One of the most rewarding perks of working at a healthcare facility is the meaningful relationships your staff members form with patients. In return for the help and life-changing treatment they received, it’s only natural for patients to seek an outlet for expressing their thanks.
That’s where grateful patient programs come in! This top healthcare fundraising strategy allows patients and their families to honor your hospital’s staff, an area of care, or a clinical program with a generous donation.
Through grateful patient programs, donors can make tangible contributions that directly impact the quality of your patient care, such as by giving funds for a cancer research program, a new MRI machine, or even resources to build a new wing.
That’s why we’ve got your back by outlining seven essential steps for supercharging your grateful patient program.
But before walking through how to connect and earn these vital donations, let’s begin by answering a few basic questions about grateful patient programs.
Grateful Patient Programs: FAQ
Grateful patient programs have a lot in common with other types of fundraising initiatives. However, due to the delicate nature of patient relationships, there are a few key differences that healthcare organizations should be aware of when launching their program.
What is a grateful patient program?
Nonprofit consultant Graham-Pelton offers this definition of grateful patient programs as a starting point: “A grateful patient program consists of all the steps and resources that a healthcare institution uses in order to consistently secure grateful patient donations as an ongoing initiative.”
Essentially, a grateful patient program is a donation program offered by hospitals and healthcare organizations. While these organizations are unlikely to turn down small or mid-sized donations from patients, grateful patient programs usually target individuals who have the potential to be major donors. As such, these programs consist largely of strategies for stewarding relationships with patients.
What are the benefits of a grateful patient program?
Grateful patient programs enable patients to express their gratitude to the hospitals and healthcare organizations that helped them. These donations usually go to programs and services dedicated to treating patients with similar conditions to what they experienced.
For hospitals and other healthcare institutions, grateful patient programs are often a core part of their fundraising strategy. These programs enable hospitals to fund the life-saving services they offer, such as buying new equipment, furthering research, and keeping their staff employed.
What are the elements of a successful grateful patient program?
As we go through how to launch your grateful patient program, we’ll review why each step is essential to your hospital’s success. However, a few core elements of functioning grateful patient programs to highlight beforehand include:
- Supportive staff. Ensure your entire team is aware of and supports your grateful patient program. Create lines of communication between doctors and other medical staff with your fundraising team. When your staff sees your grateful patient program as necessary for your hospital’s continued operations and ability to provide a high level of care, they’ll be more likely to proactively assist fundraisers.
- A positive patient experience. Patients are far more likely to participate in a grateful patient program if they are, in fact, grateful for the care they received. Speak with patients about their experiences at your hospital to ensure they receive high-quality treatment, compassion from your staff, and convenience in accessing care.
- Purposeful results tracking. As with any fundraiser, monitor your results to identify your current strategies’ strengths and weaknesses. Ensure your team tracks metrics such as donor acquisition, repeat donations, response rates to donation solicitations, and patient feedback in response to fundraising requests.
Additionally, your grateful patient program must follow all privacy and compliance regulations. Keep patient data secure and follow HIPAA requirements to show respect for patients, protect their privacy, and avoid compromising your hospital’s standing with state and federal standards.
1. Gain Support for Your Grateful Patient Program
While we hope you’re as enthusiastic about grateful patient programs as we are, remember that not everyone on your hospital staff will be ready to support your program right off the bat. Many members of your team may not be aware of or even have doubts about grateful patient programs, and your first step is to get influential members of your hospital’s leadership on board.
With the support of your hospital administration, board members, and CEO, your healthcare fundraising team can form a dedicated group to plan, manage, and promote a successful grateful patient program.
Here is an overview of the roles various team members might play:
- Hospital administration and board members can lend support for advancing healthcare fundraising initiatives associated with your grateful patient program. These individuals can help plan activities and allocate funding to get your program off the ground.
- Major and planned gift officers will conduct prospect research, organize donor data, and cultivate lasting donor healthcare bonds. Ensure your gift officers coordinate with the rest of your fundraising team to help strategically plan events, adjust outreach, and secure major donations.
- Doctors and nurses can act as ambassadors for your grateful patient program once you’ve gained support from higher-up authorities. Be conscious that medical personnel may be uncomfortable with directly soliciting gifts from patients or families. To help ease the burden, encourage your physicians to only provide information about your grateful patient program to those who express a specific interest in giving back to your hospital. Keep lines of communication open so staff can quickly call in a member of your fundraising team to answer patients’ questions and ensure medical team members can focus on providing care.
To gain buy-in from these teams, do your research and be ready to present data that demonstrates the impact your grateful patient program has the potential to make.
Additionally, the clearer you can be about the specific role each team member will play, the better. After all, doctors are far more likely to support a program if they understand that their main role is to alert your fundraising team to interested patients rather than having to make a sales pitch to their patients themselves.
2. Create Grateful Patient Protocol for Your Hospital
As mentioned, you may have trouble attaining some staff members’ buy-in for your grateful patient program. Often, medical personnel’s concerns stem from worries about how fundraising may impact patient treatment. When will fundraisers approach patients? Will patients feel pressured to donate? Are doctors expected to share patient medical information with your fundraising team?
Approach these concerns seriously, and enforce guidelines that resolve delicate issues associated with your fundraising program to set hospital staff and fundraisers’ minds at ease.
Specifically, to ensure your grateful patient program has a smooth implementation, your fundraising team must address potential challenges early by establishing policies that reflect:
- Compliance with HIPAA guidelines and dedication to protecting patient privacy (see section 5)
- A set of protocols to establish when and how major gift officers or other fundraisers may approach a patient
- A set of protocols to establish when and how physicians and staff can advocate for the grateful patient program
- A clear, open line of communication for physicians and staff to address concerns
By acknowledging these factors in your grateful patient program, you can foster an environment where hospital staff and fundraisers treat contributors as patients first and donors second. If you have doubts about the right way to approach one of these topics, meet with board members, doctors, and other relevant parties to gather first-hand insights and ensure they are part of the decision-making process.
3. Provide Access to Grateful Patient Materials
In an ideal situation, a patient will express their desire to give back to your hospital without prompting. In reality, many patients may want to give back somehow but never vocalize their gratitude to the right people.
To draw attention to your giving initiatives, your healthcare fundraising team should create grateful patient materials easily accessible in the form of easy-to-grab materials, like brochures or pamphlets, to be placed in the hospital.
Doctors and nurses should be aware of where these materials are so they can provide them to patients as needed. Medical staff may feel discomfort talking to patients about fundraising, and educational materials serve as an easy way to continue the conversation without turning your doctors and nurses into fundraisers.
To make the giving process easier, your hospital should also look into creating a page on your website about your grateful patient program. Incorporate online donation tools for patients to make contributions. These virtual giving tools can provide donors with a fast and convenient way to support your grateful patient program with capabilities like:
When investing in new fundraising technology, check whether online giving tools already integrate with your existing nonprofit CRM or fundraising software. Software that integrates with your current system will be easy to implement, prevent data silos, and create less work for your team.
4. Screen Prospects for Your Grateful Patient Program
It’s no secret that hospitals that target donors with high giving potential are more likely to see a return on their investment. After all, while every donation helps, a grateful patient program only pays for itself when it brings in major gifts.
That’s why it’s imperative for your healthcare organization to leverage prospect research resources. Prospect research involves analyzing potential donors’ finances and charitable tendencies to determine their capacity and affinity for making a major gift.
Your fundraising team only has so many major gift officers, and screening patients allows hospitals to allocate their resources by identifying constituents who have the affinity and the ability to give a significant donation.
Typically, hospitals use the following two strategies to conduct prospect research for their grateful patient programs:
- Prospect screening services. Partner with a wealth screening service to gather data about patients’ past donations, real estate purchases, political donations, and other markers of wealth. External partners reduce your team’s workload and may have access to databases your hospital does not. However, sharing patient data with third parties may cause privacy concerns.
- In-house research team. Additionally, your organization can form an in-house research team. These professionals are enlisted by your hospital for the sole purpose of performing prospect research screenings. To set up this team, you will need to hire and train staff to conduct research and purchase access to necessary information databases.
Once your hospital’s fundraising team has identified key prospects, craft targeted communications to pique their interest in your grateful patient program.
5. Emphasize Patient Well-Being in Your Grateful Patient Program
Hospitals can be stressful places, even for patients who receive the best possible care and leave with great results. Without question, your medical institution’s highest priority should be treating patients and ensuring they have as positive an experience at your hospital as possible.
Grateful patient programs rely on positive patient relationships to succeed. Treating patients to the best of your ability is not just the right thing to do—it also helps your hospital secure future funding.
To create an environment where patients feel safe, respected, and valued, in your grateful patient communications, your healthcare facility should always:
- Respect patient privacy. Patients’ medical concerns are between them and their doctors. When reaching out to patients for donations, fundraisers shouldn’t discuss their health, treatment plan, or ongoing medical concerns.
- Align donation opportunities with expressed interests. Covering health-related expenses can be stressful for many people. Ensure you only extend donation requests to patients who have an interest in giving.
- Seek organic opportunities to reach out to prospects. Look for moments when donors are likely to feel generous. For example, if a physician is being recognized for an achievement at your hospital, the physician’s former patients are prime prospects for making a contribution in the physician’s honor.
