You don’t fundraise one way. A year-end revenue push, an annual renewal drive, a major gift portfolio — each one calls for a different kind of donor. That’s exactly what DonorSearch Enhanced Core is built for: giving every model one clear job, tied to how you actually fundraise.
So let’s go over what each model does, recent improvements to the models, and how they work to help fundraising teams find the right donors throughout the full fundraising cycle.
Quick primer if you’re new to this: DonorSearch is EverTrue’s philanthropy-first intelligence platform, built on 200M+ charitable gift records plus wealth and capacity data. DonorSearch Enhanced Core gives you up to six predictive models, each one built around a different fundraising strategy.
Short-Term: Most Likely to Raise (MLR)
Some fundraising moments move fast: a budget shortfall mid-year, a giving day six weeks out. MLR predicts which donors are most likely to make the highest-value gifts in the next 12 months, and new improvements to the model give more weight toward monetary value, making it optimized for bringing in revenue.
For education and health organizations, that means 39% better top-prospect identification than capacity-only screening, with an average of $9.1M more revenue surfaced per organization than before. With an ROI of $480 for every $1 spent on the model, Most Likely to Raise is a foundational starting point for any fundraising team.
Annual Giving: Acquisition, Retention, Sustainer, and Upgrade
Annual giving is several jobs at once: keep the donors you have, turn first gifts into habits, bring in new donors, and move existing donors up a tier. That’s why DonorSearch Enhanced Core offers four distinct models for each need.
Note: “Top 10%,” used frequently below, means the highest-priority slice of your file, aka the donors a model flags as most worth your team’s attention.
Acquisition predicts which non-donors, or donors who haven’t given in four years, are most likely to make a first-time gift in the next 12 months. Acquisition strategies are essential to most organizations, as continuously bringing in new donors is key — and this model assists that mission.
Retention predicts which donors are most likely to give again in the next 12 months and flags who’s likely to lapse. New improvements allow the model to identify 46% more donors in the top 10%, a great boost to fundraisers who are focused on annual donor continuity.
Sustainer predicts which donors are most likely to make at least four gifts in the next 12 months, with recent enhancements allowing the model to identify 43% more sustainers in the top 10%. This is a massive advantage for fundraising teams who want to find dedicated donors that will repeatedly support their cause.
Upgrade predicts which donors are most likely to move up at least one defined giving tier in the next 12 months (for example, $100–$249 to $250–$499), a change from the former system of percentage increases to better align with how annual giving teams work. The model now captures 3x more upgraders in the top 10%, a marked improvement that is useful when looking for recurring donors that are able to increase their contributions.
Major Gifts: Major Gift Propensity
Building long-term portfolios takes more than a hunch. Major Gift Propensity predicts which donors are most likely to make a gift of at least $10,000 within the next five years, giving MGOs a clearer pathway to qualification.
Organizations using Major Gift Propensity have identified an average of $23.9M more in top-prospect revenue than capacity screening alone, with an ROI of $4,800 in additional captured revenue for every $1 spent on the model. If your organization is one of the many that relies on major gift revenue, this model is essential to your portfolio-building toolkit.
Why Enhanced Core is worth it
You don’t need every model to get value from DonorSearch Enhanced Core. Every package includes MLR at no cost, and then the rest is built à la carte, meaning you can choose models tied to the strategies you’re actually running. That’s the real value here: you always know exactly which score to check because each model has a distinct job that points to real results.
Outside of the scores, DonorSearch Enhanced Core also provides the same benefits of all DonorSearch packages: constituent files enriched with wealth data and past giving history, portfolio-building tools, 40+ CRM integrations, and more. Plus, DonorSearch Enhanced Core comes with the additional bonus of a visualization tool that helps you understand your database easily.
One donor, six models, one story
With DonorSearch Enhanced Core offering models that span the full fundraising lifecycle, the combination of all six models can show the evolution of one donor’s giving story throughout every stage.
For example, the person your MLR score surfaces for an urgent appeal could be the same person your Retention model is tracking a year later, the same one your Upgrade model later watches for a tier move, and eventually the constituent your Major Gift Propensity score flags as ready for a larger ask.
Whether you’re ready to cultivate donors across that giving journey or are needing to focus on a specific strategy at this time, DonorSearch Enhanced Core offers the predictive modeling and scores that surface donors ready to support your cause. Because the causes that matter most can’t afford to run on guesswork.
Schedule a demo to see which DonorSearch Enhanced Core scores fit where your fundraising strategy is right now.
About EverTrue
EverTrue is a philanthropy-first intelligence platform that helps fundraising teams turn data into action and build meaningful donor relationships. Learn more at evertrue.com.
Interested in seeing how EverTrue helps fundraising teams manage outreach, track engagement, and build stronger donor relationships over time? Schedule a demo today.