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Upcoming Webinar Announced!

Upcoming Webinar Announced!

Each year, our clients join us for our End-of-Year Fundraising Workshop series where we walk through everything from audience segmentation and campaign set up to tracking your progress in the WaterGrass database. During this presentation we’ll hear from three of our clients and learn about how they found success in 2023. We’d love to hear from you too during our Q&A.

Guest Speakers:
     Brittany Chavez – Arizona Trail Association
     Maggie Stange and Crys Bauer – West Virginia Rivers Coalition
     Lisa Cole – Missouri River Relief

Lessons Learned from 2023 End-of-Year Fundraising
Friday, March 29, 2024, 1pm EST

Register Here

Hope to see you there!

Automating Your Volunteer Management

Automating Your Volunteer Management

Artwork designed by freepik.com

Many conservation organizations mobilize volunteers for events, but find few of those volunteers become long-time supporters. This seems counterintuitive – these are people who make the effort to show up, learn about the organization, and probably share a commitment to its mission. But on average fewer than half volunteer again (according to our research) and less than 20% ever donate.

Why? One of the biggest reasons is that the event organizers are overwhelmed with the task of managing the event, and don’t have time to connect personally with participants.

The problem shows up in various ways:

  • Events may be very large, such that organizers don’t have time to make personal contact with the participants. (Organizations that run smaller, more personalized events seem to have better success generating volunteer donations and better volunteer return rates.)
  • Organizers don’t have time to record the names and contact information of their participants, or if they do, they don’t enter them into their database until later. Usually, they are just too busy and have to move on to the next event as soon as the current event is done, and the information is lost.
  • They don’t systematically cultivate those volunteers, inviting them to attend another event or take the next step in the organization.
  • They don’t track volunteer history and may not recognize long-term volunteers.
  • Volunteer organizers turn over frequently. When they leave they take with them their internal rolodex of valuable contacts and much of what they learned. The next organizer starts from zero.

A database or client relationship management (CRM) system like WaterGrass can help, and here’s how:

Facilitating Volunteer Registration: CRMs can manage client registrations with online signups, and also handle paperwork like instructions or waivers. When users sign up online into a CRM, their information is automatically recorded in the database and doesn’t need to be entered manually later. (Stand-alone volunteer management systems like Eventbrite or SignUpGenius also have online signups, but their information isn’t submitted to your organizational database so that you can track and cultivate them. Importing the lists into your organizational database is an extra step, which may or may not happen.)

Letting Volunteers Manage Their Own Events: If the CRM has a feature like the WaterGrass Volunteer Portal, volunteers can manage their own list of interests, cancel their participation, review their work history and even log their own hours. Some volunteers take great pride in seeing their contribution grow, and really appreciate being able to track it themselves. Organizers like having up-to-date interest lists. 

Targeting Invitations to the Right Volunteers: CRMs can track volunteer interests, allowing you to easily send invitations to volunteers who have indicated interest in a particular type of event.

Making it Quicker to Process the Participation List: Some CRMs have forms that facilitate the entry of volunteer hours. The WaterGrass “Process Participant List” reduces the work necessary after the event – when most organizers are eager to just go home. This makes it more likely that names and contact information of “walk-in” participants gets into the CRM right away. Thank you messages can go out on time.

Finally, a computerized volunteer management system structures the work so that new employees can adopt the same system and continue to enter data in a uniform way. It maintains and builds the organizational history which makes outreach easier, and it keeps the data clean and reliable.

All this amounts to more time for organizers to focus on the volunteers, to enjoy the work that they do, and to build connections between volunteers and the organization.


Do you organize volunteers? Reserve your spot for the Using a CRM to Manage Volunteers webinar series, which begins with a free introductory webinar on March 20th at 1 PM Eastern Standard Time:

Post by Baird Straughan, February 2024

Keeping Your Email Out of Spam Folders in 2024

Keeping Your Email Out of Spam Folders in 2024

Setting Up and Testing SPF and DKIM Authentication for Automated Email Systems

For years … decades, actually … hackers have been able to “spoof” email addresses and send out spam as if it came from other peoples’ email accounts. Internet service providers have finally settled on authentication standards to ensure that emails actually originate from the same domain as their return address. 

