A major gift prospect walks in with their grandkids on a Saturday morning, scans a membership card, and spends three hours on site. The development director finds out on Tuesday, if at all. That gap costs you a natural moment for a hello, a thank-you, or a quick behind-the-scenes invitation.
Altru records the visit. What it does not obviously do is tap a fundraiser on the shoulder when it happens. This article covers what you can set up today, how close to real time each option gets, and the honest limits.
Start with the honest answer
We are not aware of a built-in Altru setting that sends a fundraiser an email or text the moment a specific constituent checks in at the gate. If your organization has one configured, it is likely a customization or an outside integration. Before you build anything, ask Blackbaud support whether your version supports alerts tied to a sale or scan, and test any answer in a sandbox rather than on live data.
Without a push alert, you have three practical approaches. Most organizations end up using two of them together.
Option 1: Make the record speak up at the desk
The fastest signal comes from the person already looking at the guest. Altru lets you flag constituents through things like constituencies, attributes, and notes on the constituent record. Depending on how your desk workflow is set up, some of that information can be visible when staff pull up a member during a sale or check-in. Confirm exactly what your front-line staff can see on their screen before you rely on it.
To make this work:
- Use one clear marker for prospects. A single attribute or constituency such as “Development prospect” is easier to query and easier for staff to recognize than a mix of notes.
- Keep the instruction short. “Prospect, please let Development know: ext. 214” is enough. Leave giving capacity, ask amounts, and research notes off anything front-line staff can see.
- Give staff a simple way to pass it on. A shared Development phone line, a group chat, or a radio call. Whatever it is, write it down in the desk procedures and include it in seasonal training.
This is the only option that gets a fundraiser to the lobby while the guest is still there. It also depends entirely on a person noticing and acting, so expect it to work well on weekdays and less reliably when lines are long.
Option 2: A daily “who visited” query
This is the dependable backbone. Build a query that returns visits from the previous day (or the same day, if you run it in the afternoon) and filters to constituents who carry your prospect marker. Useful columns include:
- Constituent name and lookup ID
- Assigned fundraiser or prospect manager, if you track that in Altru
- Visit date, and what they did: membership scan, ticket purchase, program or event attendance
- Membership level and expiration date
- Most recent gift date and amount
Where visit data lives depends on how your organization admits people. Membership scans, daily sales, advance sales, and event registrations may each sit in a different area, so you may need more than one query or a combined view. Check with whoever manages your admissions setup which transactions actually tie back to a constituent record. Walk-up guests paying cash at the window often are not linked to anyone.
Then decide who receives it. Some teams have the development coordinator run the query each morning and forward the relevant names to each fundraiser. Others export it to a shared spreadsheet. If your Altru setup supports scheduled or automated query output, use it; if you are not sure, ask support before assuming it does.
A next-morning list will not get anyone to the lobby in time. It does give fundraisers a timely, specific reason to reach out: “So glad you brought the family in on Saturday” is a far better opener than a cold call.
Option 3: Event and program rosters
For ticketed events, member previews, and lectures, you know the attendee list in advance. Run the same prospect filter against registrations a few days ahead and send fundraisers their names. That turns a check-in alert into a planned conversation, which is usually better anyway. Assign a staff host to the people who matter most and make sure they know what to say and what not to say.
What to do with the alert
An alert is only useful if someone acts on it in a way the visitor appreciates. A few ground rules worth agreeing on:
- Greet, don’t pitch. A family day out is not the time for an ask. A welcome, a thank-you, or an offer to show them something new is plenty.
- Record the contact. Log an interaction or contact report on the constituent record so the next person knows they were seen and by whom.
- Decide who owns follow-up. If the assigned fundraiser is out, name a backup so names on the list don’t sit for a week.
- Review the list quarterly. Prospects who have closed, declined, or moved should come off the marker, or front-desk staff will start ignoring it.
Keeping the prospect list clean
Every option above depends on one thing: the visitor scanning in has to be the same constituent record your fundraiser is tracking. Duplicate records quietly break this. The prospect may be on one record while their membership sits on another, created at the desk under a different email or a spouse’s name. Run a periodic duplicate check on your prospect group and merge carefully, keeping the record that holds the giving history and the prospect assignment.
Quick answers
Can Altru text a fundraiser when a prospect scans in?
Not that we know of without customization or an outside integration. Confirm with Blackbaud support for your environment.
What’s the simplest version to start with?
Tag prospects with one attribute and run a daily query of yesterday’s visits filtered to that attribute. You can add the desk alert once the list is reliable.
