International prospect research Archives

September 14, 2017 By Helen Brown Leave a Comment

International prospect research resources – United Kingdom

From a North American perspective, international prospect research just doesn’t get any better than the United Kingdom.

First of all, there’s no language barrier.

Second, the way information is gathered and distributed by commercial and governmental entities is relatively similar to ours, so navigating around information sources feels …familiar. Logical.

And third, many of the resources that provide information here in the US (like LexisNexis, Factiva, D&B, and Moody’s) also offer products and services in the UK, so there’s crossover. Some of the information we can already get through what we’ve already, well, got. [Read more…]

August 17, 2017 By Helen Brown 4 Comments

Who do you stand with?

Due diligence research is a key part of prospect research in the UK and Europe. All of the prospect researchers at nonprofits that I know there – and not just the ones who work at human-rights or cause-related orgs, but researchers at universities, membership, animal rights, arts organizations, consultants – every kind of organization – they all include due diligence as part of their work. It’s just as important as finding wealth indicators or career history or interest in their organization’s cause.

They’re considering these questions: Do we want our organization to be associated with this person? Or this company? Or this trust/foundation? [Read more…]

March 23, 2017 By Helen Brown 1 Comment

Well chuffed

You’ve heard me and several others talking about what’s happening on the UK fundraising/prospect research scene right now. Two charities have already been assessed hefty fines, and 11 other UK charities are currently under investigation for their fundraising activities including their prospect research/wealth screening activities.

It’s the wealth screenings that are the big deal part of it for us. [Read more…]

February 23, 2017 By Helen Brown Leave a Comment

New Order

Town Hall Albert Square Manchester. Photo by Stacey MacNaught: http://blogsession.co.uk/

Twenty years ago this coming June, a nightclub called The Haçienda closed in Manchester, England. For nearly 15 years, but mostly in the mid-to-late ‘80s, the Haçienda was the place to see, be seen, and dance to great music. Madonna took the crowd on holiday and The Smiths showed what a difference it did make in music history. Income from record sales from co-owners New Order helped keep the club afloat during the recessionary years. [Read more…]

January 26, 2017 By Helen Brown Leave a Comment

The Cavalry

As Americans, we’re acculturated to believe – deep down in our cell structure – that no matter how dire the situation, the cavalry will always come at the last minute to save the day.

The cavalry can be a heroine, a hero, a bunch of dusty dudes on horses, or a squad of geeky introverts, but you only have to look at every movie ever made in Hollywood to know that when help is needed, it will come. [Read more…]

January 19, 2017 By Helen Brown 6 Comments

Disentangling facts and values in the UK’s wealth screening controversy

This week we are honored to welcome guest contributor, Ian MacQuillin, founder and director of Rogare, the fundraising think tank at Plymouth University’s Hartsook Centre for Sustainable Philanthropy. As I mentioned a few weeks ago, a serious change threatens to alter the landscape for fundraising and prospect research in the UK. I’m not succumbing to hyperbole when I say that very soon wealth screenings and possibly even prospect research could be greatly curtailed or eliminated altogether. Unless awareness is raised and the momentum shift is altered, the impact on the charity landscape will be devastating. I am grateful that Ian agreed to share not only what’s happening in the UK, but also how these changes could impact us in North America. I hope you will join me in sharing this article socially to help educate our peers. ~Helen

Abbaye de la Sauve Majeure – Ulysses, by Ophelia2 (Own work) [GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html) or CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

It’s possible that during the course of 2017, using Google to research a potential donor will be declared illegal by Britain’s data protection regulator. [Read more…]

January 12, 2017 By Helen Brown Leave a Comment

8 apps and sites every billionaire needs

Earlier this week, I was looking at my phone – and at all the apps I have and don’t use – and started thinking about how every person’s app collection looks different based on their individual needs and interests. I wondered how different my screen would look if I were a billionaire. (Hey, a girl can daydream). And so my journey of discovery began.

As I researched, I realized that many of the sites I was idly finding were actually useful for prospect research purposes. Which led me to abandoning my original mild curiosity and heading toward useful employment of my time, which is a good lesson in the power of daydreaming! [Read more…]

October 27, 2016 By Helen Brown 1 Comment

Expanding Your Prospect Research Horizons

(Fairly appropriate fortune for a fundraising researcher, eh?)

Something must be in the air because I’ve had three calls in the last two weeks about training new researchers.

Fundraising intelligence (or prospect development, whatever you want to call it) is one of those professions that you can’t go to college for. There are degree programs in nonprofit management and, frequently, fundraising intelligence is part of the coursework, but there’s not yet a higher ed degree in prospect research, prospect management and data analytics.

So mostly it’s taught by the experienced to the newcomers, and you learn – and get better – by doing. [Read more…]

August 25, 2016 By Helen Brown Leave a Comment

Brexit, 2 Months Later: The undercover fundraiser (with apologies to Tim Harford)

We’ve been somewhat distracted here in the US with our own looming election, so perhaps we can be forgiven for forgetting that another monumental, electrically charged election nicknamed ‘Brexit’ happened two months ago this week in the United Kingdom. If your nonprofit has constituents in the UK or Europe, this will be much on their minds because it has likely already had a significant impact on their personal finances. Now that the dust has settled a bit, I asked my colleague Marc Whitmore at More Partnership (that’s him in the photo) to give us some insight on what’s happening with Brexit through the philanthropy and fundraising lens. It’s a fascinating read – enjoy! ~Helen

What the hell happened, Britain?

Quite. Well, in May 2015, the UK elected a Government with the manifesto pledge to hold a referendum with a simple question: should the UK remain in or leave the European Union? That referendum took place on 23 June 2016, and 51.9% of those who voted, voted to leave the EU. [Read more…]

July 21, 2016 By Helen Brown Leave a Comment

Brexistential Crisis: Philanthropy After Brexit

As we watch the United Kingdom deal with the aftermath of last month’s vote to leave the European Union, those of us in the philanthropy sector wonder what the loss of EU funding will mean for charities reliant on that funding. I asked Ben Rymer to share his thoughts and research once again here on The Intelligent Edge to help us understand Brexit’s potential impact on philanthropy.

While uncertainty rules the day on Brexit’s effect on philanthropy, four things seem reasonable to expect in the wake of the British public’s vote on June 23rd to leave the European Union.

First, Brexit is likely to be bad news for the British macroeconomy. A weaker sterling (the British pound is so far the worst performing currency in the world in 2016), continuing low productivity (see chart below from the Resolution Foundation) and lower profits (the FTSE 250, consisting of mainly British companies, lost £38bn from June 24th-July 8th) are all notable trends.

There is a risk that Britain (or, in the event of a breakup of the UK, perhaps only England) will become a sort of ‘Greater Guernsey’. [Read more…]