But what if you INTEND to send an email from a mail server that isn’t running under your organization’s domain? For example, say your email is “me@myorganization.org,” but your CRM database sends email on your behalf and it has a sending server address like “salesforce.com.” That can look like spam too.

At WaterGrass, we and our clients use the WaterGrass CRM to register participants in our events and to send them confirmation and reminder emails, expiration and renewal notices, as well as for a host of other things. We want the inboxes receiving these emails to know that they came from us.

That’s possible thanks to the new authentication standards, Sender Policy Framework (SPF) and DomainKeys Identified Mail (DKIM). These let ISPs verify that our email comes from a server we authorize to send on our behalf. Beginning this month, Google and Yahoo say they will require all bulk emailers (sending more than 5,000 emails a day to their email servers) to use SPF and DKIM. And anyone who uses SPF and DKIM will be less likely to be caught in spam filters.

What To Do

Luckily, it’s easy to test whether your emails already have SPF and DKIM, thanks to a number of different testing tools. Our favorite is DKIMValidator.com. Simply send an email to the address DKIMValidator provides, and then click on the “View results” button to see what security has already been set up for you, as well as the rating give by SpamAssassin, a tool used by most ISP’s to weed out spam.

It’s only a little more complicated to test email generated by your CRM. We’ve put together documentation with screenshots to guide you, as well as help testing and setting up your SPF and DKIM authentication.

If you’re not ready to dive in now, store this blogpost away for the inevitable time when authentication is required of all of us. And remember, if you’re a WaterGrass user, you can always get in touch with support@watergrass.org to help you through this process.

The Best Time to Switch Databases

The Best Time to Switch Databases

Surprise! There’s no easy time, especially if your organization uses your system regularly. 

Imagine updating the electrical in your home while you’re still living there…changing your organization’s database, or CRM, can be similarly inconvenient and even stressful. In fact, it would be surprising if such a big change didn’t have an effect on day-to-day operations.

Here are a few suggestions, from our team and our clients, on how to time this important switch. Because while it may never be easy, planning will make it easier. 

Better Times

  • During Your Slow Season: For some organizations there are 1-2 months where operations and fundraising “slow” down and staff are graced with a planning period. This is a strategic time for loading data into a new database, setting up the next season’s events, and testing and working out any kinks in processes.
    • 💡Tip: If your organization has no slow season (for example, the slow season for volunteering is the peak season for fundraising, and vise versa), a longer transition and some overlap with previous systems may be necessary. That way each team that needs to be set up in the new database can do the work when the time is most ideal for them.

  • While Your Experienced Staff is Available: Moving to a database usually involves cleaning up your data, and for that you need staff who can judge what’s essential and what’s outdated. Then, once you get to the new software, you’ll need to compare reports from the two systems to see that they match.

  • When Current Database/Software Is Up for Renewal: Some database systems lock clients into multi-year contracts. If this is the case for your organization’s current system, the year the contract expires is the most economic time to switch.
    • 💡Tip: Start these conversations with your team about a year in advance of any deadline and build in some time for an overlap of the new and old software. 

Tougher Times

  • During Large Fundraising Events: The bread and butter of many databases is managing donors and their donations. Switching to a new database in the middle of a large appeal could hurt an organization’s bottom line. Donations need to be tracked accurately, donors need to be thanked promptly, and software glitches need to be avoided.
    • 💡Tip: Schedule a large buffer here, and if possible, plan for some smaller “pilot” fundraisers before you take on your largest event. 

  • Before Financial Deadlines and Audits: At the end of the fiscal year or during an audit, it’s especially important that your donor records match your financial records. Wrap up your work for these large tasks before changing anything up.

