Donor Concentration Risk Trend
This dashboard-format analytic tracks the share of total fundraising revenue captured by your largest donors over time, drawn from analysis QX209.
How to use the Donor Concentration Risk Trend
This is a dashboard-format analytic that shows how much of your total fundraising revenue is concentrated in your largest donors, and how that concentration is changing over time. It is built on the data from analysis QX209, and a rising line means revenue is flowing into fewer hands, which is a risk worth watching.
The Concentration Curve tab is the latest-year snapshot, showing all nine donor tiers for the current year to date against the last full fiscal year. The Top-Donor Share Over Time tab tracks the revenue share held by your top 1, 5, and 10 donors across eleven fiscal years, alongside donor counts and total revenue. The Percentile Share Over Time tab does the same using the top 1, 3, 5, 10, 15, and 20 percent of donors. The central metric is the percentage of revenue captured by the top tiers, and it matters because heavy concentration means the loss of just one or two major donors could materially disrupt your budget.
The strategic value is risk management. This analytic tells you whether your organization is becoming more dependent on a small number of donors, which is a signal to invest in broadening the base, or whether your revenue is diversifying in line with a healthier risk profile.
You should refresh and review this annually with leadership and your board, since concentration risk is a governance concern as much as a fundraising one. If the top-donor share is climbing, weigh strengthening mid-level and acquisition efforts to broaden support, and pair the trend with deeper stewardship of the major donors you already depend on.
Measure success by a stable or declining top-donor revenue share where diversification is the goal, by growth in the number of donors outside the top tiers, and by reduced year-to-year volatility in total revenue.
Analytic ID: QX262
Analytic Name: Donor Concentration Risk Trend
Focus: 3.3: Dashboards; 1.2: Revenue Concentration Analysis; 3.1: Health Checks
Type: Dashboard Style
Scope: Organization
Description: This dashboard analytic shows the organization's donor concentration risk over time.
Key Question: How is the organization's donor concentration risk changing over time?
Action: Review donor concentration risk to determine if strategy or tactics should be adjusted to move closer to a desired risk profile.