How to Set Up News Alerts to Support Prospect Research
As a prospect researcher, it’s essential to proactively locate news about prospects in a timely fashion. From job promotions to marriage announcements, the ability to send your development officer news as-it-happens is key to the engagement of potential and current prospects. But this process can be more complicated than you’d think. First, you have to […]
Advanced Google Search Tips for Prospect Research
Google is vital to every prospect researcher. Whether you’re crafting event bios or developing a research profile, you’ll inevitably end up in Google to ensure you aren’t missing any news stories and other personal items of note about a prospect. In today’s society, you’d be hard pressed to find someone who doesn’t know how to […]
How to Perform Fundraising Data Analytics From Scratch
So, you’ve been assigned to work on your organization’s data analytics in order to show what variables are impacting your giving program, where your organization can improve its work processes, or what potential prospects are falling through the cracks. Now what? Don’t panic! If you have a basic understanding of Excel and PowerPoint and know […]
How to Get to Know Your Prospects & Donors Better Using Facebook Reactions
Chances are, you’ve heard of—or used—Facebook’s new Reactions feature. Released earlier this year, Reactions make it possible to express how you feel about a status in a variety of ways. Now, not only can you tap the Like button, but you can also react to a post using the Love, Haha, Wow, Sad, or Angry […]
What Are the Best Resources for Prospect Research on Home and Neighborhood Values?
When researching a potential prospect, one important aspect of the wealth capacity estimate is the value of the prospect’s property and home(s). There are several ways to gather this information, but the two that I most commonly use are assessed value and market value. For Assessed Value: Tax Assessors’ Websites Tax assessors’ websites (you can […]
5 Ways to Prioritize Fundraising Prospects
Sometimes, as a researcher, you’re provided with a list of potential prospects—either from your development officer or a wealth screening—and tasked with prioritizing them with little or no asset information. Below are five easy ways to determine which prospects to focus on first. 1. Past Donors If a prospect has given to your organization in […]
Advanced Search Tips for Finding Prospects on Social Media
In my role as a development analyst, many of my clients are related to the healthcare sciences. For this reason, I often search for new prospects based on areas of interest, such as diabetes or cancer research. Plenty of tools exist that can help with this task, but I’ve found that social media is especially […]
9 Creative Ways to Discover New Prospects
One of the most exciting aspects of prospect research is the discovery of previously unknown prospects for your organization. Whether you’re starting a new campaign or trying to find the last few donors to fully fund a program, new prospects are vital to any nonprofit organization. As such, it is imperative that prospect researchers set […]
Uncovering Prospect Wealth: Airplane and Boat Ownership
As I’ve mentioned in my previous blog posts (see: how to research doctors and nurses), many facets exist when researching prospects, especially prospects with prominent or successful careers. One thing you’ll want to look for is whether the prospect owns luxury items, such as airplanes or boats. While this might sound daunting, it’s actually pretty […]
4 Key Factors to Consider When Valuing Farmland
As with everything in the world of prospect research, valuing a farm is more of an art than a science. By using a few key data points, however, you can provide your development officers with a strong estimate of their prospects’ farm values. There are four main factors that you need to consider, which I’ll […]
A Little-Known Facebook Hack for Prospect Researchers
Since its public launch, Facebook has become integrated into our daily lives. The more connected we become as a society, the more desensitized we become to sharing our private information in the public sphere. For those of us in the prospect research world, however, this constant sharing of information has been a boon. Facebook is […]
The Resources You’ll Need for Researching Nurses
In my last post, I detailed a number of useful resources for conducting prospect research on doctors. Today, I’m going to focus on another important group of prospects in the medical field: nurses. Why nurses? Four reasons: Nurses are great connections to grateful patients, their families, and medical organizations due to their passion for the field. […]
