Old Dominion University's development office uses Maptive to plan alumni and donor events, travel, and outreach. Jonas Porter and his colleagues build maps that gift officers can use when planning regional work.
For fundraising staff, the question is where the donors relevant to an event or visit plan are located. A donor list can describe individual donors or households, and the relationships matter to the people using the map. Who the map includes affects both the regional count and the names on a follow-up list.
| Planning question | Prepared row unit | Maptive view | What it cannot infer |
|---|---|---|---|
| Where do donors concentrate? | One donor | Marker Density | Interest in attending an event |
| Where do donor households concentrate? | One defined household | Marker Density or boundary count | Household membership from a shared address |
| Where has giving come from? | Donor or household with a defined gift total | Represents Numerical Data or boundary Sum | Future giving capacity |
Decide whom the donor map counts
Choose donor or household records
Choose the unit that fits the staff request. For a donor visit list, keep individual Donor IDs. For a household invitation list, use your donor system's Household IDs and its rules about whom to include. Linked people can remain separate donors even when the organization sends one invitation to their household.
An address alone can't make that decision. Two people at one address may belong to a household, or they may be unrelated. A donor may also have moved while another household member stayed. Use the relationships maintained in the donor system and keep a record linking each donor to their household for any list that will need names later.
Combine gift rows into the chosen unit before importing. Recurring gifts can create many rows for one donor, so a transaction export would show the concentration of gifts rather than the number of donors. Keep a total to check the number of donors or households you expect to map.
Include the chosen ID, address, assigned officer, and the preferences staff need to respect. Keep the contact restrictions from the donor system in the working file. For an event planning map, you may also need a donor type or alumni category. Leave out details the staff won't need before you upload the file.
Define the historic giving measure
Choose a gift period and a consistent amount field. Cash received during a fiscal year answers a different question from lifetime giving or pledged amounts. Label the field so a fundraiser can tell what the total includes without opening the original report.
Use your organization's gift-credit rules when preparing totals. A gift may have hard credit to the donor who made it and soft credit to another person associated with it. Don't add both as new cash received. Check that the mapped totals match the source report for the same period and scope.
Keep last gift date and donor status as separate fields. If the staff request concerns lapsed donors, define that group in the donor system or source spreadsheet first. Maptive can filter the exported status and dates, but those fields need a clear meaning before they become a map view.
Past giving describes recorded support. It doesn't establish a person's total wealth, future gift, or willingness to meet. Use the amount to understand the file's history while the assigned officer reviews the relationship.
Import the donor list
Choose Create New Map, give the map a name that includes its purpose or period, then click Continue. Under Your Data, use Add File, drag in the headered file, or paste the table with its headers. Select Map Now.
Review Categorize Data when checking the location matches. Address fields belong in Section 1. Titles and contact fields belong in Section 2. Correct any column choices and click Done. A donor ID or assigned officer can remain a business field without being forced into an address category.
Inspect known addresses and any points that appear far from the rest of the file. A missing street address or an old residence can affect a regional invitation list. Keep unresolved records available for correction rather than assuming they represent donors outside the region.
Compare the imported records with the prepared donor or household total. Retain the source date and address type in the map description. The staff using it should know whether the file describes a current mailing address, a residence, or another location your organization uses.
Keep the first map within the staff group allowed to work with these records. Apra's ethics call for suitable fundraising information, keeping it confidential, and respecting people's privacy. Decide the permitted staff purpose before preparing a wider view.
Compare concentration with historic giving
Map the people in the group
Open Map Tools, select Heat Mapping Tool, choose Marker Density, and click Add Heat Map. Each mapped record contributes to the density view, so a donor-level table describes donors and a household-level table describes households.
To examine a supplied category, use Select Sample and Specific Group. Choose the category column and its value, then add the layer. That could be an alumni group or another defined segment relevant to the staff request. Keep the chosen group clear in the map's name or description.
Use the same radius, intensity, opacity, and color settings when comparing groups. Adjusting the radius changes how broadly the heat spreads around locations, which can make several pockets appear as one larger area. Check actual records before choosing an event region from its shape.
