Fundraising Tech: Prospect Research in the Internet Age
by Gary B. Grant
Researching prospects has long been an important element of major gift fundraising. It’s helpful to have some information before meeting a potential donor. First of all—do they actually have the potential to be a major donor? Do they have wealth? Do they have an interest in our organization’s mission? What are their possible connections that I may need to know to even secure a first visit?
Before the internet, fundraisers relied on input from volunteers and other donors, and professional prospect researchers had only hard copy materials such as newspapers and magazines. Research might have involved spending hours in a library looking at microfiche. I can recall a publication in Chicago that I renewed annually that listed board members from other businesses and organizations and indexed them so that one might see who the people in our circle could reach. “John, I see you are on the Art Institute Board with Mary. Could you try to help us connect with her?”
Then computers started being used to collect data on people. Around the same time as my first capital campaign, one consultant had collected neighborhood data, and we paired our entire database to see who lived among other wealthy homes. Neighborhoods were indexed with titles such as “furs and station wagons” or “blueblood estates.” This cluster analysis gave us a little taste of the possibilities of uncovering the gems in our databases.
Over time, the data began to be more individualized, but the information was highly proprietary. Even the capacity formulas were propriety, so companies could retain the value of their prospecting resources. A basic formula might be coding the potential capacity for giving at 5% of the identified assets.
The culture of prospect research has evolved
I’d also note that prospect research felt like a stealth profession in those days. No one admitted that they were probing for your information and background, and all of us felt a bit queasy at the notion that previously private information was becoming freely available. To be blunt, it just creeped people out. Today, the field is much more open and accepted. We seem to accept more that there’s a lot of information on us just a Google search away. In essence, we are all prospect researchers in our daily activity as any parent of a child of dating age may know.
Things are very different today compared to 2006, when Gary Grobman and I authored Fundraising Online. Then, a handful of websites had emerged to offer public data that was accessible for free or by subscription.
David Lamb (http://www.lambresearch.com/) was perhaps most renowned at the time for accumulating these resources into one site. For example, there was Hoovers (https://www.dnb.com). Most businesses were listed, and you could find much about a company—from the names of the C-suite executives to the business revenues. Then there was Edgar (https://www.sec.gov/), a search function of the SEC that gave us information on publicly traded companies, so we could see donor prospects’ income and executive compensation if they were board members.
Another good one back then was Guidestar (https://www.guidestar.org), which allowed anyone to find information on any charity or foundation, including the 990s. This continues to be bread and butter for any prospect researcher.
Internet search tools have been a gold mine for prospect researchers
In the early 2000s, we also began to use search engines broadly for the first time—Google and a slew of earlier tools that searched the entire web (remember Alta Vista and Infoseek?). At the time, though, it was relatively rare to find much on a particular individual unless they were actively maintaining a web presence.
Today, there is a much higher likelihood that your prospect might pop up in a news story. Perhaps they were seen at a fundraising gala for another organization, or some noteworthy business accomplishment was recognized in a local paper (most of which are now online).
Google allows you to search specifically by either all websites, news stories, or images. There is a lot of good prospect information on company websites, and many senior executives have published bios published there.
Fundraisers, especially those doing their own prospect research, might want to play with the advanced search filters in Google. Note that you may have to hit the Google gear button to find it, or go to https://www.google.com/advanced_search?. Here you can, for example, limit your search to results in pages ending in .edu and .org or eliminate words that are clogging up your returned pages.
Experienced prospect researchers can refine their search with skills, but practice will help anyone.
LinkedIn offers substantial assistance to aid prospect research
For the past 20 years, Google (https://www.google.com/) has been perhaps the second-best tool for prospect research. The first has been LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/). Founded in 2003, LinkedIn became popular in 2006, just when we wrote Fundraising Online. It was too young at the time to catch our eye and be reviewed.
