Virginia Organizing Project Improves Grassroots Fundraising Effectiveness with Tools from thedatabank
By Michelle Mattioli, VOP
The Virginia Organizing Project's issue work is critical - community leaders across Virginia are taking on predatory lending, racial profiling, tax reform, health care, affordable housing, environmental protection and more.
As community organizers, VOP engages in intensive leadership development AND in bringing people together to make concrete changes that improve the quality of their lives.
All of this important work is made possible by the financial support of a broad base of individual donors, with donations ranging from two crumpled dollar bills to the $100,000 check or planned gift.
VOP's work is strengthened through tools from thedatabank - specifically the eMarketing Software Module and Fundraising Software Module.
How do thedatabank's tools help with fundraising?
VOP supporters let us know what issues they care about so we can develop a meaningful relationship with them. They sign themselves up online, saving staff time.
We know whether donors prefer to be contacted by email, phone or letter. We know if they don't want to be called, and who prefers to receive our news magazine online. Donors have a say in how they want to interact with our organization, which builds a stronger relationship.
We can track contacts to VOP supporters, record them by staff member and indicate whether the contact was for organizing or fundraising purposes. This helps staff members work together, so organizing and fundraising support each other.
Our development team uses the Strategy table to track the next contact with donors, for example, when to send the Annual Report, invite someone to an event, or set up a meeting to discuss a donor's gift for the year.
The Fundraising Software Module allows detailed entry of donations, records thank you notes sent, generates reports on which grassroots fundraising strategies are most effective, generates lists for targeted direct mail appeals and more. VOP hasn't had to spend money on costly fundraising software because thedatabank's tools do the job.
More info about the Virginia Organizing Project.
If you would like to see what The Databank can do for your organization sign up for a free online demo.
Back to main Success Story page