Outreach to Donors and Gift Recipients
One of the highlights from my internship at the University of Iowa Center for Advancement
First-time Donor Project​
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One of the projects I worked on was leading our intern cohort in sending 140 thank you notes to first-time donors. Every week, I received a list of donors that made their first gift to any area at the University of Iowa, and then screened these donors' giving histories in I-STAR (the organization's CRM) to verify that it was their first gift. After identifying what area(s) these donor supported, I assigned each thank you note to the appropriate intern. I also helped answer any questions the other interns had while writing their notes.
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Additionally, I directed 18 first-time donors who made gifts of $500 or more to the DXO team and contacted development officers for any major gifts from first-time donors.
Alumni Notes
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Another project I assisted with was alumni notes. Every year, while creating their donor reports that are sent to some of the university's top donors, the UICA's stewardship team reaches out to alumni who received scholarship during their time at Iowa, which allows donors to see the lasting impact of their generosity.
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This process required organizing and cleaning data to determine who to contact, including removing any @uiowa email addresses that were no longer active. I drafted customizable email templates that could be tailored to each scholarship and alum, asking for an update on their life post-graduation and a note of thanks to the donors of their scholarship. After sending those initial emails, I followed up with these alums three times, once each week, to remind those who hadn't responded of how much the UICA and donors appreciate being able to read their letters. I read every response I received, made edits to grammar as needed, and formatted them into Excel. Typically, these notes are formatted as letters in Word; however, the stewardship team was working on digitizing their donors reports into a platform called Mythos. Preparing these notes in Excel allowed the stewardship team to smoothly and efficiently upload all responses into Mythos.
Responses
(and counting!)
68
713
Alumni contacted