This ultimate guide will help you get started with creating an efficient impact report to boost your nonprofit's transparency with the right tools and inspiring examples. Keep reading!
![Nonprofit Impact Report: Everything You Need to Know [ +Examples]](https://donorbox.org/nonprofit-blog/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/Nonprofit-Impact-Report.png)
You’ve done the work of courting a donor, securing a donation, and working toward your nonprofit’s mission. Well done! Now comes the next part: creating a nonprofit donor impact report so your donors know what you accomplished with those hard-earned donations.
It can be tricky to decide what all needs to go into an impact report. You don’t want to overwhelm with information, but you don’t want to look like you’re holding back on everything you’ve done for the past year, either.
We’re here to help! In this guide, we’ll share everything you need to know about nonprofit impact reports.
A nonprofit impact report, sometimes referred to as a donor impact report or simply a nonprofit annual report, details what your organization has accomplished in the last calendar or fiscal year.
A nonprofit impact report usually includes three main types of reporting:
As a nonprofit organization that takes donations, you know how much responsibility that requires. You have to accept donations securely and legally. You have to maintain a relationship of trust with your donors. And creating an impact report is an important part of that process.
Donor impact reports are typically either published quarterly or annually. Publishing quarterly reports is usually necessary for organizations that are very active. For example, they have multiple campaigns a year, several events a quarter, and many donations. Publishing annual reports is more appropriate for smaller or less active organizations.
You need to create impact reports for the following reasons:
Your impact report should include some good numbers representing your accomplishments. This means that first, you need to gather the data behind those numbers. Meet with your team and ask them to pull the following types of information for whichever period of time you’re covering:
Donorbox helps you easily collect all this information. On your Donorbox account, you can explore the options for campaigns, donations, and supporters to collect data on donors, members, and event attendees, as well as all the campaigns you’re running and donations you have collected online on Donorbox. You can also add offline donations to Donorbox, hence rest assured that all your data can be stored in one place and managed from there.
Donorbox also lets you add filters to your donors’ list to make sure you can segment data for donor communications, reporting, and other needs. Our Reports module helps you create various reports on “donor overview”, “new donors”, and “LYBUNT”.
Donorbox also lets you integrate with some of the leading CRM tools like Salesforce NPSP and Nonprofit Cloud, Blackbaud Raiser’s Edge NXT, HubSpot, and more to effectively manage donors and donation data and use them for your impact report.
Some readers of your annual report may be connecting with your organization for the first time. Some will likely be potential donors. It’s important to include organizational information as a sort of introduction to the people that power your mission – and to show that you manage funds responsibly.
This section should detail your organization’s progress over the past year. How have you served your mission? How have your organization’s efforts moved the needle on your cause?
Include the following types of information:
Depending on how much information you decide to include, you might choose to create a PDF document or a page built directly into your website. Adding your annual report or impact report directly to your website makes it easy for visitors to access and more dynamic as you can link to other material on your website or even include animations.
If you have too much information to include, though, your page could get bogged down and lose some of its functionality. By creating a PDF, you can easily distribute it both on your website and via email. This makes way for more design possibilities and more room to include information.
Whichever you choose, remember to focus on readability, attractiveness, and clarity of information. For example, our nonprofit user Park City Education Foundation has embedded its donor impact report on its website and we love how each piece of information is neatly highlighted.
Bonus Resource: Watch this webinar on simplifying annual reports for enhanced donor engagement:
Also, here’s a detailed webinar on data visualization with examples:
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The best impact reports are designed to be pleasing to the eye. You want readers to be able to access the most important information right away–without getting bogged down with too much noise.
Think easy-to-read infographics along with charts and graphs. You want to illustrate your impact, and design is a great way to do that.
Pro tip: The design of your report should match the branding of your organization. That means colors, textures, and shapes should feel cohesive both throughout the document and with your nonprofit organization’s other branded material. When it comes to design, consistency is key!
As mentioned above, pictures can do so much work in your impact report. The right picture can illustrate so much more than data ever can and can help you create a comprehensive document that truly shows your organization’s efforts.
Add pictures that illustrate why your mission is important. For example, a picture of a school child smiling with the new backpack that your organization provided is a lot more powerful than a picture of the backpack by itself.
Pro tip: Be sure to only use pictures that your organization owns and/or has permission to use. This is not the time to use stock photos. The more your images seem connected with your organization and mission, the better. Community Foundation of Northwest Florida, one of our nonprofit users, sets the perfect example for you.
In addition to the numbers, design, and pictures, you’ll need to write descriptive text to go in your annual report. This is where you can provide qualitative data.
This might include:
Pro tip: Just as your design needs to match your organization’s branding, your written text should too. Think about the tone that best fits your organization: Conversational? Academic? Professional? Whatever it is, be sure to write with some level of authority so your readers know they can trust what you’re saying.
Decide how you’ll roll your impact report out. Usually, this will include an email to present donors, a post on social media, and sometimes even a direct outreach with major donors so they know you’re thinking about them.
You should be proud of your impact report, both of what it details and how it looks/reads. Getting the word out there–that it’s ready and live on your website–will add to your appearance as an organization that takes pride in what they do.
We’ve shared some noteworthy examples with you throughout the sections in this article. Here are three more examples that will certainly inspire excellent design, picture, and content ideas for your nonprofit.
In the 2023 global impact report for New Energy Nexus, there are many pictures of entrepreneurs the organization sponsors, along with explanations of the products the organization supports. These pictures are effective because they bring people to the page. They show that there are real people behind the scenes who are benefitting from this organization.
But there are many other reasons why this impact report has made it to our favorites list! It included the following:
We love this report for its attention to every important detail.
We love how Code for America adds their impact reports right on their website, making for an easy-to-navigate and attractive reading experience.
Their report includes:
And more. They also share a look into what the future holds, making it easy to see how their success in 2023 can be replicated and expanded.
This is an annual report from the Wellington Zoo that details all of their activities, goals, and achievements for their fiscal year.
Here are some elements that work well in their report:
And more. We love this report’s detailed approach to transparency. It truly paints a complete picture of the zoo’s activities for this fiscal year.
When it’s time to create your impact report, let the facts of the last year or quarter guide you. A good impact report addresses all questions, with one main mission: to make donors feel like their donations were used well. And to encourage those who haven’t donated yet to give to your mission.
To create the best impact report for your nonprofit, you need an online system that helps you collect, store, and manage data. Along with processing your donations and storing donor data securely, Donorbox also helps you manage and send this data to other great CRMs, making it easy for you to pull data for your impact report.
Donorbox has helped over 80,000 organizations fundraise through simple, affordable, and outcome-driven features like Recurring Donations, customizable Fundraising Pages, Crowdfunding, Peer-to-Peer, Events, Memberships, and more. Check out all our features here.
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Lindsey spent years wearing many hats in the nonprofit world. Whether she was helping arts nonprofits with their messaging and content, planning a fundraising gala, writing an NEA grant proposal, or running a membership program with over 400 members, she learned how to navigate – and appreciate! – the fast-paced world of fundraising. Now, she loves sharing those hard-earned lessons with the Donorbox community.
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Lindsey Baker Bower