Acknowledgement – An acknowledgement is a document sent to thank the constituent for the transaction, whether it is a donation, pledge, event purchase, membership renewal, or other type of contribution.
Advanced Analytics – Advanced Analytics is an add-on option for performing geo-searches based on constituent addresses, evaluating email templates for deliverability, scheduling routine reports, and creating specialty reports which require summary tables and complex data analysis. Contact support for pricing and additional information.
Attendee – An attendee is a constituent that will be participating in an event. An event attendee can be the registrant or a guest of the registrant.
Auto Responder – An auto responder can be created to send an automatic email to a constituent who has recently been subscribed to an email list category. Auto responders are often used to welcome new subscribers to your list and provide them with information about the area of interest to which they subscribed.
Auto Reminder - An auto reminder can be created to send an automatic email to a particular group based on a trigger related to a date. Auto reminders are available for events and to send membership renewal reminders.
Automated Action – Automated actions are emails and notifications that can be created when a constituent reaches a pre-defined trigger. For example, you can get a notification when a constituent reaches a Cumulative Received Amount (lifetime giving) of $5,000.
Batch Update – Batch Update allows you to add information into a group of records at one time. For example, adding a time tracking record to a group of constituents who are volunteers.
Batch Gifts – Batch Gifts allow you to enter contributions that are a general gift type in batches. You can select the same payment type and other designations for all the gifts at once, then just select the constituents. Batch Gifts will be assigned a Batch ID in the Gifts Grid.
Builder – The Builder is a tool to allow you to create and modify customer views for the grids.
Campaign – Within the context of DonorView, a Campaign is an email campaign where an email marketing template is sent to a group of contacts or email lists.
Categories – The word “Categories” is used throughout the database to classify and group data. In the constituent’s profile page, the Categories identify the ways in which the constituent interacts with your organization – such as volunteer, donor, member, event attendee or prospect. Within the Time Tracking feature, categories can be used to identify what areas and activities a volunteer supported your organization. All category lists are editable.
Column – A column is the header on a grid identifying the data field.
Company Field – There is a field on an Individual constituent’s profile page to indicate what company they work for or are related to.
Company Profile Type – A Company profile is constituent in the database that represents an entity like a corporation, business, foundation, organization, club, or group. A Company Profile Type does not include fields like First Name or Company but does include fields like Company Type and Industry as well as a list of all the employee-related Individual constituents.
Constituent – A Constituent is any record in the database including members, donors, vendors, grantors, contacts on an email list, sponsors, and prospects. A Constituent is an entity that you want to communicate with, record transactions for, or is related to another constituent, such as an employer. Constituents can be individuals (people) or companies (groups, organizations, or businesses.) The constituent individual's last name or the constituent company's name will be listed in the Last Name/Constituent or Last Name field.
In the example below, the constituent record for a local business person, Eralyn Adams, shows "Adams" in the Last Name/Constituent field, and the name of the company he works for "Adams & Co." in the Company field on the same row as his name outlined in green. The company he works for also has a constituent record, a Company profile type where "Adams & Co." is listed under the Last Name/Constituent Field. You can can also see the company's primary contact information in the Primary 1 Contact Title, Primary Contact 1 First Name, Primary Contact 1 Last Name fields outlined in yellow.
Contact – From the Constituents Grid, +New is used to add a new constituent and there are three types listed: a new Contact, also known as an Individual Profile Type, a new Company, or a new Household. A Contact is also used in the Email Marketing Module to indicate the Contacts or constituents who are assigned to different email lists.
Conversion – The term “conversion” is used to refer to the process of converting data from one software platform to another. We use Excel or Comma-Separated Value (CSV) files to transfer data from one database into DonorView.
CRM – Constituent Relationship Management
Dashboard – Each module within DonorView has a summary dashboard showing current statistics within the file. The dashboards are not currently editable.
Designation – How received funds will be used by your organization (see Revenue Category Fields).
Direct Email – Direct Email is a feature within DonorView that allows you to send an email from the software and keep a copy of the message in the constituent’s record. This feature must be enabled in the User Settings.
