From Benchmarking to Better Decisions: What Public Media Can Learn from Nonprofit Peers
Public media organizations aren't the only ones navigating a fundraising environment marked by uncertainty, shifting donor behavior and increasing pressure to make decisions faster. Last month, fundraising leaders from 16 national nonprofit organizations gathered as part of the Epiphany Benchmarking Community to compare results, discuss emerging trends and explore how organizations can adapt in real time. Launched by CDP and ROI Solutions in late 2025, Epiphany was created to take benchmarking to the next level. The participating organizations represented more than $1.3 billion in annual fundraising revenue and a wide range of missions, from advocacy and conservation to health and humanitarian causes. Despite their differences, many of the same questions surfaced across the group: How do we respond to changes in donor acquisition? What drives long-term donor value? How should we adapt as giving behavior continues to evolve?
CDP's partner, ROI Solutions, recently shared a recap of the meeting and the seven fundraising trends that emerged from those discussions in their article, From Benchmarking to Better Decisions: 7 Trends Reshaping Fundraising. While the discussion focused on national nonprofits, many of the takeaways will feel familiar to public media fundraising leaders.
As stations navigate questions around donor acquisition, retention, sustainer performance, changing donor expectations, evolving communication channels and increasing competition for charitable dollars, the need for timely insights has never been greater.
But perhaps the most valuable lesson from the national nonprofit discussion wasn't the data itself.
It was the conversation.
Data is Important — Context is Essential
For years, benchmarking has largely been a retrospective exercise. Organizations review annual reports, compare performance against peers, identify trends and consider what might have been done differently. The challenge is that by the time those insights are available, the fundraising environment may have already changed.
Today's fundraising leaders need more than a historical snapshot. They need the ability to identify emerging trends while they are still developing and evaluate whether those trends are unique to their organization or part of a broader industry pattern.
That's where benchmarking becomes most valuable — not as a scorecard, but as a decision-making tool.
When donor acquisition costs increase, retention rates shift or a new fundraising strategy gains traction, the first question is rarely, "What happened?" It's "Is this happening everywhere?"
Benchmarking helps answer that question. Peer conversations help explain why.
Public Media Has Always Learned Best Together
One thing that stood out from the nonprofit benchmarking discussion was how frequently participants turned to one another for perspective. Organizations openly shared successes, challenges and lessons learned. Fundraising leaders challenged assumptions, compared approaches and explored how different strategies were performing across organizations.
That spirit of shared learning is something public media knows well.
For decades, stations have benefited from collaboration — through benchmarking initiatives, fundraising roundtables, conference sessions, working groups and informal peer networks. Some of the sector's strongest ideas have emerged not from isolated analysis, but from collective problem-solving.
Benchmarking communities build on that tradition by creating a structured environment where organizations can compare results, explore trends and learn from one another's experiences.
The most valuable takeaway often isn't a chart or dashboard. It's hearing how another organization responded to the same challenge you're facing and understanding what they learned along the way.
Why Near-Real-Time Insights Matter More Than Ever
The pace of change in fundraising continues to accelerate.
Public media organizations are evaluating how donor behavior is changing, which acquisition channels are producing the strongest long-term value, how sustainer programs are performing and where shifts in engagement may signal emerging opportunities or risks. Many of these questions need answers now — not after the fiscal year closes.
That's one of the core ideas behind Epiphany Benchmarking.
Developed by CDP and ROI Solutions, Epiphany was designed to move beyond static annual reports and provide participating organizations with monthly updates, peer comparisons and facilitated discussions that help transform findings into action. The goal is not simply to measure performance, but to support smarter and faster decision-making.
The combination of timely data and peer learning allows organizations to identify patterns, evaluate strategies and adapt while opportunities still exist.
Turning Insight Into Action
As public media organizations and other nonprofits alike face an increasingly dynamic fundraising environment, one thing is becoming clear: Data alone is not enough.
The organizations that thrive will be those that combine timely insights with a willingness to learn from others, test new approaches and adapt quickly when conditions change.
The recent Epiphany Benchmarking discussions reinforced a simple but powerful idea: Better decisions happen when organizations have access to both meaningful data and a trusted community of peers.
At CDP, we believe public media organizations deserve access to both. That's why we partnered with ROI Solutions to create Epiphany Benchmarking — bringing together near-real-time fundraising insights, peer comparison and collaborative learning to help organizations make more informed decisions with greater confidence.
Interested in learning more? Explore Epiphany Benchmarking and discover how stations are using timely data and peer collaboration to uncover opportunities, navigate challenges and strengthen fundraising results.
And if you'd like to dive deeper into the seven fundraising trends discussed by nonprofit leaders during the recent Epiphany Benchmarking meeting, be sure to read ROI Solutions' companion article, From Benchmarking to Better Decisions: 7 Trends Reshaping Fundraising. It provides additional context on the conversations and trends that inspired many of the ideas discussed here.