Nonprofits, what's your problem?

Do nonprofits have a problem?

You know that selecting, buying, and implementing enterprise software is a complex task requiring detailed technical knowledge rarely part of the “day job” of the people making the decision.  Furthermore, the process could take months to a couple years (or more).

That’s not the problem.

The stereotype of software salespeople as predators is often true. Many, especially those working for large, publicly traded companies or venture-capitalized start-ups, are on quota. They’re not bad people, but if they miss their quota, they risk losing their job; closing the deal, makes them money. It’s easy to see how this zero-sum game might lead one to gloss over complexity and nuance.

Companies design a veil of confusion around their products, contracts, and pricing for a key reason: they are beholden to revenue estimates for which Wall Street and VCs hold them accountable. Failure to meet estimates can mean lower stock prices and loss of shareowner trust.  

That’s not the problem either, because--honestly--who trusts salespeople, anyway?

The key issue is nonprofits themselves. You’re too nice. Organizations deal with punishing sales experiences all the time. Some even wind up happy. How? If your nonprofit wants to make the process of selecting, buying, and implementing enterprise software work, you need to become knowledgeable, demanding, cynical.

You need to be a tough customer. 

Here’s how:

1. Have staff knowledgeable about the business operations and technology help make the right choice. Free up their time so these people can focus on the process and engage with the details before a decision is made. If you have staff whom can drive the process, you have to make sure that their other responsibilities are reduced so they can give this process their undivided attention. Consider devoting internal staff to the project or working with a consultant familiar with the organization’s needs.
2. Software can only improve a situation when it aligns to an organization's strategic plan and goals.  How many nonprofits actually get specific goals and expectations from senior leadership before researching and selecting software? The best projects have someone from senior leadership (CEO, COO) as engaged project sponsors, setting direction, removing roadblocks and holding everyone accountable. If the CEO can have an intelligent conversation about what’s going well and what’s not working during the process, her/his level of involvement is about right.
3. Get staff buy-in. Dictates from on-high rarely survive ground conditions. Project owners or managers should find out if the software will work for staff and give them what they need. The result is that staff will actually use the product when the switch flips on.
4. Boards usually carry fiduciary responsibility for an enterprise software decision but are rarely involved in selection. If the board has to approve the funds, they might consider appointing a member to get involved and stay involved. You don't want to have to ask the board for money more than once.
5. Consider the alignment of the vendor with your market and their track record of successful long-term relationships with clients like you. My belief is smaller, privately held firms are most willing to go the extra mile for their clients.
6. Hold vendors accountable to terms of contracts, statements of work, and deadlines. If something feels wrong, it probably is. The time to address a problem is early. If this makes your salesperson or project manager uncomfortable, that might be an indication you found something that will make your life difficult later. It is okay to push back early–you are the customer, after all.

Ready for even more integrations?

ClearView CRM connects with even more software that nonprofits use regularly

New accounting software integration is system’s 14^th

The list keeps growing. ClearView CRM from SofTrek Corporation added three more applications with which the system connects. The integrations, which allow the applications to “talk” to ClearView CRM directly, give SofTrek's nonprofit clients the flexibility to build a fundraising software system that exactly meets their organizations’ needs. 

The applications that newly connect with ClearView CRM include peer-to-peer and online event fundraising, in addition to the system’s 14^th accounting software integration. They are:

• DonorDrive peer-to-peer fundraising software that provides tools for people to raise funds for causes they care about.
• TeamRaiser online event fundraising software that helps organizations turn event participants into fundraisers.
• Epicor accounting software, which provides general ledger journals, accounts payable and receivable, cash management and other accounting functions.

ClearView CRM’s core donor database now connects through APIs (application programming interfaces) with nearly 45 applications that nonprofits use regularly, such as accounting, credit-card payment processing, giving analytics, prospect research, email marketing and more.

“These latest integrations with ClearView CRM prove our commitment to helping our nonprofit clients create fundraising software systems that work exactly as they want them to,” said Robert Girardi, SofTrek president and CEO. “We've always believed in playing nicely with others, as the tech industry puts it, and we'll continue to add to the list of applications to which our clients can connect ClearView CRM."

Turning Reports into Dashboard Panels

Are you on a quest for the perfect fundraising dashboard? With ClearView CRM, you have a useful option of adding your own report-based, custom panels to the system’s standard list of dashboard panel choices.

ClearView CRM offers a range of panels already built into its Panel Library, from Action Reminders and Gifts by Geography, to Prospects Added in Past Month and numerous others. As luck (or software developers) would have it, you also can add panels that reflect reports you use frequently but that don’t appear on the built-in panel list. Technically, this is called “rendering” a report in a custom panel.

Adding a new custom panel to your available Panel Library list offers a few advantages:

• Efficiency: Report information that you use frequently is immediately available in the panel when you log in to your ClearView CRM dashboard.
• Effectiveness: An optimum panel configuration allows you to grasp quickly the import of what you see.
• Choice: You have more options with which to build exactly the dashboard(s) that supports your and your organization’s work.

