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Documentation Dashboards Reporting

Dashboards Reporting

Dashboards & Reporting How-To

Use this guide when you already know the reporting task you need to complete and want a clear path through the dashboard or a dedicated reporting page.

Before you begin

Decide whether your goal is exploration or exact follow-up. Use the dashboard when you want a shared view of what is happening. Use a dedicated reporting page when finance, compliance, operations, or campaign management needs a precise answer or export.

When to use this page

Use this page when you need to:

  • compare donations, events, programs, and email activity in one place
  • narrow the dashboard to one area of work
  • export a finance- or compliance-oriented report
  • move from a broad summary to a precise operational follow-up task

What you will learn

This guide shows you how to:

  • compare activity across modules from the main dashboard
  • narrow the dashboard to one event, program, giving form, or designation
  • use dashboard filters before interpreting charts and KPIs
  • export Event Tax Report
  • export Receipting Compliance Report
  • understand where export is available on list-style reporting pages

Before you start

Before reviewing any dashboard or report, decide three things:

  1. What question are you trying to answer?
  2. What reporting window should everyone use?
  3. Do you need a summary view or an export?

This simple check helps avoid one of the most common reporting mistakes: opening a screen before the team has agreed on what they are actually trying to learn.

Step 1 — Compare events, programs, giving, and email activity on one dashboard

Start on the main dashboard when you want the broadest operational view.

  1. Open the dashboard.
  2. Choose a date preset or custom date range.
  3. Set the reporting period that best matches your question.
  4. Leave all sources included if you want the widest comparison.
  5. Review the KPI and trend widgets before narrowing anything down.

What this helps you do

This broad view helps staff answer questions such as:

  • Which part of the tenant appears most active right now?
  • Did fundraising improve during the same period as event or email activity?
  • Are we seeing engagement but not enough conversion?
  • Do the trends support what staff expected from recent work?

Why start broad

Teams often jump into one report too early and miss the wider pattern around it.

A broad dashboard view helps frame the conversation before anyone narrows the scope.

Example: A development director could compare a gala, a scholarship appeal, and recent email engagement before a weekly leadership check-in.

Step 2 — Confirm the filter scope before interpreting the numbers

Before acting on what you see, verify the active filters.

Pay close attention to:

  • date preset
  • start and end dates
  • period
  • included sources
  • adjustments
  • event
  • program
  • giving form
  • designation
  • attribution interaction type
  • tracking source
  • tracking subsource

Why this matters

A surprising widget does not always mean something changed in the tenant. It may simply mean the reporting scope changed.

For example:

  • one team member may be looking at a full quarter
  • another may be looking at a filtered event
  • one dashboard may include all sources
  • another may be narrowed to one source or designation

Always confirm the scope before drawing conclusions.

Tip

If a number looks unexpectedly low or high, the first thing to check is the filter set, not the data itself.

Step 3 — Narrow the dashboard to one area

When the broad view is too busy, use the drill-down filters to focus the dashboard.

Available drill-down filters may include:

  • Event
  • Program
  • Giving form
  • Designation

After applying the filters, review the updated widgets and charts again.

Use this when you want to answer questions like:

  • How did one event perform during this period?
  • Is one giving form driving most of the revenue?
  • Are results for one designation different from the overall trend?
  • Did one program show stronger engagement or participation than others?

Why this step is useful

In many cases, this narrower dashboard view is enough to answer the operational question without exporting anything.

That saves time and keeps the team in the same visual reporting context.

Step 4 — Decide whether a dedicated report is now necessary

Once the dashboard is narrowed, ask:

  • Do we still just need a summary?
  • Or do we now need an exact file, record-level review, or compliance-oriented output?

Stay in the dashboard when:

  • the KPI or chart already answers the question
  • the team is discussing overall performance
  • a screenshot or summary is enough for the next conversation
  • you are comparing cross-module activity

Move to a dedicated report when:

  • you need to export data
  • the work is finance- or compliance-focused
  • the question is no longer exploratory
  • staff need precision instead of summary

This is the point where many teams save time by switching tools intentionally instead of forcing the dashboard to do a report’s job.

Current export rule of thumb

In Altrinum, export is generally available when you are looking at a meaningful multi-row list, grouped table, or report result.

