Over the years, we’ve heard from all kinds of non-profits about what frustrates them most about the software they used in the part, and here are the top six things we’ve heard:
1. Having to Re-enter Data
Many non-profit organizations complain that they would have to enter important donor information twice because the CRM software doesn’t integrate with other software they use like email, and accounting programs.
2. Dealing With Duplicates
Lots of non-profits also complain that their CRM or membership management software had no mechanism for preventing duplicates, so contacts would end up in their database 3 or 4 times. On top of this, there are no tools for finding and merging duplicates.
3. Running Queries
Every non-profit needs to perform queries to monitor campaign progress, analyze fundraising effectiveness, uncover trends, and refine your processes, but why does it have to be so difficult and time consuming?! This is something that really seems to annoy non-profits. If these are searches you run all time, it should not be as complex as performing brain surgery. It should be easy!
4. Dealing With Support
Often times we hear from non-profits who complain that they would have to wait a week or two to get a response to their email about a support question. How can this be? They also complain that phone support isn’t an option at all, or if it is, it costs a bundle!
5. Cost of License, Upgrades and Users
Non-profits also complain that the software license is really expensive for non-profit organizations, and they have to pay extra for new releases, and users. Maybe when they buy the software, two users is fine, but a year later they need three, and later they need five. Having to pay for additional users is frustrating because it means the cost can go up quite significantly, and this is not something they would have been able to budget for when they first bought the program. We know organizations that try to juggle two user licences among five people because it is just too expensive to add more users.
6. Still Having to Use Other Programs
Non-profits almost always tell us that the software they used to use didn’t do everything they needed. Even though they invested a lot of money into a nonprofit CRM solution, they still had to buy additional tools to manage volunteers, events, emails, and donation processing. Not only does this cause problems with managing data, but it really adds up: maybe an extra $30/month for a volunteer system, $20 for EventBrite, $20 for Constant Contact, plus a per transaction fee for online donations – all on top of the price of the donor CRM.