Nonprofit

How does your nonprofit choose the software it uses? Do you use what’s available at no cost or came with your computer and hope for the best? Or have you purchased software from an office supply store and find that it just doesn’t fit the needs of a nonprofit?

It’s not uncommon to find that off-the-shelf accounting packages, for example, don’t quite match the needs of your organization. Accounting for nonprofits must take into consideration different revenue sources and requirements. Sometimes adjusting packaged software is like fitting a round peg in a square hole. It works, but there are gaps.

The key to ensuring nonprofit efficiency and productivity lies in a nonprofit technology strategy. Planning purchases in advance ensures you’ve covered all your organization’s needs while handling its finances with care and consideration. It helps you build up your technology the right way, focusing on the primary organizational needs while preparing for future needs, too.

Five Questions to Ask to Build a Nonprofit Technology Plan

We’ve put together these five questions to help you get started building your nonprofit technology plan. Gather your team together and review this list of questions to find the right software for your needs.

1. What are the tech needs of your organization? You may wish to take an inventory of the current software packages you are using. Include all departments or groups in your inventory and ask everyone to list the software they have on their desktops or organization-wide.
2. Who needs what? List all the functional areas in your organization and then the types of software each needs. All groups need word processing and basic spreadsheet software, but perhaps only the accounting department needs access to accounting and financial management software, and marketing needs access to graphic design and/or specialized CRM software.
3. Do you need to integrate new or existing software? Today’s solutions emphasize integration for good reason. It helps boost efficiency, saves time, and improves all aspects of your workplace. If you have a current package for accounting and finance that you like, for example, you may wish to find a CRM system that integrates easily with it so you can track member communications against donations and other data. Integration enables you to do much more with the data you have and to work more effectively across teams.
4. Are you considering specialized nonprofit software? Software developers familiar with the nonprofit world develop packages that fit the needs of an organization better than standard off the shelf ones. These packages take into consideration the various revenue streams common to a nonprofit, variations in fiscal years and accounting, and many other areas. Software designed specifically for nonprofits may save you time and money and help you ramp up more quickly than purchasing a package meant for a for-profit and adapting it for the nonprofit world.
5. What training do we need? Sometimes nonprofits think they need new software when they can use their existing software to meet their needs—with the right training. You may wish to explore training solutions to use your existing software more efficiently. Or, if you’re buying new software, learn about the training options available from the software vendor. The more you know about your software, the more use you will get out of it.

Write Up Your Plan

A written plan offers a robust roadmap of technology solutions that can be shared among team members, board members, and others who can advise and guide your purchases and budget needs. It doesn’t need to be an elaborate plan. List your goals, budget, software needs, and who needs them. Then, decide which teams or individuals will begin the exploration process to find the right software packages for your nonprofit.

Nonprofit software has come a long way from the days of single-use packages that need frequent updates. Today’s cloud-based solutions run over the internet, so anyone with a web browser can access them. They don’t need fancy hardware to run, and they are very user-friendly. Find out more about nonprofit software solutions or get help with your nonprofit tech strategy from the experts at Welter Consulting.

Welter Consulting

Welter Consulting bridges people and technology together for practical solutions for nonprofit organizations. We offer software and services that can help you with your accounting needs. Please contact Welter Consulting at 206-605-3113 for more information.

One size does not fit all. That goes for shoes, clothes, and … nonprofit marketing. The answer? Market segmentation.

Market segmentation means separating constituents into categories based on similar characteristics. Your current database most likely contains current and past donors, people who signed up for your email list, and perhaps volunteers and those who attended an event. In other words, it’s a mishmash of people who have, at some time, expressed interest in the mission and vision of your nonprofit.

No two people in the database share the same characteristics, of course, but if you are like most organizations, you send them identical promotions. Both Loyal supporters and casual followers receive the glossy four-page mailer with a response card or an email a week detailing your work. Perhaps the casual follower only wants to know of significant events while the loyal supporter loves to hear success stories. Yet, you’re talking to them both identically, and one size does not fit all.

The answer is market segmentation. Here’s how to use even the most rudimentary database or customer relationship management (CRM) system to begin segmentation.

Segmentation Strategies Start with the Data

To start a segmentation strategy, review the data in your CRM or database. What have you collected? Most databases contain rudimentary information such as names, addresses, telephone numbers, and other demographic data.

