I’ve been enjoying the discussion in the Chronicle of Philanthropy’s LinkedIn group in response to the question, “What’s a good, affordable donor database program for a small non profit?” (you’ll probably need to join the group to read the responses). There have been 120 responses so far, and they’ve been all over the map, from expensive, high-end systems to free ones, from established players to new ones. My unofficial tally is that Raiser’s Edge and Salesforce have been mentioned the most. Raiser’s Edge gets mostly high marks, but is described as too expensive and complex for a small nonprofit. Salesforce has the most disparate comments, ranging from “I am a huge Salesforce fan” and “Salesforce is excellent!” to “I do not recommend SalesForce, even if it is free” and “It may be free, but as someone with software development experience, I found administration of it to be much too complex for the average nonprofit user.”
Are you a Salesforce nonprofit user? If so, is it working for you? What do you think are the keys to success?
Alicia Schmidt says
Hi there,
I am the Customer Success Evangelist with the Salesforce.com Foundation.
It’s true, the comments on the LinkedIn thread are diverse, mostly, I think, because Salesforce is more than just a single-minded application. It is a platform that can be used for fundraising OR program management OR lots of other functions. As such, it does require some combination of time, money or technical skill to be customized and used effectively by a nonprofit (of ANY size).
We do offer 10 licenses at no cost to nonprofit organizations, and unfortunately that has led some organizations to choose our product even though it might not meet their requirements. Our product is a very powerful tool, but it isn’t a good fit for every nonprofit.
We’ve done some research on orgs that are most successful on our platform and we have found that generally speaking, they:
Have an IT capable staff
Are flexible and open to change
Have Senior Management that drives and actively uses salesforce.com
Have high visibility of the product – staffers know that the org is using salesforce.com and why
Have a partner or skilled technical resource dedicated to their implementation
Of course, there are always exceptions, but we have found this to be generally true. We don’t want nonprofits to choose our product because it is free, we want them to choose our product because it will help them more effectively achieve their mission.
Hope this helps,
-Alicia
Robert says
Thanks for the input, Alicia. I agree that a big part of the problem is that many nonprofits have chosen Salesforce primarily because it’s free. I agree with these two articles from Idealware on the true costs of “free” software.
The True Costs of Free and Low-Cost Software
There Ain’t No Such Thing As a Free Software Package
Price should be just one consideration, after making sure the software will meet your needs and that you have the capacity to use and support it.
Mark says
So I know this is old – but Salesforce now has the Nonprofit Starterpack along with their free enterprise licenses which helps many organizations – however I have found that most organizations still need significant time and money invested into Salesforce to work for them.
Apricot by CTK is very popular – they have United Way connections as well.
iMis is very popular along with software from Blackbaud.
Den says
My trial of salesforce has ended and can’t get in touch w/ anyone to reconnect us. The person at the nosoftware line continually reminded me this is a donation to NP’s and don’t expect the customer service to be turnaround. It’s a $4500 gift so be grateful.
Robert Weiner says
Denise — If you work for a nonprofit, you might ask on the Nonprofit Salesforce.com Practitioners forum: https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/npsf
Robert