Rutgers University Foundation

Bill:
“The particular strength of DonorSearch Ai is that it allowed us to connect the individual engagement data that we had with the broader DonorSearch footprint of data and information. Unifying those two sources of information through one tool, we’re able to get the best of both worlds.”

“My name is Bill Mitchell and I am the Senior Associate Vice President of Research and Prospect Management at the Rutgers University Foundation. The Foundation has been around since 1973. Its mission is to advance Rutgers in terms of encouraging engagement and philanthropy to support Rutgers’ mission. Given that we are a mature institution, I look at it as our organization at the Rutgers Foundation as having a fiduciary responsibility to be as efficient and effective as possible. Our interest in these modeling tools is really about helping us do a better job of identifying those who are more likely to engage with us to begin with, those who are more likely to ultimately be in a position to be able to make significant monetary contributions as well. So, the modeling really does help us – to use a sports analogy, it helps us improve our batting average in terms of outreach to the world. I think the end result is a score, a model, and an outcome that is more powerful and more effective.”

“We were interested in upgrading what we were doing in terms of standard wealth screening and prospect research and the advent and the addition of the modeling capabilities on top of that just allowed us to take it a few steps further so that we were not just looking at individuals with the potential means and potential interest in partnering with us philanthropically, but it gave us insight into who then may be more motivated.”

“Now that we’ve been using DonorSearch Ai for two and a half, close to three years now, we’ve got a great track record of predictive results that the model has made that we can compare to actual behavioral results. And, simply put, when we compare the scores with what then happened over the subsequent twelve months of the score prediction – we find that it works. Individuals that scored very highly on the model, generally speaking with few exceptions, did end up making gifts to us.”

“I found the DSAi team itself to be particularly helpful and engaging. They are always ready and available to ask questions. In fact, the other great part about the DSAi models are that the team will take the time and they will sit with you and go through what they are seeing in terms of the drivers of the model, why they think that’s relevant, and also then will call on their expertise from across the industry, not just across higher ed and healthcare, but also the wealth of nonprofit clients that they serve to be able to give you context for the data that you’re seeing that is your own. It is a powerful, cost effective, full-service solution that really fits our needs.”