- Creating a strict solicitation timeline. Follow-up materials should only be sent after a patient has been discharged. Determine how long after a visit to send materials about your grateful patient program. For instance, if recovery from a procedure takes two weeks, you might solicit the patient three weeks after their stay to ensure everything with their treatment is wrapped up.
Use your CRM to track patient data related to fundraising, allowing you to personalize your outreach and connect donors with giving opportunities they are likely to be interested in.
That being said, the best way to honor patient well-being during healthcare fundraising is to adhere to The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA). A legal measure, HIPAA guarantees patient protection for confidential medical information against use in a hospital’s healthcare fundraising or promotions.
As such, respect patients’ privacy by not discussing the following HIPAA-defended items with donors’ medical teams:
- Diagnosis
- Nature of service
- Medical treatment
Additionally, have a plan in place for when a patient withdraws their permission to use their medical records in a previous agreement with your hospital. These patients are unlikely to have a high affinity for giving and should not be contacted for further donation solicitations unless they have specifically noted otherwise.
6. Open the Door to Healthcare Fundraising Matching Gifts
Implementing a stellar grateful patient program is an accomplishment, but there is another way for your hospital to maximize those funds: adding matching gifts to your healthcare facility’s fundraising strategy.
Matching gifts allow your grateful patients to use their employer’s matching gift program to double their contribution to your hospital! For instance, if a patient donates $2,000 to your organization, they may just need to fill out an application with their place of work to have their employer donate an additional $2,000, earning your hospital a total of $4,000 from one donor.
Your medical institution can easily set up and promote this donation goldmine. All it takes is for you to incorporate a matching gift search tool into your grateful patient donation process.
Include a matching gift database search tool on your grateful patient online donation form. That way, patients can check their matching gift eligibility while making a donation. Some patients may even have employers who enable matching gift auto-submission.
Auto-submission is the latest technology in matching gifts and allows employees to have their matching gift applications completed for them. Here is a breakdown of how this technology helps donors:
To get started with matching gift auto-submission, your hospital or healthcare-related organization just needs to invest in matching gift software. Donors who qualify for auto-submission can then opt into the process to have their match applications filled out for them, while other match-eligible donors will be prompted to take the next steps to participate in their employer’s corporate matching program.
7. Track Your Grateful Patient Program’s Progress
Last but not least, the success of your grateful patient program relies on how you monitor its progress. With careful and continuous tracking, you can identify places of improvement to tweak to improve your program and better serve your hospital and its patients.
Medical institutions should establish clear goals and criteria for how their grateful patient program should develop based on metrics like:
- ROI
- Number of donors
- Response rate
- Retention rate
- Average gift size
While big-picture results determine whether your program is a success, you can make targeted improvements by tracking more granular data. As part of your program, have your fundraising team take note of:
- How long it takes to convert a prospect to a grateful patient donor. Roughly how many conversations does a major gift officer need to have with a patient before they make a donation? How long should you wait after a patient’s discharge to reach out with fundraising requests? Do any patients contact your team to inquire about donations, or does your team start the majority of donation conversations?
- The response rate to different grateful patient communication strategies. Whenever you implement a new strategy for reaching out to patients, document your approach and patient response rates. You may be able to attain data directly by surveying long-term donors about their thoughts on different strategies, but much of your data will be observational, such as noticing if response rates change or become increasingly positive or negative.
- The response quality to different grateful patient stewardship techniques. Once patients have expressed interest in your grateful patient program, they have entered the stewardship phase of your engagement. Have major gift officers document their meetings with prospective supporters in their donor profiles. Then, use this information to determine both individuals’ and your donors’ response as a whole to various relationship-building strategies.
To maintain a better grip on these factors, use a robust nonprofit CRM software solution. This technology will save your healthcare fundraising team a lot of stress while managing your grateful patient program’s growth.
More Resources for Grateful Patient Programs
The bond between patients and healthcare staff is like no other; it requires hard work, respect, and communication to ease patients’ discomfort and make them feel safe and cared for during their time at your hospital. Encourage your patients to help others receive the same exceptional care they did by making a personal donation to your grateful patient program.
For more must-know tips on how to boost your healthcare fundraising, check out these additional resources:
MemberClicks Reviews | Our Rating and Alternative Solutions
/in Learning Center /by Adam WeingerThe search for the perfect association management software solution is a major undertaking for your association. You want to ensure your team has plenty of features at your disposal, but you also need a sleek solution that won’t bog you down or blow your budget.
When reading MemberClicks reviews, you might think you’ve found your solution and stop looking. As one of the major players in the association management space, MemberClicks offers many associations the database, communications, and events features they need.
But did you know that there are plenty of incredible association management solutions out there that might serve your association better?
Before you make an important software purchase, make sure you actually understand what your options are. In this post, we’ll review the following association management software solutions to help you decide which providers you should reach out to in your search:
It might seem overwhelming right now, but choosing association management software becomes so much easier once you have a shortlist of vendors to consider. With these top providers, you can’t go wrong!
Let’s get into the reviews to guide you to the best fit for your association.
1. MemberClicks Review
MemberClicks was founded in 1998, making it one of the most established legacy AMS products still on the market. In its lifespan, the software has expanded, bringing on a diversity of features that serve as the software’s main selling point.
The associations that find the most success with MemberClicks are those with the smallest staff. This AMS provides everything a small association needs in one package, which is much easier to keep track of than a constellation of separate systems that might or might not integrate properly with one another.
The MemberClicks solution is also highly customizable. Associations using the software are able to include their branding on their website, email campaigns, applications, and events pages. Many MemberClicks members feel overwhelmed and confused at the beginning, but with time and support, they are able to adjust to the level of customization available:
Top Software Features
MemberClicks provides small associations with:
Of course, this wealth of options comes with a downside.
A common complaint among MemberClicks customers is slow load time. With this many features packed into one locally hosted solution, it’s no wonder that MemberClicks can be clunky and slow down associations’ operations.
2. MemberClicks Alternative: Fonteva for Associations
In contrast, Fonteva for Associations is a lean, streamlined software solution that offers customization and breadth of features without slowing down essential business operations.
The speed can be attributed to true-cloud hosting. The Fonteva for Associations platform is built completely native in Salesforce, the world’s most popular cloud CRM. That’s why enterprise-level associations with members and chapters all over the world choose Fonteva instead of a locally hosted solution.
With Salesforce, your member data and operations are hosted in the cloud. That means:
Besides, though Fonteva for Associations comes fully equipped with the most common modules needed by large associations, you have access to the Salesforce AppExchange with your Fonteva license. Instead of cluttering your core platform with point solutions, Fonteva gives you the opportunity to browse the AppExchange and Fonteva Marketplace to complete your software package. The Fonteva User’s Network can give you some ideas of what other users have done to customize the software to their needs:
Top Software Features
Fonteva for Associations offers enterprise-level associations access to:
The best part? You don’t need any technical coding knowledge to customize and implement any of these features.
But if you need to reach out for assistance, you can always take advantage of Fonteva’s world-class training and customer support team, as well as all the support materials Salesforce has to offer.
3. MemberClicks Alternative: Salsa
Some specific member-based associations and organizations need specialized solutions that can meet their unique needs.
If you’re a nonprofit that works in the arts and culture space, your members are your donors. You need a solution that understands constituents in both categories at once, like Salsa.
Salsa CRM, a top nonprofit CRM, integrates seamlessly with Salsa Engage, a digital marketing, fundraising, and advocacy platform that brings your association, nonprofit, or organization closer to your members.
The most important advantage Salsa’s suite of products offers to nonprofits and associations is its integrated marketing features. Without close member communication, you can’t push your campaigns forward and build a strong, sustainable member community. Salsa makes it possible to always know where you stand with your campaigns:
Top Software Features
With Salsa, you can take advantage of:
Whether you’re supporting your members in fundraising, advocacy, or community engagement, Salsa makes it possible to track all your supporters’ activities in one database.
Instead of importing data after an event or major campaign, let the software do the work automatically so your records are ready to inform your next campaign — marketing campaign, fundraising campaign, advocacy campaign, or otherwise!
4. MemberClicks Alternative: Doubleknot
Visitor-serving nonprofits run very different membership programs than trade associations and arts and cultural nonprofits. For museums, science centers, zoos, and aquariums, specific administrative software like Doubleknot can take care of the unique challenges faced.
One main difference between visitor-facing nonprofits like museums is the motivation behind membership. While nonprofit members may join to support a charitable cause and trade association members may join for professional networking and advancement, museum members most often join to take advantage of specific member benefits.
Whether your museum offers discounted admission, invitations to special after-hours events, or gift certificates to the gift shop, your membership management software needs to be able to prioritize the ease of providing those benefits to the proper members at any time, on any device.
Doubleknot makes museum membership programs beneficial for members and profitable for your institution. Plus, through Doubleknot museum management, your programs become even more engaging for the greater member community. Centralize all you need for museum management in member profiles:
Top Software Features
Doubleknot offers museums and science centers:
Arguably the most important feature on this list are automatic membership benefits.
If a museum member buys an admissions ticket, item from the gift shop, or camp registration, the system should automatically apply any appropriate discounts of special permissions. The system should also allow nonmembers to purchase membership and take advantage of their new membership benefits in the same transaction, both online and in the gift shop.
