Tag Archives: donor research

Top Tips for Everyone: Power Searching with Google

Profiles, Prospect Research, , ,
Kate Rapoport, Research Associate

In July I attended an online class Google offered called “Power Searching with Google.” The class reminded me of a bunch of tricks to Google searching, and taught me some new ones as well.  Here are a few that I think will be useful for prospect researchers.

Patent searching

If the prospect that you are researching has been involved in research and you want to gather information on what patents she may hold, Google can help with that. On the left hand panel in the search page, under the word “Shopping” click on the word “More”.  The list will expand and you will see “Patents”. Now you can search for your prospect’s name and Google will find patents that contain that name.

Site and Filetype Operators

These operators allow you to narrow your search significantly. The site operator confines your search to one website or domain. For example:

“Jazzy Jay Jefferson” Site:Stanford.edu

…would produce only results that included Jazzy Jay Jefferson on the Stanford.edu website.

“Jazzy Jay Jefferson” Site:.edu

…would find every instance of Jazzy Jay Jefferson on every website that ended in “.edu”.

The filetype operator confines your search to a type of file. For example:

“Jazzy Jay Jefferson” Filetype:pdf

…would produce only results that include Jazzy Jay Jefferson and are PDF documents. (Think: online donor recognition reports!)

Date Range Limiting

If your prospect created a great deal of news in 2008 because of a controversy that you already have sufficient information about and you are now only interested in search results that give you information about your prospect from 2009 to the present, Google offers date range limiting. On the left hand panel of the search page at the bottom is the option “Show search tools.” Once clicked on, the first option is for date range. I can search SlideShare founder “Rashmi Sinha”, click “Show search tools”, select “Custom range”, enter 2009 to 2012, and receive search results from that time frame only.

Search Translated Foreign Pages

If your prospect is an immigrant from or has an interest in a company from another country, you can try to find more information by using the Translated Foreign Pages search function. Type in your search keywords, go to the left hand panel, select “Show Search Tools”, and then select “Translated Foreign Pages”. This will bring up searches for your prospect in available translated pages. You can customize the languages you wish to look through at the top of the search page once you have made the search request.

Conversions

This one is clearly not just for prospect researchers. I can never remember the correct ways to convert feet into meters, for example. Google has a really neat tool that does that for you. Enter “16 feet in meters” into the search box and it immediately gives you the answer (4.8768, just in case you were curious). You can use Google to convert any measurement as long as you use the formula “Number units in units.”

I hope you found these top tips informative, or at least a helpful refresher!

About the Author, Kate Rapoport:

Kate graduated from Smith College with a B.A. in Women’s Studies. She began her career in non-profit administration, became a mother and now, at Aspire Research Group LLC, applies her intelligence and curiosity to preparing prospect profiles that tell the stories that lead to major gifts.

Power Searching with Google Course: A Review

Prospect Research, , , ,
Kate Rapoport, Research Associate

In July, Google invited the public to take a free course entitled “Power Searching with Google.” Google offers many easy ways to find information that the general public doesn’t know about. This course offered anyone the opportunity to learn about the advanced tools Google provides to help search the internet.

As a prospect researcher, I’m always looking for new ways to find things. Also, I was curious to see how Google was going to present the information and how accessible it would be. I signed up for the course and over two weeks completed the six classes and the review exams.

The classes were very easy to follow. The lessons were recorded as video lectures given by a Senior Research Scientist at Google, Daniel Russell. The videos were never longer than ten minutes, and many of them were only five minutes. After each video I completed an exercise to demonstrate that I had learned the material. Usually five short videos made up one class.

Structuring the classes as a series of short videos made it much easier to grasp each concept quickly, but didn’t allow my attention to wander the way a longer video lecture might have done. Also, each class session had an overarching theme, such as interpreting results, advanced techniques and finding facts faster. I found Mr. Russell to be an engaging lecturer, which kept me from wandering away, which I have been known to do in other online lecture classes.

I recommend that other researchers take this course if it is offered again. Although I already knew at least fifty percent of the material, the course clarified things and introduced new ideas on how to perform searches. In a later blog post, I’ll talk about the most useful search skills that the class taught.

