make an impact. So that’s just one example. Do a personalized thank you note this week before you hang up the week on Friday afternoon,
and make sure you record it on the contact screen and DonorPerfect, we want to track that. So in DonorPerfect review your top 10 donors with heart and data, right, we saw that top donor listing. You could see your top 10 donors and start looking at them. Look at their giving history that RFM. That we talked about. If you’re going to be uploading that information into DonorSearch to get that MLR, you definitely want to be doing this so you can review them, add the heart layer and consider what you know about life events, their family, their passions, their pets. Trust me, if you ask me about my pet, you’re going to get my money, or previous conversations you might have had, reach out with a tailored touch point, again, a handwritten note, an article, right that may be a conversation that you all had, or an invitation. Maybe you’re going to do a meet and greet, or just a special gathering for special donors. These are things that you can do and why it works. You combine analytics with empathy to strengthen loyalty and set up future upgrades.
Yeah, so Tammy, so good Donna and so the third let’s say, let’s just spot one lapse donor. Let’s reach out and reconnect. So run a quick report of donors who gave last year but have not given this year, haven’t given yet. And pick one or two names and just reach out personally, give them a call, send them an email, maybe even a card with a warm, you know, just a warm note and and a little curiosity. Like we’ve missed you, we’d love to invite you back. Or if you feel like maybe there was a reason why they went away, like, you know what? We haven’t connected in so long. And I would love, I’d love to just visit with you and just have a conversation. I’d like to or maybe I feel like, the last time I saw you, there was a little apprehension, and I just want to reconnect and work through that in whatever way you want to reach out and reconnect with the lapsed donor, do it, and here’s why it works. Data shows that the gap that the heart transforms the outreach into We miss you instead of we need your money, right? So bring the heart and really the genuine, your genuine care and compassion and empathy to that outreach, so that they know it’s not, it’s not about the money, it’s about them as a human, and bring them back into the family.
Absolutely, I agree. Well, Tammy, guess what? It’s time for. Q A, I love Q A, yeah, I do too. So, Lori, do you have questions for us?
I have a few. I think I’ve had a lot of people asking more about DonorSearch and what it does, and how do I get training? And you know, things along those lines. Let me see what I can find here. First questions. Well, first somebody asked, Why you? Did you say moose management is old school?
Well, it doesn’t use AI, that’s my answer. I’ll use that. That’s good.
I’ll chime in there, because I do, I do train on Moves Management. Of course, it’s attributed to Jerry pannis and Bill Sturdivant, and it’s classic major gift wisdom. But now we just need to talk about modern moose management, to Donna’s point, how AI can inform those that classic wisdom and give us even more precision insights. So it’s still relative, let’s just modernize the moose management.
And guess what? Old School is not bad. Just saying,
if it still works,
people still use it. That’s right, that’s right, yep.
Okay, so one of the questions is, would you suggest top 10 donors of all time, or top 10 donors during a specific period last year, last two years? So, Donna, you had done an example of top donors. Do you have a response to that?
Yeah, I think it’s kind of whatever your organization feels is manageable and realistic. You know, you could go back. I had a client the other day that wanted to see it. I’m so glad you asked this. Alexandria, they went back five years to see their top donors, and we created some calculated fields to get those numbers for them. And it really, really worked out well. So I think it’s just really, you know, your focus. Do you want more bang for your buck because you’re screening more records, sure? Why not? Right? Go for it. If you want to go back farther. You know, in years, you could certainly do that. But I also think you have to temper that with you know, are they engaged if they gave two years ago and they haven’t done anything else, and you’re never going to hear they. Opening their emails, they’re not doing anything. Maybe that’s not the one. So I think we need to incorporate additional information to pull that and then be realistic, make sure it’s something you can handle, that you can manage, and something that you can stay on top of. I don’t know if that helps, but I do think there’s a lot of play there.
And if I can jump in, I would say, for what purpose is this an anniversary campaign? You know, a big organizational milestone? Then I might go back a little further, you know, those folks who were founding people, or the first folks who began your part of your giving, your legacy circle, or, like some milestone, I might go back further, but to Donna’s point, if this is, you know, for just a, you know, we’re looking at as more of a project base, or just major gifts or annual fund, I probably would Consider folks who have, maybe have a little more recency. You know, three to five years, I think would be, would be reasonable.
I agree. Okay.
I have questions in chat. I have questions a lot. Just seem to be focused on on DonorSearch, though, although one of the first things that came in, and I think it’s a question, it says relationship of major donors to Planned Giving. That’s the question, relationship, relationship of major donors to Planned Giving. Does anybody want to talk about the relation to that?
Well, just generally. I mean, I would say just generally. You know, major donors, absolutely, if, if part of their beliefs and values, part of their aspirations in their giving is to is to leave a legacy, to continue, like to ensure that generations of their family continue to support the cause that means so much to them. Legacy giving can be a powerful way to mobilize that desire, to fulfill on that desire. But as Donna and I were sharing earlier, the percent that the propensity to leave a legacy gift is actually higher from monthly donors than major donors. Not that major donors won’t Absolutely, quite a good number of them will, but a higher percentage of your monthly donors will leave a legacy gift if given that opportunity. Because even if they don’t have a lot of liquidity in life right now, when they pass, they’re giving from appreciated assets, and so it’s much easier for them to express that loyalty in a bigger number through a legacy gift. Sorry, I’m not sure if I answered the question. I think that was helpful.
