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Pinky Swear Foundation

How the Donor Impact Portfolio Inspires More Confident Asking and Greater Giving

Despite open lines of communication between Program and Fundraising, Pinky Swear lacked an efficient and consistent way to leverage their data to really show donors what their specific gift would mean for the families served.

01. Problem / Challenge

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 When Pinky Swear began working with Veritus Group to build their Donor Impact Portfolio (DIP), they already had structures in place and a supportive culture that recognized the value of fundraising and the role of donors in achieving their mission. And because they understood the importance of data in telling the organization’s story to donors, they knew they needed a better system to share specific information when asking donors to fund their programs.

Prior to the DIP, fundraisers relied mainly on previous giving in their asks, without specific information or equivalency language about the impact a specific gift would make for the families served. As Pinky Swear’s MGO Chloe Czaplewski explained: “One challenge was figuring out the right words to use when talking about this.”

02. Solution

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Veritus Group worked with Pinky Swear’s Fundraising, Finance, and Program teams to package the entire organizational operating budget into Program Categories that include real impact per dollar and equivalency language for their donors. The result is the Donor Impact Portfolio (DIP), a document with all of the organization’s programs and projects, what they cost (including overhead expenses), what has already been funded, and what’s still needed for each program to be fully funded.

The DIP, along with the accompanying Donor Offer Toolkit, gave staff at Pinky Swear the tools and equivalency language they needed to create impactful and believable donor offers that showed the tangible impact of gifts at varying dollar amounts.

With the DIP, fundraisers at Pinky Swear have streamlined their internal processes so that everyone is using the same data and no longer duplicating one another’s efforts. Since the DIP is a living document, their team will be able to use it year after year to create future budgets with corresponding donor offers.

To illustrate what this looks like, here’s an example from Pinky Swear’s DIP:

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03. Results

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As you can see in this screenshot from Pinky Swear’s DIP, the team can now easily view overall budget, expenses, and committed revenue for each program category. With the DIP, Pinky Swear fundraisers have more confidence about asking for a gift because they’ve developed their equivalency language based on real numbers around impact.

Drawing from the Donor Offer Toolkit, Pinky Swear prepared a presentation to apply for a grant from a family foundation, and they were able to show the impact of their work using equivalency language. Their data-backed projections for what their programs would accomplish led to a $1.75 million grant from the foundation.

In another case, a donor wanted to sponsor a fundraising event. Using the DIP, the fundraiser was able to offer this donor a specific goal for her event with equivalency language about what it would do for the families served. With concrete numbers around impact, event revenue exceeded the goal.
"It helps so much to be able to pull those numbers impact-wise. It gave me confidence speaking in front of a family foundation for a major grant application, since I had the real, trusted data at hand, and we were awarded a $1.75 million grant. Using the DIP means that our team will be using the same numbers going forward, and on the reporting side, everyone knows how you got there."

 

- Lacey Kraft

VP of Philanthropy, Pinky Swear

"Being able to have a specific number to share with donors, that’s been super helpful. And breaking it down by program, and as we learn from Veritus, aligning their passions with our programs, with what we all want to accomplish – this really makes it easy to do that. And I don’t have to contact our data person every other day to ask for the numbers!"

 

-Chloe Czaplewski

Donor Engagement Manager for Major Gifts, Pinky Swear

Fundraisers Now Have Key Program Data to Help Create Donor Offers

What the Organization Needed

Despite open lines of communication between Program and Fundraising, Pinky Swear lacked an efficient and consistent way to leverage their data to really show donors what their specific gift would mean for the families served.

Our Recommendation

Veritus Group worked with Pinky Swear’s Fundraising, Finance, and Program teams to package the entire organizational operating budget into Program Categories that include real impact per dollar and equivalency language for their donors. The result is the Donor Impact Portfolio (DIP), a document with all of the organization’s programs and projects, what they cost (including overhead expenses), what has already been funded, and what’s still needed for each program to be fully funded.
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The Results

82%
Increase in Revenue

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By year two of the pilot program with Veritus, revenue increased by nearly 82% with additional revenue totaling $745,717.

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105%
Turnaround in Value Attrition

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After the first year of the pilot program with major gifts, value attrition improved by 105% (from -46% of value lost year over year, to +2.5% value retained). This means not only did existing donors stay; in aggregate they gave 2.5% more than they had previously.

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77%
Average Increase in Giving Per Donor

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During the pilot program, the value per donor increased by nearly 77% to an average gift of $5,215.

 
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The Results

$1.75 million

Grant Awarded

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Using the equivalency language from the Donor Offer Toolkit in a foundation proposal, Pinky Swear applied for and received a $1.75 million grant.

Efficiencies

System & Structure

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With a culture that values the donor and understands what fundraising is all about, Pinky Swear staff recognized the value of the DIP toolkit and collaborated interdepartmentally to create efficiencies to the donor offer process.

Real Impact

Better Donor Offers

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When a donor says, “I want to expand my giving. Tell me what you need,” – now, fundraisers have the tools to be able to respond with timely and relevant donor offers.

 
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