About the Author, Kate Rapoport:

Kate graduated from Smith College with a B.A. in Women’s Studies. She began her career in non-profit administration, became a mother and now, at Aspire Research Group LLC, applies her intelligence and curiosity to preparing prospect profiles that tell the stories that lead to major gifts.

So you have a prospect researcher on staff. Now what?

Discussion, Focused Fundraising, , , ,
Data is only as good as the people who use it!

You know that managing and using your donor data is becoming increasingly important to fundraising success and now you have a person designated to perform prospect research tasks for you. Congratulations!

Do you have any idea what your prospect researcher should be doing?

I have three suggestions that will put you and your researcher on a productive path in no time!

1 – Budget for Serious Training
Prospect research is a broad skill set that requires training and practice over time. It involves so much more than putting a prospect name into a search engine or software subscription. It is about using data to drive fundraising strategies. That means understanding fundraising *and* how to research. And that means training. Seriously consider sending new and experienced researchers to the Association of Professional Researchers for Advancement (APRA)’s national conference. Get a grant or a scholarship. Just do it. Even if she sleeps through half of it you should notice significant productivity gains when she returns – it’s that good!

Also, it should not be overlooked that prospect research can be a painful hot button if your board and staff are not well educated on how it works. Your researcher needs to understand how to perform her job ethically and responsibly and be able to communicate that to others.

2 – Ask Really Good Questions
As a front-line fundraiser you should know what is in your overall fundraising plan and what your goals are for the year. Based on that knowledge you need to begin asking your researcher really good questions. Such as…

We are going to add planned giving prospects to our major gift pools. How many of our donors have a lifetime giving of more than $$, and have given more than once a year for the past 2-5 years? And of those, how many live in a geographic area where we can visit without significant expense?

Hopefully, it is obvious how asking good questions related to your goals could open up productive conversations with your researcher. Now she can say things like…

I noticed a cluster of matching zip codes so I reviewed the names. Did you know that one of our trustees lives in a community with 10 percent of the people on the list you asked for?

Now I bet you are asking, “I thought researchers did prospect profiles?” We do that too. Proactive research identifies opportunities through data. Reactive research, like prospect profiles, gives you the information edge to maximize giving.

3 – Include Researchers in Fundraising Discussions
A trained researcher who is engaged in the conversation around using data is a marvelous asset to your team. So be sure to include her in your fundraising discussions. Musing over a capital campaign? She could have a LOT to add about who is in your database and best practices and trends in research used by similar organizations.

But I’m not just talking about formal meetings or discussions. After your meeting with a donor, mention new information or strategy you are thinking about. Was the ask amount on target with the wealth information found? Debriefing your researcher means she can learn and grow, providing you with more and better information next time.

Prospect Research Adds Value – So Value Your Researcher

It is virtuous circle – the better trained and engaged your researcher is, the better able she is to help you raise more money. And thankfully, researchers are often independent learners. If you can communicate your fundraising objectives and where you think research could provide support, your researcher can probably figure out and communicate to you the best practices in the field.

These conversations might pull you and your researcher out of your comfort zones for a while, but your efforts will be well rewarded by more dollars raised for your mission. And heck, you’ll probably have more fun at work too!

Jen Filla founded Aspire Research Group so that every development office could have the benefits of professional prospect research. Known for her creativity and clear communications, she uses her direct fundraising experience to craft research solutions for organizations across the country that answer the questions that lead to more and higher gifts, guiding fundraisers comfortably every step of the way.

Other Posts You Might Like

3 Actions That Demonstrate Your High Prospect Research IQ

The Dangers of (Not) Managing Prospect Research

Can you really trust prospect research? 10 things you should know

Identification to Discovery Visit: 5 Fun Questions to Ask

Focused Fundraising, Major Gift Teams, , , , , ,

Once you have identified your donor prospect, the next step is usually to make a discovery visit. Sometimes this happens over the telephone, but ideally it will be a visit at the person’s choice of location. The goal is to meet her where she feels most comfortable and qualify her as a major gift prospect.

Most often we aim to determine or confirm the following:

*Affinity, or how close she feels to our organization
*Inclination, or how philanthropic she is to us and others
*Capacity, or whether she has the ability to make a major gift

Confirming Affinity and Inclination

No matter how much or how little time you have in your first visit, do NOT walk away without finding out about the individual’s giving, passion, and movement to the next step:

1. Why does the prospect give to our organization?

You can begin your conversation with a “thank you” for past giving and a natural curiosity for how the prospect first discovered and began giving to your organization. If there is no giving to your organization, or even if there is, consider asking if she is involved with any other organizations.

