Central Ohio startup SureImpact Inc. has raised $2 million to expand the market for its software seeking to transform philanthropy by demonstrating which interventions actually work.
Nearly 2,000 workers at nonprofits are using SureImpact's data analytics to track results for a collective 90,000 clients, such as whether a rent voucher improves someone's housing stability, founder and CEO Sheri Chaney Jones said.
"We envision becoming the best-in-class, dominant, best-in-market platform that all nonprofits are using ... to measure impact," Jones said in an interview. "This is a product that has been needed for a really long time. We are first to market in using technology to solve this problem.
"What it means for the world is, hopefully people will receive more person-centric interventions that actually work and solve their problems."
The seed round, led by Rev1 Ventures with participation from Queen City Angels and individual angel investors, brings the startup to a cumulative $2.6 million raised since it debuted in February 2020.
Clients use the data to improve their effectiveness by boosting what works and eliminating what doesn’t, and in turn donors and taxpayers can steer their dollars to the most effective programs.
Clients of the software already are getting more funding and news coverage as a result of demonstrating impact, she said. Nationally, nonprofits report a drop in philanthropy.
"That donor who wants to have their name on something can feel even more excited, because they can put their name on something and share the social return on investment," Jones said.
"The early adopters are driving cultural change for everybody else,"
After demonstrating product-market fit in Ohio, the round will help with a sales and marketing expansion to other states.
One of Columbus Inno's Startups to Watch for 2023, the Liberty Township company has eight employees. Jones also is an honoree in the inaugural Women of Influence awards from Columbus Business First.
The software recently rolled out dashboards to filter and analyze data, updated every four hours.
"These are insights that would take organizations days if not weeks to analyze just once," Jones said. "Now they just log in."
The Columbus Department of Development signed SureImpact to track results over the next three years for all 112 nonprofits that received Elevate grants through two rounds, using federal Covid relief dollars. The contract was less than $50,000 so did not need City Council approval, the agency confirmed.
"Columbus likes to be known as innovative and collaborative and one of the first," Jones said. "For them to be doing government in this way unlike any other city in the country is exciting."
Other clients include Columbus-based Siemer Institute, which helps families on the brink of homelessness stabilize their housing, and Huckleberry House. The Ohio Department of Health also is using it to measure results from grantees.
SureImpact was inspired by Jones' consulting business, Measurement Resources Inc., which she started in 2010 to provide data-driven insights to help nonprofits operate more effectively. The startup purchased rights from Measurement Resources to a library of 300 best practices templates for various sectors.
Rev1 was an initial investor in 2020, and its COO Kristy Campbell is on the board. SureImpact has used Rev1's discounted business services and subsidized interns, besides learning from the experience of other startups.
“With an innovative product and a proven track record, the sky's the limit for SureImpact," Cambell said in a release.
SureImpact also would be a "great fit" for public companies seeking to demonstrate their environmental social and governance work, Jones said, "which would expand our customer base."
A logical entry point would be corporate foundations, similar to its current clientele.
"Our biggest challenge ahead is we are innovative," Jones said. "We're not a commodity product – we're something new and different that doesn't exist."
As a manual process, the analysis SureImpact provides requires so much time and energy that many nonprofits never even try, she said.
"Not only do you have to educate the market the product is available, but you have to educate the market that the problem we're solving is now solvable."
