The power of tracking charitable donations in fund accounting software

One of the advantages to using a dedicated fund accounting software program is the ability to expertly track charitable donations. As your organization grows the need to effectively track and maintain donations from various funders will increase as well.

Being able to track donations effectively also enables future planning for how you’re going to see and capitalize on growth long-term and use the data from donations year over year to increase your retention of donors, build donor giving profiles and plan for new ways to fund raise.

Let’s look at four key stats in giving from the 2020 Global Trends in Giving Report:

1. 1. 55% of donors worldwide prefer to give online with a credit or debit card. 12% prefer to give by bank/wire transfer, 10% by direct/post mail, 10% via PayPal, 8% in cash, 2% via digital wallet, 2% by text-to-give, and 1% by mobile money.
   2. 51% are enrolled in a recurring giving program. Of those, 87% give monthly, 8% annually, 3% weekly, and 2% quarterly.
   3. 60% have donated to an NPO in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
   4. 32% have donated through Facebook Fundraising Tools. Of those, 89% said they are likely to give through Facebook Fundraising Tools again.

Keying in on donor data is also key to your budget planning. Are there ways you can be better utilizing data from donors that you’ve captured to capitalize on in the next year?

Do you have recurring donors that you have overlooked because their giving is a lesser amount, but yet, it’s consistent?

For instance, what if your fundraising targets are built around gifts that are $1000.00 or $2000.00 in one donation, but you also have a recurring donor over a two-year period who has given you $100.00 per month every month without fail which equals $1200 yearly or $2400 over two years.

This $100 year recurring donor might be one who is willing to add another $50.00 to their current monthly donation if they are given this opportunity. Being able to export data and create a robust report that shows regular monthly donors, can provide a new opportunity to do a smaller campaign toward them targeted at increasing their current giving by as little as $50. 00 more a month.

Just one donor out of that campaign group that opts-in to give $50 more a month, results in $3600 over a two-year period. Not convinced on the power of data and recurring giving?

Did you know that 45% of worldwide donors are enrolled in a monthly giving program? That’s a powerful percentage of donors to retain and provide new giving opportunities to.

Here are 4 key questions to ask when looking for a strong, data-driven fund accounting solution:

• Do we have the ability to track multiple revenue sources?
• Can we export data into real-time reports on donor levels that we can pro-actively review and use for potential new campaigns within a budget year?
• Does our system provide a way to track donors/donations in a year to year view for our key stakeholders and board members review?
• Can our data be kept safe? What are the privacy and fraud protections inherent in our system?

Are you considering changing your current fund accounting software? Have your nonprofit tracking needs outgrown your current system?

MIP Fund Accounting® lets you track unlimited funds and manage your books with ease, users can easily track every fund, follow every dollar, and MIP will flex and scale based on nonprofit growth. Contact us for a demo today!