Cost Benefit Analysis

Nebraska Hospice and Palliative Care Association

Prepared with Bloomerang — the giving platform built for purpose
August 20, 2026
Prepared by Levi Ouimet
You keep a statewide mission moving with a small team — while the workplace coalition funding you've leaned on for years has dropped from about $30,000 at its peak to around $16,000 today. Your goal is to build a predictable, independent donor stream by the end of 2026 to offset that decline — funding the public education campaigns that show what hospice really does. Today that growth is blocked by scattered spreadsheets and almost no visibility into your local donors. This looks honestly at what staying on that setup is costing you, and what changes when your giving lives in one place you own.

Section 1: The cost of staying the course

Before looking at what a new platform can do, it's worth being clear-eyed about what the current setup already costs you — in dollars, in time, and in relationships that quietly slip away.

The coalition gap — your revenue is declining

For years, nearly all of your fundraising has come through one channel: the combined health agency drive. That single stream has dropped from about $30,000 at its peak to around $16,000 today. Giving has been uneven year to year, but the direction is clear, and with no independent donor base to fall back on, every dollar the coalition sends your way is a dollar you don't control.

These are your own estimates from our conversations and are worth confirming against your financials — but the direction is not in question.

The capacity tax — done by hand

Right now every gift is tracked by hand across spreadsheets, every thank-you goes out one at a time, and there's rarely a second touch after it. Cross-referencing who gave, when, and how much eats hours you don't have — hours that could go to the member hospice visits and awareness work only you can do.

The stewardship gap — the donors you have aren't being cultivated

You have roughly 50 supporters on file. Without a system to follow up, most hear from you once a year, if that. The people who already give are your single most likely source of the next gift — yet today there's no way to cultivate them over time, spot who could give more, or notice a lapse before it becomes permanent.

The knowledge-in-one-head risk

Some of your strongest relationships live in the heads of the people who built them — your board members among them. When a conversation isn't captured, it can't be followed up on, handed off, or built into a real ask. One schedule change or one person stepping back, and that relationship goes cold with no record it ever existed.

The closing window

Your website is being rebuilt right now. That's a one-time opportunity to put donation forms, event registration, and donor capture in place as part of the new site — rather than bolting them on later, or missing the chance entirely.

Section 2: The Bloomerang upside, sized to your reality

This isn't about a windfall. For an organization your size, the value is steadier — and it compounds: keep more of what you raise, cultivate the supporters you already have, and give your growing sponsorship and memorial gifts a real home.

1. A donor base you actually own

Every gift — online, event, memorial, or mailed in — lands in one place under your name, not a coalition's spreadsheet. That's the foundation of fundraising you control instead of fundraising you wait on.

2. Stewardship that runs on its own

Instead of a single thank-you, a new supporter can receive a warm welcome, a story about the hospice benefit a few days later, and a personal follow-up after that — automatically, without adding anything to your plate. That's the difference between one touch a year and a relationship.

3. A clear view of who you already have

Bloomerang surfaces giving history, engagement, and public wealth and giving signals on the contacts already in your database — so the next unexpected $5,000 gift is one you saw coming and cultivated, not one you happened to get lucky on.

4. A home for what's already working

Your conference sponsorships have grown from about $7,000 to $30,000, and your strategic partnerships keep climbing. Event registration, sponsor tracking, and follow-up can live in the same place as your donors — so that momentum compounds year over year instead of resetting each spring.

5. Storytelling that scales

You want to get the news about hospice out — the amazing benefit you provide to the people you serve. Built-in email and templates let you tell those stories to the right supporters, on a schedule, without starting from a blank page each time.

6. Time back for the person doing all of it

Every workflow above replaces something you do by hand today. For a small team, that reclaimed time isn't a nice-to-have — it's the whole point.

As an indicator, not a promise: even in years when giving declines across the sector, Bloomerang customers tend to raise more year over year — around 6% on average. That's a signal of what a system built for stewardship can do over time, not a guarantee for any one organization.

Section 3: What it costs, and what it takes to pay for itself

The investment

ItemWhat's includedAnnual
Giving Platform StandardBloomerang CRM (up to 1,000 records), Bloomerang Fundraising, and unlimited support — after a 16% bundle discount (-$553)$2,899
Data conversionSmart Start Basic data conversion — $800, fully waived as a signing promotion$0
Total first-year investment$2,899

Section 4: Your ROI — projected growth vs. the investment

Applied to your total annual revenue of $208,765, even a conservative first-year lift from moving onto a complete giving platform returns many times what the platform costs. Adjust the scenario to see the range. These are illustrative indicators, not guarantees, and they are not stacked on top of one another.

$
The revenue that consolidates onto the platform — giving, events, and sponsorships.
$
Your proposed first-year total.
A steady lift from using the full platform rather than scattered tools.
Projected first-year growth
$23,257
11.14% applied to $208,765
Return on the investment
8.0×
projected growth for every dollar invested
What powers that growth

The projection is what a complete platform tends to produce — here's the engine behind it, drawn from Bloomerang's customer data. Each is an indicator in its own right; together they compound rather than add:

  • 64% donor retention — 22 points above the 42% industry average — so more of every year's revenue carries into the next instead of leaking away.
  • 33.7% more raised by nonprofits on Bloomerang's built-in processors, with up to 55% better conversion from Express Donate and digital wallets.
  • 12.5% more $1,000+ gifts within three months of wealth screening — the repeatable path to the next gift like the recent $5,000 one.
  • 19.3% more online donations year over year, with one-time gifts running 27% larger and recurring gifts 58% larger.

Illustrative only. These are marketable indicators from Bloomerang's data, not guarantees for any one organization, and they are not additive. Growth applies to the revenue that actually runs through the platform — worth confirming against your financials.

Section 5: What this is — and what it isn't

One fair question has come up: "We don't have enough donors to need donor software — we need a list." It deserves a straight answer.

Bloomerang is not a service that hands you a list of strangers to cold-call. What it does is make sure the supporters you already have — and every relationship you and your board build in person — actually get captured, thanked, and followed up on, instead of living on a spreadsheet or in someone's memory. For an organization rebuilding its own fundraising after years of leaning on the coalition, that foundation has to come first. A list with no system behind it leaks; a system captures whatever comes in and grows it.

If sourcing brand-new prospects is also a priority, the optional DonorSearch prospecting add-on can help identify new supporters in your area who give to causes like yours. That's a separate choice from the core platform — worth a conversation, but not a reason to wait on the foundation.

The bottom line

The status quo isn't holding steady — coalition funding has dropped from about $30,000 at its peak to around $16,000 today, with nothing independent to replace it. For $2,899, you get a system that keeps every gift, cultivates the supporters you have, captures the sponsorship momentum that's already working, and gives one very stretched person her time back. The bar to make it worth the investment is low. The upside — a mission-driven donor base you own — is exactly what the last few years have shown you need.

Built for Purpose
This analysis is an illustration, not a guarantee. Figures for coalition funding, donor counts, gifts, and sponsorships are drawn from estimates shared during our conversations and should be confirmed against your financial records. Results depend on how the platform is adopted and used.