Email List Category – DonorView allows you to create unlimited Email Lists to segment your communications. Each Email List is assigned to an Email List Category. These categories function like areas of interest. When using the Join My Mailing List (JMML) or Subscribe Link in the Email Marketing Contacts page, you can allow subscribers to select what types of email lists they would like to subscribe to. For example, Events, Memberships or General Information.
Email Marketing Template – A template used to send emails to those who are subscribed to one or more of your email lists. DonorView includes over 150 premade templates you can use, or you can build a new template from scratch.
Email Status – A flag provided on an email which can no longer be included in email marketing messages.
Abuse – A email campaign recipient clicked “this email is spam” upon receiving it.
Abuse Report – A email campaign recipient sent an email complaint to their domain host about your email campaigns.
Do Not Email – The constituent has requested not to receive email.
Hard Bounce – The email address cannot be delivered due to a problem with the email address.
Invalid – The email address is invalid.
Spamtrap – Email address created by ISPs and never used by a sender. They are embedded in a website and if an email campaign is sent to one, the ISP knows the address was collected using suspicious methods of gathering emails and could lead to future emails being denied.
Unsubscribe - The constituent has requested not to receive any email marketing from your organization.
Field – A field contains data about one aspect of the record, such as first name or e-mail address.
Filter – A filter can be applied to a grid to choose a smaller part of your data set and use that subset for viewing or analysis. For example, you can filter the Constituents Grid to show donors who have given a gift of more than $1000 or filter the Membership Grid to show active members.
Follow-Up – A follow-up is a task assigned to a specific DonorView user that is linked to an interaction. For example, an interaction is recorded for a meeting with a constituent and a follow-up is assigned to call and touch base in a week.
Fundraising Goal Category – A Fundraising Goal Category allows you to group multiple fundraising activities into one larger goal. So that an event, auction, and donations can all be recorded for the same Fundraising Goal Category.
Grace Period - Identifies how many days the original expiration date will be used for a renewing membership. For example, a membership expires August 31st and the grace period is set to 60 days. If the membership is renewed anytime before October 30th, the member would retain the same August 31st expiration date for the new year. If they renew anytime after 60 days, say on November 5th, they will have a new expiration date tied to the new transaction date of November 5th since it is after the grace period. The membership status will also be shown as New instead of Renewal.
Gift – A gift is a single transaction and is recorded on the Gifts Grid in the Fundraising Module.
Gift Type – The gift type identifies what kind of transaction was processed.
Auction – purchase of an auction item or auction add-on item.
Event – purchase of an event level, event fee, or event add-on item. Donations made through an event page are also categorized as an event gift type.
General – a one-time donation of cash (can be paid by check, credit card or other payment method.)
In-Kind – a contribution of goods, materials, or services.
In-Kind Pledge – a promise to deliver goods, materials, or services in the future.
In-Kind Pledge Payment – the fulfillment of the in-kind pledge when the goods, materials or services are actually received.
Invoice Payment (AS ONLY) – the payment of an invoice.
Membership – the purchase of a membership level or a membership add-on.
Pledge – A promise to make a donation in the future. A pledge schedule can be created to break the pledge into smaller amounts paid over time. For example, a pledge of $1200 can be broken into twelve pledges of $100.
Pledge Payment – the fulfillment of a pledge when the donation is actually received.
Stock – the donation of stock that the organization will now own.
Grid – A grid is the table that shows all the columns and rows of data. Each row contains a constituent, page, or transaction record. Each column contains the data for each field.
Expiration Dates - There are two types of expiration dates, hard and rolling.
Hard Expiration Dates – All memberships expire on the same date, such as 12/31, each year.
Rolling Expiration Dates – Memberships expire after a specific number of days after the purchase. This is generally 365 days, so the expiration date would be the anniversary of the purchase. This can be any number of days you desire, so if you set your number of days to 90, a membership purchased on May 15th would expire on August 13th. Rolling Expiration Dates can also be extended to expire on the last day of the month, so in our previous example, the membership would instead expire on August 31st.
Household Profile Type – A household profile type is a grouping of individual constituents who live at the same address. Grouping together people who live at the same address allows you to see all the transactions and other data for the household in one place.