More Tips 

💡Create a Calendar/Schedule: Get your team in the same room and create a calendar. Include previous software expiration dates and time for data loads, system set ups and staff training. For each item, plan in more time than you think you’ll need.

💡Communicate with Your Constituents: While database work is the backend of your organization and one hopes that transitions will appear seamless to your donors, members and volunteers, there is a chance your supporters will notice the change. Let your constituents know that you’re working with new software, how much you appreciate their support and ask them to contact you if they run into any problems. This may even be a good time to lean on your inner circle of supporters, who can help you test new systems before they even go live.

💡Clean Your Data: If your data is healthy (few duplicates, less outdated data, void of erroneous fields of information) it will be easier for you or the new database company to load it into your new system. Data loads are a heavy lift, but this can make it easier.

💡Plan for Staff Training: A tool is only helpful if you know how to use it. Your calendar/schedule for this switch should include time to train any staff or volunteers who will have access.

The WaterGrass Solution

If you’re shopping around for a new database, check out WaterGrass. WaterGrass is a set of tools made for nonprofits (volunteer, event, member and donor management) built on top of the Salesforce CRM. Go here to learn more.

Best of all, WaterGrass staff are here to help. We’ll work with you to load your data into the database, help customize it to fit your needs, and continue to be available for one-on-one training and troubleshooting for your team as long as you’re with us. 

Let’s continue the conversation! Click here to contact us.

Thanks to Annie Nelson, Lisa Cole, Sarah Morse, Brittany Chavez, Barbara Budd and Lisa Luokkala for their contributions to this post!

Recommended Workaround: Google Chrome 108 Breaks Some WordPress Donation Pages

Recommended Workaround: Google Chrome 108 Breaks Some WordPress Donation Pages

​UPDATE: As of 12/8/2022 Click and Pledge has patched its WordPress plugin to avoid the problem. Visitors using Chrome 108 on Click and Pledge donation pages will see the picklists, which look slightly different – they’re truncated, and visitors will have to scroll to the desired value. But they work. Google is also rolling out a new version (109) of the Chromium engine with a fix, so the problem will eventually disappear. BUT for some other web platforms, visitors who still have Chrome 108 may run into the picklist problem if they’re visiting non-Click and Pledge pages which are i-framed on a separate web platform. We can’t say that all payment platforms will be as quick as Click and Pledge to release a patch.

In any case, for Click and Pledge, the problem is resolved and the fix mentioned below is now unnecessary.

============

Bad news. The 11/29/2022 update of the Chromium engine no longer works with “select” (picklist) fields on WordPress and Squarespace sites where a Click and Pledge page is embedded (iframed). A bunch of our WaterGrass users fall into this category, and we only noticed the problem while we investigated something else. The result of the problem is that visitors to a donation webpage can’t use the picklists to select their credit card’s month and year of expiration, so they can’t donate. You can test your own site by clicking on those fields while using an updated version of Chrome.

After we alerted our clients, one reported that since the 29th she has seen an unexpected drop in donation rates. But so far only one user has called in to alert any of our clients to the problem, and we’re running this configuration in about 15 client organizations, so this is a stealthy bug that may cost you donations without you ever becoming aware. Especially since the Chromium update rolls out slowly over the whole population of users, so that the effect will be gradual.

The problem clearly goes back to Google’s update of its Chromium engine, which is the basis of multiple browsers, including Edge , Opera and Brave as well as Chrome itself. I was able to verify that I could make a donation on a CnP page on a WordPress site when I used an older Chrome version, but could not donate as soon as I updated the browser to 108.

Google is aware of the problem and is incorporating a fix into Chromium 109. We don’t know how long it’ll take for a patch to come out, or how long it’ll be before your donors update to 109.

Our recommendation is to be safe and follow the lead of the Huron River Watershed and others who have had their webmasters add text to their donation pages like this:

​​
 ​

My preferred wording is “We are experiencing technical difficulties. If you are using the updated Chrome browser (or Edge, Opera or Brave), please click here to donate. The form below will work otherwise.” I would highlight this paragraph because otherwise some people won’t read it.