Many interactive summary reports in the ClearView Reports Library are good candidates for a custom panel. Great examples are the Active Donor by Geography report and the Solicitor Activity Performance Summary report. Your ClearView CRM administrator will need to configure any new custom panels to display properly and with the right kind of information.  After you select the report you want in the custom panel, you’ll choose an appropriate visual layout. Once the panel is complete, it will show up in the Panel Library, and anyone can choose to include it in a dashboard.

If you don’t have support from an internal ClearView CRM administrator, ask for help to create your report-based custom panel from your account manager or anyone on the Client Services Team. They’ll be happy to help you produce a custom panel that can immediately show up on the fundraising dashboard of your dreams.

New Connections, New Capabilities

ClearView CRM Connects to Three More Applications

New integrations add accounting, call center and social capabilities

If you're a multi-channel fundraising shop, ClearView CRM fundraising software has taken your

ability to connect all your channels to a new level.  You probably know that ClearView already integrates with a long list of various kinds of applications--accounting, online giving, giving analytics and more--that nonprofits use regularly.

Three new integrations recently added to the slate of applications with which the system connects. All will help ClearView's nonprofit clients conduct their fundraising efforts more efficiently and accurately by “talking” to one another directly. New integrations come from the accounting, call center and social engagement arenas:

• Workday Financial Management, a cloud-based suite of accounting applications including grants management and reporting.
• USA800, an inbound call center that allows nonprofits to outsource their constituent-support and telephone donation-processing needs.
• Crowdster, a group of social applications like networking, cause marketing, event registration and more.

ClearView CRM’s donor database now connects through APIs (application programming interfaces) with some 40 applications.

“We’ve always had a philosophical commitment to openness for ClearView CRM,” said Robert Girardi, president and CEO of SofTrek, which develops ClearView. “These new integrations reflect our continuing efforts to expand the range of applications to which clients can connect our constituent relationship management system.”

6 Ways to to Grow Your Active Donor Base with Data, Part 3

In Part 3, the final part, of this post, we'll discuss simple ways to optimize your direct fundraising processes to help grow your active donor list.


Selecting and segmenting lists to which you send appeals, as well as direct mail fundraising, are both art and science. Taking a fresh look at how you do them can help grow your active donor list.

• Try segmenting lapsed donors based on preferences like their preferred giving channel and on issues in which they expressed interest. Both provide more targeted appeals.
• Use the “monetary” part of RFM segmentations to make decisions on approaches to lapsed donors. For instance, begin your ask level based on the donor’s last donation so you’re not asking a former $50 giver for $25.
• Try using philanthropic rating on your lists, importing the screening data to help you select lists for mailings. By doing so, one client organization increased its response rate to acquisition mailings by 67% while decreasing its expenses because it sent fewer appeals to more appropriate targets.

Direct mail tactics are also fair game for experimentation. When you implement your next acquisition campaign, try suppressing only active donors rather than using other more selective criteria. Another possibility is mailing deeply into your lapsed donor file during an acquisition campaign. Organizations that have mailed to past donors who were up to 20(!) years lapsed have seen documented recapture rates of nearly 1.5%.


You can also consider using carefully evaluated outside lists—from other NPOs, compiled lists and consumer-response lists. Although list acquisition is problematic for any organization, and response rates on purchased lists are generally low, exchanging your donor lists with other NPOs can be a fruitful way to obtain names for acquisition campaigns. List exchange names typically cost less than rentals and often perform better. In addition, you can also try comparing your lapsed donor lists with outside lists to determine duplicate donors considered “multi-buyers” who could be your best prospects.


Finally, make sure you’re mailing in sufficient numbers to achieve your acquisition goals. You can do this by determining mail quantities using actual attrition statistics and typical (not wishful) response rates. For instance, say your active donor list is 200,000, and your historical attrition rate of has been 16%. If you want to add 10% more new donors to grow your active base, you need to acquire approximately 5000 new donors. If each acquisition mailing attracts one new donor for every 100 names, you must mail 500,000 pieces each year.

6 Ways to Grow Your Active Donor Base with Data, Part 1

Without a healthy active donor base, you’re in trouble. That’s a truism all nonprofit fundraisers acknowledge. Growing the number of active donors is a constant process, but you can take steps today to boost that effort. The following strategies focus on reactivating lapsed donors and acquiring new names.  Upgrading current donors is certainly important, but these folks are already active givers.

For most nonprofits, addressing attrition is the key to growing a healthy active list.  Most also recognize the need to generate growth in new donors.  Making sure the data your organization has is working the way it should can address both needs and translate to better results.  And, no, your data doesn't have to be “big.” You can make use of data already in your systems to encourage growth.
  

#1:  Tighten Up Data Management

Data management is the administrative process by which your organization acquires, validates, stores, protects and processes the data it needs. The result of good data management is data that’s accessible, reliable, timely and accurate enough to satisfy the needs of anyone who uses it.
If your data is not satisfying everyone—if it, in fact, gives people heartburn—try a few of these tactics to tighten up your data management.