Individual Profile Type – An individual profile type typically records a single person’s data; however, it can be used for couples if the couple does not interact with your organization independently. For example, if Bob and Julie Abbott only mail in one donation each year and it is from both of them, they could share one record. However, if Bob plays in the annual golf tournament and Julie volunteers once a week, they should each have their own individual records. A Household can be created for the Abbotts to see all their information in one place.
Interactions – A record of communication or direct involvement with a constituent. Can also be used to record notes or reports about a constituent.
Implementation – The process DonorView uses to describe converting your data or creating your new database.
JMML - Join My Mailing List (JMML) is a widget available on the Email Marketing Contacts page to be able to collect names and contact information of constituents who wish to sign up for your emails or text messaging lists.
Mail Merge – A feature on the main grids to allow you to send a mail merge letter from the module’s Mail Merge Template library to a constituent. It is identified with a small envelope icon.
Mail Merge Template – The CRM, Fundraising, Events, and Membership modules feature built in mail merge letter template libraries. The templates are built similar to the Mailings feature in Microsoft Word. Inserting merge fields into the letter template will allow a custom letter to be sent to each constituent identified in your view using the Print/Email Mail Merge feature from the Actions menu.
Member – A member is a constituent who has purchased a membership or is part of a group that purchased a membership for multiple constituents.
Membership – A membership is a transaction whereby a constituent purchases or is assigned a membership level. A membership usually includes benefits like discounts for event purchases, admission to a venue, a newsletter, or other perks that are exclusive for members. Memberships typically have a start and expiration date, but lifetime memberships can have no expiration date.
Membership Owner – The Membership Owner is the constituent that purchased the membership and is also the only constituent able to renew the membership.
Merge – Merge is a feature on the Constituents Grid to combine two constituent records together. The merge icon is identified by a checkbox under the Merge column.
Merge Field - A merge field is a placeholder to tell the software where to insert data in a document. Merge fields correspond with the columns/fields on a grid. For example, when creating an acknowledgement letter for a transaction you will create a Mail Merge Gift Template and insert merge fields like {MERGEFIELD Date\@"MM/DD/YY} into the body of the letter to personalize it with the gift date for that specific constituent.
Module – A module is the label for the different activities performed in the software. The modules included are the CRM, Fundraising, Events, Membership, Peer to Peer, Volunteer, Auctions, Email Marketing and Surveys.
Multiselect Field – A field which can contain multiple values.
Pages – Within DonorView, pages are the webpages that are created by the software for donations, event registrations, or membership purchases.
Peer to Peer – A campaign where your supporters are fundraising on your behalf by reaching out to their friends and family to solicit donations.
Perpetual Pledge – Pledges that are scheduled on a desired frequency, like monthly or quarterly, that are scheduled out until the expiration date of the constituent’s credit card.
Picklist – A picklist is a list of values which can be selected for the field. A picklist can be multiselect or single select.
Portal – The portal is the DonorView feature which allows your constituents to access the information contained in their record. You can control what information is available for the constituent to see.
Primary Contact - The primary contact is the main contact person at the company. This person will have their own individual constituent record and will be linked to the company constituent record via an employer-employee relationship. There are Primary 1 (main contact), Primary 2 (secondary contact), and Invoice contacts available for all company constituent records. The Primary 1 Contact also has the ability to login to the company's information from the member Portal. There is no limit to the number of Company Contacts a company can have and they do not have to be assigned as primary or invoice contact.
Primary Email – The main email for the constituent. This is the email address that is used to link the constituent’s record to any new entries from a page. The primary email is used to validate an active membership when an event transaction requires a membership. It is also where newsletters and other email or survey campaigns will be sent. Each Individual Constituent should have a unique Primary Email address.
Primary Member – A primary member has a membership and has a constituent profile record created. A constituent who has a primary membership may or may not be the membership owner, there can be several primary members included in a membership such as with a family membership where there are two primary members (adults) and t secondary members (children.)
Primary Relationship – The primary relationship is the DonorView user who has the primary connection with the constituent. This field is often used to designate a fundraising contact, donor care manager, or volunteer coordinator.