The link “please click here to donate” should be the link to your naked donation page, which you can get from CnP Connect / Campaigns and Forms / Payment Forms where you first designed your payment page. The Connect page looks like this:

The link will look something like “https://connect.clickandpledge.com/w/Form/b86f9cd9-1f49-4d77-8753-f82b29e85504“.

When users click on this link, it will take them to the “naked” CnP payment page which is not framed within your WordPress website, and therefore won’t have the same Chromium browser issues.

Alternatively, you can want to wait and see how soon Google comes up with a fix. But since it’s now the middle of the end-of-year donation season, that wouldn’t be my choice.

Baird

PS. I’d be surprised if Click and Pledge is the only payment platform affected. I’ve focused on it because it’s the most common platform for our clients.

New Trends in Fundraising Outreach for 2022

New Trends in Fundraising Outreach for 2022

At WaterGrass, we try to stay close to our client organizations, especially at the end of the year, when they bring in a disproportionate amount of support from their communities. We enjoy learning with them what works and what doesn’t, and sharing their lessons with others.

For the past five years, Carl has run an End-of-Year Appeal series for WaterGrass organizations.  This year, he was surprised when:

  • Fundraising goals for the EOY campaign jumped substantially;
  • Groups employed a greater range of techniques to reach out.

The change is striking enough to share what we’re seeing.  Here are five takeaways:

Giving Tuesday is serving as an “anchor” for the start of End-of-Year campaigns.

Lis Heras, Development Coordinator at Friends of the Rappahannock, is one who has used Giving Tuesday with success. She shared a printed piece she used to inform board members and others about their fundraising options, and recorded a short video for us:

More are using “peer to peer” campaigns

Melanie Cheney writes, “ When it comes to P2P giving, we’ve heavily focused on Facebook Fundraisers and have seen great success doing them in the past, and we’ve encouraged others to create one as it is a super easy P2P giving option.”

“I often have prioritized it in this way when asking people to consider hosting a P2P:

  1. You can host a Facebook Fundraiser centered around Giving Tuesday (or anytime really).
  2. Create a Peer-to-Peer Fundraiser on CoMoGives during the entire month of December! (See below.)
  3. There are more ways to support your favorite non-profit than donating money.  You can share emails, Facebook posts & Fundraisers with your friends, telling them why you support Missouri River Relief!  You can also make a pledge of action here, on the CoMoGives.com webpage.”

One of the downsides of Facebook is that it doesn’t share your donors emails with you so you can’t reach them directly.  Melanie says, “If we don’t already have their contact info, we reach out to them through Facebook and ask for it. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t.”

Organizations make the process of donating easier by including QR codes in their printed materials.

Allie Schneider says, “I heard about the idea of including QR codes on fundraising materials and thought I’d try it to see if our donors responded to it. I tracked engagement by creating two campaigns in Click & Pledge. One was embedded on our main donation landing page, accessible by a button on our homepage of the website. The second was embedded on a ‘hidden’ page that wasn’t linked anywhere. It was only accessible by typing in the exact url (which we didn’t promote) or using the QR code. This helped keep the two methods separate.”

“We’ve discovered we have minimal engagement with our QR codes. People seem to prefer to donate by credit card by going directly to our website. HRWC will continue to include QR codes for a few reasons. It’s a low-cost way to offer additional donation methods, it’s new so we’d like to give our donors a chance to become familiar with donating to HRWC via QR codes, and as a safety precaution, HRWC no longer accepts credit card donations by mail so we are going to include QR codes on our mailings so donors still have a credit option.”

Some groups choose to fundraise through aggregators (like United Way) rather than process donations themselves.

Lisa Cole from Missouri River Relief is trying out a donation aggregator site offered by the Community Foundation of Central Missouri. 

