Some initial resources

If you are interestted in measuring the effectiveness of your fundraising, here are some useful places to start. Some theory is always useful. I would start with "Fundraising Management: Analysis, Planning and Practice" by Adrian Sargeant and Elaine Jay http://www.charityfundraising.org/Books.htm, this is a really good basic primer on fundraising management.

You will also want to look at what other organisations in your sector do and what results they get. Look at their annual reports (if they are a charity registered in England & Wales, their annual reports will be downlaodable from the charity commission website http://www.charity-commission.gov.uk/registeredcharities/first.asp. For a US non-profit, Guidestar (www.guidestar.org) is the starting point.

I will cover the vexed question of fundraising ratios in a later post but the most comprehensive coparative analysis of the cost-effectiveness of various forms of fundraising in the UK is the annual FundRatios study. A summary of the 2005-06 results is at
http://www.cifc.co.uk/Fundratios06.html