Journey Types Explained

Overview

Each journey template in Vega is designed for a specific type of relationship or fundraising program. This article explains the purpose of each journey, who it is designed for, and when to use it.

A contact can be in multiple journeys simultaneously — for example, many major donors are also bequest prospects.

In case you missed it, read the Introduction to Journey Templates first.

Fundraising journeys

Major Donor Journey

Who it's for: Individual prospects and donors being cultivated for a significant gift.

The Major Donor Journey uses the LAI framework — Linkage, Ability, and Interest — to assess each prospect's likelihood of making a major gift. Linkage measures how connected the prospect is to your organisation and the people in it. Ability measures their financial capacity. Interest measures their enthusiasm for your cause.

The journey has six stages: Prospect Qualification, LAI Scoring, Cultivation Touchpoint, Solicitation, Stewardship Action, and Renewal. 

It includes six insights: Major Donor Readiness, LAI Score, Ask Readiness, Cultivation Momentum, Stewardship Health, Lapsed Donor, and Reactivation.

Use this journey for any individual donor where you are managing the relationship personally and working towards a specific ask.

Bequests Journey

Who it's for: Prospects and confirmed legacy donors.

The Bequests Journey tracks individuals through the delicate process of identifying, engaging, and stewarding legacy donors. It uses propensity indicators — age, giving tenure, mission connection, and bequest signals — to score each prospect's likelihood of leaving a gift in their will.

The journey has four stages: Prospect Identification, Legacy Conversation, Commitment, and Stewardship

It includes three insights: Bequest Indicator Score (overall propensity), Legacy Conversation Readiness (whether the time is right to raise the topic), and Bequest Stewardship Health (quality of the ongoing relationship with confirmed bequest donors).

Trusts & Foundations Journey

Who it's for: Philanthropic trusts, foundations, government grant programs, and community funds.

The Trusts & Foundations Journey covers the full grant cycle: identifying funders, assessing alignment, building a relationship, submitting an application, receiving a grant, and reporting back. It tracks mission alignment, previous funding history, relationship depth, application quality, reporting compliance, and renewal likelihood.

The journey has three stages: Funder Identification & Alignment, Cultivation & Application, and Reporting & Compliance

It includes four insights: Funder Alignment Score, Application Success Rate, Funder Stewardship Health, and Funder Renewal Likelihood.

Use this journey for institutional funders rather than individual donors. If a corporate has its own foundation, use the Trusts & Foundations Journey for the foundation entity and the Corporate Partnerships Journey for the company itself.

Corporate Partnerships Journey

Who it's for: Companies being approached for sponsorships, partnerships, cause-related marketing, payroll giving, or significant donations.

The Corporate Partnerships Journey tracks the relationship with a corporate prospect from initial identification through to an active, renewing partnership. It assesses mission alignment, giving capacity, decision-maker access, engagement quality, and stewardship health.

The journey has eight stages: Identified, Qualification, Cultivation, Proposal & Negotiation, Stewardship, and Lapsed.

It includes four insights: Corporate Alignment Score, Corporate Engagement Momentum, Corporate Stewardship Health, and Corporate Renewal Likelihood.

Corporate Engagement Momentum uses a Trend display format rather than a Tier Score, so you can see at a glance whether the relationship is warming, stable, or cooling.

Mid-Level Donor Journey

Who it's for: Donors giving in the $500–$10,000 range who have potential to upgrade significantly.

The Mid-Level Donor Journey focuses on the conversion opportunity in the mid-level tier — donors who give regularly and meaningfully but haven't yet been cultivated for a major gift conversation. It tracks giving frequency, tenure, gift range, engagement breadth, wealth signals, and upgrade readiness.

The journey has six stages: Identified, Qualification, Cultivation, Stewardship, Major Gift Referral, and Lapsed.

It includes three insights: Mid-Level Upgrade Likelihood, Mid-Level Engagement Depth, and Mid-Level Loyalty Health.

Use this journey as a feeder into the Major Donor Journey. When a mid-level donor is referred upwards, their record can carry both journeys simultaneously during the transition.

Regular Giving Journey

Who it's for: Recurring donors giving via direct debit, credit card, or payroll giving.

