“Momentum makes me the best major gift officer I can be. I’m more efficient, more targeted, more organized.”

— Matt Bessen, Development Officer, University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

Top Challenges Before Virtuous Momentum

• Personalizing outreach without spending excessive time
• Cut-and-paste mistakes: an email meant for one donor addressed to another
• No easy way to know which of 230 portfolio donors to prioritize on a given morning
• Contact reports that took weeks or months to get written up after a visit
• Post-trip follow-up eating into time that should have gone to prospecting
• Losing personal context (a recent move, a shared meal, a past conversation) because it lived buried in an old contact report

What the University Accomplished (With Help From Virtuous Momentum)

• Draft hundreds of emails in an afternoon
• Sent ~2,000 individualized emails in 4 months
• Replaced weeks-long contact reports with mobile logging complete before the next visit.
• Surface easily forgotten personal details and work them into outreach
• Trained the AI on their own writing voice so drafts sound like them, not like a generic assistant
• Built out automated smart alerts and reminders (birthdays, giving anniversaries, upcoming gifts, 30-day “get in touch” reminders) 
• Manage a 230-person portfolio with less manual overhead than before

The Blank Canvas or the Cut-and-Paste

The University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire is a public, regional comprehensive university serving roughly 9,300 students, and like most institutions its size, campus programs and student support lean on the ongoing generosity of alumni and donors. Keeping that giving personal, rather than routine, falls largely to development officers like Matt Bessen, a challenge that only gets harder as a donor portfolio grows.

Before Virtuous Momentum, Matt saw it as a choice between two bad options: personalize every message by hand, or move fast and risk sounding impersonal.

“Until we started on Momentum, it didn’t seem like I could [personalize every message and move quickly] at the same time.” 

— Matt Bessen, Development Officer, University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

But their current systems had real pain points:

• Emails meant for one donor sometimes went out addressed to another 
• Specifics within a copied email would get missed, so the message didn’t land as personal
• The result fell short of reaching donors on a deeply personal level

Allowing Space for the Small Details That Matter 

When the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire switched to Virtuous Momentum, Matt found that they could increase personalized details in their emails while decreasing the time spent crafting the emails. 

Virtuous Momentum pulls personal, specific details from old contact reports and donor bios, so outreach doesn’t read like a form letter. For Matt, this meant not having to rely on memory or dig back through notes before reaching out. Momentum surfaced things like:

• A family trip a donor had mentioned, worked naturally into a follow-up message
• A past conversation about a shared interest or milestone
• Details he’d genuinely forgotten, that still made the message feel personal

309 Emails in an Afternoon

In our conversation with him, Matt demonstrated for us how he uses Virtuous Momentum, pulling 309 emails and explaining that with the help of Virtuous Momentum, he could send highly-personalized emails to each of these individuals in an afternoon…2-3 hours. 

At scale, this allowed the university to send ~2,000 emails in the span of 4 months…with every email highly personalized. 

And, according to Matt, these individualized emails through Virtuous Momentum beat out a mass email send through a platform like Mailchimp any day. 

“I’m getting a lot more visits because these emails are a lot more personal.” 

— Matt Bessen, Development Officer, University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

This allows the University of Wisconsin-Eau Clai to still prioritize those personal touchpoints with donors without moving so quickly that they risk unsubscribes and mass blasts that don’t truly land with their donors. 

Teaching Momentum His Writing Style

Matt was skeptical when Virtuous Momentum’s onboarding asked for writing samples…until he saw what the AI did with them.

“[Virtuous Momentum] takes phrases and the way I say things. I don’t like to use the word love… it knows me well enough to know that isn’t my style.” 

— Matt Bessen, Development Officer, University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

He still reviews every draft before sending, by preference more than necessity. 

“AI is not perfect, and that’s why I prefer putting my eyes on it, scanning it just to make sure… I like the fact that I get to put my eyes on it. And if I don’t like it, there’s a regenerate button.” 

— Matt Bessen, Development Officer, University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

Contact Reports in Seconds, Not Months

Mobile contact reports changed how quickly Matt’s notes actually make it into the donor record, which is also what feeds the personalization above.

“I can go stream of consciousness. I can leave a visit and have an extremely well-thought-out, well-organized contact report done before I get to my next visit.” 

— Matt Bessen, Development Officer, University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

This process used to take Matt weeks and even months. 

Plus, Matt doesn’t have to switch between systems since Momentum syncs all of this info directly to his CRM. 

Smart Alerts & Reminders for a 230-Person Portfolio

With 230 donors in his portfolio, Matt relies on smart alerts and reminders within Virtuous Momentum to make sure nothing slips: 

• birthdays
• giving anniversaries
• incoming gifts that need a thank-you
• 30-day check-in reminders

Matt also appreciates the flexibility within Momentum’s smart alerts and reminders. 

“Where has [Virtuous Momentum] been all my life? And why doesn’t everybody have this?” 

— Matt Bessen, Development Officer, University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

Frequently Asked Questions

How does Virtuous Momentum help with donor outreach at scale?

Virtuous Momentum can draft personalized outreach for an entire prospecting list at once, each email individualized rather than sent as a single blast.

How does Virtuous Momentum personalize emails?

Virtuous Momentum drafts in the fundraiser’s own voice rather than a generic tone, picking up on personal phrasing from writing samples provided during onboarding.

“It takes phrases and the way I say things. I don’t like to use the word love. It knows me well enough to know that isn’t my style.” — Matt Bessen, Development Officer, University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

How does Virtuous Momentum handle contact reports?

Virtuous Momentum lets fundraisers log notes on mobile right after a visit and turns them into an organized contact report.

“I can go stream of consciousness. I can leave a visit and have an extremely well-thought-out, well-organized contact report done before I get to my next visit. That typically…used to take weeks, if not months…” — Matt Bessen, Development Officer, University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

Does Virtuous Momentum send emails without review?

No. Virtuous Momentum drafts messages for the fundraiser to review before sending, with the option to regenerate a draft that isn’t right.

“AI is not perfect, and that’s why I prefer putting my eyes on it, scanning it just to make sure. I like the fact that I get to put my eyes on it. And if I don’t like it, there’s a regenerate button.” — Matt Bessen, Development Officer, University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

How does Virtuous Momentum support large donor portfolios?

Virtuous Momentum uses automated smart alerts and reminders, such as birthdays, giving anniversaries, and periodic check-in reminders, to help fundraisers stay on top of large portfolios.