The important part about having a fundraising plan isn’t that you’re constantly referring to it; the important part is that you have those planning conversations.
With Christmas and New Year right around the corner, you are hopefully being flooded with year-end individual donations. In fact, the final three months of the year is especially critical for organizations that rely on individual donors for 30%, 60%, or in some rare cases even 90% of their budget.
Regardless of where your organization falls on this spectrum, wouldn’t you love to get data about individual donors at a broad range of other organizations? Would it be helpful to know the average percentage of individual donors who give online, or the average ratio between major donor and everyday donor? Would it be helpful if you could predict the return on investment in fundraising planning, development staff, or CRM?
Back in 2010, Heather Yandow saw a need for this kind of data and used her math degree and decade of development experience to launch the Individual Donor Benchmark Project. The project consists of an annual survey of nonprofits to learn
more about their individual donor strategies and achievements. Each year, her consulting firm Third Space Studio, produces a well-designed and easily understand Individual Donor Benchmark Report.
This self-described data nerd has developed an incredibly useful body of data that you can use to evaluate your current fundraising program, inform your planning process, and advocate for additional resources with boards and funders.
We explored some of the high points from the past five Individual Donor Benchmark reports, including:
- Universal truths about individual donor giving
- The one document that is the bedrock of all successful fundraising
- Why a 60% retention rate is probably good but an 80% retention rate may not be healthy for your organization
- The statistical ROI when paying for development staff
- How to take part in the 2017 Indidivudal Donor Benchmark Project
Heather Yandow’s Contact Information:
- Third Space Studio: http://www.thirdspacestudio.com/
- Email: Heather@thirdspacestudio.com
- Facebook: www.facebook.com/thirdspacestudio
- LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/heatheryandow
- Twitter: @3rdspacestudio
Register to take the 2017 Individual Donor Benchmark Survey here: