The Rearview Mirror vs. The GPS: Make the Most of Your Station’s Fundraising Data

As the end of the year quickly approaches, stations are spending more time looking at their annual fundraising results. Some of the primary tools used to assess these results are Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) in finance, audience, content, and workplace culture against current goals and past performance.

Now, let’s examine this process through the use of an analogy. When you’re on a road trip, you’re obviously using the rearview mirror while you’re driving, but the most effective way to get to your destination is to use the GPS to get you there safely and in the quickest amount of time.

For stations, the GPS equivalent for public media’s membership operation is CDP’s Revenue Opportunity & Action Report (ROAR). This relatively new tool, available free of charge to all public television and radio organizations, helps analyze a station’s membership program using 31 key fundraising metrics.

There are several very good options to assess revenue performance on an annual basis that benchmark against others in the industry (this would be the rearview mirror approach), but the beauty of the ROAR is that the data is updated monthly (the GPS).

The reports can be accessed throughout the year to assess your performance, giving you a more immediate look at your program’s performance to help identify new revenue opportunities throughout the fiscal year.

The CDP ROAR is an absolute must-have tool in this climate. Providing a cross section of KPIs that collectively represent a snapshot of your fundraising performance along with comparative industry benchmarks, combined to ensure that you are properly positioning your fundraising staff in the areas where you’ll get the best return. The monthly delivery of ROAR allows for quick response and re-alignment when needed, and the one-page summary, complete with traffic light indicators directing your attention to areas in most need of attention, positions the ROAR to become the most valuable tool in your strategy toolbox.

A recent piece in the Harvard Business Review titled “KPIs Aren’t Just About Assessing Past Performance” offered wise advice about the most effective way to track organizational success. The author, Graham Kenny, writes that KPIs can be more than just a scorecard for station performance. “These indicators can become a powerful and nuanced tool to predict changes around the corner for your business. The secret? It’s all in mapping and measurement intervals.”

The ROAR provides enormous flexibility in the cohort groups you benchmark against and allows you to trend performance over a five-year period. The dynamic representation that ROAR brings to stations provides the opportunity to move quickly and effectively to capture revenue that you might not even know you’re missing when you look at the data on an annual or even a quarterly basis.

The typical approach used to review prior fiscal year performance to inform current year strategy is fast losing its effectiveness. To truly maximize fundraising performance, stations need more frequent KPI-to-goal assessment, responsive staff to pivot strategy when needed and benchmark measures to surface peer performance indicators highlighting opportunities for improvement.

To get started with ROAR, stations need to submit their data to the National Reference File. CDP makes the process easy with training and step-by-step guides to complete the process. Once that is ready, you can set up a time for your complimentary ROAR review with CDP. This is a free service that every station should be taking advantage of to grow their donor revenue.