2. How does the prospect feel about the relationship?

Next, you can guide the conversation naturally to ensuring that the prospect likes the mailings and other information received or if you need to make adjustments. Maybe you need to add or change the type of mailing to cater to the prospect’s specific interest.

3. Would the prospect like a tour, visit a program, etc.?

Now that you are talking about what the prospect likes about your organization, you can make an appropriate suggestion about a tour, talking with a program director, or some other activity that would interest her.

Confirming Capacity

To confirm or verify a prospect’s capacity to make a gift, guide conversation toward the primary source of wealth:

4. What a wonderful award this is! It looks like your business has been doing well…

You do not have to have constant eye contact with your prospect. Take a look around you and ask normal, curious and fun questions about what you see on the walls or on the shelves.

5. I’d love to learn a little more about your business. How many employees do you have here?

Don’t be afraid to change the conversation. Keep track of time and be sure to bring the conversation around to answer your questions before the visit is over!

Discovery visits take practice.

If you find yourself back in the office wondering how you spent an hour talking and still don’t know anything new about your prospect, forgive yourself and replay the visit in your head or talk it over with a colleague until you recognize where you could have done things differently. Then schedule another visit.

Once you become adept at your discovery visits, you will find that you are able to shorten the time between identification and actually asking for the gift. Discovering a prospect’s true interest in your organization prepares you to deepen that interest into passion. And once you have passion, in-depth research on your prospect prepares you to ask for the right amount.

Best wishes to you on your next discovery visit!

Click here to register for the 6/14/2012 webinar: Savvy Conversational Research Techniques for Fundraisers

Other blog posts that might interest you:

3 Steps to Major Gift Mojo!

Will Your Donors Talk to You?

How to get from $250k to $40m

How safe are you at your donor prospect meetings?

Focused Fundraising, Major Gift Teams, , ,

Everyone loves online research, right? You can find out so much about a person online! But is all that information helping you in your donor prospect meetings?

Whether you are a frontline fundraiser prepping for your next meeting or a prospect researcher preparing a donor prospect profile, you need a plan *before* you start looking for information.

Ask yourself these questions:

*  Where is this prospect in the gift cycle? How close is she to making a gift?
*  Do I know what her passions are?
*  What is my best guess on likely capacity given what I know right now?
*  Do I know how she is connected to our organization?

Once you have answered these questions you are ready to do some research! Or are you? At this point you should know what you want to accomplish during your next contact with the donor prospect. Do you? I encourage you to be very specific about it. Here are some examples of specific goals:

At the next visit I want to…

  • Discover whether the prospect has an interest in our organization and is otherwise a good major gift candidate.
  • Confirm the information we know and solidify the next step.
  • Deepen the prospect’s engagement with a special invitation that matches her interest.
  • Ask her for a transformational gift!

If you are a prospect researcher you will want to have a conversation with the frontline fundraiser that exposes the motive for the visit and the research request. You can try to get the person to be specific by repeating what she says to you. For example, you might say things like:

  • Oh, so you are trying to find out what the prospect is passionate about so you can figure out which program to talk about?
  • Aha, her secretary is blocking your calls and you need to find another way to connect with the prospect. I can help with that.

Now you really are ready to do some research! But you are still in danger of being ill-prepared for your donor prospect meeting. How is that? Because online research is like visiting the witch’s house that Hansel and Gretel happened upon in the woods. Everything is so yummy you might crawl right into the oven without even thinking about it. You might follow so many different trails of fascinating information that you sit down with your donor prospect and lack the vital information you need. Yikes!

Maybe you have been diligent and answered the questions mentioned above. You also know specifically what you are trying to accomplish at the next visit. Here are three research pitfalls to avoid as you embark on your online research journey:

(1)  Not documenting the information you collect. If you don’t have a template or a spot in the database for the things you learn, you assume the risk of selective memory. As humans we remember what we hoped to learn instead of what we really found out. And worse, we completely forget everything the next time round.

