Have you ever wondered if you’re measuring things the right way? Could this be done better? Should we find a way to measure this better? In baseball, the players were typically chosen based on speed, quickness, arm strength, hitting ability and mental toughness. Around 1995, the Oakland Athletics team started using a technique called Sabermetrics that focussed on several different statistics like on-base and slugging percentages. This new approach allowed the team to find undervalued players who could deliver great outcomes to attract to their team. This re-thinking of measuring player value allowed them to punch above their weight (in terms of budget) with a more affordable team and remain competitive with teams with significantly higher budgets.

How does baseball apply to fundraising?

If you’ve ever participated in benchmarking or collaborative analysis, you’ve likely seen a wide range of metrics to compare your organisation against. Chances are, you’ve not needed to give too much consideration to whether or not the information delivered to you is actually looking at the performance of fundraising programs or just measuring the donor outcomes from the largest programs. It’s a subtle difference, but the opportunity to drive strategic improvements is dramatic for organisations of all sizes. Lumping all the data together is like using the old baseball metrics, and assessing individual programs is the new and improved way to gain real opportunities and advantages.

What’s the difference?

It’s easy to think that if we put everyone’s data in one big melting pot and then calculate metrics, it would reflect the ‘sector’ trend. In one way, it does. It reflects how most donors behave in response to fundraising programs being assessed (i.e., those that provided data). In another way, it doesn’t. It misses the individual impact of each charity’s approach to fundraising. It limits the insight that can be gained by asking all members to provide their data and assessing each program’s performance.

Fundraising Insights takes a different approach. It measures each charity independently and then provides insight into how charities compare with each other rather than how charities compare with what most donors are doing. This provides a more helpful assessment of fundraising programs and how different activities can influence outcomes with donors.

What should I do?

If you’d like to gain real insight into your fundraising program performance, you can join a range of other forward-thinking organisations, such as Oxfam Australia, Caritas, Ethiopiaid, Guide Dogs QLD, WA & Tas, RCPCA Victoria, Foodbank, JDRF, and Taronga. Register or get in touch with Dan Wilson. Register for the Fundraising Insights FY25 program today.