She explains that “it’s part and parcel of this larger effort in which we participate, and that makes it easier than offering one, directly, ourselves.   Last year we had a significant struggle, to be honest, getting people—even our board—to participate in it. But for other local organizations, it seems to be as powerful as the industry best practices indicate.  I’ve invited our board to offer one this year.  Last one actually did (in addition to myself and another staff member).”

Heavier use of videos to highlight the resources you’re protecting.

The Eagle River Watershed Council in Colorado has to compete with many high-profile nonprofits in the area, so their Development and Communications Manager Melanie Smith used the pandemic lull to develop more professional-looking materials, including their letters, website, and videos.

“In 2020 everyone was isolated and online.  We had a budget for outreach, so we developed a new website and a “foundational video” to let the river tell its own story.” Melanie says,

“Last year we developed a flexible tag line:  “This place is home.  Help us protect it.”  Or “This place is wild.  Help us protect it.”  So we had a lot of B-roll left over from the original video, and from it we created shorter videos for each one of those tag lines.  We broadcast them however we could, even including them on donation pages if it didn’t slow the load time too badly.  We did social media ads, and linked it into the signature of our emails.”

“And we saw an unanticipated growth in donations,” she reports, although she’s not sure that it can all be attributed to the new materials.

You’ll find a copy of the video Melanie mentions here. Check out the Eagle River Watershed Council’s full YouTube Channel, where you’ll even find a video of a spoken-word poem.

What new techniques did YOUR organization use in this year’s year-end appeal?  What can other organizations learn from YOUR fundraising this year?  Add your comments below!

 

What Did COVID Teach Your Volunteer Programs?

What Did COVID Teach Your Volunteer Programs?

COVID served as a sort of stress test for many volunteer programs. Could they survive without in-person activities? Could you adapt them to the new circumstances?  

Most important – Were there changes you made that you’re adopting permanently?

At WaterGrass we convened a discussion on the topic.  (WaterGrass is an organizational database that among other things manages volunteer activities, so we have the raw data on volunteering.) Jason Frenzel from the Huron River Watershed Council Council and several other volunteer managers share their experiences and insights over the last two years.

This was a preliminary discussion – a more extended one will take place at River Rally in June – but some fascinating insights arose.  If you or your organization manages volunteers, I’d love you to post your comments.

  1. Organizations that had already begun managing volunteers through online portals or even delivering programs online saw a much smaller drop in their volunteer hours.
  2. Some groups reported changes in their participant demographics. In particular, low income populations were less represented.
  3. Some urban groups pivoted to provide other needed services to marginalized populations, beyond their standard education and recreational activities.
  4. Trails and waterways attracted more use and highlighted the importance of these organizations in their missions. Few of them capitalized on that to raise funds or Garner new volunteers.
  5. Volunteers were eager to find activities during the pandemic, and hungry for anything offered.

One organization reported that when it closed its volunteer programs it also lost the ability to stay in contact with and cultivate new volunteer leaders, on whom it depends to lead many of its large activities the impact of this will be felt in the coming years.

Volunteer programs were forced to adopt digital strategies when they couldn’t convene face-to-face activities; many of them discovered things that they would now continue to do online instead of in person.

What was your experience?  What changes did you make in your volunteer programs? Which will you keep? Please post your comment below.

And if you’re interested in the WaterGrass database as a tool for managing volunteers and donors, give me a shout!

Baird

Issues campaigns for non-advocacy organizations

Many conservation organizations shy away from advocating on issues because they work closely with local governments or state agencies and don’t want to antagonize them.

But advocacy can also lead to growth.  For example, over the last 20 years Organizations in the Waterkeepers Alliance – which advocate and also take legal action against polluters – have grown much faster than typical watershed associations which are usually focused on water quality monitoring and public education but avoid controversy.

Even neutral organizations that provide technical expertise should take advantage of hot Issues in order to highlight the importance of their work. 