(2)  Spending too much time on the wrong things. Let’s face it. Our prospects are fascinating people. But we need to find specific answers and then move on. Once again, templates help to keep us focused. Your job is either to get away from your desk and raise money or help your frontline fundraiser get away from her desk and raise money. Period.

(3)  Not answering important questions thoroughly. Once you have collected your information and feel you are finished and ready for the visit, take a few minutes to imagine yourself at the visit. This goes for prospect researchers too. Pretend you will be on that visit. Now look at the information you collected again. What is missing? Are you wondering if she still sits on that board? Go back and answer the (now) obvious questions.

Online research is a powerful tool. As we apply our research prowess to fundraising we need to keep a razor-sharp focus on our donor prospects. We are not playing Jeopardy, we are playing Family Feud and it is up to your development shop to work as a team to effectively and efficiently answer the fundraising questions that will lead to more and larger gifts.

Other blog posts that may interest you:

The Dangers of (Not) Managing Prospect Research

Discussion, Focused Fundraising, , , ,

I met a guy who was previously a Vice President of Development at a decent-sized higher education institution. When he found out I was a prospect researcher he admitted that he never really did know what those prospect researchers did in his office. He was in charge, and he didn’t want to fire them, but there was a perception of zero value to him.

Since then I have met accomplished consultants and other nice fundraisers who are completely ignorant of what prospect research does – even though it is a critical piece of their success. Pretty wild, huh?

That’s like suggesting you know you need your cell phone, but you’re not sure why. You don’t have to know how to use every bell and whistle on the new phones, but you would be seriously limited if you didn’t have a cell phone at all. Why? Because you make phone calls with it!! Prospect research helps you focus on your best donor prospects. That’s pretty important!

I’m not exactly sure why the words “prospect research” make so many fundraising folks uncomfortable, but I’d like to do what I can to change that. As I was sitting at a conference contemplating this surprisingly common resistance to prospect research, I thought I might break it down with journalist questions. Here’s what I came up with:

Who? Identifying. Prospect research identifies which donors to spend time with. You wouldn’t start with “A” and go to “Z” for 10,000+ records, would you? (not even for 1,000 records!)
What? Tracking. Prospect research creates tracking systems to ensure you know what actions you must accomplish to keep your prospects cultivated and eventually solicited. Can you keep up with 100+ prospects in your head? I think not.
Where? Reporting. Prospect research helps you keep track of where you are in reaching your goals. Reporting on things like the number of proposals likely to close before fiscal year-end is critical for planning!
When? Strategy. Want to know when you should send out those appeal letters? Want to know if you have capacity in your donor pool for a campaign goal? Prospect research informs strategies with your own donor data.
Why? Money. To raise more money for your mission! Prospect research answers the strategic fundraising questions that lead to wildly successful fundraising programs. Period.

So the next time you or I run into someone who claims ignorance of prospect research, we can say to them: “It’s so easy! Prospect research helps you focus on your best donor prospects.” And then when we get back to our offices and send the “nice to meet you” networking email, we can direct them to this blog post, which (I hope) quickly and easily explains the value prospect research has in any serious fundraising endeavor.

Whatcha think about that?

Are You Making These 5 Donor Research Mistakes?

4Fundraisers, Resource Links, , ,

Whether you are a prospect researcher or a front-line fundraiser, you need to find accurate and relevant information about your donor prospects. As an individual living in the information-age, you need to avoid data pitfalls. How well are you doing this? Check out these five donor profiling mistakes to find out.

1.  Misleading Estimates
We often use estimates when reporting on our prospect’s assets. Zillow.com gives us a Z-estimate on the value of residential real estate. Dun & Bradstreet gives us an estimate of private company earnings. The Forbes’ Rich Lists provide estimates of net worth. Don’t make the mistake of presenting these figures as true or exact. Be sure to round your numbers. For example, use $433,000 instead of $432,951. Exact numbers often mislead people to believe they are true, even when you state them as estimates. And Forbes cannot know Bill Gates’ true net worth (net worth = all assets minus all liabilities) unless Bill personally discloses that information.