The Regular Giving Journey is the highest-volume journey for most organisations. It focuses on three things: retaining existing regular donors, identifying and acting on cancellation risk early, and finding donors ready for an upgrade ask.

The journey has six stages: Acquisition, Onboarding, Active, Giving Upgrade, At Risk, and Lapsed.

It includes three insights: Regular Giving Retention Risk, Regular Giving Upgrade Likelihood, and Consecutive Year Giving Score. All three are expressed as 0–100 scores — higher is better, meaning a high Retention Risk score means the donor is healthy and unlikely to cancel.

Event Donor Journey

Who it's for: Contacts who attend fundraising events and have potential to become committed donors.

The Event Donor Journey tracks contacts from their first event attendance through to conversion as a regular or major donor. It records event type, giving behaviour at the event, number of events attended, and post-event follow-up actions.

The journey has five stages: Event Attendee, Follow-up, Regular Donor Pipeline, Major Donor Pipeline, and Lapsed.

It includes one insight: Event Donor Conversion Likelihood, which weighs giving behaviour at events and attendance frequency to indicate which event donors are most worth pursuing.

Community Fundraising Journey

Who it's for: Peer-to-peer fundraisers running their own fundraising pages, challenges, or activities.

The Community Fundraising Journey tracks fundraisers from recruitment through to completion and re-engagement. It records the type of activity, fundraising target, amount raised, engagement level, and participation history.

The journey has five stages: Recruited, Active, Completed, Re-engagement, and Lapsed.

It includes one insight: Fundraiser Re-engagement Likelihood, which identifies fundraisers most likely to participate again in the next campaign.

Capital Campaign Journey

Who it's for: Major gift prospects being approached specifically as part of a named capital campaign.

The Capital Campaign Journey is a time-limited journey tied to a specific campaign. It covers quiet phase asks, public phase asks, pledge management, and post-campaign stewardship. Unlike the Major Donor Journey, which is evergreen, the Capital Campaign Journey is typically imported once per campaign and archived when the campaign closes.

The journey has six stages: Prospect Identification, Quiet Phase Ask, Public Phase Ask, Pledge Management, Stewardship, and Declined.

It includes one insight: Capital Campaign Pledge Health, which tracks whether pledge payments are on schedule.

In Memoriam Journey

Who it's for: Families and individuals who give a tribute or memorial gift.

The In Memoriam Journey manages the sensitive period after a first tribute gift, with the goal of converting a one-off gift into a long-term relationship — without being inappropriate given the circumstances. It tracks tribute gift type, acknowledgement quality, mission connection, and interest in staying connected.

The journey has five stages: First Gift, Acknowledgement, Legacy Conversation, Regular Giving, and Lapsed.

It includes one insight: In Memoriam Conversion Readiness, which weighs the depth of the person's connection to the cause and their openness to further contact.

Volunteer journeys

Volunteer Onboarding Journey

Who it's for: New volunteer applicants going through the onboarding process.

The Volunteer Onboarding Journey covers every step of the compliance and induction process: application, interview, skills profiling, background checks, referee checks, police checks, training, and assignment. It tracks compliance status at each step and flags volunteers ready to be identified as giving prospects.

The journey has nine stages: Application Accepted, Interview, Skills & Interests, Background Checks & Referees, Police Check, Training & Induction, Assignment, Active Volunteer, and Lapsed.

It includes three insights: Volunteer Engagement Health (mission connection, motivation, and engagement quality), Volunteer Retention Risk (tenure, engagement, and lapse signals), and Volunteer Role Suitability (availability, skills match, interview outcome, and compliance clearances).

Volunteer to Donor Journey

Who it's for: Active volunteers identified as potential financial supporters.

The Volunteer to Donor Journey manages the careful process of building a giving relationship with a volunteer — without jeopardising the volunteer relationship. It tracks volunteer tenure, mission connection, engagement quality, relationship-building touchpoints, and giving conversation readiness.

The journey has five stages: Volunteer Identified, Relationship Building, First Gift Ask, Donor, and Lapsed. 

It includes two insights: Volunteer Donor Readiness (overall readiness for a giving conversation) and Volunteer Mission Alignment (depth of personal connection to the cause).

Volunteers in the Onboarding Journey can be flagged as giving prospects at the Assignment stage, which creates or updates their record in the Volunteer to Donor Journey automatically.