eGift Success Stories

GiftLegacy users are receiving planned gifts using the GiftLegacy System. Below are just a few of the success stories that GiftLegacy users are experiencing. If you would like to share your success story, please contact us.

Larry Smith Assistant VP Gift Planning

"GiftLegacy has become an integral part of Baylor University's Gift Planning marketing program since we began our relationship with Crescendo Interactive in 2009. Baylor University and the Office of Gift Planning appreciate the tools and services provided by Crescendo. In the past two fiscal years we have documented 59 new planned gifts for approximately $18.7 million and have realized 61 estate distributions of $20.4 million."

Glenn Pittsford Assistant Vice President for Gift Planning

"An all-time record $62.5 million in planned gifts was provided by wonderful donors for Texas A&M last fiscal year. Amazingly, in 7 of the past 11 years new all-time high planned giving levels have been reached. A total of $500 million in planned gifts have been documented in the past 12 years. The commitment of Aggies to their school continues to impress me. Many of these givers have been inspired by the planned gifting marketing they have received from us over the years. That marketing is based on and derived from the Crescendo donor-friendly marketing and e-marketing philosophy and materials. We give Crescendo much credit for the success we have enjoyed."

Bill Yaeger Assistant Vice President of Principal and Planned Gifts

"Since we have expanded the use of the Crescendo services and moved our website to GiftLegacy 3.0, we have seen a marked increase in Planned Giving activity here at The Citadel Foundation. I started exploring the Crescendo services in more detail while I was the interim Planned Giving Director in 2008 - 2009. I realized at that time that we were not making use of all their services to the extent that we could. Since the beginning of 2010, we have begun using them more and more. We switched to the new 3.0 GiftLegacy website in January. Here are some numbers: From 2008 to 2009, we had a 49% increase in dollar amount of Planned Gifts. From 2009 to 2010, we had a 136% increase in the number of Planned Gifts. Since the beginning of 2008, we have recorded $33,994,000 in Planned Gifts, most from a living alumni base of only 27,000."

Jonathan Rich Managing Director Gift Planning

"Crescendo Interactive has been a key element to the success of our gift planning program for over a decade. Ducks Unlimited, Inc. utilizes all the services offered by Crescendo. DU recently concluded a comprehensive campaign called 'Wetlands for Tomorrow.' With using the products/concepts offered through Crescendo, DU secured over $125 million in documented deferred gifts. DU raised a total of 1.7 billion during the largest conservation campaign ever conducted. Ducks Unlimited members are passionate about our critical conservation mission and Crescendo helps us assist our members and their trusted advisors in making mission changing gifts on a daily basis. Crescendo services free up my time to close current and deferred gifts. They are great partners."

Jennifer Nohelty Gift Planning Counselor

"Crescendo Interactive offers a complete planned giving system through GiftLegacy! It has given us the confidence and the competence in charitable gift planning for working with our donors, and it acts as an incredible silent salesman. We have closed over $100 million in current and deferred gifts in the past two years! Many of our donors visit our GiftLegacy website and play with the charitable giving calculators. The calculators allow our donors to see how a gift will look in their estate plan. A picture is worth a thousand words, and Crescendo’s flowcharts allow people to picture themselves as major donors. These flowcharts have been the starting point for many donors who wanted to turn their ordinary estate into an extraordinary legacy."

Judy Cash Director of Gift Planning

"Our business graduates love the ease of using GiftLegacy to run their own calculations, read stories of fellow alumni, use eLiterature, and keep up with current financial and tax information. Our GiftLaw website has over 2,000 views each week as donors and their advisors find it so easy to view GiftLaw Pro and obtain comprehensive tax information with just a few clicks. These powerful tools have generated millions of dollars in gifts to the McIntire School. The Crescendo conferences and GiftCollege provide recognized certification and life-long learning experiences enhancing one’s ability to stay abreast of changes in our exciting field of Gift Planning. Crescendo offers a complete package, more than we can use, that gives me the sense of adding a team of estate attorneys and an experienced back office to our team. What a bargain!"

Angela Schmucker Director Of Planned Giving

"I would like to share with you how much easier my life as a planned giving director is because we are very actively using so much of what Crescendo offers. After my first Practical Planned Giving Conference, I came back to the office as a brand-new PG director knowing that I had the resources to be successful. This gave me a great comfort level. I still needed to implement things, though. The good news is that everyone, including Charles, was there to support me throughout. From setting up a fantastic and professional looking website rich with content, to walking me through the various choices for literature, to answering questions on using the software, you have all been there for me. Thanks to everyone at Crescendo for helping us ramp up to what will soon be a very robust planned giving office. We have donors "coming out of the woodwork". What a great problem to have!"

Kristen L. Dugdale, Esq. Vice President of Gift Planning

"The GiftLegacy System benefited our gift planning marketing by offering eBlasts for our "Will Power" campaign. These "Will Power" branded ePostcards are also rotating on our GiftLegacy website banner to continue the theme. The GiftLegacy "Guide to Wills & Trusts" was redesigned with CU Foundation photos and donor stories. We are using our branded GiftLegacy postcards, eBlasts and website to encourage alumni to request our "Guide to Wills." The Foundation's gift planning in 2010 received $25 million in new bequest identifications for approximately 70 individual gifts. This is a 700% increase over the prior year. An additional $37 million in total planned gifts from trusts, annuities and estate distributions added to the 2010 year's planned gifts. In 2011, $33 million in new bequest identifications from approximately 56 individual gifts were designated to the Foundation. We raised an additional total of $41 million in planned gifts in 2011 also from trusts, annuities and estate distributions. In 2003 the Foundation had a total of approximately $50 million identified revocable intentions. Today we have close to $150 million."

