Opportunity Forecasting for Gifts Associated over Multiple Years

Leslie Green
Leslie Green
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in Blackbaud CRM™ General Discussions
Hi BBCRM Community!  I have a question regarding opportunities and forecasting.  If we have an opportunity that is certain to close during the current fiscal year, the fundraiser will mark it with a likelihood of 100%.  We have a forecasting report that we use that has a "Certain to Close" bucket and that's where these opps appear until the revenue is received (once revenue has been associated with the opp, it no longer appears in this Certain to Close category on the report). 


We have some situations where the fundraiser will tell us that part of the gift (this would be an outright gift and not a pledge) will not be received until a future fiscal year.  Do any of you have this scenario and if so, do you record the future fiscal year amount as a new opportunity and if not, how do you forecast for opportunity differences between Accepted Amount and Revenue Committed Amount if that difference will be associated in a future year?

Comments

  • Liz Hackett
    Liz Hackett
    Ninth Anniversary Kudos 3 February 2026 Monthly Challenge 2025 bbcon Attendee Badge
    Hi Leslie,

    We update all our opportunities at the start of each financial year.  If there are future opportunities for a record we add them as a seperate opp on the person's record, just to keep it clean.  This avoids the situation when the accepted and committed revenue falls over two time periods.
  • Jaimie Lane
    Jaimie Lane
    Tenth Anniversary Participant Facilitator 1 Loyalty Badge
    Hi Leslie,

    In addition to Liz's advice, we also have a tag that we use to identify which opportunities are part of a multi-year strategy, so that even if it spans separate opportunities, we know it's part of one overall multi-year gift.  It also allows for separate reporting.  

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