Database Marketing

According to Lisa Scott, data can be as dangerous as it is a success factor if you are not careful. She is absolutely spot-on and reminds us that transparency isn't just for commercial companies anymore. You all know from my other blogs how important I believe data is to our success in the nonprofit industry. But, it is not enough to just say “data"—it’s about data strategies, business rules, organizational priorities and much more when you think through your data.

Join us to explore how to get your data organized, centralized and accessible to fundraisers and other personnel for effective use.

With all the modern channels to potential donors, learn the myriad of ways you can grow your list and engage new supporters.

Are you helping guide your constituents down the right path? Trigger-based marketing is the right thing to do, and guess what — it’s not really “new.”

To get a handle on what’s in store for 2015, NonProfit PRO rounded up some of the nonprofit industry’s finest, who were kind enough to share their nonprofit trends for 2015. Here are four trends on data and reporting.

Data has long been at the heart of direct marketing. In the nonprofit world, data allowed us to rent lists of people who had shown a propensity toward giving to causes similar to ours. On the cultivation side, data permitted us to choose which donors to mail based upon previous history and tailor messages to their interests. This smart use of data let us provide donors what they wanted rather than cluttering up their mailboxes with irrelevant offers. And it allowed nonprofits to raise more dollars at a lower cost to more efficiently and effectively feed hungry children, cure life-threatening cancer and support our wounded veterans.

The opinions, thoughts and feelings of our prospects, supporters and donors exist whether we seek them or not; 100 percent of the risk lies in ignoring them.

The short answer is yes. If your data-tracking systems need their own organization charts or binders full of complicated instructions, then your software infrastructure is definitely broken.

At a recent Wake Up Your Fundraising Breakfast Panel presented by FundRaising Success and sponsors Blackbaud and Listen Up Espanol, three fundraising professionals joined me in a discussion on maximizing your return on "big data" to enhance fundraising and relationships with donors.

This session helps you sort through data issues and offers ideas to avoid the typical traps, such as collecting it and then wasting it.