For example, the Superior Rivers Association provides water quality data to local tribes and municipalities. It sees itself as a technical organization.  But when a huge taconite mine was proposed for their headwaters, the organization hosted informational public meetings and used those to recruit new water quality monitors to help establish a baseline and track the water quality in the case that such a mine were built.  They increased donations, and the number of trained water quality monitors rose by 50%.

They never took a stand on the taconite mine proposal itself.  But they did come out against loosening water quality regulations that stood in the mine’s way, because as a technical organization they valued sound science.

Critical issues like proposed mines are an opportunity highlight the importance of your conservation organization, whether it’s advocacy-oriented, technical or academic.

Online outreach on hot issues lets you reach even more individuals.  Originally used only by national groups, today it is ubiquitous among statewide organizations. Local conservation groups should be adopting it now too, because it’s local issues that people feel strongest about.

If you’re curious about online advocacy tools be sure to join us for Kathleen Tyner’s presentation about online advocacy at the West VirginianRivers Coalition.  She has tried out three tools so far, with great success.  And she has some clear recommendations even for small groups.  (Her presentation is Wednesday, the 23rd of March, at 1:00 PM Eastern.  You can sign up here.)

Volunteering at Scale

Baird Straughan, 7 Feb 2022

We started WaterGrass to help organizations manage growing volunteer programs with limited staff, and the Milwaukee Riverkeeper has achieved that in spades.  Along the way, they illustrate some basic principles of large-scale volunteer programs, and illuminate a new challenge for us.

In our webinar How One Organizer Led 218 Events with 2780 Participants in a COVID Year*, Allie Mendez described the Milwaukee River’s Adopt-A-River program, how it has grown and how MRK automated it through the WaterGrass database.

Some features that made this program a success are:

  • The software automated every step.  As the programmer, I thought that some of MRK’s requests were over the top.  Surely any volunteer organizer with just a little database knowledge could handle some of the procedures manually.  But the results is that Allie doesn’t have to think about the database at the same time she’s managing people.  The bigger the program, the more important ease of use becomes.
  • The program intentionally filters for people who are likely to succeed.  It selects for volunteer leaders who are comfortable with automation.  As Allie said, “We primarily communicate with email, so we know that if people can’t keep up with [the emails in our signup process], then they probably aren’t a good fit for the program.”
  • Allie also introduced a change to the registration process to allow prospective site leaders to take time before they committed to the program.  “Before the pandemic we had in-person orientation,” Allie said, “and people would sign the Adopter Contract forms the day of and we would get them into our system right away.  But turning it virtual has actually helped us retain our volunteers better because we give them a chance to think about it [before they commit].  This is essentially round two of our weeding out.  With training being virtual now, people need to make sure that they fill out those forms and return them on their own time.  This cuts down on our work by making sure that people are really interested and committed.”
  • Because the process is uniform, Milwaukee Riverkeepeer can measure results, make adjustments and learn. Otherwise, for example, they wouldn’t be sure that their volunteer retention had really improved.

The challenge is that automated processes sacrifice personal contact with the participants.  This can have a real impact  on the program, because it’s harder for the organizer to get to know those up-and-coming leaders who will be the next generation of cleanup site captains.  Without food and camaraderie, it’s hard to create a bond.  And while this process is very efficient, there are a lot of people that it misses because they aren’t comfortable online.  Those are challenges for the next iteration.

How would YOU approach this challenge? (Please add your comments below.)

In theory, CRMS systems like Salesforce (upon which WaterGrass is built) help build relationships because you can automatically tailor your marketing to each person. Generally, that means sending a pre-written series of messages via different channels (email, text, Twitter, etc.) automatically, with certain logic branches depending upon the recipient’s response.

But that’s not quite building a relationship. Eventually the recipient realizes they’re getting automated responses that lead to a pre-defined conclusion, rather than a personal give-and-take.

Here are my ideas. I can envision using a couple automatic message “paths” to test whether volunteers want to become the kind of leaders you need. If they answer “Yes,” then they’re probably expecting a response from a human. I’d suggest a phone call within a day or two to discuss whether they’re a good fit for the program.

