CI Blog

Annual Tier Transition Stats- Basic Analysis

Written by CI Hub Team | Oct 1, 2025 10:38:51 AM

Annual Tier Transition Stats- Basic

How to use the Annual Tier Transition Stats- Basic analysis

This analysis provides a clear, year-over-year view of how your donors transition between giving tiers —  Top, Middle, and Bottom—based on their annual giving totals. By examining your Gifts data and classifying each donor by segment for every fiscal year, it then tracks whether each donor upgrades, downgrades, maintains their segment, or lapses the following year. The thresholds that define each segment are drawn from your organization's own standards, ensuring that the segmentation aligns with your unique fundraising model.

At its core, this analysis calculates the percentage of donors in each tier who take each possible transition path: upgrading to a higher tier, maintaining their current position, dropping to a lower tier, or lapsing (not giving at all the following year). These transition rates are essential for understanding not just retention, but the health and momentum of your donor pipeline. By filtering out deceased constituents and excluding the most recent fiscal year (since transitions can't be measured for donors who have not yet had a next year), it focuses on actionable, up-to-date insights.

You can use these findings to strengthen your Constituent Intelligence efforts. For example, seeing a high upgrade percentage among Bottom-tier donors might prompt you to invest in targeted cultivation or stewardship for that group. If you notice that middle-tier donors have a high lapse or downgrade rate, it signals a need to reinforce engagement before attrition sets in. The analysis also helps you identify which segments are most stable, letting you allocate resources for maximum impact.

Fundraising directors and development officers should review this analysis at least annually, ideally as part of regular Constituent Intelligence routines. Major gift officers can use the insights to prioritize outreach to donors likely to upgrade, while stewardship teams can design interventions for those at risk of lapsing or downgrading. Consider sharing results with your board or leadership to highlight progress and inform strategy.

Success should be measured by tracking improvements in upgrade and maintenance rates, reductions in lapses, and ultimately, growth in total giving from each segment over time. If you use this analysis to guide targeted interventions and then see positive movement in these metrics, you can be confident your Constituent Intelligence approach is driving stronger donor relationships and program outcomes.