If a filter changes the pins while the heat stays the same, inspect Unlink From Other Tools. An unlinked layer can still show the broader group. That can be useful as context, but the person reading the map needs to know which donors the heat still includes.
Map the supplied gift values
For giving amounts, select Represents Numerical Data in the Heat Mapping Tool. Choose your numeric-only giving field in Numerical Data, select All Markers in Data or Specific Group, and click Add Heat Map. Keep currency symbols and explanatory notes outside the numeric cells.
Compare the value view with the donor-count view. An area with many donors may account for a modest share of giving. Another area may have fewer donors with larger recorded totals. Those are different planning facts, and neither requires treating the donors as having different personal worth.
For exact totals within standard areas, use the Boundary Tool. Choose the Boundary Set and My Numeric Data, select Sum as the Function, choose the giving field in Fill Data, and click Load Boundaries. Marker Count / Location Density provides an area count of the mapped rows instead. Name the chosen unit when reporting that count.
Check the boundary settings as well as the input. Ignore Filters can leave a fill showing a broader group than the visible donor markers. These tools summarize the prepared data, so you still need to check the totals against the source. Use that source to decide how to group households and credit gifts.
Select a useful regional worklist
Ask the requesting fundraiser what the list is for before drawing its area. An event invitation and a travel visit list may use the same donor geography but different fields that decide whom to include. The assigned officer, campaign interest, and contact preferences can change who belongs in each output.
Open the Grouping Tool / Colored Pins Tool and choose a supplied officer or campaign field as Primary Group. Use the Filter Tool to narrow the records. Select Create Filters on first use, or the gear for existing filters, then choose Group for status or category and Date for the relevant date field. Check the chosen group against the staff request.
For a local pocket, click the lasso icon on the map's right and draw the area with polygon points. Close it at the start or double-click, then select Export location data to a file. Inspect its IDs and addresses before handing it to a gift officer. A drawn boundary can cut through a neighborhood, so review any nearby donors who might reasonably belong in the staff plan.
If you need the full filtered group, use Export Data, choose Export Filtered Data, select the format, and click Export Now. Avoid choosing Export Data Visible on Map unless the current screen area is the intended selection. Otherwise, a donor outside the viewport can disappear from the worklist.
Keep a short note explaining the count with the regional export. Record the starting group size, the IDs selected by geography, and any records withheld because of preferences or unresolved addresses. Staff can then explain why the final contact list differs from the number of donors shown in the wider map.
Check the export against donor-system contact restrictions and staff assignments again. Keep only the fields needed for the follow-up, name the staff owner, and record when the preferences were checked. This helps prevent an older working list from being treated as current after a donor changes their instructions.
Share only what the staff task needs
Choose access for the recipient's role. Eligible licensed colleagues can use Team Map Share from the map's three-dot menu on the home screen. Select the team member and grant editing or view-only access. This requires multiple licenses purchased together, and one person can edit the map at a time.
For an external viewing link, open Share and Share Externally and choose Password Protected when appropriate. Review Map Settings and Shared Maps/Presentational Maps before distributing it. Check the tools, visible columns, marker data, and export access the recipient gets.
Inspect the Marker Visibility Button as well. A hidden pin can still be shown through viewer controls when those controls allow it. Hiding markers is a display choice, so don't use it as the way to remove donor identities from a broader presentation.
For a general audience, prepare a separate file of grouped data with the areas and totals they need. Leave individual names, addresses, IDs, and contact details out of that file. Review small groups that could reveal a donor even without a name. Test the recipient's view and any available downloads before release.
Turn the map into a realistic visit plan
Before arranging visits, ask the gift officer to review the short list. They need to check each donor's interest, availability, access needs and existing relationship. Neighborhood income doesn't establish a particular donor's means or intent, and a blank region may reflect past outreach or missing addresses. Mark the records cleared for follow-up, recheck contact preferences, and assign the invitation or visit request to the responsible staff member.
