Non profit revenue is driven by a more complex series of channels than most for profit businesses.
I’ve learned this after working with a number of non-profit organizations since establishing Semphonic’s Washington DC practice 5 years ago. In our engagements with National Geographic, The Nature Conservancy, American Chemical Society, American Society of Clinical Oncologists, the American Institute of Architects, the Council on Foreign Relations, the Biotechnology Industry Organization and others, I have learned just how bottom-line focused non-profit organizations have needed to be so that they can accomplish their mission.
Why is the non-profit revenue model complex? It is a true multi-channel structure with revenue coming from donations, dues, conference and event registration, sponsorships, conference exhibitors, publications, grants, subscriptions, partnerships and merchandise. More and more of the non-profit focus, especially for national organizations is online and I have found that there is a high degree of sophisticated thinking around visitor segmentation, engagement and how this plays into focusing marketing and content. Read The Importance of Analytics, a case study about The Nature Conservancy’s use of analytics for donation strategy if you’d like to get a detailed perspective.
Perhaps this is “old news” to those of you who’ve been in the non-profit field, but it was a fascinating discovery for me…and it is one that makes digital analytics for non-profit organizations an incredibly rich and interesting endeavor…as well as seeing some real world results when analytics is conducted effectively.
With this as a back drop, I’m really looking forward to our upcoming webinar, How Non-Profits Get Results with Web Analytics. Linda Shum, AVP Interactive Design and Strategy at United Way of the Bay Area and Emily Fisher, Online Editor at Oceana are going to share how they applied the recommendations that came out of the Non Profit Analytics Challenge that Semphonic ran for the first time at X Change last year.
Much of the focus of the session is going to be how to improve branding, boost donations, attract new members and engage volunteers. I think it’s going to be a really informative session. To register go to: https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/796787512
If haven’t yet gotten your free copy of Semphonic’s recently published The Non-Profit Organization Guide to Using Google Analytics to Improve Branding, Donations and Member Activity, I hope you download it and find it to be a useful reference.
And stay tuned…we’ll soon be announcing “open season” for this year’s application process for the Non-Profit Analytics Challenge.