What LI did over the coming years was to offer us a database of published résumés, and today probably more than 90% of professionals are on LinkedIn—and more for young professionals. Why do so many publish their career information? There are many reasons, but I think the primary ones include the fact that employers want to see it. When I hire, I almost always want to see a potential hire’s LinkedIn profile. What they publish is less likely to be deliberately tailored for my eyes. A good profile demonstrates professionalism, attention to details, and because the look is uniform, it’s often easier to read than a pile of résumés.
I will cover more in a future blog about how a fundraiser should consider LinkedIn for their own purposes. In the meantime, suffice it to say that for prospect researchers, you will almost certainly want to find the LinkedIn profile of any prospect and to use LinkedIn for prospecting. Again, take the time to become familiar with the advanced search features.
Finding valid phone numbers has become more difficult in the internet age
There is one area of internet accessibility that feels like it has oddly gone downhill since the early 2000s, and that’s the ability to find individual phone numbers. In the early days, there were several white pages sites, my favorite at the time being “the ultimates,” which combined all the tools into one (including a nifty reverse search tool that allowed us to find the person behind a phone number).
Unfortunately, the use of cell phones seems to have made white pages nearly impossible, and I have not had great success even with the paid services whose ads jump out every time you try to find a person’s number. This, however, is compensated somewhat by the relative ease in finding work numbers—which these days may be a better way to reach people anyway.
Standard internet sites for prospect researchers
Here are some tools that savvy prospect researchers and ambitious fundraisers will want in their toolbox. Some are new, and some have just evolved in value.
Lexis/Nexis (https://www.lexisnexis.com). This is a good subscription-based tool that can help you find where people reside. A “comprehensive person report” even allows you to enter a name and an old ZIP Code, and it will match to the person and their current address. You can search by Social Security number and can even find potential relatives, not to mention a basic criminal background check.
LinkedIn Sales Navigator (https://business.linkedin.com/sales). This subscription service by LinkedIn allows you access to a wide variety of tools that make LinkedIn serve as a database with saved lists and improved search features. I use this tool to make me aware of our alumni who indicate they have new jobs or promotions. And I can find those in my constituent groups who are in C-suite positions.
RelSci (https://www.relsci.com/). This is a subscription relationship mapping tool that can help you find the path to someone based on the boards they’ve served on, companies they’ve worked at, and mutual connections.
Zillow (https://www.zillow.com/). This is among the strongest and best-known sites that allow you to learn the value of someone’s home. It even tells you when it was purchased and how much the home value has increased since purchase. Less well known, but very useful, are the county property appraiser sites, where you can see who owns a property. You can Google the appraiser site for your county—or go to http://pulawski.net/).
DuckDuckGo (https://duckduckgo.com/) is an internet search engine that protects the searchers' privacy and does not profile its users. Every user receives the same results with every search rather than getting results based on the information the search engine has previously collected on the searcher.
Mine social networking sites ethically for helpful information
In closing, consider social media in general. Today, there is an explosion of available information on individuals and their personalities that they make freely seen on Facebook, Twitter, TikTok, and other popular social media platforms. You can determine wealth when they brag about their new Ferrari. You can learn about their philanthropy when they share information about their personal philanthropy. And you can get clues on how to best cultivate relationships when they share their interests, their politics, and their travels. You can learn about their spouses and children.
This returns us to the question of ethics. Generally, I would say that what people share openly is fair game. However, if you are friending someone just to gain access to their information from a prospect research standpoint, then you probably have crossed a line. Use good judgment, and treat others the way you would want to be treated by the organizations you support.
Gary Grant has a BA from the University of Chicago and a JD from Illinois Tech's Chicago-Kent College of Law. He currently serves as Senior VP for Development for Florida Institute of Technology (Florida Tech). Founded at the dawn of the Space Race in 1958, Florida Tech is the only independent, technological university in the Southeast. In this role, he oversees all fundraising and leadership engagement for the University. Gary has authored several books on the use of the internet in nonprofits and fundraising.