Purchaser – The purchaser is also known as the registrant and is the constituent that completes or pays for the transaction or registration.
Query – A query is a request for data that meets the identified criteria. For example, a query can be created on the Constituent Grid to show a list of all constituents identified as a Volunteer in the Category field.
Recipient – Within the Email Marketing module, recipients are those constituents who will receive the email campaign.
Record – A record contains specific data about a single constituent, like their profile information and giving history.
Relationship – A connection between constituent records and can be things like work, business, or family relationships.
Registrant - The registrant is also known as the purchaser, and it is the constituent that completes or pays for the transaction or registration.
Reporting – Reports are created in DonorView by adding filters and sorting grids. Reports can be saved as Views as well as exported to Excel.
Revenue Category Fields – All revenue that is recorded in DonorView can be categorized in up to four ways using the For, Fund, Event and Appeal fields. The picklists can be edited and used any way that you like, but it is recommended that you identify the purpose and values for each field to use them consistently and assist with producing reports. Read More.
For – You can identify what project, program, campaign, or area your revenue is earmarked for.
Fund – Fund allows you to allocate the revenue to a specific fund, bank account, or other area as desired. If you set up the QuickBooks Integration this field is frequently used for your QB Accounts and/or Classes.
Event – You can record other sources of revenue, like donations or auction purchases, that you would like to tie to an event.
Appeal – If you are sending out requests for support or invitations to events or memberships, you can record the name of the appeal to track the response rate.
Secondary Member – A secondary member is part of a group of members at a specific membership level, however a constituent profile record is not created for the secondary member. Secondary members are listed on the Details view of the Membership Grid or on the membership owners membership tab. Secondary memberships are used when communication is intended only for the membership owner and primary members. A good example of secondary members is a family membership which has two primary members for the adults, but also includes three secondary members for children.
Secondary Relationship – Like the Primary Relationship, the Secondary Relationship is a DonorView user who has a regular contact with the constituent.
Security Settings - DonorView users can be assigned different levels of user rights under the security settings. Those settings include:
Full Access – Allows user to view, edit and export data in that module.
No Access – Removes all access to that module or function, including from appearing in menus within the software, and removes related tab(s) from the contact profiles in the CRM module.
Read Only – Data can be viewed, but no changes can be made.
No Ability to Send – Allows view/edit access for module, but removes the user's ability to send direct emails, email campaigns, surveys, and text messages from within the software.
Sort – A sort arranges the data in numeric-alphabetic order. The sort can be in ascending or descending order.
Source – The source is from where the funds were obtained or who referred the constituent to the organization.
Source Code – A source code is usually an alpha-numeric code to identify the specific appeal or source of the contribution.
Text to URL – A Text to URL is a code that when texted to your organization’s virtual phone number, the constituent will receive a link back to the URL you have designated.
Time Tracking – Time tracking is used to track volunteer and committee time. It can also be used to track education time, contact time with a constituent, and CEUs earned.
Transaction – A transaction is a record of a single donation, pledge, or purchase. It can also be a record of an event or membership registration, even if it is a zero-dollar transaction.
Trigger – A trigger in DonorView is an event, amount, or date that causes a specific action to happen. Triggers are established for Automated Actions like sending a birthday email to a constituent the day before their birthday or notifying the development director when a constituent reaches a specific cumulative giving amount.
URL – A Uniform Resource Locator (URL) is a web page address. DonorView automatically creates a URL that can be shared for all pages created in the software.
User – A user is a person provided access to the DonorView software or to the portal.
DonorView – A user with access to the DonorView database that is assigned specific security clearances to the different modules within the software.
Mobile – A DonorView user who also has permission to log in via the mobile DV Connect app.
Portal – A constituent who has signed up to access their personal and membership information.
View – A view is an arrangement of columns, filters, sorts, and queries that make up the specific appearance of the data on a grid. A view can also be thought of as a report.
Widget – A widget is a component that can be added to a website via an html code. Within DonorView widgets can include things like a thermometer providing a visual representation of the amount raised for an event, a list of the top ten teams in a peer-to-peer campaign, or a Join My Mailing List (JMML) sign up box.