Toni Jernigan Director of Planned Giving

"Since purchasing GiftLegacy four years ago, planned gifts to MUSC have reached record breaking levels. Last year we brought in $25 million in gifts! We attribute our substantial increase in planned gifts to our consistent branding and eMarketing - with everything, including the print marketing, driving donors back to the planned giving website. Our doctors, researchers, alumni, faculty and friends appreciate the easy to understand gift calculations and flowcharts. Crescendo's customer service gives me peace of mind, knowing that they are available to answer any planned giving questions I may have, all in one place."

Shirley Druggan Director of Planned Giving

"The University of Texas Health Science Center has subscribed to the GiftLegacy Pro System for our planned giving marketing since 2008. This total program replicates my efforts and brings significant results. The 2011 planned giving report totaled approximately $3 million from 15 gifts. Our UT bequest booking policy is to count only $1 for bequest intentions; for 2011 there were 5 bequest intentions in our total. The average planned gift was approximately $200,000. Our Science Center cost per dollar raised equaled $.01. ROI equaled 9,540%! Using the analytics in GiftLegacy’s new 3.0 CresManger, I am thrilled to see some of our eNewsletter receivers, while on their travels from as far away as Tokyo, are reading our eNewsletters and linking to our planned giving website articles. Many are frequent readers; some are visiting our GiftLegacy website daily. "

Carole Touchinski Executive Director

"The Marquette County Community Foundation has seen a major increase in donor activity and interest in planned giving that can be directly attributed to the enewsletter. In fact, the hits on our website used to be 90+% direct links, now the majority of those hits on our website are coming in via email and other links. The Crescendo products are definitely driving our P.R. and communications plans in way we never expected nor could we have ever dreamed of without the products. Investing in the products and, more importantly, the people at Crescendo has been the single most important and significant investment we have ever made."

Debbie Eliason Planned Giving Officer

"The greatest success I've seen is from GiftLegacy is in one of our member eNewsletter. 43 requests for a will guide resulted from a blurb. If I didn't have Crescendo I could not have responded quickly or efficiently to those requests. One of our GiftLegacy eNewsletters immediately brought in 12 wills guide requests, too. We just sent out another enewsletter and within 2 days, 19 requests for a will guide came through."

Rick Lofgren, CFRE President

"Shortly after we switched over to GiftLegacy 3.0, we received a number of inquiries from our supporters about IRA rollovers. Since then, two donors have executed a transfer and another has discussed doing it later this year. Having the option on our website allowed supporters to make larger gifts and reduce their taxable income - a win/win for everyone involved! One supporter told us they did the same for other charities, and thanked us for informing them it was possible"

Bentley B. Marane Executive Director, Planned Giving

"We're getting a lot of good response from our GiftLegacy eNewsletters. I customized our header with some great donor profiles and it led to a $25,000 annual gift and a confirmation of a $200,000 planned gift. The effort in personalizing my headers these last few months truly paid off!"

Pat Bilow Gift Planning Counselor

"A number of people I've worked with have commented about the excellent material in our gift planning website and wonder how I find the time to write so well and so much. Of course, I tell them about the great Crescendo staff that does all the work for me. Thanks, Crescendo! You've made such a difference! I love all the print material that can be customized to LWML. Aside from imparting a boatload of great information to lots of people, you're also making me look good!"

Randall J. Sweeney Executive Director

"Having just instituted a brand new Charitable Gift Annuity program at Chautauqua, I can firmly say that the Crescendo services have made a considerable impact on our early success. With the launch of our GiftLegacy website last fall and the use of illustrations provided through the Crescendo Pro software, we are not lacking in marketing or administrative ammunition for our new program. This has been proven to us by the fact that we are currently in the process of closing two new Charitable Gift Annuity contracts, totaling over a half million dollars. It's no coincidence that these contracts have come at the same time we began publicly promoting our new website and software. Additionally, we have seen our GiftLegacy website hits increase in each month since its launch. We haven't even scratched the surface as to what Crescendo can offer, and we are already seeing measurable success!"

J.R. Loofborrow Director of Advancement

"Mount Hermon Association, Inc. recently completed two significant gift-annuities. The largest was $500,000. Crescendo's eMarketing tools not only allowed us to provide illustrations, but also assisted us in answering the donor's specific questions. Thanks Crescendo!"

Beth Berger Autrey Divisional Planned Giving Director

"I received a call in my office from a woman, age 82, who was interested in a $15,000 Charitable Gift Annuity. As we discussed how Charitable Gift Annuities worked I found her to be very informed and inquired if she had other CGA's. She informed me that she did not, so I asked how she knew so much about them. It was then that she told me that she had learned about them from our web site. While surfing the web she had come across our GiftLegacy site and had been intrigued. She had already researched how CGA's worked, what her benefits would be and had looked at the calculations. We set an appointment and within three days I had met with her and had a signed CGA application. When I returned with her document she was very excited to have become a part of The Salvation Army."

John M. Wall Senior Divisional Planned Giving Director

"A woman donor age 60 years old was looking for information via the Internet. She typed in "charitable gift annuities" and ended up looking at the sites of a few different charities that issue CGA's. Somehow she ended up on a Salvation Army site and was referred to me since she lived in Florida. The woman indicated she had no children, was not married and was looking to increase her income. She felt this would be a good way to provide for herself and support the local Salvation Army corp. She indicated she had visited the corp on previous occasions and ended up taking out an annuity over $100,000 using cash that was in a CD."