Increase Your Missional Impact Through Data Visualization

01Improve Non-Profit Fundraising and Donor Relations with Data Visualization

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Learn How to Make Data Visualization Work for You

05Let us help you turn your data into a story that influences action.

03 04Non-Profit Story Telling UX – Is Your Organization Doing Enough?

Clear, Concise, and Impactful Non-Profit Financial Reports with Data Visualization

Improve Non-Profit Fundraising and Donor Relations with Data VisualizationFundraising has always been a challenge. We’ve seen this with educational institutions and alumni, and we have seen it with organizations trying to get donations to continue their work in humanitarian efforts. To get people to give willingly is especially challenging when they are skeptical, because they don’t really believe their money is going to make a real impact. This, unfortunately, will always be a challenge, but it’s a challenge that can be minimized using data visualization.

We have helped many non-profits and associations over the years use data visualization to visualize stories in the form of an infographic, report (financial and general data), and information dashboard to improve donor relations and increase donations. Data visualization effectiveness depends on the quality of data and the ability to extract the right data story for the intended audience.

In this digital age where everything is at our fingertips, one of the most effective ways to build donor relations and increase donations is using data visualization as a method to visualize the data story on your website, social media and other digital platforms. Some tips to think about:

To illustrate the effectiveness of using data visualization for data storytelling, we recently helped The Council on Competitiveness. Every year they release a roadmap titled “Clarion Call for Competitiveness”. They wanted to share their data in a visual summary. We analyzed their data, created a data story and designed an infographic to visualize that story. As a result, they saw an increase in influence and action, because people related to the data story.

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Are you doing the same things, year in and year out, to gain and retain donors? Maybe it is time to turn your data into a visual story that will influence donors to give willingly.

• When you visualize a story that clearly defines the problem you are addressing, the impact of solving that problem, why the donor is needed for success, and how you are measuring success, the donor will be more willing to enter the story through financial support. Without a good story, they may only see a sales pitch.

• When the donor becomes part of the story, the donor will see their social return on investment.

• The donor’s relationship will financially continue and may spread into physical involvement as well as encouraging their network of friends and family to get involved.

October 23, 2017

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Learn How to Make Data Visualization Work for You

We have all data that’s been collected and we want to use it in reports, infographics, website content, presentations, apps and the list goes on. Data visualization is a great way to accomplish this. With tools like Tableau and Domo, organizations have been able to create their own insights easily. Recently, we’ve spoken with these organizations who have become disenchanted or frustrated with the process of data visualization in their organization, even with use of visualization tools. The main issue: they don’t understand what’s being visualized. In the end, some of them revert to excel spreadsheets or PowerPoint presentations, while others sought the help of a data visualization firm to fix the issue. If you’re frustrated with how your organization uses data visualization, we would like to share a couple of insights to help you get the most out of your data visualization process:

We hope these insights will help you turn your frustration into satisfaction with your data visualization process. If you would like to understand more about data visualization and using it effectively, download our free guide “Getting Started with Data Visualization.”

• You are using the wrong data – Look at your target audience to validate the use of your data sources. Are you pulling data from one source when you should be pulling data from another? Although you have access to many data sources, it may not be necessary to include all of them.

• Data visualization is a process. If you have a data visualization product that performed well for the first year, but has seen a big drop-off in user engagement, your users’ behavioral patterns may have changed. The data may still be relevant, but the source of data or type of visual may no longer be applicable. Taking time to evaluate your users’ needs will help you keep your data visualization products relevant and effective.

• Data visualization, by definition, pulls data from a source or multiple sources to visually show trends, patterns and insights. Data analytics is a source that collects data such as Google Analytics. It is not the role of data visualization to collect data, rather, it’s primary role is to visualize the data.

• A story is not being told with the data – Pretty charts and cool interactive visuals by themselves are not effective alone. The best examples of data visualization products starts with a data storyline. What’s the end point you are trying to make? How does the data story help make that point?

• You are using too much data – You may be telling a story with your data, but you are noticing users are not fully engaging. To be memorable, stories need to be simple and clear. Look at your data. Do you have too much detail in the visual story? Are you using data to support every detail? How relevant is the story to the target audience? A clear, simple visualization and call-to-action is more effective than all the bells and whistles.

October 23, 2017

Non-Profit Story Telling UX – Is Your Organization Doing Enough?It is no secret that we live in a fast-pace world combined with shortened attention spans. We have a very limited time to make a connection with our audience. This is especially true for non-profits. A connection with your audience determines your level of success and missional impact. This is one of the reasons that many organizations put such a tremendous emphasis on user experience (UX) in the digital age. We believe that an emphasis needs to be put on UX, because a good UX opens the door to financial support via donations, call-to-actions, and the ease of sharing your missional impact in the world. We also believe to achieve exceptional UX, the story and its delivery are key.

