ASI Releases New Benchmark Survey Results on Membership and Fundraising
25 May 2018 at 4:56 pm
On Thursday, ASI released details of two reports about membership and fundraising performance in fundraising companies around the world, based on data collected in the latter part of 2017 through a survey of senior-level executives.
ASI said in a statement: “The two reports explore the foremost challenges, goals and opportunities not for profits are currently facing to both attract new members/donors and to maintain their existing bases.”
Included in the questionnaire were 23 questions detailing demographics, performance, technology, website/mobile and overall goals.
The report on membership performance aimed to discover how organisations were attracting and keeping members engaged.
A total of 52 per cent reported that about half of their renewals were processed online with 70 per cent of participants confirming retention rates of more than 75 per cent.
The survey, first carried out in 2015, also included new questions regarding data protection and Payment Card Industry (PCI) compliance, staff efficiency, revenue growth and continuous performance improvement.
The results showed that 60 per cent of participants believed their organisations to be PCI compliant, however overall confidence in future growth and sustainability had decreased since its previous report conducted in 2017.
“To achieve continuous performance improvement, an organisation’s technology investment must align with its business strategy. But many associations aren’t there yet and it’s resulting in inefficiency, cost overruns, and staff burnout,” the report said.
The second report on fundraising performance aimed to increase knowledge about successful marketing strategies that current fundraising executives use to keep existing donors coming back, as well as methods to attract new donors.
Results showed there was an increase of 46 per cent of overall engagement, yet only 49 per cent of these executives were inclusive in this statistic. This was a 54 per cent decrease from the previous year’s report.
These results directly inform the decision to increase the priority of donor acquisition.
“It’s vital that non-profits explore all possible strategies to boost retention and engagement, including increasing online self-service options, replacing outdated donor management systems, and ensuring mobile-friendly content and resources,” ASI said in a statement.
“The most successful fundraising organisations ensure their business strategy drives their
technology investments — they continuously learn about themselves from their operational activities.”
According to the report one of the best ways to do this is with a centralised management system that integrates donor data with the website.
“Yet, the 2018 survey shows that 63 per cent of non-profits still use separate/multiple systems, which undoubtedly make their top challenges (inadequate integration between the donor management system and website, inadequate online self-service options, and poor/incomplete data) even more daunting,” the report said.
“If non-profits don’t address the core systemic issues, they will likely continue to wrestle with the same challenges in the foreseeable future.”
