There’s nothing like a good spring clean up. And, just like our home projects, our IT clean-up jobs vary in size.
When was the last time you cleared your cookies? Most websites cut cookies when we visit them. Cookies can be good when they keep track of what’s in our shopping cart or what part of the page we were reading. But third-party cookies running in the background by advertisers, served up generously by Google and Facebook, can target your accounts and leave you vulnerable. Clearing your cookies periodically is a way to protect your information from hackers.
You might also consider a Virtual Private Network (VPN). A VPN is a service which, for a small monthly fee, uses an intermediate IP address for your web use, so you remain anonymous to trackers. This is useful for protection if you work in coffee shops, libraries, or on other published WiFi.
Our CTO and Cybersecurity expert Matt Eshleman presented a special mini-webinar (on video) on how to protect your login credentials and what to do if you suspect you were compromised – or, worst case scenario, you know you’ve been hacked because you can’t access your phone and all your accounts.
Data Quality
Maybe your data could use a clean-up, too? Our friend Peter Mirus at Build Consulting discusses data quality in this video, and uses examples from the nonprofit and public sectors to show how data quality can have big fundraising and program impacts. He explores the role of good data at your organization, provides tips on how to get everyone at your organization on the same page, and offers ideas on how to prioritize data for quality improvement.
If you think this project is daunting, Peter and Build Consulting have created a downloadable checklist of tasks that breaks it down into practical steps. These Examples of Audit Queries for Improved Nonprofit CRM Data Health will help you know what to ask your database and when to ask it. These examples, and a sample timetable for weekly, monthly, quarterly and annual clean up, will help you plan to keep your donor database healthy. Don’t be caught cleaning up the data the night before your big fundraising appeal begins!
You might also want to try the video for Improving Nonprofit CRM Data Management. This “ask the experts” discussion with three leading CRM donor database consultants answers participant questions on how to take your donor data management to the next level. Answering real-life nonprofit CRM scenarios lets this expert panel dig into practical questions our community faces (with humor!) This video is appropriate for nonprofit executives, managers and nonprofit IT personnel.
Donor Data Success Story
Organizations often have years of donor data that doesn’t inform action. Information about donors and prospects contained in CRM for nonprofits—when properly managed and analyzed—can have a dramatic impact! Luckily, there are techniques to transform data into information—improving donor data to drive outcomes.
In this video, Build Consulting shares a story of how one nonprofit organization improved their donor data.
Clearing for Action
- Decreasing the “noise” in the database
- Getting to know the constituents
- Learning about best practices and engagement/giving trends
- Developing a plan and building consensus
Taking Action
- Reducing friction in the subscription and donation processes
- Improving handling of potentially fraudulent transactions
- Pushing the right Call to Action
- Improving donor data analysis and segmentation
- Increasing integration and process automation
- Applying greater discipline in constituent data management
Assessing the Outcomes
- Increased revenue
- Increased “sustainer” monthly giving; smoothed out cash flow
- Increased donor and organizational happiness
This story includes key lessons that can be leveraged by any nonprofit to increase organizational knowledge of its constituents while turning that information into outcomes. You’ll learn a variety of helpful strategies and tactics to create better donor data. You can apply these lessons to improve your own donor data and create your own success story!
Are you ready to commit to cleaning up your nonprofit’s databases?
Hopefully, these considerations have been helpful as you think through data clean up.
If you’re ready to learn how data clean up – or a new file system entirely -could benefit your nonprofit specifically, get in touch with us.
We have 25 years of exclusively serving nonprofits, we feature high-level strategic expertise to help you plan for the future (not just put out fires). We have built our 100-percent-employee-owned business by focusing on the specific needs of our clients, ensuring that they are prepared for the future with systems that support their missions.
Everyone in nonprofits struggles to keep databases optimized and to gather the data needed to support the mission. Community IT Innovators can help you tame your data and get back on the road to mission impact.
As you consider how clean data can help you, let’s talk.