5. MemberClicks Alternative: MIP Fund Accounting
One integral element of the association management process that you absolutely don’t want to overlook is the accounting process. Keeping your membership fees, fundraising opportunities, and expenses organized is key to a successful association.
Associations don’t focus on making a profit, but providing effective services for their members, making their accounting needs very different than your typical for-profit business. That’s why it’s important to invest in accounting software specifically designed for associations.
MIP Fund Accounting offers a fund accounting solution so that associations can provide financial transparency with their members and make smart financial choices.
With a completely configurable ledger, your association will be able to track funds from the time they enter the system until they’re spent on the services you provide. You can track funds based on restrictions and specialized fund groupings, making it easy to determine the next best steps for investments.
Top Software Features
MIP Fund Accounting offers the features your association needs to make smart financial decisions. For instance:
One of the most unique features offered by MIP Fund Accounting is the ability to choose between hosting the software on-premises or in the cloud.
You may choose to host the software in the cloud if you prefer a more modern UI, have reliable internet connectivity, have staff in multiple locations, and prefer access from anywhere at any time. Meanwhile, those who choose on-site hosting may have specific IT policies, have a primarily co-located staff, have in-house IT staff, or prefer manual control over updates.
Having this option shows that MIP Fund Accounting understands that different organizations and associations have different needs. And you can make the best decision based on where your association’s priorities lie.
Association management software solutions should make membership management easier, not harder. Choose the solution that simplifies your association’s operations, and you can’t go wrong!
If you need some more information before embarking on the software search, start with these great additional resources:
7 Key Steps for Championing Your Grateful Patient Program
/in Healthcare fundraising /by Adam WeingerOne of the most rewarding perks of working at a healthcare facility is the meaningful relationships your staff members form with patients. In return for the help and life-changing treatment they received, it’s only natural for patients to seek an outlet for expressing their thanks.
That’s where grateful patient programs come in! This top healthcare fundraising strategy allows patients and their families to honor your hospital’s staff, an area of care, or a clinical program with a generous donation.
Through grateful patient programs, donors can make tangible contributions that directly impact the quality of your patient care, such as by giving funds for a cancer research program, a new MRI machine, or even resources to build a new wing.
That’s why we’ve got your back by outlining seven essential steps for supercharging your grateful patient program.
But before walking through how to connect and earn these vital donations, let’s begin by answering a few basic questions about grateful patient programs.
Grateful Patient Programs: FAQ
Grateful patient programs have a lot in common with other types of fundraising initiatives. However, due to the delicate nature of patient relationships, there are a few key differences that healthcare organizations should be aware of when launching their program.
What is a grateful patient program?
Nonprofit consultant Graham-Pelton offers this definition of grateful patient programs as a starting point: “A grateful patient program consists of all the steps and resources that a healthcare institution uses in order to consistently secure grateful patient donations as an ongoing initiative.”
Essentially, a grateful patient program is a donation program offered by hospitals and healthcare organizations. While these organizations are unlikely to turn down small or mid-sized donations from patients, grateful patient programs usually target individuals who have the potential to be major donors. As such, these programs consist largely of strategies for stewarding relationships with patients.
What are the benefits of a grateful patient program?
Grateful patient programs enable patients to express their gratitude to the hospitals and healthcare organizations that helped them. These donations usually go to programs and services dedicated to treating patients with similar conditions to what they experienced.
For hospitals and other healthcare institutions, grateful patient programs are often a core part of their fundraising strategy. These programs enable hospitals to fund the life-saving services they offer, such as buying new equipment, furthering research, and keeping their staff employed.
What are the elements of a successful grateful patient program?
As we go through how to launch your grateful patient program, we’ll review why each step is essential to your hospital’s success. However, a few core elements of functioning grateful patient programs to highlight beforehand include:
Additionally, your grateful patient program must follow all privacy and compliance regulations. Keep patient data secure and follow HIPAA requirements to show respect for patients, protect their privacy, and avoid compromising your hospital’s standing with state and federal standards.
1. Gain Support for Your Grateful Patient Program
While we hope you’re as enthusiastic about grateful patient programs as we are, remember that not everyone on your hospital staff will be ready to support your program right off the bat. Many members of your team may not be aware of or even have doubts about grateful patient programs, and your first step is to get influential members of your hospital’s leadership on board.
With the support of your hospital administration, board members, and CEO, your healthcare fundraising team can form a dedicated group to plan, manage, and promote a successful grateful patient program.
Here is an overview of the roles various team members might play:
To gain buy-in from these teams, do your research and be ready to present data that demonstrates the impact your grateful patient program has the potential to make.
Additionally, the clearer you can be about the specific role each team member will play, the better. After all, doctors are far more likely to support a program if they understand that their main role is to alert your fundraising team to interested patients rather than having to make a sales pitch to their patients themselves.
2. Create Grateful Patient Protocol for Your Hospital
As mentioned, you may have trouble attaining some staff members’ buy-in for your grateful patient program. Often, medical personnel’s concerns stem from worries about how fundraising may impact patient treatment. When will fundraisers approach patients? Will patients feel pressured to donate? Are doctors expected to share patient medical information with your fundraising team?
Approach these concerns seriously, and enforce guidelines that resolve delicate issues associated with your fundraising program to set hospital staff and fundraisers’ minds at ease.
Specifically, to ensure your grateful patient program has a smooth implementation, your fundraising team must address potential challenges early by establishing policies that reflect:
By acknowledging these factors in your grateful patient program, you can foster an environment where hospital staff and fundraisers treat contributors as patients first and donors second. If you have doubts about the right way to approach one of these topics, meet with board members, doctors, and other relevant parties to gather first-hand insights and ensure they are part of the decision-making process.
3. Provide Access to Grateful Patient Materials
In an ideal situation, a patient will express their desire to give back to your hospital without prompting. In reality, many patients may want to give back somehow but never vocalize their gratitude to the right people.
To draw attention to your giving initiatives, your healthcare fundraising team should create grateful patient materials easily accessible in the form of easy-to-grab materials, like brochures or pamphlets, to be placed in the hospital.
Doctors and nurses should be aware of where these materials are so they can provide them to patients as needed. Medical staff may feel discomfort talking to patients about fundraising, and educational materials serve as an easy way to continue the conversation without turning your doctors and nurses into fundraisers.
To make the giving process easier, your hospital should also look into creating a page on your website about your grateful patient program. Incorporate online donation tools for patients to make contributions. These virtual giving tools can provide donors with a fast and convenient way to support your grateful patient program with capabilities like:
When investing in new fundraising technology, check whether online giving tools already integrate with your existing nonprofit CRM or fundraising software. Software that integrates with your current system will be easy to implement, prevent data silos, and create less work for your team.
4. Screen Prospects for Your Grateful Patient Program
It’s no secret that hospitals that target donors with high giving potential are more likely to see a return on their investment. After all, while every donation helps, a grateful patient program only pays for itself when it brings in major gifts.
That’s why it’s imperative for your healthcare organization to leverage prospect research resources. Prospect research involves analyzing potential donors’ finances and charitable tendencies to determine their capacity and affinity for making a major gift.
Your fundraising team only has so many major gift officers, and screening patients allows hospitals to allocate their resources by identifying constituents who have the affinity and the ability to give a significant donation.
Typically, hospitals use the following two strategies to conduct prospect research for their grateful patient programs:
Once your hospital’s fundraising team has identified key prospects, craft targeted communications to pique their interest in your grateful patient program.
5. Emphasize Patient Well-Being in Your Grateful Patient Program
Hospitals can be stressful places, even for patients who receive the best possible care and leave with great results. Without question, your medical institution’s highest priority should be treating patients and ensuring they have as positive an experience at your hospital as possible.
Grateful patient programs rely on positive patient relationships to succeed. Treating patients to the best of your ability is not just the right thing to do—it also helps your hospital secure future funding.
To create an environment where patients feel safe, respected, and valued, in your grateful patient communications, your healthcare facility should always:
Use your CRM to track patient data related to fundraising, allowing you to personalize your outreach and connect donors with giving opportunities they are likely to be interested in.
That being said, the best way to honor patient well-being during healthcare fundraising is to adhere to The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA). A legal measure, HIPAA guarantees patient protection for confidential medical information against use in a hospital’s healthcare fundraising or promotions.
As such, respect patients’ privacy by not discussing the following HIPAA-defended items with donors’ medical teams:
Additionally, have a plan in place for when a patient withdraws their permission to use their medical records in a previous agreement with your hospital. These patients are unlikely to have a high affinity for giving and should not be contacted for further donation solicitations unless they have specifically noted otherwise.
6. Open the Door to Healthcare Fundraising Matching Gifts
Implementing a stellar grateful patient program is an accomplishment, but there is another way for your hospital to maximize those funds: adding matching gifts to your healthcare facility’s fundraising strategy.
Matching gifts allow your grateful patients to use their employer’s matching gift program to double their contribution to your hospital! For instance, if a patient donates $2,000 to your organization, they may just need to fill out an application with their place of work to have their employer donate an additional $2,000, earning your hospital a total of $4,000 from one donor.
Your medical institution can easily set up and promote this donation goldmine. All it takes is for you to incorporate a matching gift search tool into your grateful patient donation process.