Export is generally not shown for:

  • single-record detail pages
  • KPI-only answers
  • pages where an export would add noise without real operational value

Step 5 — Export an Event Tax Report

Use the dedicated report when you need event-specific tax-related output rather than a dashboard summary.

  1. Open Event Tax Report.
  2. Set the relevant event and date filters.
  3. Review the reporting scope one more time.
  4. Export the file as CSV.

When this is the right tool

Use this report when:

  • finance needs event-related tax data
  • operations needs an exact event-focused export
  • the dashboard provides context, but not enough detail
  • staff need a file they can review outside the dashboard

Good practice

Before exporting, confirm that the selected event and reporting period match the exact request.

This is especially important when staff are handling multiple events in the same season.

Tip

Dashboard context is helpful before opening this report, but the export itself should be driven by the exact event and date scope required for the task.

Step 6 — Export a Receipting Compliance Report

Use this report when the work is specifically about receipting review, compliance follow-up, or exact donation-focused reporting.

  1. Open Receipting Compliance Report.
  2. Choose the fiscal year or a custom date range.
  3. Add receipt, profile, or giving-form filters if needed.
  4. Review the scope carefully.
  5. Export the file as CSV or XLSX.

When this is the right tool

Use this report when:

  • finance is reviewing receipting issues
  • staff need a file tied to a specific compliance process
  • you need more exactness than the dashboard provides
  • the work requires a defined fiscal or reporting window

Good practice

Align the date range to the business process, not just the screen you happened to open first.

For example, a campaign review window and a receipting compliance window may not be the same thing.

Step 7 — Review AI Ask Optimization results honestly

Use the Donations reporting surface when you want to review completed gifts that carried AI Ask Optimization attribution.

  1. Open Donations.
  2. Apply a paid date range.
  3. Add any combination of these filters if needed:
  • AI Ask Applied
  • AI Ask Strategy
  • AI Ask Confidence
  • Giving Form
  • Tracking Source
  1. Review the AI Ask summary metrics and revenue breakdown charts.
  2. Click a summary stat or use the chart widget actions to open the filtered Donations list for optimized or standard completed gifts.
  3. Export the filtered list when you need offline analysis of attribution, strategy, confidence, or stored reason codes.
  4. Treat the results as completed donation attribution only.

What this view can answer

  • How many completed gifts carried AI Ask attribution?
  • How much completed revenue came from gifts with stored AI Ask attribution?
  • Which strategies or confidence levels appeared on completed gifts?
  • Which giving forms or tracking sources were associated with optimized completed gifts?

What this view cannot answer

  • who saw optimized suggested amounts but did not donate
  • how many impressions or exposures occurred
  • conversion rates from optimization exposure to donation

Those questions would require exposure tracking, which is intentionally not part of the current reporting model.

Short honesty note

These AI Ask metrics measure completed donations that do or do not have stored AI Ask attribution on the donation record.

They do not measure who saw optimized amounts, impression volume, or exposure-to-donation conversion.

Other places export is now available

Other list-style reporting experiences in the tenant may also surface export directly when the result itself is tabular, including:

  • Ask Altrinum multi-row results
  • Prospect Research section lists

If the screen is acting like a report or filtered list, look for export there before rebuilding the same result somewhere else.

Step 7 — Use email reporting pages when the question is about email operations

If the real question is about campaign performance or audience readiness, use the email-specific reporting pages rather than forcing a broad dashboard comparison to do the job.

Current email reporting pages may include:

  • Email Performance
  • Email Audience Health

Use Email Performance when:

  • you want to review campaign trends
  • you need a more email-specific performance view
  • broad cross-module dashboard widgets are not detailed enough

Use Email Audience Health when:

  • you want to review eligibility or health concerns before sending
  • staff need to understand suppression, readiness, or list quality issues
  • the problem is about audience condition rather than campaign output

Tips and common mistakes

Tip

Start broad, then narrow. That usually produces better reporting decisions than jumping directly into an export without context.

Tip

If a widget looks surprising, check the filter set before assuming the data changed.

Warning

It is easy to compare one dashboard screen with another while forgetting that the date range or drill-down scope changed. Always confirm the active filters first.

Warning

Do not use a dashboard summary when a finance or compliance workflow requires an exact report export.

Tip

If leadership, development, and finance are all reviewing the same period, agree on the reporting window first, then let each group move into the report that matches their follow-up task.