In a classic scene of late 90s cinema, Cuba Gooding Jr commands Tom Cruise – the film’s eponymous hero Jerry Maguire, a sports agent desperately trying to save his last remaining client – to ‘show me the money’. In other words, Gooding Jr’s character needs cold, hard proof of his agent’s commitment.  

Following the release of our new Major Donor Giving Research Report, our blog this week brings together 10 key points on major donor giving.

How do major donors decide which charities to support? Why do some wealthy individuals not give at all? Discover answers to these and more questions in this new report.

At nfpSynergy, we've been tracking the proportion of the UK public that volunteer for over ten years. This report gives an overview of volunteering over time from as far back as 2003 up until August 2017.

Here are some of our key findings:

Are charities losing out by failing to ensure more diverse trustees and supporters? Our blog this week looks at the spending power of BAME (Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic) people in the UK, and how much they are represented in charity governance and fundraising campaigns.

In an attempt to better understand how levels of trust affect the third sector, we've started a new research programme to try and identify what exactly charities are trusted to do, and how they are trusted compared to other sectors.

This week's guest blog explores the importance of Customer Experience. Martin Jervis argues that charities can't hide behind terminology; ultimately, donors, beneficiaries, supporters, and volunteers are 'customers'. Therefore, they should be approached with strategic and tactical expertise; but unfortunately, this is scarce in the UK.

According to the Charities Aid Foundation, girls are more likely to show an interest in working for a charity than boys; girls are also more likely to say that they intend to raise money for charities than boys.What are the implications of this supposed gender gap? How can we better engage boys and build a more equal support base from a young age?

There has been a lot of focus in recent years on getting young people into volunteering, with less emphasis on encouraging volunteering among older age groups, despite the valuable skills this group has to offer. How can we change this?