Mission Research
InnesFarm builds and supports fundraising and donor management solutions to the SOHO market and nonprofit sector.
| Date | Investors | Amount | Round |
|---|---|---|---|
| investor | €0.0 | round | |
| investor | €0.0 | round | |
N/A | Acquisition | ||
| Total Funding | 000k | ||
Mission Research, founded in 2000 by Dr. Heather Scott-Marshall, carved a niche for itself as a full-service market research firm long before it launched its notable software product, CircleDog. The company was established with the objective of applying rigorous, peer-review standards of academic research to the private and public sectors. Dr. Scott-Marshall, who holds a PhD from the University of Toronto, leveraged her extensive background in advanced quantitative and qualitative research methods to build the firm's reputation. Her professional journey through consulting for national research firms revealed a gap in quality and ethical standards, which directly inspired the formation of Mission Research. The firm was joined by other seasoned professionals like Lucas Marshall and Chris O'Rourke, who brought decades of experience in research and operations.
The company's business model was service-based, providing strategic consulting and in-depth research to a diverse client base that spanned all levels of government and various private sectors, including finance, telecommunications, e-commerce, and media. Revenue was generated by executing high-level research projects such as complex market segmentation, brand positioning, customer satisfaction studies, and new product development. In August 2008, Mission Research expanded its offerings by launching CircleDog, a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software specifically designed for non-profit organizations to manage their donor and customer relationships. This product represented a strategic move to package their data management expertise into a scalable software-as-a-service (SaaS) solution for a specific vertical market.
CircleDog operated as a key product line under the Mission Research umbrella. As a CRM for non-profits, its function was to streamline fundraising, communication, and constituent management for charitable organizations. This positioned the company in the non-profit technology sector. The journey of Mission Research and its CircleDog product concluded in August 2013 when the company was acquired by Frontstream. Following the acquisition, the CircleDog product was eventually discontinued, marking it as a deadpooled entity in the tech landscape.
Keywords: Mission Research, CircleDog, non-profit CRM, donor management software, Frontstream acquisition, Dr. Heather Scott-Marshall, market research firm, customer relationship management, public sector research, private sector consulting, fundraising software, constituent management, deadpooled, non-profit technology, data management, strategic consulting, brand positioning, customer satisfaction studies