I think it’s a very good answer. It is. And like someone said, I was talking with it might have been trying to think of who I was talking to, the monthly donor, Sadie. That gives you $10 a month, right? And then she leaves you a big old $10 million month gift. What? So? Yeah, no one should be overlooked. No one should be overlooked. But we also, again, like we said, we want to temper that, to make sure that something that we can manage and can handle, and that plan giving is super important. I agree.
Okay, so Sarah’s asking any advice on sending annual appeal letters to major givers. Should they be different than regular annual appeal letters?
Absolutely yes, absolutely yes. So here’s what I’ll say to this. Your donors know that you’re using a template to do your thank yous. They know that you’re using templates to do your appeal letters. The difference is the quality of it, and if they get something different that really resonates, that something that is telling them the story, how their money is being used, referencing and making it personalized. And you can do that with DonorPerfect, because you can include those merge fields to personalize that information. That’s what’s going to make the difference. So yes, I would absolutely have a different letter, because what you say to a major donor is totally different than what you’re going to say to a new donor, or a monthly donor, or even, you know the one off donors, it’s absolutely critical that it’s different.
Yes, and I would add, for your top major donors, you might even add a handwritten note on that appeal letter that says you’ve already given so generously, but I thought you’d be interested. See this, I thought you find this interesting. Will they likely give many of them will and if not, no harm, no foul,
exactly. Okay.
So summer adds on to that. She says, What do you find is the most accepted way of outreach to these donors, letters, email, social media, in person.
From my perspective, it will vary donor to donor to donor. They all have their preferred communication channel, and so that’s why it’s important for a couple of things, like one, do surveys, survey your donors about their preferred communication channels, particularly your major donors. You can even ask them. I mean, if you if these are the donors who want face time with you, you have conversations. Maybe they’re board members and major donors, you can say, Listen, I want to make certain that I’m, you know, giving keeping you informed, but in a way that you most like, the most convenient way for you. Do you like email? Or would you prefer that? I you know, XYZ, what’s your preferred communication? I would also say, you know, really look at their behavior. Do they respond to your emails? Like, if email is an abyss that might not be their preferred communication channel, but if they respond to your text right away, or if they always call you back again, those are just some clues. Their behaviors tell you everything, but again, a survey is probably the fastest way to get insights from at least a portion of them that will respond to the survey. Donna, what would you add?
I would add that that I agree with you 100% we have to understand how people are going to respond. I know you know, for me, and I’m not a major donor, so don’t be hitting me up, folks. But I know for a fact that if someone sends me a text message from my organization, or I get this lovely email, like every quarter, and I haven’t really gaged it, but it is the most beautiful email that tells how much my little bit of money helps that email. I open it every time, and I read it, and it just makes me happy, and I’ve upgraded because of it. So again, I agree with Tammy. I think you have to do that survey is super, super simple. You can do that in DonorPerfect, using our classic form to do a simple survey to find out what their engagement preferences are, and then jump in on that definitely, absolutely and offering them your cell phone number. Wow, they feel like they’re in. I think that agreed.
Okay, so I have one final question, and Suzanne is asking, when Thank you. Tax acknowledgement letters go out late. Should I write a note and acknowledge it or just send them out late?
How late is late?
Yeah, that’s what I want to know.
It’s a fair question.
And are you in Canada or United States? That’s the other one.
Very true, very true. Yes,
right, right. Well, I would say, you know, use your own judgment, depending on how late they are, you know, like, I remember when I was chief philanthropy officer at the Children’s Center in Detroit, and we thankfully got so many gifts, you know, like at the year end, and it was hard to keep up with our limited staff, to keep up on that gift processing. So that meant that we, as you know, my director of individual giving, the chief philanthropy officer, other our team would kind of pull together with some board members, and we would say, we know these are not going to go out the door in 48 hours like our goal is, let’s call and thank people and leave a warm, grateful voicemail or a live conversation better yet, and then they’ll know their their gift was received. It’s so appreciated. We’re going to use it the way you intend us to use it. And they’ll get that gift acknowledgement letter a little late, but they’re not sitting there wondering, did they even get my gift like I see it hit my account? I guess they did, right? So I would say, if it’s going to be late. Try and do some calls beforehand to answer your question specifically, I think it’s donor by donor. If they have a sensitivity to not getting acknowledged promptly, for sure, reach out to them. Absolutely.
Okay. Agreed. All right. Right? So we have hit four o’clock so, and we are out of questions anyway, so I think, yeah, I think that’s all the questions. All right. So before we wrap up, I just want to give a heartfelt thank you to Tammy and Donna for sharing their expertise and passion today, and thank you to each of you for the important work that you do every day. By growing your major gifts, you’re fueling lasting impact in your communities. So keep an eye out for the recording, and I’m sure if anybody has any questions, you can reach out to your account manager. I know there were plenty of DonorSearch questions, but other than that, I hope to see you in some future webinars. I appreciate you taking the time today. I know it’s difficult to get away, but I appreciate you being here, and you ladies as well. I hope you have a great rest of your day.
Thank you so much. Don’t forget to scan the QR code to get your major gift fundraising workbook,
folks, I’ll leave it on just a minute. Yep, make sure
you get that it is chock full of great information. Thank you, Tammy,
my pleasure. Thank you, Donna, always great to partner with the two of you.
Absolutely. All right. All right. So we’re gonna end the session and we can, I is the major gift fundraising workbook should actually be on this site as well, so they should be able to access it. There. Too. Good. Great. All right. All right, everyone. Thank you. Bye. Bye.