2. Portraying a Secondary Source as Primary
A primary source is the original producer of the information, like the tax-assessor’s office for real estate ownership or the university that bestowed a degree. A secondary source is someone else who tells you about the information, like an online website reporting on real estate sales or an online data aggregator listing an honorary degree for your prospect. As you might imagine, newspapers and magazines are usually secondary sources as well. Be suspicious of secondary sources. When you record the information, especially if you only found it in one place, cite the source so everyone knows it is not primary. For example, you might lead the sentence with the following: In 2004 The New York Times reported that Pauline Prospect…

3.  Not Checking Self-Reported Information
Who’s Who has been a fabulous source of information for decades, and it is all self-reported information not verified by an independent source. With the popularity of social media and the ease of online publication, our prospects often create a lot of public information about themselves. Be careful to disclose the source of your information if you cannot verify the information elsewhere. Use an asterisk (*) or quote within the text to alert the reader the information is not confirmed. For example, sometimes the data is just too dated to be confirmed online. You might provide a footnote like this one: *These volunteer leadership positions were provided in various biographies, but were not otherwise able to be confirmed.

4.  Overlooking the Deep Web
The majority of the public uses search engines to find information online, but sometimes we need to visit a specific website to access the information in the “deep web”. For example, if you want to check that your airplane flight is on time and that you are still on it, you must visit the airline website and search its database. You cannot search on Google to find this information. As prospect researchers, we need to know when to visit a website directly, especially to find primary or original sources of information. Examples include political contributions, real estate data, incorporation records, and public company filings. Start collecting key links and link lists.

5.  Omitting Dates
We scan through hundreds of data sources to extract relevant information about our donor prospects. It can be easy to forget to check the date of the source. Keeping track of the chronology of the data you are collecting is critical to providing an accurate picture. For example, you might come across information confirming your prospect’s occupation only to discover the source is dated five years ago. It can also be critical to know that the multi-million dollar named endowment was only last year.

Online search sources and methods change swiftly. Stay curious and keep reading!

Some other post you might find helpful:

How to Find Giving History
Can You Really Trust Prospect Research?
What I Like About Google

3 Consultant Relationship Types that Succeed: Which one for you?

Focused Fundraising, , , ,

If you know what type of consultant relationship you want before you hire, you will be better able to evaluate the skills, approach, and personality of the consultant. Better evaluation means you will be much more likely to achieve your desired outcomes. Never underestimate the human element! Here are three fundamental relationship types to consider:

#1 – Restaurant Menu: Just Do It For Me!
Imagine it is a Friday night. You are tired after a long work-week and decide to take the family out to dinner at a local restaurant. You order pecan-crusted grouper on a bed of spinach and just as you are about to sip your glass of wine the chef appears at your side. He asks you, “Do you know how to get the pecans to stay encrusted? No? Do not worry! Come back to the kitchen in five minutes and I will show you.” Ummm. Not exactly what you had in mind. In fact, it would be irritating and awkward.

If you need a problem solved and you do not have the staff or resources to tackle it, you want a consultant to come in and do it for you. This consulting relationship is not unreasonable and can be a great way to get your organization moving forward.

As an example, you may need your donor database analyzed to determine best prospects for major gift and/or annual appeals. You know that there are consultants who can examine your database and make effective recommendations. You receive the ratings imported into your database and review the suggested prospect segments or groupings with the consultant. Then it is up to you to “eat” your “meal” – you need to engage and ask your donor prospects for gifts.

#2 – Cooking Class: Teach Me How To Do It Myself!
Now let’s imagine it is a Saturday morning and you arrive with your coffee in hand, ready for your cooking class. As you enter the classroom you discover the morning meal completely prepped and ready to go into the oven. You wonder, “How am I going to get my egg mixture fluffy like that next week when my in-laws are visiting?” And then, “Why did I pay for this class if I don’t learn how to make the dishes on my own?”

If you need to solve a problem that requires you to implement the solution on a regular basis, you want a consultant to walk you through how it works, using her expertise to shorten the time between learning and using your new skills. This kind of consulting builds your organization’s internal capacity by teaching staff valuable new skills.

As an example, you may be preparing for a campaign and want to be able to qualify major gift prospects as needed. The consultant trains your staff member how to do the research herself and creates a worksheet so that she can methodically establish a capacity rating and inclination rating to be entered in the donor database. Now the staff member can “cook” the “meal” with the same great results every time – she can prioritize new prospects quickly and effectively.

