I need to conduct what we call "lifetime value" analysis. I have a table that contains donation history of all donors for a non-profit organization. The field layout contains many fields but only fields of importance for this analysis are:

AcctNum - acct# of the donor
GiftDate - date a donation was given
Amount - amount of donation

Basically, I need to figure out how many and how much donation was received in 1997 that is considered to be "first gift" or donation from a new donor. Once determined, I need to track how much more donations were received from those same group for each subsequent years (1998, 1999, 2000, 2001).

It seemed kind of easy when I was first told about doing the analysis but now I'm kind of at a loss where to start.

1. I think I need to first determine the "first gifts" for 1997 but how?
2. Then, I need to use the same set of data to match up for each subsequent years donations given by the same group.

Is there an easy way to do this? Thanks.