That takes time, which means you need to employ Allie’s principle of filtering potential leaders down to a manageable number. Your pre-written messages need to appeal narrowly (or broadly) enough to attract the right number of candidates. And it means focussing only on volunteer programs you’ve decided to invest in, because otherwise you won’t have time to develop the potential leaders who respond.

What are your ideas about blending automation and personal outreach to volunteers?

* Allie updated the numbers for the title.

Know Your Database Culture

Installment #1 of the Nine Database Best Practices.

Carl Paulsen, WaterGrass

 

Databases provide us with the tools to make our jobs with nonprofits easier.  Or at least that’s what they SHOULD do.  The trouble is, a database is like any other tool; it works best when in the hands of a skilled craftsman.  In the hands of someone who doesn’t know what they are doing it can make a mess.

There are a lot of things to learn in order to become a database craftsman, or what we like to call a database maven.  Nothing will replace strong support services for learning how to use a database, and that’s probably the single most important benefit of the WaterGrass database - our unlimited support model.  But there are some basic principles that can help keep you out of trouble and on the way to success.  We at WaterGrass have put together a list of 9 best practices we encourage all our clients to follow.

Let’s start with the human element.

Your first step on the way to database bliss is to assess and recognize the database culture in your organization.  What do we mean by “database culture?”  For example,

  • Do staff love the database or run in fear every time your director asks for a report?  
  • Do you have rules for how to enter data into your database?  Are they followed?
  • Do data get entered regularly or whenever staff happen to have the time? 
  • Who is responsible for making sure the data is accurate?  Everyone?  No one?
  • When a new program begins, do the staff incorporate it into the database, or do they just open a new spreadsheet?

We see groups go through a transition that we like to group into 5 levels of database sophistication.  These range from the reluctant staff with no expertise to those groups that know how to fully embrace databases and put them to use to grow their organization.

Data Culture Spectrum

Where do you think your organization lies?  Is yours an organization with one lone advocate who understands the importance of databases or are you an organization where a number of people use the database, but only some use it well?  Even if your Executive Director would like everyone to use the database regularly, will your program staffers comply?  Or will they continue to run their projects from spreadsheets?

If you can move your organization along this spectrum, your database WILL make your lives easier.  But you first have to understand where your organization lies and then make a commitment to improve.

Discuss your database culture with your colleagues.  This exercise will help you avoid choosing overly ambitious projects which lead to frustration, and to identify next steps which build success. (In the corporate world, more than half of new database initiatives fail - usually because they didn’t fit the corporation.  In the nonprofit world, we have fewer resources and less ability to enforce new rules, so it’s even more important to choose wisely.)

Consider where you stand in your database journey and think about where you’d like to be and how to get there.  Think about it like a long-term campaign.  Who are your allies?  Do you need a database advocate?  Have one but need broader adoption among staff?  What would help that transition along?  Perhaps you need some regular meetings to ensure you stay on track, and to celebrate your meaningful progress.  Perhaps you want to design reports that would demonstrate the value of the database to the larger staff?  Or do you need a web based donation and signup systems or dashboards showing fundraising or volunteer progress.

Then consider which of the following practices in our upcoming blogs that you can actually implement.  You don’t have to adopt them all immediately (though you should strive for that over time).  For now, pick one practice that: 

  • suits your organization;
  • will generate benefits quickly;
  • and is within your capacity.

Implement it fully.  Hold off on others until it becomes second nature.  As you make progress on this one practice, be sure to talk about it in your organization.  Show your progress and how it has helped with your job.  This one step will help you move along the spectrum.

But make no mistake, evaluating your database culture is one of the 9 best database practices!

 

Carl Paulsen is the training and support director for the WaterGrass database, a client-relationship management system (CRMS) built for growing conservation nonprofits.  The former Director of the New Hampshire Rivers Council, he has helped dozens of organizations move up the database spectrum to improve their database practices, raise more money and involve more volunteers.