How stronger reporting with Bloomerang drives donor engagement and retention
Key Nonprofit Highlights
The YMCA of Rock River Valley in Rockford, Illinois is committed to strengthening communities by ensuring everyone has the chance to learn, grow, and thrive. Guided by Christian principles, it offers programs and services that promote a healthy spirit, mind, and body for all. The YMCA of Rock River Valley transformed its fundraising and donor management operations by switching to Bloomerang’s Giving Platform. Previously struggling with limited reporting and data functionality, the team now benefits from reliable reporting and analytics, custom fields, a user-friendly interface, and seamless event and peer-to-peer fundraising tools. These improvements helped raise 102% of their Double Your Impact Week goal, boost donor retention to 56%, and streamline campaign management. With Bloomerang’s responsive customer support and innovative features like text fundraising, the YMCA has enhanced its ability to engage donors and support its community effectively.
Challenge
Struggling with limited reporting and data from their old CRM
Before switching to Bloomerang, the advancement team at the YMCA of Rock River Valley faced significant challenges due to the limitations in their old donor management system. Among the hurdles was a lack of reporting functionalities, which hampered fundraising efforts. “As a development professional who came to the Y from outside the Y, I was often frustrated by the lack of robust, reliable reporting available in our previous system,” said Michelle Gorham, the organization’s Chief Advancement Officer. “I knew we needed a new solution, but resources are always tight, and the priority is putting available dollars into meaningful programs for our community—not necessarily on backroom functions.”
Solution
Empowering donor engagement with Bloomerang’s fundraising tools
When Gorham was introduced to Bloomerang’s Giving Platform, she was impressed with the company’s focus on helping nonprofits grow, developing fundraisers, and being another teammate for their customers. Bloomerang’s custom fields and exceptional reporting functionality made for a powerful combination for gathering donor data and diving deeper into individual donor involvement. “I am grateful that Bloomerang lets me create some custom fields to gather information, like how donors are involved in our Y other than membership,” expressed Gorham. “I now know the key interests of our most generous donors and can create reports to show me all the donors who have said they care about ‘academic programs’ or ‘camp’ or ‘disease prevention programming’ so that we can engage in important conversations with them.”
The need for event and peer-to-peer tools led to Bloomerang Fundraising, expanding the Y’s fundraising capabilities and ensuring every gift and campaign is managed effortlessly. “The features and accessibility that Bloomerang offers continue to put donor data and reports at our fingertips, but we needed an additional solution that would seamlessly cover event fundraising and a growing interest in peer-to-peer fundraising,” said Bobby Reitsch, Executive Director of Development. “One of the biggest bonuses for us? Bloomerang Fundraising talks directly to the Bloomerang CRM, making management of funds, campaigns, and appeals, financial reporting, custom fields, and donor data painless.”
Results
With reliable data from Bloomerang, the Y is improving donor retention
By adopting Bloomerang’s Giving Platform, the YMCA of Rock River Valley witnessed major changes in their donor management and fundraising operations. Its reliable reporting and analytics tools and dedicated customer support eliminated ineffective processes, turning data-driven insights into actionable strategies. “I am so grateful to Bloomerang for giving me a way to pull reports that I trust and that make sense,” said Gorham. “I am also so thankful for the amazing support team that takes calls, emails, and chats. They are phenomenal and help me get the exact information I need, without ever making me feel like a bother to them.”
Better insights into their donor data have improved the YMCA’s productivity and communication, allowing them to make better informed fundraising decisions. “Most importantly, we know that our donor retention is 56%, which is not something we knew before,” said Gorham. “The previous system simply didn’t give us reliable data. And now, in a matter of minutes, I can communicate with donors and share a story, a request, or a thank you. I’m more efficient than I would have been had I stayed in our old database.”
Creating fundraising campaigns, giving pages, and custom events is also more efficient for the Rock River team with Bloomerang’s Giving Platform. “It’s intuitive and quick, especially with the drag-and-drop functionality,” said Reitsch. “Another added benefit is how simple it is on the donor side to access a page via link or QR code, view the content, register for an event, or make a gift.” Their team has seen so much success with Bloomerang Fundraising—like when they raised 102% of their Double Your Impact Week goal—that they recently upgraded to the Premium Fundraising Suite. “We’re in the process of trying the auction and texting options,” said Reitsch. “We look forward to seeing how it may bolster our fundraising efforts and make giving to our Y easy and impactful.”
With its commitment to continuous improvement, the YMCA of Rock River Valley has confidently equipped itself to serve its community better with Bloomerang’s Giving Platform, and they can’t recommend it enough to fellow nonprofits. Expressed Gorham, “I love Bloomerang and tell everyone who asks—and often those who don’t—that they should look into it.”