Include a matching gift database search tool on your grateful patient online donation form. That way, patients can check their matching gift eligibility while making a donation. Some patients may even have employers who enable matching gift auto-submission.
Auto-submission is the latest technology in matching gifts and allows employees to have their matching gift applications completed for them. Here is a breakdown of how this technology helps donors:
To get started with matching gift auto-submission, your hospital or healthcare-related organization just needs to invest in matching gift software. Donors who qualify for auto-submission can then opt into the process to have their match applications filled out for them, while other match-eligible donors will be prompted to take the next steps to participate in their employer’s corporate matching program.
7. Track Your Grateful Patient Program’s Progress
Last but not least, the success of your grateful patient program relies on how you monitor its progress. With careful and continuous tracking, you can identify places of improvement to tweak to improve your program and better serve your hospital and its patients.
Medical institutions should establish clear goals and criteria for how their grateful patient program should develop based on metrics like:
While big-picture results determine whether your program is a success, you can make targeted improvements by tracking more granular data. As part of your program, have your fundraising team take note of:
To maintain a better grip on these factors, use a robust nonprofit CRM software solution. This technology will save your healthcare fundraising team a lot of stress while managing your grateful patient program’s growth.
More Resources for Grateful Patient Programs
The bond between patients and healthcare staff is like no other; it requires hard work, respect, and communication to ease patients’ discomfort and make them feel safe and cared for during their time at your hospital. Encourage your patients to help others receive the same exceptional care they did by making a personal donation to your grateful patient program.
For more must-know tips on how to boost your healthcare fundraising, check out these additional resources:
Top 3 Easy and Clever Political Contributions Search Tools
/in Learning Center /by Adam WeingerThe Top 3 Political Contribution Search Tools
Political contribution history can be an extremely accurate indicator of giving potential, but the search tools to find them are often underutilized by prospect development professionals!
If it’s been a while since your last major campaign, or if you’re new to the topic, definitely check out our overview on the basics of prospect research.
Even if you’re experienced with donor prospecting, you might be unsure about how political contributions are relevant to your organization’s prospect development goals. Among all the metrics that you might use to guide your prospect development, this data can be the most useful mainly because it indicates demonstrated commitment and an interest in continual engagement with personally meaningful causes.
Political contributions search tools make a great addition to your other prospecting techniques, like a prospect generator tool. Having the full picture of your prospect as an individual is the key to an effective solicitation later.
Individuals who make political contributions of any size can become excellent prospects since they’re clearly willing to stand by their beliefs and are motivated by a desire to see their support in action.
As a result, political contribution searches can be an extremely effective development strategy if your organization is deeply cause-based or pursuing major or ambitious campaign goals. If this describes your organization in any way, definitely consider these top 3 political contribution search tools:
Read on to discover how these tools work and why they’ll help your organization to focus its prospect development strategies like never before!
1. DonorSearch
How Does This Political Contribution Search Tool Work?
Let’s say you’re developing a prospect strategy for an organization that works to empower young women who study law and political science. You’ve very generally identified one prospect, a guy named Bill Gates, so you do a quick search on DonorSearch’s political contribution search tool:
Does anything stand out? Gates’s major contribution to support women candidates for Senate is an excellent indicator that he’d also be willing to support your cause.
In this case, Gates would be a prospect with proven potential. Now imagine extending this idea to your entire prospect development strategy. With access to detailed political contribution data, you could more sharply focus your prospect development strategies, saving your organization time and resources in the process.
DonorSearch is a leader in prospect development resources because its databases and search tools are among the most exhaustive and accurate on the market.
By giving you the biggest picture possible of your own data and theirs, including invaluable political contribution information, you can make faster and smarter donor prospecting decisions for your organization.
Why Do We Recommend This Search Tool?
Unlike other prospect screening services that focus solely on wealth markers and statistics, DonorSearch’s suite of prospecting solutions will give you much a more comprehensive of who your prospect is as an individual.
With access to political contribution data, full philanthropic giving information, and professional histories, you’ll be able to fully integrate your existing database with DonorSearch software and augment your existing prospect profiles. It’s easy to generate longer prospect lists and identify potential major donors in your existing database by screening it with DonorSearch.
After all, identifying commonalities and trends between your donors and prospects is the first step to growth, especially when you have access to political contribution data.
Do you have any prospects that you’ve tried to approach unsuccessfully for years? Maybe their political contribution histories or other data will give you the breakthrough insight about how to individualize that strategy!
2. FEC.gov
How Does This Political Contribution Search Tool Work?
The United States Federal Election Commission provides a very handy search tool for its database of political contributions made by individuals:
In this federal database you can filter your searches with a number of fields, allowing your organization to identify individual potential prospects by location, employer, and contribution date and amount.
For instance, if you’re trying to identify potential donors for a hospital capital campaign, filtering the database by state and quickly browsing might yield you these results:
Immediately you find four individuals in your state who have supported a cardiology political action committee, one of whom donated $1,000. The database will provide you with the donor’s name and location, then by cross referencing your other prospect development resources you can find more detailed contact information and begin your appeal.
Why Do We Recommend This Search Tool?
The FEC search tool can be an extremely useful resource for your nonprofit’s prospect development strategies.
Refining your searches lets you easily find individuals with a proven commitment to financially supporting their beliefs and values. For the right organization this information can be invaluable.
Best of all, as a federal database, this tool is completely free to use. It can provide an excellent starting point for your donor prospecting, saving you time and effort in the early stages of identifying prospects.
3. Local Political Contribution Search Resources
How Do These Political Contribution Search Tools Work?
Do a little online research to see which political contribution resources might exist to report specifically on contribution data in your local area.
Here’s an example from The Virginia Public Access Project:
This Virginia political contributions database is a great example of the general features you’ll find in similar resources. You can search donors by name, city, and zip code.
Let’s say your organization is based in Newport News, Virginia. A quick search reveals the largest donors in the city, both individuals and other organizations, like the local shipbuilding consortium:
This search allows you to easily identify those in your area who regularly donate to political causes and candidates, indicating a proven commitment to financially supporting those whose work they believe in.
Why Do We Recommend These Search Tools?
If you already know that you need to target mainly local prospects, these niche political contribution databases should be your first step in the donor prospecting process since they let you completely focus your efforts.
With the ability to quickly identify and target political donors specific to their local areas, nonprofits stand a better chance of successfully converting prospects into major donors. Maybe you’re unaware of an individual or company a few blocks away that regularly donates to all kinds of causes!
The shared connection of community can be a powerful incentive to support nonprofit work, so understanding your local prospect environment is extremely important before expanding your scope.
Bonus Tip:
Political Contributions and Corporate Philanthropy
Political donations and corporate giving can be excellent links between one another!
Political contributions search tools, and especially exhaustive databases and tools like DonorSearch, will uncover the professional affiliations of prospects for your capital campaign or major fundraising project.
With this information, nonprofits can then reach out to businesses that employ major prospects, and together they can discuss elements of corporate giving, like:
Always remember to apply your strategies for individual prospect development to corporations, since corporations with demonstrated histories of supporting political issues are much more likely to invest in similar nonprofit causes.
If you’re beginning work on prospect development for your organization’s future fundraising projects, make sure political contributions are a core component of your prospect research strategy.
This metric is extremely valuable as an indicator of giving potential, yet it is often underutilized by nonprofits looking to build their prospect lists!
Rely on these political contribution search tools, and your organization will never miss out on strong prospects in your community and around the country.
Check out some additional resources on prospect development and political giving that you might find useful:
DonorDrive Integrates with Double the Donation for Matching Gifts
/in Learning Center /by Adam WeingerAtlanta, GA (December 5, 2019) — Double the Donation is proud to announce a new integration with DonorDrive, a leading provider of technology and marketing solutions to nonprofit organizations.
Through the new partnership, DonorDrive users can now enable Double the Donation’s matching gift automation with just a few clicks. Double the Donation then goes to work automatically identifying matching gift opportunities for every transaction passed through the DonorDrive system. The integration ensures that not a single matching gift opportunity slips through the cracks.
Double the Donation has built the most comprehensive database of companies that match employee donations. Their database automatically accounts for parent companies, subsidiaries, and spelling variations to make sure that donors are connected with the matching gift programs that they qualify for.
Using this extensive database, Double the Donation automatically triggers out customized emails to each donor encouraging them to check their match-eligibility and then submit those match requests to their employers.
“We’re excited to begin our work with DonorDrive because they work with real change-makers,” said Adam Weinger, President of Double the Donation. “It’s our mission to continue making it easier and easier for these organizations to take advantage of the $4-7 billion in matching gift revenue left on the table each year.”
The biggest hurdle to collecting that unclaimed matching gift revenue is donor awareness. Most donors don’t know that they’re eligible for employee matching gift programs, which is why Double the Donation’s follow-up communications are so important.
When a donation is made with a corporate email address, the donor is automatically sent their employers’ matching gift guidelines. Double the Donation offers donors a clear and simple breakdown of their employer’s matching gift program so that they can quickly and easily see what kind of match they are eligible for.
Find out more about DonorDrive at https://www.donordrive.com/.
Find out more about Double the Donation at https://doublethedonation.com/ or schedule a private demo of Double the Donation at https://doublethedonation.com/get-a-demo/.
