Imagine starting your workday on a single screen that instantly tells you which donors are ready to engage with your mission. If your nonprofit CRM has a built-in Donor Score, you can! Here, you’ll learn how to interpret the Donor Score and integrate it into your organization’s fundraising workflow.
What is the Donor Score?
The Donor Score rates each of your supporters (on a scale of 0-100) based on how recently, how often, and how much they give. It’s a single, easy-to-understand giving engagement score that helps you create a strategic plan for who to contact, when, and what to say.
It illuminates all of your organization’s opportunities, so you can create engagement lists and schedule personalized stewardship with ease. For example, DonorPerfect users can do all of this on a single screen.
Interpreting the Donor Score
Define what “donor engagement” really means
While emails, event attendance, or clicks can hint at donor interest, the truest measure of engagement is giving behavior. The Donor Score turns recency, frequency, and gift amount into a simple, data-driven way to understand how each donor is giving today.
For faster fundraising decisions without complicated analysis, the Donor Score highlights recent giving activity so you can determine who to steward or re-engage. With a nonprofit CRM like DonorPerfect, the Donor Score is calculated using your organization’s specific data and automatically updated every night, so you always have the most up-to-date view of each donor’s giving behavior (as it relates to your unique constituency).
See your donor data in an actionable context
Most fundraisers have more donor data than time. Numerous reports exist, but pulling, evaluating, and developing a strategy can take hours. The Donor Score changes that, assessing each donor’s giving patterns at a glance.
With a nonprofit CRM like DonorPerfect, every donor record is in one workspace with sortable columns and built-in filters. On this page, each Donor Score instantly shows you who’s most financially engaged, so you know who to prioritize for your next campaign or stewardship effort. From there, you can assign staff follow-ups and tasks without ever leaving the page.
Create a priority order for your fundraising tasks
The Constituent List complete with the Donor Score gives your fundraising team a daily starting point, immediately showing you where to focus your engagement efforts and which donors to prioritize. Think of it as your command center for task management. With fresh data at a glance, your team can divide and conquer— build donor segments, create to-dos, schedule follow-ups, and more.
DonorPerfect users: Log in now and discover how simple it is to:
- View every donor at a glance in one sortable list
- See High, Medium, and Low Donor Score segments to identify who to prioritize
- Easily customize columns to see the data you want
- Filter and sort instantly to focus on the donors who need attention now
- Assign follow-ups or to-dos without leaving the page
- Export lists for outreach or further analysis
Not a DonorPerfect user? Let us show you how simple it is to turn your donor data into action!
Integrating the Donor Score
While the calculation method can vary between nonprofit CRMs, it’s important that your Donor Score feature uses data from your own donor base, not a national average, so your insights are relevant to your organization’s unique giving patterns.
When evaluating a Donor Score feature option, look for the following criteria:
- Accurate – Based on verified giving history
- Fair – Separate comparisons for individuals and organizations
- Up to date – Recalculated on an automatic or scheduled basis
- Integrated – Doesn’t require multiple systems or screens
In DonorPerfect, for example, the Donor Score shows how each supporter’s giving compares to others in your system, not against external benchmarks. It also calculates individuals and companies separately for fair, accurate comparisons.
Pro tip: Identify five donors that you want to connect with, whether to re-engage, upgrade, or simply check in. Then, input their donor details into Practivated and practice those conversations with your AI fundraising coach until they feel natural.
Using the Donor Score in your nonprofit CRM
1. Steward your top donors
Filter for High Donor Score to find your strongest supporters. Assign personal thank-you calls directly from the list.
2. Re-engage donors whose giving has slowed
Filter for Low Donor Score to identify those who may need renewed outreach. Export the list for a personalized “we miss you” campaign.
3. Strengthen your mid-level strategy
Filter for Medium Donor Score supporters and use Constant Contact to invite them to join your recurring giving program or attend an upcoming event.
Why you’ll love our Donor Score
Most CRMs mix financial and digital activity to measure engagement, making it hard to tell what truly matters. DonorPerfect keeps it simple. The Donor Score focuses solely on giving behavior, so you always know where your donor relationships stand.
“One of our strategic goals is to build stronger relationships with our donors. The Constituents Page [in DonorPerfect] helps us see where to focus, whether that’s our top-score donors or those with lower scores.”
— Jennifer, Senior Manager of Development
When you can quantify your donors’ engagement with one simple figure, your nonprofit CRM empowers you to make confident decisions, retain loyal donors, and grow your supporter base. It’s the difference between managing data and prioritizing relationships.
Need help taking action? DonorPerfect experts can help you determine who to prioritize and how. Our free guide—Donor Engagement Models for the Digital Age—provides creative ideas for a multichannel engagement strategy that doesn’t leave out your non-monetary supporters. Discover four modern approaches that help you connect authentically, retain constituents, and grow giving. Download your free copy below!
Donor Engagement Models for the Digital Age
Motivate today’s donors
