Nice Predictive Analytics Write-Up

While this forum primarily concentrates on sharing analytics concepts and trends, one "area" of analytics I am passionate about promoting is a greater understanding of uses/efficacy of analytics and data-mining. I will freely admit I often find myself, along with many other practitioners, focusing on topics you might call "inside baseball" to the analytics world; bemoaning limitations related to data quality, or frustrated trying to adapt the powerful software we use to meet our specific needs.

Every so often however, I step back and take a longer view of my work, and our industry. In doing so, I see the biggest barrier to success and growth in this field are not these important yet narrowly focused issues. The larger challenge is an understanding, acceptance, and ultimately, utilization of our efforts. I remind myself people dont trust or use what they don't understand very often.

I find articles like this to be helpful. While it does not mention fundraising, it also does not discuss technical details or statistics: it talks about end-target impact. It talks about how positive it is for customers. I firmly believe that more stories like these will be the entry way to more interest and understanding in our work. Please feel free to distribute to friends and colleagues and add a note saying "and ask me what I can do like this for donors..."

Sam’s Club Personalizes Discounts for Buyers

By Andrew Martin

SECAUCUS, N.J. — For years, hotels, airlines, banks, online retailers and other data-driven businesses have turned to powerful computers to help determine the optimal price for their products, or to find ways to recommend items that groups of customers with similar tastes might want to buy.

The big retail chains have been slower to adapt, in part because of the sheer volume of customers they serve and products they sell. But now, Sam’s Club, Wal-Mart’s warehouse chain, is offering a program called eValues that strives to offer bargains tailored to each member, based on that member’s buying history.

Read more

Fundraising Analytics Survey - Video Summary

Results from the 2010 DonorCast survey on analytics in fundraising in video summary format.

Fundraising Analytics Survey Results

Dear fundraising analytics professionals,

The results of our 2010 survey are now available. Links to an executive summary or full presentation can be found here:

Executive Summary
Full Presentation

Thank you to those that participated!

Joshua Birkholz
Alex Oftelie
Jeff Lockhart

Welcome Jeff Lockhart

Many of you know that Jeff Lockhart joined the DonorCast team earlier this year. I have invited him to be a contributer to our new and improved NewsWatch. Here is his bio.

Jeff Lockhart is a senior analyst in the DonorCast practice. In this role, Jeff provides economic analysis and research for campaign and development program studies. Additionally, he provides a unique perspective on predictive analytics methodologies.

Before joining Bentz Whaley Flessner, Jeff served in various analytical and client service capacities for the University of Maryland, Cambridge Associates, Vanderbilt University, and the Dell Corporation. Jeff is a skilled economist and thought-leader in data-driven strategies. He has earned his MBA in Decision Sciences and Strategy from the Fuqua School of Business at Duke University and his Bachelor of Arts in Economics from Vanderbilt University.

Competitive Advantage with Predictive Analytics

It is quite clear that the fundraising landscape has become more competitive for non-profits. As a result, there’s been a growing emphasis on the use of technology and analytics to grab new donors.

Given that several of the models used in the non-profit world are logical extensions of those developed in the for profit world, it’s no surprise that we frequently find the same land grab in the business world. The accompanying article discusses the use of predictive analytics in the insurance world to improve profitability. Transcending industries, one simple statement from the article underscores DonorCast’s main sense of purpose in helping clients:

“Predictive analytics are on track to become a major enabler in the success of commercial lines insurers, providing a competitive advantage over those that are either late-coming adopters or non-users all together.”

One could easily replace commercial line insurers with non-profit organizations to highlight the challenges facing organizations today.

Read more

Identifying Capital Prospects

A little video fun...

NewsWatch is back

Thanks for your patience as we migrated the NewsWatch from our server to blogspot. We are back.

We look forward to resuming our coverage of interesting developments in analytics and their potential applications to nonprofit fundraising.

Joshua Birkholz