Power in Numbers: Use Vendor Management to Maximize Nonprofit Growth

Have you heard this quote from Elyn Saks? 

“Choose your friends wisely, and also choose friends that you can trust.” 

Going it alone has its advantages, but there’s a good reason why forming strategic partnerships has a big impact on nonprofit growth. 

It feels great when you’re part of the equation and have a partnership you can rely on! Today’s success story begins when Qgiv, One & All, a full-service, performance marketing agency dedicated to nonprofit marketing, and DonorPerfect, a nonprofit CRM for donor management, collaborated with Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank (GPCFB) to create a powerful campaign engine to accomplish their fundraising goals. 

Meet Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank 

GPCFB supports an 11-county service area in Pennsylvania with emergency food assistance, anti-hunger initiatives, and nutrition education. 

Like many nonprofits, GPCFB had the makings of a great team assembled. They not only had One&All on board but were also working with DonorPerfect for their donation management software (another great Qgiv partner).  

They relied on their donor data stored within DonorPerfect and the expertise One&All had to offer, but they needed a comprehensive online fundraising platform flexible enough to handle their campaign needs. One&All introduced Qgiv to GPCFB as the customizable, out-of-the-box solution they needed, and the rest is history. But let’s explore this unique partnership a little more. 

Meet One & All 

One&All has been successfully helping nonprofits strategize and grow through a combination of traditional and digital marketing since 2017, when they were created as a result of a strategic merger between Grizzard Communications Group (founded in 1999) and Russ Reid Agency (founded in 1964).  

Their traditional marketing approach relies on offline strategies, including direct sales, direct mail (postcards, brochures, letters, fliers), tradeshows, print advertising (magazines, newspapers, coupon books, billboards), referral (also known as word-of-mouth marketing), radio, and television. Whereas their digital marketing focuses on digital technologies that utilize internet and online platforms to promote products and services.  

Most recently, they’ve been working their magic with Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank.  

Their approach to utilize historical donor data to help guide GPCFB to make smart decisions in all their marketing communications ensures they deliver the right message to the right audience at the right time. This use of the science of consumer behavior, market research, and predictive modeling and segmentation has aided in creating compelling experiences and helps nurture and foster donor relationships. 

Meet DonorPerfect 

DonorPerfect develops, markets, and supports software that’s easy to learn, easy to use, and adaptable to users’ unique needs. Their platform includes a core donor management system with integrations and extensions that enable an organization to initiate or improve specific aspects of their fundraising. 

DonorPerfect has been working with GPCFB for the last twenty years. Their overall flexibility, affordable pricing, and support package has made additions and changes to  data remarkably simple for GPCFB over the years. This, in turn, has given them something unbelievably valuable: the gift of time. Like most nonprofits, they’re limited as far as their available staff time for database maintenance. DonorPerfect has automated many processes that were manual in the past. 

Luckily for GPCFB, they found the best CRM fit for their organization early on.  Even luckier is that DonorPerfect continues to grow and evolve its offerings to keep up with the growing needs of its nonprofit customers.  

What happens when you combine over 100 years of nonprofit and tech experience for the greater good? 

With three of the industry’s experts at the helm, GPCFB took advantage of their team’s experience and has successfully marketed to donors and captured donations at a phenomenal rate. 

“I have experts on all levels coming together to help us be successful. Without them we would be guessing and hoping, but I know that it’s all connected on an expert level. I know we are working with experts who care about our success, and that extra layer of them all working together is pretty awesome.” Megan Bailey, Director of Individual Giving, Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank 

As a result of the collaboration with Qgiv, DonorPerfect, and One & All, GPCFB is focused on building out campaigns according to the cohesive plan they formed. With help from their technology partners, they:  

• raised over $27 million this past fiscal year, far surpassing their $11 million goal 
• increased recurring donors by over 150% 
• increased the number of transactions by over 54% 

And this nonprofit growth was all accomplished in 2020 during the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic! 

Moral of the Story 

It’s never too late to assemble your own winning team to help your organization raise more this year. Consider getting different perspectives by building your external resources. You don’t have to face things alone! 

Read more about this remarkable success story and how you can emulate Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank’s success!