Learn more about analytics and research best practices, as well as real world examples and solutions for nonprofits.

RECENT POSTS

Dec 11, 2013

Unsustainable Trends

Annual TrendsThese trends might sound familiar:

  • Your new donor acquisition counts are flat.
  • Your retention is slipping.
  • So, your active donor counts are shrinking.
  • However, you have seen big gains in average gift size.
  • So overall, your revenue is flat.

This has been the general trend in fundraising for the past couple of years.

And it’s unsustainable. We all know at some point the decreases in active donor counts will be too much for average gift sizes to mitigate.

The question is at what point will your revenue fall?

Here’s a simple equation that will tell you: (-1*%∆R) > (1*%∆RPD)
• Where R = retention, and,
• Where RPD = revenue per active donor per year

In English, when your percentage loss in retention is greater than your percentage gain in revenue per donor, your revenue will fall.

To read Part II of our unsustainable trends blog posts, click here.

The Privatization of the United State Postal Service

The current administration has advocated for the privatization of the USPS. This initiative creates a lot of questions and sends a shiver down the spines of development directors for nonprofits that rely on mail appeals to raise a significant portion of their budgets....

read more

ARCHIVES

© 2024 Analytical Ones