5 Ways to Humanize Your Fundraising Emails (and Why That’s Important)
/in Learning Center /by Adam WeingerThe average officer worker now receives 121 emails a day. And your inbox, and mine, will only get more crowded in the coming years (it seems) making the need for your emails to stand out and get opened important. But that’s just the first step, what are you going to say, and how are you going to say it, if they do open?
Well, based on our research of 218 email experiments related to email messaging, here’s what you need to do:
Write your email like it is to a real person, from a real person.
It sounds simple, and at one level it is, but it’s a crucially important fundraising idea that can grow your online fundraising. For example, here’s an experiment from our research library where the control email was pretty good, informative, and used facts and figures to make their case to the reader:
Not bad right?
But for the treatment, they wanted to ‘close the distance’ between the sender and reader by making the copy, tone, and voice, in particular, more personal. More human.
Do you see the differences? They are pretty small but the end result here was that the one that was more personal, increased donations 328%. And revenue? It increased 716.3%!
Being more personal is the high level idea that you should be infusing all the elements of your email with because it speaks to donors — you, me, humans — the way we connect with people. The concept that we treat digital experiences as if they are with real people is called social presence and it’s the social presence that separates those two emails from one another and it’s using social presence that can help you engage donors and separate your emails from those 120 other emails people receive each day.
We created a free online training course on email fundraising optimization that covers all you need to know but in this post let’s simply look at how you can improve them by fostering a 1-1 communication style through these 5 components of an email body:
1. Design and Format
Stripping down the design and branding of an email appeal is one of the first experiments we run with clients, one of the easiest things you can test in your next appeal, and one of the most consistent ‘wins’ we see in our library.
If you don’t believe me, check out experiment #4174. The control was their usual email:
Pretty standard email with the logo, image header, copy making the case, big call-to-action button, personal signoff, and a PS.
This isn’t a ‘bad email’ – according to best practices you’ll find online and from other organizations – and in many ways a pretty good one but the intent of this email is pretty clear and quite early. It’s a marketing email.
So we wondered what would happen if we took out the branding and even the template itself to create a more personal feel using the same copy and call-to-action button to make it feel less templated and designed and here was the result:
The stripped down email increased clicks to the donation page by 80.3% and because of that led to more donations.
But could we simplify and strip down even further? Let’s test it! Here was that new ‘winning’ email (now the control):
And this time for the experiment, we wanted to get even simpler and clearer with the ask so moved the logo/branding down to the signature block and took away the big button and replaced it with a hyperlink and ended up with this:
In this case, the more personalized email increased donations 145.5%!
Looking for more evidence? Check out experiment #5824. Or #7524. Or #7466. Or #6429. Or #483. Or… I think you get the point. Our experiments show time and time again that for fundraising emails less design is better.
Why? Because real people don’t send emails with logos, beautiful header images, and well crafted footers. Think about what design elements you’d have in a personal email to a friend or family member and try to mimic that.
Do you use a header image? A logo at the top? A button in it? A signature? If you wouldn’t send it to a friend, take it out of your design and test it.
Key Tip: Choose an email design that mimics what you would send to a friend.
2. Salutation
This is one of the first things people see and it’s also often taken for granted. “Easy” things like using the person’s name can do wonders for email engagement.
Here’s an experiment with the National Breast Cancer Foundation where we had no first name vs. with first name:
The email with the first name increased clicks 270%.
When real people send emails to real people they use their name!
Hopefully that truly is an “easy” one for you (and you shouldn’t have to test that one) but you can also make your salutation more relevant to the receiver with internal factors like:
Or external factors like:
These salutations work because… that’s how real people start conversations. So give it a shot in your next email.
Key Tip: Start a salutation with their name and, if possible, a personally relevant introduction.
Body Copy
The question I get asked most often when it comes to emails is, “how long should our email be?” And in response I twist the classic consultant ‘it depends’ answer a bit to be, ‘however long you need it to be to effectively answer the main value proposition question’:
“If I am your ideal donor, why should I give to you, compared to some other organization, or not at all”
If you can answer that question in a sentence, then great. Your email could be a sentence. If you need 1,000 words, then so be it. Your email can be 1,000 words. But more often than not, your emails need to be a bit longer than you think and our research has shown that again and again.
Because you suffer from something called the curse of knowledge — a marketer’s fatal flaw where we assume the reader knows much of what we know — you end up writing fundraising appeals that quickly go through things like the need and solution — the value proposition — and get to the ask before the reader has have enough info to make a good decision. And since inertia or gravity is going against people giving their money away, they don’t.
Or even if you do spend time trying to answer the value proposition question and featuring something like a matching gift, you may answer it in your own words or language full of acronyms, technical speak, and insider terms that the reader may not even understand.
You have to make sure you have enough content, aka copy, to let the reader know and understand what you’re asking them to do which is often more info as opposed to less. And the only real way to know what your donors respond to or if they get your value proposition is to run tests and experiments.
Donors will tell you they want shorter emails, with less copy, and just the stats. But after looking through over 218 experiments, I can tell you that longer emails, with more copy, and emotive language raises more money.
Key Tip: Before you make a request, make sure there is enough body copy to answer the question why… both for the email and for the request.
Call-to-Action
Alright, you’ve done the hard work. Someone has opened your email. They’ve read through the main body. Now it’s time to present the call to action and move them on ‘down the funnel’ (or up the donor mountain as we like to say). Be clear. Be direct. Be simple.
Do you want people to learn more? Will they understand what it means to ‘stand with you’? No. You want people to give so make that clear in your call to action. Learn more or ‘soft’ calls to action like ‘stand with us’ language may get more clicks but they’ll often get less donations (here’s one example and here’s another one).
And what about the design of the call-to-action? We’ve already covered that the more designed an email is the more it can appear like marketing so why not use basic links or even raw links like this: https://www.nextafter.com/research/2016/09/how-a-raw-link-in-an-email-affects-donor-conversion/
Key Tip: When you make a call-to-action request, be clear about your desire and intentions.
Tone/Voice
Remember the very first example with the slight differences that led to a 328% increase in donations? It not only was more ‘you’ focused and personal, it also was full of social cues and emotive language that a real human would use. Check it out:
It is full of emotive words like ‘turn up the heat’,‘desperately’, ‘incredible’, and ‘the fight begins’ but also human terms like ‘I’d be honored’, ‘Would you be able to help’, and the opening ‘I wanted to get this news to you as soon as I could’.
The combination of personal terms and emotive language sets a tone and gives a voice to the email that can engage and entice readers so when they reach the call to action (notice the raw link) they are on board. They’re motivated. They’re ready to join the fight.
Or if you zoom in a bit closer to the CaringBridge example above you may have seen that, beyond the design, we made a few other minor changes around the tone as well. Take a look at the first few sentences of each email a bit closer:
Again, the first email isn’t bad. It starts out fine enough, tries to develop some connection, and gets into a story. Another ‘best practice’.
But in the treatment, we used ‘I’ and ‘you’ language to be more like a human sending an email to another human and create a sense of empathy before jumping into the campaign even without the story ‘hook’.
The tone you have and voice you use through your copy sets the stage not just to lead up to the call to action but helps people put down their ‘I’m getting marketing to’ guard to engage with the content on a more personal and human level.
Key Tip: Read the email out loud and add/adjust content to account for tone/voice so it sounds like it is from a human, and makes you feel something.
Remember…
People give to people. Not email marketing machines. So best way to optimize your email fundraising is craft your email — from the design and format to the call-to-action — as if you were just one person writing to another.
Take the time and copy length you need to simply describe the value you are offering, don’t let your design distract from your message and connection, infuse some social cues, and clearly ask for a donation if you are indeed asking for a donation.
And just in case you skimmed everything up until now here is the…
5 Ways to Humanize Your Emails Summary
Good luck!
Author Bio
Brady Josephson is a charity nerd, entrepreneur, digital marketer, professor, and writer. He’s the Vice President of Innovation and Optimization at NextAfter — a fundraising research lab and consultancy on a mission to unleash the most generous generation in the history of the world. Brady lives just outside Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada with his wife Liz, dog Melly, and cat Thor. You can follow him on Twitter @bradyjosephson.
Matching Gifts: When Spouses Both Donate to a Nonprofit
/in Learning Center, Matching Gift Companies /by Adam WeingerFor most nonprofits, the topic of matching gifts is confusing enough as it is. However, the fine print can make it even more confusing, often turning donors away from taking advantage of corporate philanthropy. For instance, what happens when two spouses (both of which work for companies with matching gift programs) submit matching gifts separately to your organization?
Oftentimes, when a nonprofit’s fundraising team can’t find out the answer, the organization gives up when it could have received both matches. To fully understand situations like this, let’s dive into a few key questions:
Corporate philanthropy, like matching gift programs, is vital to nonprofit success. Let’s dive into common matching gift guidelines for situations like this.
1. Are Both Spouses Eligible to Receive a Match for the Same Organization?
In most cases, both spouses are able to submit a matching gift request to their respective employers. Assuming the standard case where companies match donations dollar-for-dollar, a single donation would effectively be tripled. We rarely, if ever, see a rule preventing a gift from being matched by multiple companies.
A more common occurrence is for both spouses to work for the same company that offers matching gifts. If that’s the case, one of three things typically occurs:
To stay up-to-date on your donors’ matching gift eligibility, jump ahead to learn about matching gift databases.
