What a prospect research consultant does that software can't
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Wealth screening software produces a ranked list. That list is not a fundraising plan, and the distance between the two is where most screening investments quietly fail.
The two purchases
A screening subscription gives you data. Capacity scores, wealth indicators, giving history, applied to your file. Kindsight is reported from around $4,150 a year for one user and roughly 1,500 screens; DonorSearch from about $4,000 for a small file, with per-record screening reported at roughly $1–$2 per record; WealthEngine from around $5,000 for a single user plus a one-time implementation fee reported between $2,000 and $20,000.
A consulting engagement gives you a portfolio. The same screening happens, and then a person who has done this before turns the output into a tiered list with names, capacity ranges, suggested ask amounts and a rationale for each. Typically around $4,000–$5,000 as a project.
The prices are comparable. The deliverables are not.
Why the interpretation is the hard part
A screening file comes back with a few hundred names carrying scores. The obvious move — work down from the highest score — is usually wrong.
The top of the list is often people with significant wealth and no relationship to you. They screen high because capacity models measure capacity. Cold-soliciting them converts badly and burns the enthusiasm of whoever tried.
The names worth working are further down: moderate capacity with a long giving history, someone connected to a board member, a donor whose giving stepped up last year. Finding those requires reading the screening output against your own data and your own relationships, which is judgment rather than sorting.
That is what the engagement buys. Someone who has built portfolios before, looking at your file, saying: start with these twelve, this is the range, this is why.
When the consultant is the better buy
A first screen. If nobody on staff has run a major-gifts portfolio, scores arriving with no interpretation will sit in a folder. This is the single most common way a screening subscription produces nothing — and the survey data supports it: 95% of shops under $250K raised spend $0 here, and half of the $250K–$1M segment still spends nothing.
Pre-campaign feasibility. A one-time job. A project is the right shape for it; a year’s subscription is not.
A team without capacity to interpret. If the development director is also writing the appeal and staffing the gala, an extra data file is not help. A ranked shortlist with suggested asks is.
When the subscription is the better buy
Recurring screening. New donors arriving continuously that you want scored on an ongoing basis.
Someone on staff who has done this before. If your development director has built portfolios at a previous organization, they need data, not interpretation, and paying for interpretation is paying twice.
A large file you re-screen periodically. Per-project pricing stops making sense when the project happens every year.
What to ask for either way
Whichever route you take, the deliverable should include a written method, not just a list. How the tiers were set, what the capacity ranges are based on, how to add new prospects to the same framework.
Without it you have bought one list with a shelf life of about eighteen months, and you will buy another one in two years. With it, your team can maintain the portfolio and you have bought a capability.
Also ask, in both cases, for a test on people you already know. Give the consultant or vendor 50–100 constituents whose capacity you can independently verify — board members, past major donors, people whose giving elsewhere is public. Check who they flagged, who they missed, and how many high ratings you know are wrong. Our wealth screening guide covers running that comparison properly.
The question underneath all of it
Neither purchase works without a named person whose calendar has room for visits.
That is the actual constraint, and it is worth being blunt about because both a subscription and an engagement will happily take your money regardless. If the answer to “who is making these visits” is unclear, spend the money on nothing at all, hand-research your top 25, and see whether that produces meetings. If it does not, the problem is capacity and no amount of data will fix it.
If you want help thinking through which of these fits — or you would rather have someone run the first screen and hand you a portfolio — that is what our consulting work covers.
Common questions
What does a prospect research consultant cost?
A screening-and-interpretation project typically runs around $4,000-$5,000 — comparable to a year of an entry-level screening subscription, with the difference that the deliverable is a tiered portfolio rather than a data file. Ongoing retainers and per-profile research are priced separately.
Is a consultant cheaper than screening software?
For a one-time need, usually yes in total cost, because you buy the project rather than a year plus the staff time to interpret it. For ongoing screening of a growing file, software is cheaper. The question is whether the need recurs.
What should a prospect research engagement deliver?
A tiered prospect list with names, capacity ranges, suggested ask amounts and a rationale per prospect — plus a written method so your team can maintain it. A data file with scores is a partial deliverable, not the whole job.
Can we screen first and interpret later ourselves?
You can, and shops do. It works when someone on staff has run a portfolio before. It fails when the scores land with a team that has never built one, which is the most common way a screening subscription produces nothing.
This post is part of the guide to the established fundraising stack ($1M – $5M raised).