• Most important and a best practice: Merge all your databases--donor, volunteer and event, even shadow--into one main list.  Also, integrate your online database, if you have one.  So many benefits here: If someone makes a change (e.g., snowbirds indicate their preferred seasonal addresses), everyone has access to the information. Incorrect data due to double entries decreases.  Any information captured online immediately appears in the main database.  The list goes on.
• Standardize how you collect data.  First, determine what donor and prospect information is required when a record enters the system, whether by manual entry or online capture.  Also, require the use of USPS-standard address formats.  A further step is to expand your data collection to include information you might not currently store, such as mail records that show appeals, responses to appeals or giving channel breakdowns.
• Standardized your workflows.  Adopt and communicate a consistent way to code information, and build that into your system.  For instance, make mandatory certain information (say, source codes showing where donors come from) so that anyone who adds a record into the system has no choice but to enter the info.
• Implement a National Change of Address (NCOA) and/or “new move list” service (from companies like SofTrek partner Melissa Data) to ensure that current addresses are always available even on inactive donors.  Since U.S. Census Bureau statistics indicate around 15% of people change addresses in a year, this move alone could greatly increase the quality of your contact data. 

Next:  Thoughtful list analysis

9 Must-ask Questions for Your Nonprofit CRM RFP (Part II)

By Steve Birnbaum

(Part 2)

Last post, we discussed the first five of nine questions you need to ask when you’re developing an RFP for a new nonprofit CRM. These final four questions continue the process of digging deeply into the real and vital (yet sometimes not obvious) strengths and weaknesses of any system you’re considering.

6. How does your system safeguard constituent data in the cloud?

Make sure vendors can specify how their security strategy keeps sensitive donor information safe. Cloud-based systems should help you meet data governance rules, have well-established policies for disaster recovery and PCI compliance and meet all appropriate regulations and standards.

7. Does your system empower multi-channel fundraising?

More and more NPOs are running sophisticated multi-channel fundraising campaigns. Any system you review should not only support large, complex direct-mail segmentation for online and offline campaigns but also offer tools to support major and planned giving, including capital campaign management.

8. How will your system support our national/chapter organizational structure?

Your chapters shouldn’t get less out of a system just because they’re not national headquarters. Ask if vendors’ systems have built-in national/chapter organization functions. Systems you consider should also be able to enforce rules about how chapters share, see and access data.

9. Do you provide a development environment?

A complete development environment should be a mandatory part of any system implementation. Ask vendors if they include all of your data in a test system at no charge, allowing you to test integrations and other system changes without affecting your live data.



Remember, your organization’s goal is not simply to buy a nonprofit CRM or fundraising software. Your ultimate goal is to make sure that your system improves the way you interact with all your constituents and helps you grow their devotion to your cause. Good luck with the process. 
Read Part 1 of this post . . .

Steve Birnbaum is SofTrek’s Vice President of Client Solutions.  He has more than 17 years’ experience in nonprofit management, with particular expertise in organizational planning, technology implementation, and change management.

9 Must-ask Questions for Your Nonprofit CRM RFP

By Steve Birnbaum

(Part I)

When you’re developing an RFP for your new nonprofit CRM system, some questions are more equal than others. In addition to the basics about functionality, make sure you include nine other must-ask questions, five of which we feature in this post. These questions get at some of the most important, but sometimes overlooked, aspects of a nonprofit CRM or fundraising software system. The answers will reveal a great deal about the in-depth capabilities of the systems you’re considering.

1. Can you describe the vision and product roadmap for your system?

The systems you consider might have wonderful features today. Your organization, however, is buying a system for today and for years from now. Make sure vendors can clearly explain their plans for their system in the next several years. Be alert for vendors offering outdated client/server technology today while planning to require your purchase of an expensive upgrade in a few years.

2. Can your system grow with us?

Your organization is not static, so ask vendors if their systems are scalable. Your system’s capacity should easily grow with your organization, accommodating any number of users and constituent records. Even if you never plan to grow that large, you should be confident that millions of records and hundreds of users would never be a problem.

3. Can your system align with our business processes?

You work with constituents and constituent data in the way that makes sense for your organization. Vendors should be able to configure their systems to work the way you do, not vice versa. Look for a platform that accommodates extensive configuration without the downside of having custom software.

4. Are you committed to system integration?

Ask vendors if they have a track record of working closely with other vendors to share data and processes among systems. A look at their current system integrations (finance systems, content management systems and others) will offer a good indication if they actually do. Unless you want to live in your vendor’s walled garden, make sure they play nicely with others.

5. How can you help us improve our major gift effort?

The key to effective major gift solicitation is having a full picture of a prospective major giver’s relationship with your organization. Ask vendors if their system includes a comprehensive constituent relationship management (contact management) platform to support annual and long-term development efforts for major gift programs, including tools for forecasting, reporting and analysis. The system also should run on tablets and other mobile devices on which major gift officers often rely.
 


Next post:  The final four must-ask questions for your nonprofit CRM RFP

Steve Birnbaum is SofTrek’s Vice President of Client Solutions.  He has more than 17 years’ experience in nonprofit management, with particular expertise in organizational planning, technology implementation, and change management.