Eye on FDO

Economic Crisis Information

Wondering how the current economic crisis is affecting your current prospects and past donors? FDO's grantmaker profiles now include "forecasts" to this effect, when available, within a new Economic Crisis Information section. This data has been compiled from the public announcements made by grantmakers about how they plan to respond to the recession. The Economic Crisis Information section can be found near the top of a grantmaker profile, below the At A Glance section.

New Search Fields for All Subscribers!

Are you ready for this year's first round of new enhancements? Well, here's the scoop: now you can search for grantmakers, companies, and grants by congressional district and grants by grantmaker state! In all, this increases the number of search fields in FDO from 49 to 53. Whether you're a grantseeker looking for funding prospects, a grantmaker looking for funding partners, or a researcher studying the field, we think this added flexibility will help inform your work in new ways.

Exporting Tool Enhancement

I have great news for those of you who use FDO's exporting tool: your spreadsheet file will now contain complete contact and address information when you export data from a grantmaker search results list. In all, up to nine new data fields will appear in addition to the original five, grantmaker name, city, state, total giving, and total assets.

As with the funder-specific alert service that we added to FDO earlier in the week, this enhancement was also a frequent subscriber request. In the interest of serving you better, we're pleased to oblige.

Announcing FDO Alerts!

Today, we debuted an exciting new service for FDO Professional subscribers. Now you can sign up to receive alerts on the grantmakers of your choice! FDO Alerts are delivered via e-mail and contain information on profile and status changes; details on newly posted grants; links to new 990 filings; and links to newly posted news articles, job openings, RFP announcements, and publications. Look for the "Add to My Alerts" option in the Tools section of any grantmaker profile.

The addition of a funder-specific alert service has been a popular request for some time now; the results of our last two FDO user surveys clearly show this. We're happy to make this wish a reality and we're sure that FDO Alerts will help you stay current like never before. To let us know what you think, click the Comments link below.

New! Congressional District Mapping

FDO's interactive mapping tool just got even better. Today, we added a new geographic display option for state maps that enables FDO Professional subscribers to map a funder's grants by U.S. congressional district! As with our three other state-level geographic display options—county, city, and ZIP code—you can continue drilling down to view a list of recipients specific to a particular congressional district, a list of grants specific to a particular recipient, and finally an individual grant record.

The ability to map grants by congressional district provides yet another way for you to clarify your understanding of a funder's giving and is sure to be especially useful if you're a grantmaker, policymaker, or philanthropic researcher. I hope you like it! To share your thoughts, click the Comments link below.

New! Mapping and Charting

I'm excited to announce that we've added two new tools for FDO Professional subscribers. Now you can map and chart the distribution of a funder's recently awarded grants!

Our interactive mapping tool enables you to view grant dollars on a U.S. or world map and drill down to see disbursements by county, city, or ZIP code. Our interactive charting tool enables you to view a bar chart breakdown of grants by recipient type or primary subject and drill down to second and third levels of detail. Look for the new Map Grants and Chart Grants tabs at the top of FDO's grantmaker records.

These new features will help you focus your fundraising strategy like never before and I hope you're as enthusiastic about them as I am. To share your thoughts with us, click the "Tell Us What You Think" link at the top of any mapping or charting screen or click the Comments link below.

You Spoke, We Listened

I'm happy to announce that, by popular request, FDO's grantmaker profiles are now available in an alternate "compact" format! Just click the Compact View link at the top of any grantmaker profile to switch views for the remainder of your current session. To switch back at any time, click the Standard View link. The advantages of Compact View include less on-screen scrolling and a reduction in paper when printing. So, the choice is yours: Standard View or Compact View. We know many of you have requested this preference option and we're happy to deliver.

Ready...Set...Blog!

Welcome to Eye on FDO! I'm Dave Clark, the Foundation Center's manager of online subscription services. As the official blog of Foundation Directory Online, Eye on FDO will serve as a platform for communication between myself and the FDO community. I'll keep you up to date on all the latest happenings and help you take full advantage of all FDO has to offer.

If you've been an FDO subscriber for even a short length of time, you know that feedback is extremely important to us. After all, our goal is to enhance FDO based on what we hear from you. In that spirit, I encourage you to post comments to my blog entries and make suggestions for improving Foundation Directory Online. Just click the Comments link below any of my posts to reply.

Eye on FDO isn't our first interactive vehicle for communicating with subscribers, and probably won't be our last, but I do think it will help us to share information with you quicker and more frequently than ever before. With that in mind, be sure to visit often to stay current on everything FDO.

Thanks, and welcome!