2. How Can Nonprofits Promote Matching Gift Programs for Spouses?
Your organization may already incorporate many of our top ways to promote employee matching gifts, but don’t forget to also promote matching gifts for spouses.
For instance, do you provide donors with acknowledgement letters after they submit the matching gift request or upon receiving the actual grant from the company? If so, that would be a great time to encourage donors to ask their spouse if his or her company offers a matching gift program, too.
Simply reminding them that their donation could make even more of an impact increases the likelihood that they’ll look into it. Once a donor has gone through the match request process themselves, they’ll realize how straightforward it is.
From here, ask them to also find out if their spouse’s employer offers a similar program so the donation can be tripled! Since they’ve gone through the simple match request process themselves, they can relay the necessary information to their spouse.
Remember, if you subscribe to Double the Donation’s service, direct your supporters to your organization’s matching gift and volunteer grant webpage with our tool. That way, they can instantly determine their eligibility and submit the appropriate forms.
3. How Can a Matching Gift Database Help Identify These Opportunities?
While most employers will match both donations made by spouses, company guidelines do vary. As a nonprofit professional, you’ll need to stay on top of your donors’ personal data, such as their eligibility for matches through their employers. The research phase is an ongoing, arduous process. That’s where Double the Donation, the industry’s leading matching gift database, can help!
With Double the Donation, both your nonprofit team and your donors can instantly receive up-to-date information on their employers’ giving programs. This includes available guidelines, forms, requirements (e.g. donation minimums and maximums), and other relevant information. Plus, it easily integrates with other software, so you won’t have to worry about transferring all your data.
Plus, this comprehensive matching gift software enables email automation, customizable matching gift tracking, and other useful automation features!
With either platform, your nonprofit won’t miss out on important corporate giving opportunities. Whenever two spouses donate to your organization, they’ll instantly know if they are both eligible for matches through their employer, simply by searching their companies’ names. No more confusion on anyone’s part!
Think your organization could benefit?
Matching gifts are not something your nonprofit wants to overlook. They’re fairly straightforward to acquire, but it can get tricky when two spouses both donate to your nonprofit. In some cases, they work for separate matching gift companies, and in others, they work for the same company. It’s all about making sense of companies’ guidelines.
Now that you know typical outcomes and how to identify these opportunities, start maximizing your matching gift potential!
Blackbaud Raiser’s Edge | 5 Top Benefits and Drawbacks
/in Learning Center /by Adam WeingerNonprofits all over the the world turn to industry leader Blackbaud for their data and donor management software needs. The entire suite of Blackbaud products spans a wide range of needs, offering appropriate tools for small local nonprofits up to huge enterprise-level organizations.
If your nonprofit has considered making the move to Blackbaud, chances are you’ve done a little research into Raiser’s Edge. This all-in-one fundraising and management platform is one of the most popular Blackbaud products, and for good reason. For context, here’s how the Blackbaud experts at TeamDNL rank Raiser’s Edge in comparison with other popular products in the suite:
The price point, comprehensive features, and target nonprofit size of Raiser’s Edge all make it an extremely useful platform for a wide cross-section of nonprofits.
However, it’s important to remember that any new software is an important investment for your organization and requires careful consideration. Before moving forward with Raiser’s Edge (or its newest iteration, Raiser’s Edge NXT), you’ll need to determine that it’s the right fit for your nonprofit.
To help you navigate all the product reviews out there and cut down on research time, we’ve compiled the most significant benefits and potential drawbacks you’ll need to consider.
We’ll look at the following:
Before diving into the details, we recommend bookmarking this more comprehensive before-you-buy Raiser’s Edge guide from DNL OmniMedia. Let’s get started:
1. Pro: Nonprofits can use Raiser’s Edge for virtually all of their fundraising needs.
If you need expansive fundraising software, Raiser’s Edge won’t disappoint.
With features designed to improve operational efficiency, enhance donor acquisition and engagement, and of course, boost fundraising revenue, Raiser’s Edge is truly comprehensive.
While nonprofits of all sizes can use Raiser’s Edge, its broad functionality makes it an ideal fit for nonprofits who need to store a significant amount of data and implement more complex fundraising strategies.
For instance, Raiser’s Edge can play an instrumental role in streamlining all of the following processes:
Of course, this also means your team should be prepared to learn about as many of these tools as possible. Take some time beforehand to consider how each member of your team will need to use the platform and what features are immediately relevant to each role. This can greatly streamline the training process.
Having an overwhelming set of fundraising resources in front of you with no idea where to start is a position no nonprofit wants to be in. To avoid that situation, make sure you’ve done your research to find out exactly what kind of fundraising software you need.
Or, seek out the help of a nonprofit technology consultant who can guide you through the implementation process and ensure you’re on track for success!
2. Con: Raiser’s Edge isn’t a quick solution for inexperienced nonprofits.
Because Raiser’s Edge is so multifaceted, some nonprofits have a difficult time finding their way around the product. Specifically, smaller organizations might struggle to get up and running quickly with the Raiser’s Edge platform.
However, this isn’t due to any major flaws in the software’s user-friendliness or design. Rather, it’s because Raiser’s Edge is such a comprehensive and highly-customizable platform. This can make it a difficult adjustment for organizations that have never before used a dedicated, professional-grade data and campaign management system before.
Small, local organizations that might only have a few (or no) paid employees typically rely on a mixture of more informal tools, spreadsheets, general accounting software, and word processors. Upgrading an all-in-one system is an important step in nonprofit development, but merging all those historical processes can be a strain on small teams that aren’t used to such major changes.
Typically, small organizations struggle with a few important aspects of the Raiser’s Edge system:
Raiser’s Edge is an ideal fundraising and donor management platform for mid-sized organizations. That’s not to say that smaller nonprofits can’t find any value in it, but they are more likely to run into challenges along the way. This is especially true if they’ve never used a dedicated management system like Raiser’s Edge before.
Blackbaud has a highly competent support team who can walk you through these issues if you do encounter them. Or look for a third-party support team that specializes in Blackbaud’s suite of products. Not only can they walk you through the ins and outs of Raiser’s Edge, they can ensure all your essential integrations are up and running properly.
3. Pro: Raiser’s Edge is a highly customizable platform.
For organizations who like to get under the hood of their fundraising software and design a platform that’s fully unique, Raiser’s Edge may be a good fit.
With a multitude of configurable settings and customization options, Raiser’s Edge is most useful when organizations take advantage of the ability to adapt the platform to their needs.
Let’s look at just a sampling of what your team can configure:
And that’s truly just a taste of what you can customize!
However, it’s important to understand that Raiser’s Edge configuration is not a task just anyone can try their hand at, particularly if they’ve never worked with a Blackbaud platform before.
To truly capitalize on the advantage of in-depth customization, your organization will need to work with an experienced professional.
A web developer or nonprofit technology consultant with Blackbaud expertise can save you time, headaches, and potentially damaging mistakes. Plus, a nonprofit consultant can take the time to understand your fundraising strategy and then implement the customizations that are proven to put you on the path toward success.
When Raiser’s Edge is already such an investment, you need to go the extra mile to make sure your configurations are in line with your goals and fundraising needs. A nonprofit technology consultant can be that missing link!
4. Con: Raiser’s Edge is a long-term investment that requires additional strategy.
Comprehensive fundraising and donor management platforms like Raiser’s Edge are major investments for nonprofits; when properly implemented and customized, this software can make a huge difference for their campaign results and donor retention as they collect and use data in smarter ways.
Without an initial gameplan, however, organizations of any size can easily be overwhelmed by all these capabilities. Those that are less experienced with platforms of this scale risk not making the most of their new investment, or worse, misusing it.
You’ll most likely need to seek out some form of training and strategy support for your team as you get started with Raiser’s Edge.
While there are plenty of online and in-person Raiser’s Edge training resources offered by Blackbaud, researching all of your options can be a challenge. If you’re new to Blackbaud products more generally, just determining what type of support you need can make the implementation process even more challenging.
This master list of Blackbaud training resources covers can help alleviate some of the time you spend on research, but it’s more important that you take the time to gauge your needs before purchasing Raiser’s Edge. Consider your organization’s current software habits and your team’s levels of experience with different types of systems.
Try to determine how much and what sorts of support you’ll need and plan accordingly. For instance, for a first-time transition to a professional-grade database and management system, budget for nonprofit strategy consulting.
An expert guide can offer a personalized training plan with role-based paths, in-person coaching, and general counsel regarding using Raiser’s Edge as part of your fundraising strategy.
5. Pro: Nonprofits can integrate matching gifts into their Raiser’s Edge platform.
Saving the best perk for last, we can’t forget that Raiser’s Edge makes it possible to seamlessly incorporate the oh-so-important matching gift process right into your fundraising software!
You already know how vital matching gifts can be to your fundraising strategy. Raiser’s Edge accounts for this by making it easy to store matching gift information within your database and use that intel to (literally) multiply your gifts.
Within a Raiser’s Edge donor profile, you have the ability to view corporate giving data in a dedicated Matching Gifts section. All the relevant information, such as the company, match amount, and date, will be visible in one central location to make it easy to keep track of your matched funds over time.
Let’s look at a few ways you can take advantage of this pro:
And if you’re a larger organization interested in implementing matching gifts into your fundraising strategy, see how 360MatchPro can help you take your efficiency to the next level through a Raiser’s Edge integration!