#3- Catering Instruction: Do It For Me and…Coach Me on Implementing!
Continuing with our food analogy, imagine you are hosting a big dinner party – your first ever! You hire a catering company. They arrive with all of the different courses cooked and ready. You and your spouse are given a list of all the foods and when they need to be served. But the best part is that they dress all the tables with linens and leave you with a server. She makes sure everything happens on time, prompting and reminding you along the way. Her expertise ensures all goes smoothly. Your party is a smashing hit!

Experienced fundraisers and managers know that having a consultant who can deliver a finished package and continue to coach on effective implementation can be the perfect solution. This kind of consulting gets the initiative up and running quickly, building the skills of the entire team along the way.

As an example, you need to transition from haphazardly securing major gifts to a major gifts program. The consultant analyzes your donor database, imports the ratings and works with you to develop a complete moves management system – rating, moves and reporting. Then she coaches you through the first year, tweaking the system and making suggestions to keep you on track. Your team has the “food cooked” and can efficiently “serve” it – your team has prospect management tools and they are methodically moving major gift prospects toward gifts.

Be aware of the kind of relationship you need and want to reach your goals. Then communicate that clearly as you interview a prospective consultant. It is the first step toward hiring the right person for you and your organization – someone you like and trust with the skills to get you to your destination.

Aspire Research Group has worked in all three types of relationships with clients, depending upon the problem to be solved. Do you have a prospect research problem and aren’t sure how to solve it? We would be happy to discuss it with you. Call 727 231 0516 or email jen at AspireResearchGroup.com.

Other blog posts that might interest you:

5 Ways You Know You Need A Research Consultant

The Shocking Truth About Prospect Research Consultants!

Can you really trust prospect research? 10 things you should know

Focused Fundraising, ,

Big institutions have been using prospect research long before the internet turned the field upside down. Those institutions still lead the way in things like database analysis, multi-channel direct appeals, multi-million dollar gifts and multi-billion dollar campaigns. Big is nice, but if you’re not that big, how can you be sure prospect research will work for your organization?

Here are ten things you should know as you evaluate what type of prospect research will work for you.

(1)  In-person research is a must

As a front-line fundraiser talking directly with donors, you are responsible for some of the most important prospect research your organization can do! You are the one who gets to ask donor prospects questions about why they give, what they love about your organization, what is going on in their family and so many other crucial questions.

Example: A donor prospect can look great on paper, until you visit and discover that the child has special needs, aging parents have run out of money for care and the wife has just cut her career back to care for family.

(2) Google really is good

Google and other search engines are an incredible source of information. Learning how to use search engines effectively has become a life skill. As a front-line fundraiser, you should be able to quickly find some basic information on your donor prospect. However, you will short change yourself and your organization if you do not get professional prospect research before asking for a major gift of $10,000 or more.

Example: A fundraiser had been engaging a donor for years and he was now on the board of trustees. When they were planning a campaign, she asked for an in-depth profile to help decide the size and type of leadership gift he might be capable of. Research discovered significant commercial real estate investments unrelated to the prospect’s primary business. The fundraiser was able to ask another board member who had made complex real estate gifts, to help cultivate and solicit.

(3)  Peer Review has pros…and cons

Peer review – asking a select group of volunteers to review and rate prospects – can help you uncover personal information about prospects that formal research does not find, including great insights into a prospect’s personality. But we’ve all known prospects who impress people as wealthy when really they carry a lot of debt or still rely on money from their wealthy families. Peer review is one piece in the prospect puzzle, not the whole picture.

(4)  Information is always as good as the source

One of the first rules of research is to scrutinize the source of information. Some sources are more reliable than others. It is important to ask your vendor and keep yourself educated on the sources being used in prospect research.

Example: A Google search on your prospect’s name might reveal a bio saying she serves on a local hospital’s board, but does she? Checking the hospital’s website and/or IRS tax form 990 is a better source. Or you could just ask her…(see #1)

(5) Prioritizing is not an exact science

Your organization has done a stellar job of managing its annual appeals and building its database. Now you have to figure out who among the 5,000+ records should receive event invites, specific appeals, or be asked for a major gift. You don’t want to start with the letter “A” and go from there. But recognize that prospect screenings and data mining efforts are not perfect.