Frequently, nonprofits don’t realize the many ways they can use their existing data to personalize their marketing. The constituents’ addresses, for example, can be used to alert them of events happening near them. Or, you can use the birthdate to send a birthday greeting. It’s a way to keep in touch and to keep your nonprofit’s communication relevant.

Add Relevant Fields to Your Database

If you aren’t already collecting the following information, consider adding these fields to your database and begin the collecting information.

1. Donor status: active or never donated
2. Date of last donation
3. Order history / purchase history
4. Contact preference (mail, email)

With these fields, you can test messaging strategies to solicit donations based on donor history. New or potential donors may receive a tried and true message, for example, while frequent donors may receive more updates about how their donations are used.

Segmentation on a Tight Budget

Many market segmentation strategies can be achieved even on a tight budget. Lead scoring, a technique borrowed from the world of sales, assigns a value to each record in a database evaluated on sales or sales potential. You can mark your records similarly around donations, interest, or interaction. Most databases include simple spreadsheets and have an extra field or two that can be customized. You can group your list according to geography, past interactions with your organization, birth month or something similar, to test out segmentation strategies.

Shopping for New CRM Software

As you get more comfortable with market segmentation and segmentation strategies, you may find that your current database limits how much you can do. A full customer relationship management (CRM) system offers all the features you need to build a robust market segmentation strategy, track and measure the results, and improve your data collection over time.

There are many versions of CRM software on the market today. How do you know which one is right for your organization? You don’t need to do exhaustive research to find a solid starter system. Instead, ask these questions to begin:

1. What features do I need in the CRM system?
2. Will it need to integrate with any other systems we have, such as an email or contact management system, or can it stand alone?
3. Do I buy a site license or seat-based licenses? Is there a usage or data cap in my license?
4. Is this software complex? Will I need to have someone dedicated to learning how to use it?
5. Will I need staff dedicated to learning and training others to use this software?

Depending on how you answer these questions, you may choose a stand-alone CRM, a cloud (internet) based system, or a system that complements your existing operational software.

There’s no right or wrong answer. Just as one-size-fits-all doesn’t apply to a marketing strategy, one-size-fits-all rarely applies to a software solution either.

Welter Consulting

Welter Consulting bridges people and technology together for practical solutions for nonprofit organizations. We offer software and services that can help you with your accounting needs. Please contact Welter Consulting at 206-605-3113 for more information.

We’ve all heard the term conflict of interest, but what is it exactly? If I’m on a nonprofit board and I also run a marketing agency, can I charge the board when I make up flyers for an event? If I serve on two boards and there’s an opportunity that would be great for both, how do I choose which one to share it with?

The Law Dictionary defines a conflict of interest as “a situation in which a person has a duty to more than one person or organization, but cannot do justice to the actual or potentially adverse interest of both parties.”

We usually think of a conflict of interest as something personal, such as when there is a conflict of interest between a person’s best self-interest and that of the organization or company they serve. But there can be conflicts of interest at a nonprofit, too. To avoid them, you’ve got to recognize them first.

Types of Conflict of Interest

In general, there are two types of conflict of interest.

1. Financial conflict of interest, in which a nonprofit board member receives financial benefits from their involvement with the nonprofit or their connections.
2. Organizational conflict of interest, or when a board member has an affiliation with a person, group or organization, and the relationship may induce the board member to act against the best interests of the nonprofit.

In Washington state, the law is clear: a board member must perform his duties with loyalty to the organization. He or she must be faithful to the organization. When acting on behalf of a nonprofit, board members must set aside personal interests and relationships to make decisions that best serve the nonprofit.

Examples of Conflict of Interest

Sometimes it helps to look at examples to see how conflict of interest happens in real life. Below are a few fictional examples of conflict of interest.

1. Sam runs a construction company and serves on the board of directors for a local school for special needs children. The school plans to add a wing to their original building and publishes an RFP for construction companies to bid on it. Sam knows he can’t bid on the project, but he gives insider tips to Warren, his old friend who also runs a construction company. In return, Warren gives Sam two lucrative projects as a “thank you.” In this case, Sam has engaged in a financial conflict of interest. He has profited financially, albeit indirectly, from his involvement with the nonprofit board and its connections benefited him personally.
2. Fran serves on the boards of two health-related nonprofits and hears about a grant available for healthcare nonprofits. Fran chooses to share it with Nonprofit A instead of both nonprofits. In this case, Fran exhibits organizational conflict of interest. Fran’s actions act against the best interests of Nonprofit B, which may also benefit from the information about the grant.