Raiser’s Edge is a powerful campaign management and donor database platform, and it’s provided countless organizations with game-changing features and capabilities to support their growth. Ensuring that your organization is in a good position to adopt a new tool of this scale, however, is essential.
Carefully consider your size and level of experience, and weigh these elements against the huge potential benefits of implementing Raiser’s Edge into your nonprofit’s operations.
Learn more about fundraising software by checking out these additional resources:
Blackbaud CRM: 5 Ways to Know If It’s Right for You
/in Learning Center /by Adam WeingerIf your organization is considering upgrading to new constituent relationship management (CRM) software, the well known product Blackbaud CRM might be toward the top of your list.
While Blackbaud is known for having a wide range of versatile nonprofit software products, Blackbaud CRM is a unique solution designed specifically for established organizations with highly expansive fundraising and constituent management needs.
That being the case, you’ll need to think carefully before choosing to invest in this powerful software.
To help you figure out if this CRM is the best fit for you, we’ve put together a list of 5 tell-tale signs that you should continue considering Blackbaud CRM:
But before we start, make sure that you’re familiar with Blackbaud CRM by reading this helpful guide from Blackbaud experts and nonprofit consulting firm DNL OmniMedia.
1. You’ve outgrown your current CRM.
As you may know, Blackbaud CRM was built for enterprise-level nonprofits and includes tools tailored to organizations with large-scale needs.
With that in mind, it makes sense that you should only consider Blackbaud CRM if your existing CRM system doesn’t meet all of your data management, fundraising, or donor engagement needs.
While some CRM software is built to be more lightweight to accommodate small or midsized organizations, if growth is a priority for your team, you’ll need a CRM with scalable functionality and a variety of features to support your many needs.
Blackbaud CRM comes with all of the following features to meet a diverse array of nonprofit needs:
Plus, Blackbaud CRM can be even further expanded through configurations or integrations.
It’s important to note that if your organization doesn’t need access to tools that cater to such far-reaching needs, you’ll likely not want to invest in a platform as massive as Blackbaud CRM.
To get a better idea of how Blackbaud CRM’s feature set compares to other top-ranking software, read our reviews of the top 12 nonprofit CRMs!
2. You need a CRM that can centralize your operations.
In addition to enhancing your CRM functionality, Blackbaud CRM can also streamline your overall nonprofit operations in a holistic way.not
If your organization is currently relying on a variety of disparate fundraising platforms, donor management software, and other data sources, Blackbaud CRM can centralize those efforts.
Blackbaud CRM seeks to simplify the nonprofit management experience by giving you access to all of the information and tools you need in just one system.
Through the Blackbaud CRM platform alone (i.e., without any third-party software integrations), you’ll be able to manage all of the following aspects of your organization’s fundraising and constituent relationship management efforts:
(And more, if you can believe it!)
Having access to a full scope of fundraising capabilities in one system gives your nonprofit ultimate flexibility when it comes to planning out your strategies.
While you can always integrate external software or build out custom solutions, Blackbaud CRM comes equipped with a robust feature set that can allow you to manage every aspect of your nonprofit in one place, thus limiting the need for complicated data migrations and mitigating the risk of lost or damaged data.
3. You’re prepared to implement your Blackbaud CRM.
So far, we’ve spoken pretty highly of Blackbaud CRM. It’s multi-functional, powerful, and scalable—what’s the catch?
It’s true that Blackbaud CRM can do a lot, but before you can capitalize on all of its features, you’ll need to successfully implement the system at your organization.
The Blackbaud CRM implementation process can be complicated, time-consuming, and costly. If it is the right software for you, the payoff will be well worth the time you spend getting set up with the product; however, you’ll still need to carefully consider if you’re prepared to take on such a project.
Here’s what we recommend doing to make sure you can move forward with implementation confidently:
Be forewarned: while it might be tempting to manage your CRM implementation and training on your own to save some money, when it comes to Blackbaud CRM, implementation is not a one-person job.
You’ll receive help from your vendor (and hopefully, your IT department), but we strongly recommend seeking the help of a nonprofit consultant to walk through the process with you as well. They’ll be able to provide structured support, guidance, and training, as well as an expert’s perspective on how to maximize your new system.
4. You have a plan to customize Blackbaud CRM.
To really get the full Blackbaud CRM advantage, you’ll need to make your software your own.
How do you do that? Simply put, you’ll need to customize your CRM to fit your nonprofit, which you can do in a variety of ways.
Working with an experienced developer or Blackbaud consultant, you can integrate third-party platforms or build out completely custom solutions within your CRM.
For examples of how you might integrate your platform, you might consider adding:
Integrations can be more complex than you might think, so before you decide what you’ll need to add to make your CRM complete, make sure you have professionals on hand to conduct the integrations.
In addition to integrating existing software, you can also work with a nonprofit technology consultant to build out your CRM in ways that are totally unique to your organization.
Before you dive into the search process for your perfect consultant, though, take some time to assess your current fundraising and stewardship strategies to find out how Blackbaud CRM can enhance your efforts. What areas could be improved through existing software? Where do you need to take a more custom approach?
5. You have room in your budget for Blackbaud CRM.
With so much to consider, it’s no surprise that Blackbaud CRM implementation will cost a bit more than some other CRM choices.
While you’ll need to reach out to Blackbaud for an exact quote, what we can tell you is that you can’t expect to get such a full-service CRM solution for a minimal fee. Blackbaud CRM is a pricey solution built for organizations who need—and are prepared for—a long-term investment.
Of course, you’ll need to consider your Blackbaud CRM price quote before deciding if you can move forward with purchasing the software. But if you’ve been paying attention so far in this post, you’ll already know that you should also consider such expenses as:
While some costs (such as a nonprofit consultant) are vital to your success, other costs (such as paying for constituent profiles or user access) may not be as necessary. Make sure you’re only paying for what you need and that the benefits of the software will outweigh the costs over time.
If you ultimately find that Blackbaud CRM is too much for your team right now, it’s not too late to backtrack and find another more cost-effective option!
Blackbaud CRM is a big purchase, so don’t take the consideration process lightly! Make sure Blackbaud CRM fits into your strategy perfectly and that you’re all set with the tools you need to use it effectively.
Need to learn a little more about Blackbaud CRM (or CRMs in general) before making your move? Read these additional resources to get up to speed:
Salesforce for Nonprofits: 5 Features You Need to Know
/in Learning Center /by Adam WeingerA popular solution for for-profit businesses, Salesforce has earned its place as one of the most comprehensive CRM software options on the market. With so many companies relying on it for sales, marketing, and more, you’re probably familiar with Salesforce to some extent—but did you know that your nonprofit can take advantage of the full range of Salesforce features too?
How is Salesforce used in a nonprofit?
Salesforce CRM can be a powerful tool in your constituent management and fundraising arsenal if you know how to maximize your use of this robust software.
Since nonprofits have such specific needs, you’ll have to know how to use Salesforce the right way to stay on top of your most important efforts, including:
Is Salesforce good for nonprofits?
Yes! In this post, we’ll walk through how you can use built-in Salesforce features as well as powerful Salesforce apps and integrations to manage all of your most vital nonprofit initiatives and actually enhance your strategies through your CRM’s innovative functionality.
Ready to learn how Salesforce for nonprofits can push your organization forward? Let’s get straight to it!
1. How to Use Salesforce for Constituent Management
Potentially the most important task for any nonprofit is staying on top of all the supporter information you have access to and then using that data to drive more effective fundraising and engagement strategies.
Without your constituents, your organization wouldn’t be able to move your mission forward through fundraising campaigns, volunteer work, or advocacy initiatives. That’s why it’s imperative that you know who your supporters are and how to properly connect with them!
As a CRM, Salesforce should be your first resource for managing constituent data. Let’s lay out a few of our favorite strategies for using Salesforce for better donor, volunteer, and other types of constituent management:
Proper constituent management can also inform your fundraising strategies, specifically how you incorporate important elements such as corporate giving!
When you have complete, manageable data sets, you’ll be able to better target matching gift prospects and communicate opportunities for corporate philanthropy to the right supporters.
An integration with 360MatchPro by Double the Donation can help large nonprofits use their Salesforce data to power more effective matching gift strategies. 360MatchPro breaks down the constituent data you’re already storing in your CRM by matching gift eligibility and status. This powerful matching gifts software can put your constituent information to good use with actionable matching gift reports:
The more you lean on Salesforce for nonprofits to manage your constituent data, the more time you’ll have to focus on other things—like actually using that data to drive your fundraising tactics!
Next Steps for Using This Salesforce Feature
Interested in learning more about how your CRM can (and should) help you improve donor management? Check out our thorough guide to nonprofit constituent relationship management software to learn everything you need to know.
2. How to Use Salesforce for Event Management
For many nonprofits, fundraising events are the cornerstone of their fundraising efforts. Whether you’re planning a variety of small-scale events or one extensive annual fundraiser, you’ll need a way to manage your event logistics, guests, marketing, and more.
While you can look to a third-party solution to plan your event, having access to all of your event management features within your Salesforce system will provide a more holistic view of your efforts and allow you to streamline many of your event-related tasks.