Why?

Story telling has been used since the beginning of time to make a connection between the story teller and the listener. When a story teller uses clear and engaging content (i.e. content that captures the attention of the listener/reader), the story is remembered (impactful) and shared (inspiring an action).

We believe to improve the user experience, there needs to be an improvement as to how the story is delivered. Here’s what we recommend:

First, recognize that your organization’s story should be the foundation of your user’s experience. You can do this by applying five basic elements of a story:

Second, use your data from both internal and external sources to help craft your story. Your data can help lay the groundwork and validate your story. For example, if you are not using your data to help define your users (character) and recognize conflicts, how can you integrate an effective resolution into your story?

Third, story telling helps you personalize the user experience. Personalization helps you create a connection or bond with the user. It brings them into your story and they begin to feel that they are a part of your mission.

You need to look at your user experience. You are using UX best practices for all devices, but you need to ask yourself, does the user experience draw my audience into a story that they will remember and want to share? If it does, that is great! If not, it is time to take your user experience from good to great.

• Character – This is your user. How do they fit in your story?

• Setting – What is the platform for the story? Is it a data visualization dashboard? An interactive report? An infographic?

• Plot – What are the elements of your story? How do they relate to each other?

• Conflict – What is the issue that the character (your user) trying to resolve? What are the elements of conflict?

• Resolution – How do you bring them out of their conflict into a resolution? How are you going to solve the character’s problem?

October 13, 2017

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Clear, Concise, and Impactful Non-Profit Financial Reports with Data VisualizationIf you are non-profit, you are probably aware of Charity Watch, an organization that exposes non-profit abuse and advocates for donors. Charity Watch “dives deep” into nonprofits and grades them based on transparency. Non-profits that have a bad grade or low score usually have one thing in common…lack of financial transparency or questionable allocation of funds.

According to National Center for Charitable Statistics, there are over 1.5 million tax-exempt organizations that include almost 1.1 million public charities. In 2013, 21% of revenue came from contributions, gifts and government grants. 21% doesn’t seem to be that much, but every non-profit knows that it is critical for growth. Non-profits know people want to give to causes to make the world a better place, but they also know the number one concern is how their money is used. Is their contribution going to salaries, expenses or to specific humanitarian needs? People want to see a breakdown. They want to know if they can trust you. This is one of the reasons people look to organizations like Charity Watch.

At the same time, people love good stories. This is why Habitat for Humanity has a story page on their website. They love to enter in and become a part of a story with a cause for the greater good. Real life stories are great, but non-profits still need to show the numbers and build trust before people enter in the story. The problem: the numbers (i.e. data analytics and financial reports) are not completely understandable by everyone. If the report is too complicated, the audience will be less likely to understand the real picture. This, however, doesn’t need to be the case.

What if you could simplify the complexity by using visual storytelling?

This can be done through data visualization which is an effective way to share impactful stories using qualitative and quantitative data. When people see the story through the data visually, it builds trust and influences them to join the story as a

contributor. We’ll give you an example. Recently, we created a data visualization report for World Justice Project. We took the raw data to craft a story behind the Rule of Law in Afghanistan. What could have been boring charts and statistics became an engaging and educational story that influenced action.

How can data visualization help you create a story that influences action and builds trust? We have some ideas:

Because every non-profit has a different story, the ideas are endless with data visualization. Using data, it could be an infographic to illustrate the difference the nonprofit is making, a real-time data dashboard to show the urgency of giving to

a specific cause like hurricane relief, or an interactive report to build trust with contributors. All ideas have a common factor, that is using data in the form of a story to influence action and build trust. When people see the story through your data, they are ready to enter in the story and contribute.

So, the question you need to ask yourself. Is my data telling an impactful story? Am I using my data as an asset to influence action or am I using it for internal eyes only? Contact us to learn how data visualization can help you make a difference in your missional impact.

1. Create a visual timeline to show the impact of contributions and grants and how they were used. Build the trust.

2. Integrate success stories and testimonials with your data to show missional impact through the combination of giving and volunteering

3. People love to join a cause that builds positive community. Use data visualization to predictively show the long-term effects of community-building.

4. Illustrate how a cause or disaster relief would be affected if the nonprofit was not there making a difference.

October 12, 2017

Let us help you turn your data into a story that influences action.

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