To avoid a conflict of interest, Sam should have remained quiet and not given Warren tips for winning the RFP, or he should have declined any contracts or gifts from Warren. Fran could have given the grant application information to both organizations and allowed them to choose if they wished to apply for the grant or not. In both cases, the choices and subsequent actions of Sam and Fran made their situations into conflicts of interest.

Although federal laws governing 501(c) (3) organizations do not require a conflict of interest policy, it is often a good idea for nonprofits to have one in place. Simple guidelines may be all it takes to get people to think twice before acting in a way that could harm your nonprofit’s best interests.

Welter Consulting

Welter Consulting bridges nonprofits and solutions to help them find technology that works for them. We invite you to contact us for any assistance you need with nonprofit technology and business solutions. Call 206-605-3113 or contact us.

You’re a mission-driven organization. You focus on shaving costs without sacrificing services so that you get the most bang for your donor’s buck.

Yet there’s one final puzzle piece that donors look for: IMPACT.

What is the impact of your work? What results are you delivering? How can you quantify them?

These are important questions that investors, donors, and granting organizations want answered. Yet answering such questions is challenging.

Measuring Impact

Nonprofits who fail to answer these questions leave themselves open to criticism and suspicion. Yet it can be challenging, as well as expensive, to have an independent auditor fully evaluate the impact that your organization’s programs and services make on your constituents.

There is a middle ground between answering the impact question and avoiding it. Several tools exist to help nonprofits demonstrate a commitment to making an impact and using funds wisely towards fulfilling their mission.

• Impact Matters: Impact Matters offers a simple and free tool to quantify the impact that nonprofits make. With permission, the company also posts the results to Charity Navigator. This provides a clear signal to people searching Charity Navigator that you take impact seriously. The tool is relatively new, and may not be free forever, so you may want to investigate it as soon as possible.
• Charting Impact: Charting Impact is a joint project of Independent Sector, GuideStar, and BBB Wise Giving Alliance. It provides a questionnaire that helps you build a framework within your organization to measure the impact of your work. By using this framework and sharing the results with your constituents, you provide them with a transparent look into your organization’s education to making an impact.
• Give Well: Give Well states that it is a “nonprofit dedicated to finding outstanding giving opportunities through in-depth analysis.” The organization conducts its own research into the effectiveness of specific charities. Organizations which have been assessed by Give Well tend to see increases in donations, according to the site, because of the independent evaluation Give Well provides.

DIY Methods of Measuring Impact

Let’s assume you work in a small nonprofit. What are your options for measuring impact? You’re not working with multimillion dollar budgets or global issues; you’re trying to help clean up the local waterways, or reduce illiteracy, or find a safe haven for battered women. How can your nonprofit evaluate its impact?

1. The first step is to have a solid mission statement. The mission statement of your organization is more than just a nice paragraph to recap your organization’s purpose. It should be the yardstick by which you measure all new activities and expenditures. Dust off your mission statement and review it.
2. Next, decide the “how”. How will you achieve your mission? List the programs and services that your organization participates in that support its mission.
3. Now think about all the ways in which you can measure those programs and services. Perhaps it is the number of people served or animals adopted, the amount of trash you’ve cleaned up, or the improvements in the water quality. Quantifiable data is great (number measurement) but qualitative data may also be important.
4. Record your improvements and establish a timeline by which you will measure them regularly.
5. When you’re confident in your findings, publish them so that your constituents gain insight into your organization’s results.

You can’t measure what you can’t monitor, so don’t reach too high and pick things to monitor that are impossible to measure with any certainty.

And remember the importance of storytelling when it comes to making an impact. Yes, numbers are important, but so too are case studies, photos, and videos of people sharing how your organization has made a difference in their lives. It is this complete picture of both qualitative and quantitative data that helps constituents understand the full impact of your organization.

You make a difference. Now it’s time to measure its impact! Get started today, no matter how small or simple the steps, and gain confidence as you move forward. There’s no time like the present to start.

Welter Consulting

Welter Consulting bridges nonprofits and solutions to help them find technology that works for them. We invite you to contact us for any assistance you need with nonprofit technology and business solutions. Call 206-605-3113 or contact us.