While you can use some of Salesforce’s built-in features to plan your event, to truly maximize your event management experience, we recommend finding a native Salesforce app to extend your CRM’s functionality to include dedicated event tools.
With the help of the right Salesforce event management application or integration, you can tackle all of the following vital event elements without ever leaving your CRM:
With the power of Salesforce for nonprofits and the right event management app, you can centralize your event planning efforts and design a more productive (profitable!) event for your donors.
Next Steps for Using This Salesforce Feature
Find the right Salesforce partner for your next event by reading our reviews of the best event solutions on the AppExchange. Each of these tools can help your nonprofit’s next event thrive in a unique way, so all types of nonprofits can benefit from integrating these helpful solutions.
3. How to Use Salesforce for Fundraising Campaign Management
It goes without saying that in order to keep your organization’s mission moving forward, you need to find creative ways to bring in money for your cause.
Those efforts typically combine a lot of different fundraising techniques and strategies, from hosting fundraising events to cultivating long-term major donor relationships to simply setting up an online donation form.
Thankfully, your Salesforce CRM can help you balance all of your fundraising efforts in a way that drives your campaigns forward (and hopefully, above and beyond expectations).
By using Salesforce’s features and a few well-placed integrations, you can manage a multitude of fundraising tactics, such as:
You’ll be able to track all of these campaigns within Salesforce so that you have a real-time snapshot of who is donating, how you’re collecting donations, and how you’re measuring up to your short- and long-term fundraising goals.
Next Steps for Using This Salesforce Feature
Fundraising campaigns are the backbone of nonprofit organizations. Get started building out a Salesforce system that can cater to your fundraising campaign management needs (and other vital nonprofit efforts) by checking out these top nonprofit Salesforce apps.
4. How to Use Salesforce for Marketing and Communications
Whether you’re getting the word out about fundraising projects or inspiring supporters to make a donation, your marketing and communications initiatives can have a huge impact on your overall fundraising and donor engagement strategies.
However, with so many channels through which you can communicate, it’s difficult to nail down how you’ll connect with your supporters and how you’ll track those efforts within your CRM. Luckily (you guessed it), Salesforce for nonprofits can help!
Within Salesforce, your nonprofit should be able to manage your marketing and communications in a comprehensive way, taking advantage of all the most relevant, engaging channels, such as:
No matter what type of communication you choose to employ, Salesforce for nonprofits should make it easy to organize and segment your recipient list, design professional materials, and track responses and interactions intuitively.
Next Steps for Using This Salesforce Feature
To actually follow through with these efforts, you can take advantage of the Salesforce Marketing Cloud, which offers all-in-one marketing solutions, or look to third-party integrations or Salesforce apps. If you’re interested in exploring your options, take a look at our list of the top nonprofit marketing software.
5. How to use Salesforce for Reports and Dashboards
With all of the data you’re compiling in Salesforce (not to mention any apps or integrations you’ve paired with your CRM), you’ll need a way to make all the information you’ve stored meaningful and useful.
Salesforce for nonprofits has a wide range of built-in reporting tools to help you make sense of your different data sets. With Salesforce, you’ll be able to pose questions in order to generate custom reports. Then, you can display those reports visually using dashboards.
What kind of questions might you ask in Salesforce? Here are just a few examples of how Salesforce reports can help you break down data:
You might also view dashboards related to donors’ matching gift eligibility, as shown with 360MatchPro:
When you have a clear view of how your nonprofit is performing in all the most important areas, you’ll be able to move forward with a stronger vision than ever.
Next Steps for Using This Salesforce Feature
Salesforce’s analytics features can help you determine a more strategic plan forward in terms of fundraising, donor engagement, and other vital areas. For more help putting together your nonprofit strategy, check out this post!
Now that you know how useful Salesforce can be, it’s time to start making the most of this impressive CRM!
But before you dive into your Salesforce strategy, check out these additional resources too:
Eventbrite Salesforce Integration: Our Actionable Review
/in Learning Center /by Adam WeingerEventbrite is a popular web-based event management app designed to simplify ticketing and registration for any type of event. Individuals, organizations, businesses, and virtually anyone else can use the platform—even Salesforce users!
If your organization uses Salesforce to manage constituent data, you’ll need to integrate Eventbrite with your Salesforce CRM in order to see all of your important information in the same place.
While an Eventbrite Salesforce integration is a viable option to manage events in Salesforce, you should be aware that the data migration and platform implementation processes aren’t always as seamless as you might think.
Before you opt for Eventbrite as your event planning tool of choice, let us walk you through our key takeaways from the Eventbrite Salesforce integration:
When you know what the Eventbrite Salesforce integration really entails, you’ll be able to decide if it’s the best path for your organization to take!
Not confident Eventbrite is the right event management software for you? Take a look at this list of excellent Eventbrite alternatives instead!
1. You have options for how you implement the Eventbrite Salesforce integration.
Before we can dive into our thoughts on the Eventbrite Salesforce integration itself, let’s discuss how exactly you can get these two platforms to work together in order to plan your event.
Because Eventbrite was not designed for Salesforce, you’ll need to manually integrate the two systems so that you can store your event details within your Salesforce CRM.
Essentially, to integrate Eventbrite and Salesforce, your organization will need to take one of the following routes:
Let’s run through an overview of the potential pros and cons to each path.
Eventbrite Salesforce Connector Apps
A third-party connector application essentially does the hard work for you by transferring data from Eventbrite to Salesforce.
You can find these platforms on the Salesforce AppExchange, or you can do some independent research to find the best connector tool for your specific integration needs.
It goes without saying that the major advantage to using a third-party integration platform is that they take away the need for any knowledge of coding or API. Instead, you can implement scheduled imports following preset parameters or create your own configurations using a user-friendly field-mapping alternative.
However, if you choose to go with a dedicated connector app, keep in mind that there’s always a risk when you automate any data transfer. You’ll need to pay careful attention that the data is migrating in the way you want it to, and that you’re not losing any data along the way.
Custom Integrations
If you’re especially Salesforce-savvy, you can forgo the middleman completely and perform the integration yourself.
The benefit to working directly with the Eventbrite API is that you’ll have full control over every aspect of the integration.
Of course, in order to confidently (and successfully) pull the correct event data and send it to the right location in Salesforce, your organization will need to have a fairly robust IT department on hand to facilitate the integration.
If not, you can opt to work with a nonprofit technology consulting firm who knows their way around the Salesforce interface and can make the necessary configurations to get your team synced up to Eventbrite.
2. Customization can complicate the Eventbrite Salesforce integration.
No two Salesforce systems are alike, and most likely, your organization has already gone to some length to configure a CRM solution that uniquely fits your needs.
So, how does Eventbrite fit into the mix when you already have a complex CRM system? From our experience with the Eventbrite Salesforce integration, there are 3 considerations to keep in mind:
While Eventbrite is a solid web platform for lightweight event planning, you should understand that the Salesforce integration will not suddenly turn this tool into an end-to-end event management solution. In fact, the more you try to build Eventbrite out into comprehensive, customized software, the more complicated your event management process will be.
3. You’ll want a data manager to oversee the Eventbrite Salesforce integration process.
As with any integration or data migration, your nonprofit should expect to spend some time getting to know the new system and ensuring that all aspects are working properly before rolling the product out to your whole team.
With the Eventbrite Salesforce integration specifically, we found that the best way to streamline your integration efforts is to appoint a data manager to oversee the entire process.
This member of your team will be responsible for:
Depending on your resources and the extent of your integration, you may need to appoint a small committee or task force rather than an individual. That way, no one person is burdened with the entire project.
In order to effectively incorporate Eventbrite into your event management strategy, you might need to utilize other tools to get all the functions you need. If you do appoint a small committee to handle data migration, it’s important that they’re aware of any other Salesforce apps that you’re using.
For instance, if you’re hosting a silent auction during your event, you’ll need an additional Salesforce app to manage bidding and checking guests in and out. It’s important that your team knows what data needs to be migrated from which tools so that your Eventbrite data is as comprehensive and effective as possible.
4. The Eventbrite Salesforce integration might be costly (and time-consuming).
Any new software is going to cost your team some time and energy—and money, of course! But let’s be honest: your organization spends a lot of time laying out a workable budget and hiring the right staff to keep your operations efficient and productive.
That being the case, one of your chief concerns going into any software purchase or integration process is going to be the amount of precious time and hard-earned funds you’ll be spending to obtain and implement your new product(s).
When it comes to the Eventbrite Salesforce integration, costs (of both time and money) will vary depending on a number of factors, but here are some considerations to keep in mind as you’re budgeting:
If you don’t think you have time to create and implement a custom Eventbrite solution, the alternative would be to search for a native Salesforce event management application (i.e., one that doesn’t require integration).
Native Salesforce apps are built in Salesforce, so you don’t have to consider any extra time or money spent on data migration and integration. All of your data is automatically synced in your CRM, and all you have to do is click “install.”
Native event management apps can still be customized, but since they’re designed for Salesforce, the process is much more intuitive and streamlined than any integration. You can learn more about the benefits of native Salesforce applications by reading this helpful post from Fonteva!
With these 4 takeaways in mind, your team should have a much clearer picture of what the Eventbrite Salesforce integration looks like. Now all you have to do is decide if it’s the best route for your organization!
For more insight into Salesforce event management, check out these additional resources: