Award Winning Fundraising Software

Some good news here for our employees and customers- DonorPerfect was named a winner of the 2010 Campbell Award for exceptional customer satisfaction. The independent polling firm Campbell Rinker conducted a survey of 2866 customers of software and online solutions used for fundraising and donor management, and DonorPerfect came out on top.

There's a press release here.

In addition to our top ratings in the N-TEN / Idealware report, "A Guide to Low Cost Donor Management Systems", this new survey validates the tremendous effort our employees have given to raise customer satisfaction for our clients.

To be candid, it's hard to earn these types of awards. While we have been 'hard at work' for the last 20 years, it's really only been in the recent past where we took customer satisfaction seriously and made sure it was part of our culture at all levels of the organization.

Five years ago, it was easy to think that- naturally- customer satisfaction was crucial, and the majority of our employees felt the same way. The problem is that we did not have the right processes in place to ensure it was actually happening. As we rapidly grew and DonorPerfect took off, I will admit that some business measures- like customer satisfaction- may have been taken for granted.

I'm very proud that we've reversed course. For the last several years, we have implemented a plethora of programs and processes to ensure that we deliver on our goal of 100% customer satisfaction. We not only focus on quickly correcting problems, but also introduce ways where the problems don't appear in the first place.

The only way we will be successful is if our clients are successful AND extremely satisfied. With this recent award and our continued growth, our goal is to help as many non profit organizations know that we are the safe and successful choice for their CRM and fundraising software needs.

Update 3.0

Yes, I have been remiss in updating the blog. To be honest, upfront, and even candid (that should cover all three bases since we are in the baseball post-season!), I've been just a bit preoccupied the last three weeks.

Or 4.

Or 6.

Whatever. The point is that the blog- now nearly 5 years old, has been somewhat neglected. OK, not updated. For a while. Forever....at least since last month.

Now, I love writing- something that would make my 9th AND 12th grade school teacher, Mr. Graler, either cringe or understand in some rather interesting way. The bottom line is that I do not seem to be alone. There are MANY non profit blogs that have gone silent in the last 18 months.

However, recent events have evicted me from my arm-chair quarterback writing sessions.

These events involve intrigue, wars, fencing, escapes, and yes, even true love.*

Stay Tuned. :)

-Jon

*A reference to "The Princess Bride", perhaps the most inconceivable movie ever produced!

The Truth about Email Usage for Non-Profits

It seems painfully clear that non profit organizations should use email as a way to communicate to their donors, right? So what would you guess is the percentage that non-profits primarily use email to communicate to their constituents? 75%? 50% ? 20%? (Or if you are in the more optimistic crowd, 95%?)

The fact of the matter is that it's tiny. Our own research suggests that only 10-20% of non profits track emails for their donors on any regular basis. Most non profits only use email for their core constituents- staff, board members, and volunteers. Donors are entirely a separate animal.

If I were to guess, the average email list for an average small non profit would be ~1000 for an active email organization (ones in the 10-20% category above), and only about 100 email addresses or less in the second category.

The real problem facing non profits is actually not sending email, it's collecting them AND keeping them up to date. That's hard and takes real effort- staff resources- which most people think would be better staff on mission related activities (though one could certainly argue that collecting email for communication purposes is VERY mission related).

What's your experience? Does your non profit primarily use email to reach out to ALL of their constituents or just a fraction?

Fundraising IS Rocket Science...

My last blog post seemed to generate a lot of buzz (well, not in the comments yet) but in the emails I received from some other fundraising industry insiders.

Though we are in challenging times, it's important to stay focused on the bigger picture. At DonorPerfect, we're focusing our energy helping our clients retain the donors that they have. While average donation amounts are declining, it's critical to keep and retain donors for the long term.

As a result, as a company we've actually seen a great increase in business in the last part of the year as non-profits are struggling with ways to raise funds or simply keep their funding the same. After all, while the results were down across the spectrum, there was still a large group - 40% - that actually grew their fundraising last year.

Fundraising is hard. It really is rocket science. You would never try to build a rocket ship without the right tools and materials, so why limp along with the equivalent of hammer and chisel with Excel or Microsoft Access? It doesn't make sense.




In other news, my partner and colleague, Doug Schoenberg, recently blogged how cell phone fundraising is effecting the Haiti relief efforts.

Overall, I think cell phone fundraising is great- for the right organization. Unfortunately, people may jump to the conclusion that they need to start fundraising via cell phones, when in reality their chances of success are actually quite small.

Consider this:

The maximum cell phone donation is $10. The average online gift is $120.00. That means you roughly need 12 times (1,200%!) more donors to give via cell phone simply to make up the huge loss in the average donation amount. Can you realistically see your donor base grow 12 times? It's not likely. Your resources will be more effective if applied elsewhere in your organization.

Before people start drinking from the mobile giving kool-aid drinking fountain, they really need to make sure they have their best practices established. Creating and maintaining a direct mail program, on-line giving, major donors, newsletters, annual program, special events, capital campaigns, etc., all take a good deal of time and effort. To date, all of these fundraising techniques will be much more effective than mobile giving and should be considered first and foremost as the best bang for your buck.

