From First Gifts to Major Giving: The Virtual Engagement Officer’s First Year

October marks one year since the inaugural cohort of innovation partners fully introduced the world’s first autonomous fundraisers, Virtual Engagement Officers (VEOs), to donors. We're proud to announce that the VEO has now secured $3,000,000 in giving as the natural outcome of personal engagement.

One year of strategically managing a group of donors, now 70,000 strong with our most recently launched cohort, who were underserved by the limitations of donor: staff ratios. And the path forward is all about acceleration.

A year ago, as the very first to do this, we naturally saw a lot of questions. Could trusted digital labor really manage 1,000 donor portfolios? Should it?

It didn’t take long for our amazing innovation partners and our team to see that not only does it work, but it’s also reshaping what’s possible in fundraising. And, as the VEO accelerates beyond this $3,000,000 benchmark, it's not just driving any fundraising activity, but major gifts.

At the beginning of this journey, we set out to test a VEO’s ability to generate a single gift. In the first few months, we not only saw gifts, but the ability to manage mid-level donors, securing donations of $5,000, $8,500, and eventually $10,000 as natural outcomes of the VEO’s work.

Just recently, a donor under VEO management made a $42,000 outright gift—the largest to date. The impact is clear: over time, a VEO can move a donor not just toward any gift, but toward a major gift, just as a major gift officer would. By autonomously completing many of the same activities, the VEO is inspiring donors to increase their support and advance the missions of our partner organizations.

What began with early signs of success and opportunity grew into leadership giving and is now pointing toward $50,000 gifts, then $100,000, and beyond—not as a replacement for gift officers, but as additional members of the team, expanding overall fundraising capacity at all levels.

The achievement reflects the work of a brilliant team of AI and ML engineers, whose continuous improvements and model development are revolutionizing fundraising. In just one year, the VEO has learned from over 70,000 donor relationships and has proven capable not only of supporting the annual fund, but also of securing major gifts.

The milestone also reflects the commitment of the partners who believed in the vision from the beginning. This first year demonstrates the power of trust and a shared vision to make transformation possible.

In the coming weeks, we’ll look at data insights, growth, learnings, the evolution of donor perception, and how carrying this trajectory forward can propel the future of philanthropy as we celebrate one year of Autonomous Fundraising.

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The next chapter of fundraising is already here.

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