Example: Sweet Charity was methodically working through its best-rated prospects from a recent wealth screening when a donor not on their list expressed an interest in a naming opportunity. It turned out that the donor held a middle-class job, but had a large trust fund as an inheritance. He had been well-stewarded by Sweet Charity for five years and when he read about the campaign in the newsletter he wanted to honor his parents.

(6)  Donor Giving is Confidential

Every fundraiser is aware that a donor’s gift to your organization is confidential. We know to ask permission before sharing donor names and stories. Keep this in mind as you review results from database screenings and prospect profiles. Prospect research can only find gifts that have been disclosed to the public by the nonprofit or the donor.

(7)  Private Companies are Private

Entrepreneurs are a very philanthropic group and usually own and operate one or more private companies. Private means that the shares or ownership of the company are not available to the public for purchase. It also means that the company does not have to share information, such as sales or profits. Really. Sometimes they do share, but most often we have to guess. It also means we don’t know how much of the company they own or what they sold their company for – unless they tell someone. And sometimes they do tell.

(8)  Maybe you can find out stockholdings

Unlike private companies, public companies trade their shares with the public. So you might think that if someone owns shares of a public company we could find out, right? Wrong! Maybe we can find out. Stock ownership is reported only if the person is an insider: top executive, director, or owns 10% or more of the company stock. There are exceptions, but not too many.

(9)  You get what you pay for

Many organizations want cheap research. Why should you pay a lot of money for research if you are not sure you will even get the gift? Because, when done well, you raise more money. If you know how to use a prospect screening effectively, every area of your fundraising could have improved results. Really, really. And if you hire a professional prospect researcher (i.e., researcher-fundraiser), you will get donor profiles that provide the kind of wealth and giving insights you need to maximize major gifts. Freelancers often don’t have the experience or the paid resources to give you what you need. How committed are you to using the information? Pay accordingly.

(10)  Partnering with Prospect Research raises money!

So you invest in serious prospect research, but it still feels generic and not so helpful. Make sure that partnering is part of the purchase. Prospect research is most effective when research can answer a clearly defined question. That means discussing the project before work begins, during and after. Prospect researchers are fundraisers too and we want to raise money – get a “Yes!” – just as much as you do! So let’s talk.

Can you trust prospect research? Absolutely! When you buy quality and use it skillfully, prospect research can make your fundraising efforts SHINE. Are you looking for prospect research solutions for your organization? Contact Aspire Research Group at 727 202 3405 and ask for Jen Filla or email jen at aspireresearchgroup.com or visit us at www.AspireResearchGroup.com.

The Shocking Truth About Prospect Research Consultants!

4Fundraisers, Discussion, , , , , , ,

Go ahead and shock me!

Did you know that a prospect research consultant isn’t successful unless you, the front-line fundraisers, are successful? Shocking, but true! If I provide you with irrelevant data, or too much data, then you are less prepared and less strategic in your fundraising. You won’t raise as much money for your mission. I won’t get re-hired. And you won’t tell your friends good things about me.

I was reading an article in an excellent research magazine, Connections, published by the Association of Professional Researchers for Advancement. The provocative suggestion was that prospect researchers must move from “pushers to partners”. I never felt like I was an information pusher. But I have had front-line fundraisers tell me about their disappointing experiences with “pushers”.

When I founded Aspire Research Group, my goal was to bring professional prospect research to all sizes of organizations. We have been reaching that goal! And whenever I work with a client there is always some level of back and forth communication going on.

Whether it’s donor profiles, data mining, or prospect tracking, I need to understand who you are and what you want to achieve before I can provide you with information solutions that get you to your destination.

When you work with a prospect research consultant, be sure to make time for questions on both sides and for feedback after the work is delivered. If you do this, your consultant will be able to provide continually better services to you.

Consider the donor prospect profile as an example. You need more than house values and occupational titles. You need to understand what makes your prospect tick, why she has made gifts, and how her assets translate into wealth and possible gift opportunities. You need more than data – you need the information that will inform your fundraising.

Want to hear some shocking success stories? Want to find out how to improve your fundraising strategy with prospect research? Call Jen Filla at 727 231 0516 or email jen at aspireresearchgroup.com.