2010 - Light at the End of the Tunnel?

Now that 2009 is in the books and our clients have had a chance to enter all of their data for December, it's time to review the fundraising results for the year. It's not pretty.

2009 will likely be the worst year-over-year performance in the non-profit sector since 1956- the year the Giving USA Foundation first began publishing annual reports of philanthropy in the USA.

Because DonorPerfect is a SaaS (Software as a Service) based CRM fundraising software solution, we are able to aggregate the fundraising results of all of our clients. In a sample size of 468 clients that have been using our software for at least 3 years, giving in 2009 dropped 10.77% vs. 2008.*

The bad news doesn't stop there unfortunately- the average gift for this same group of clients dropped from $530.68 in 2008 to $475.94 in 2009, a 10.3% decline. (Note: this includes all gifts- direct mail, major donors, pledge payments, on-line, etc.) The average on-line gift amount collected through our web based giving solutions, WebLink and DonorPages, also declined 12.3%, from $139.17 in 2008 to $122.12 in 2009.

However, as this post is titled, there is some good news, and it could be the light at the end of the tunnel.

In the holiday period (November and December 2009), giving actually increased by 2% over the same period in 2008. In addition, on-line giving increased nearly 65% for all of 2009 vs. 2008.

What does all of this mean?

First of all, if you are in the group that raised more in 2009 vs. 2008 (and that is still nearly40% of you) - congratulations! You are well ahead of your peers. If you dropped some but less than 10%, you're still doing well compared to the average. Finally, if you dropped more than 11%, now is not the time to panic. Similar to all financial trends, fundraising goes in cycles, and this one is no different.

The key to maintaining your results is still the same this year as in the past- retain, retain, and retain your donors. One of the worst things to do is to 'give your donors a rest' or cut your fundraising expenses. Such thinking will quickly turn loyal donors into lapsed donors, and the end result will be MUCH less revenue, especially now since you need it the most! Worse, your results will geometrically suffer in the coming months as donors who are 'resting' lose interest in your organization and give elsewhere.

So, stick to the fundamentals, and maintain your mailing/solicitation frequency. The giving climate will turn around and things will get better- it's inevitable!


* Note: Results based on a sample size of 468 clients using DonorPerfect Online for at least 3 years, raising at least $10,000/year/client. Total raised was $763,047,713.86 in 2008 vs. $688,871,107.30 in 2009 , or a 10.77% decline in fundraising gifts. Totals include all payments and gifts-in-kind.

Update! New Website, New Version!

If you're reading this now, then chances are you took notice of our brand new website launch!!!

While we've always been proud of the information we provided on fundraising software on our old website, it was clear that we needed to redo everything and give DonorPerfect a new look moving forward.

The website is part of a new wave in design for DonorPerfect. For the past 25 years, we want to make sure that ALL of our software, including our website, takes the latest and greatest technology to make it easier for our clients to fulfill their mission. The website and our new client area will make it easy for non profit organizations to understand and realize the benefits of professional fundraising software.

But we're not just talking about our web site either! Several weeks ago we launched our latest release of DonorPerfect Online! Updated with a completely new look and feel, DonorPerfect Online has now set the standard for what easy to use online fundraising software should look like. Personally, I think it makes Apple look uncool, but I'll plainly admit I'm a bit prejudice and you can judge for yourself:

The DonorPerfect Online Dashboard. Menu items are now organized at the
top of the screen, and client resources are available in the lower left.

A Sample Constituent/Donor record. Actions, such as attaching a file or viewing an
information sheet are logically grouped together at the top of the screen.

Whether or not it's 'Apple' cool, I think it's crystal clear that the new version and new website will make it easier for non profit organizations to raise more money and save valuable time to focus on their mission.

If you haven't seen the new version, try DonorPerfect today!

NCDC, Inc. 500

The summer goes by pretty quickly, and with Fall just around the corner, the start of fundraising conference season kicks in again.

This season we kicked it off with another visit to the National Catholic Development Conference, held in Crystal City, VA. The conference was very well attended, and it was great to see everyone again and also some new faces.

As you may have been noticing on the recent Twitter feed, we'll be announcing some news- and we were able to share that with the attendees at this year's conference. October 6th is the date, and the newest release of DonorPerfect Online Fundraising Software (Fall 2009) will likely turn out to be our largest ever! Look for a post soon with screen shots as we get closer to the date.

I also had the opportunity to attend the Inc. 500 conference held just a couple of days later. This conference attracted some of the best and brightest entrepreneurs, and it also wasn't surprising that philanthropy was on quite a few agendas. I think the key points about building successful companies and organizations really centered on two key concepts- persistence and execution. (It also didn't hurt to know a few other successful people as well, of course)

Finally, I had some interesting travel experiences as well. On my ride back to Philadelphia, the train was delayed for security reasons. Why? Because Vice President Joe Biden rides Amtrak. Not sure where he is though- I didn't see him except for the extra security in place.