Making the Numbers tell a Story

Understanding donor behaviour is vital for any fundraiser. In a direct marketing programme, few fundraisers ever meet the donors and so it is analysis of information held on the database which tells the story of the success of the programme. This, together with understanding the success of other institutions’ programmes can be a great way of improving everyone’s performance, sharing risk and developing new ideas.

It was for these reasons that 15 UK universities got together with More Partnership to start an unprecedented data analysis project. 10 years’ data on giving and asking, together with demographic information on 1.8 million graduates was pooled in order to understand the state of university "Annual Giving” amongst the participants. While no personal data were shared between the participants, information on a wide range of measures of the overall programme performance were analysed in a standardised fashion and shared freely within the group. In this way outstanding performance could be identified and explained by staff from the institution concerned.

Participants learned huge amounts about donor acquisition, retention and upgrade performance in both their own programmes and that of others. It was possible to make comparisons about return on investment, and it was demonstrated, probably for the first time, that those who spend more raise more. The impact of staff absence through maternity leave or vacant posts was starkly illustrated as income dipped during those periods.

Towards the end of the project, demographic data was also compared and data collected on giving propensity by different measures.

The aim of the ongoing project is to continue to collect a uniquely rich set of data on mass giving behaviour and fundraising performance in higher education institutions. This will enable participants to improve the effectiveness of their programmes, and to target most effectively those most likely to give.

For the second year of the project, data collection for financial years which finished in 2011 will begin in December 2011 with results available in February. The consortium welcomes further participants.

With an analysis model developed, More Partnership is also interested in carrying out similar analysis for other groups of institutions, for example Oxford and/or Cambridge colleges, arts and cultural organisations and mainstream charities – please contact Adrian Beney for more information.