Fundraisers’ Guide to Measuring and Reporting Nonprofit KPIs

Tip: When you are tracking these metrics, and sharing them in your reporting, use your organization as the comparator rather than the competition. Weigh your metrics against your historical data, such as last year’s or previous quarter’s performance or the goals you have set. No two nonprofits or programs are the same; this method will show your fundraising progress.

How to Create a Fundraising Reports

Fundraising reports are your opportunity to share your nonprofit’s impact with board members, donors, and prospects. Here are three best practices to consider when writing your nonprofit fundraising reports. 

1. Show donor impact 

A donor-centric fundraising report makes donors the heroes of the story. You couldn’t have done the work that you do without the support of your donors, so make sure that is the premise of your report. 

When sharing successes, use language that includes donors. For example, if your organization built a school this year, you could say, “Due to the support of our fundraising partners at School X, School Y, and School Z, who raised $10,000, we were able to build a school in X location.” 

This highlights the efforts of individual donors and makes them feel valued and connected to your cause and the larger community around your organization. 

Most importantly, say thank you! Again, and again, and again. 

2. Use visuals

There are only so many paragraphs of plain text that a reader can ingest before their eyes glaze over. Visuals allow the reader to digest more information at a glance. You should consider including images of donors and volunteers at work, pictures from your nonprofit events, branded illustrations, etc. 

Our favorite visuals, though, are those that highlight your key fundraising metrics. Charts, graphs, and maps allow you to share information quickly with readers, especially those with short attention spans. Remember, you want to tell readers how successful your fundraising has been, but you need to communicate that in a way they will receive. 

Below are some types of data visualizations that you could use to illustrate your fundraising KPIs: 

• Pictographs
• Maps 
• Bar graphs 
• Pie charts 

3. Include CTAs, strategically

As a reader makes their way through your fundraising report, they become more aware of your message and begin to resonate more with your cause. As a result, their enthusiasm builds, and they may start considering how they can contribute to your cause. 

This reading experience is an opportunity to engage donors, prospects, and stakeholders, and you shouldn’t let this opportunity pass you by. Make sure you include a clear Call-to-Action (CTA) throughout the report to hook donors at the strategic points. 

For example, if one section of your report focuses on a specific program, you could include a call-out for volunteers at the end of that section. 

Measure Your Fundraising Success with the Right Tools

With several nonprofit campaign reporting tools available, there’s never been a better time to measure your fundraising success accurately. With the right tools, you no longer need to spend hours calculating your nonprofit KPIs and analyzing them to better understand your campaign performance. You can simply use these tools to view and report on your fundraising progress over time. 

1. Fundraising KIT

Fundraising KIT is a data-driven tool that allows you to measure your nonprofit’s fundraising performance, weigh that performance against your targets and industry benchmarks, and use that information to predict future performance. This tool can help you unlock the full potential of your nonprofit data. 

With its easy-to-read dashboard, Fundraising KIT also lets you keep a close eye on the metrics that matter to your nonprofit. You can also easily pull and share presentation-ready reports with your contacts, team, donors, and stakeholders. 

2. Neon Fundraise

Neon Fundraise is a wrap-around tool for managing your fundraising campaign. It allows you to track campaigns of all sizes, from peer-to-peer fundraising campaigns to national-level campaigns. We love that it automatically tracks your key nonprofit KPIs so you can see how close you are to your fundraising targets. 

3. Funraise

Funraise is a nonprofit management software with a collection of tools fundraisers can use to run and assess campaigns. We have included them because of their unique tools for measuring the success of fundraising events. You can also build a custom dashboard that tracks metrics that matter most to your organization. 

Tracking key nonprofit KPIs will help you measure your fundraising success, and reporting them will help you get that message out to your stakeholders. Use these best practices and recommended tools to get going.