Learn more about analytics and research best practices, as well as real world examples and solutions for nonprofits.

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Oct 10, 2023

Why Your Organization Should be on an October-September Fiscal Year

One of the many analyses we provide to clients is a mid-fiscal year re-forecast. This is one analysis where the difficulty of the projection is really dependent on the fiscal year definition.

Q: Why does that matter?

A: Well, for many organizations, more than half of the revenue is realized in the October through December period.

If your organization is on a calendar year fiscal, that means as you approach the last 3-months of your budget year, half of your revenue – or more – has yet to be realized. That places enormous pressure on budgeting, not to mention making it challenging to project the fiscal year revenue.

However, those organizations that are on an October-September fiscal year, already have a really good idea of how their financial budgets are going to turn out by the fourth month of their fiscal year (January). These projections are relatively a piece of cake.

Everyone hates budgeting. To make it simpler, move to an October-September fiscal year. Your CFO will love you for it.

Measuring Speedy Gratitude

On the first day of November, I sent out 49 small “white mail” gifts. After 3-weeks, here is what I received: Two of the gifts were returned because the address was undeliverable. Of the 47 gifts that (I think) were delivered, I have received 14 acknowledgments (30%...

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Grateful

Here it is Thanksgiving week. If you are like most people in the fundraising sector, the lead-up to Thanksgiving can be a hectic period, with the most important cultivation asks either in the mail or ready to be deployed, new donor acquisition campaigns in-home, and...

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Giving Tuesday: Is it still working for you?

In the past, some of us at Analytical Ones have been a little “Grinch-y” about Giving Tuesday. Being blitzed by emails during the workday can be overwhelming. However, we won’t knock it if it’s working! In September, Classy (the online fundraising platform utilized by...

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