Category

Nonprofit Resources

Apr 08
0

NPO Frameworks Part 2: Nonprofit Technology Design Solutions

By | Data Management, Nonprofit Resources, Operations and Development

What is this series about again?

We’re talking about systems design for NPOs. Answering the question: How should we think about operational improvements in nonprofits, given that there are so many moving parts?

In the first post in the series, we explored three ways to consider, at a high level, what it takes to capture and assess data for impact measurement. We identified the biggest categories of moving parts, and how they inform each other.  In later series, we’ll dissect some the details.  In this series, I want to stay higher-level and talk about designing solutions in general.

To recap the first post: Nonprofits are like any other organization. They have a reason for existing, they want to know if they’re doing what they think they’re doing, and their operations are the activities that support the reason for existing.  That’s all formalized in a logic model, and results in a nice structure from which to enter into the operational considerations of data capture, efficiency, assessment and improvement.

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Dec 18
0
mass emailers for salesforce

Which Mass-Emailer is Right for My Org?

By | Nonprofit Resources

We often get questions about which apps are best for nonprofit organizations. There are several things to take into consideration when answering this question, the most important being the fact that there isn’t just one solution for every nonprofit in the world. Different organizations need different things, and sometimes only a side by side rundown can yield a correct answer. Often though, it takes a side by side rundown and a detailed discussion to come to the right conclusion. So, here is your side by side comparison, and you can always contact us here to have a detailed discussion about the exact solutions you’re looking for.

Features Campaign Monitor Constant Contact MailChimp
Templates x x x
Customization x x x
List Building x x x
Tracking x x x
Automation x x PAID
Pricing
Startup Costs – – –
Monthly $7.65 to $594.15 per month, dependent on # of contacts/emails $15 to $85+ per month, dependent on # of emails; nonprofit discount available when you contact C.C. FREE to $150 or higher, dependent on # of contacts/emails
Extras $4 to $50 per month for sendIT, the required connector, dependent on # of emails – –
Support Online Online, Phone Online

Helpful links for pricing scales:

So, there you have it. While we certainly hope this matrix is helpful to you, we’d love to speak more about which is truly the best option for your organization. Don’t forget to drop us a line if you have any questions!

Sep 22
0
social media fundraising ideas

Nonprofit Fundraising Ideas: Harnessing Social Media With Salesforce

By | CRM & Salesforce, Nonprofit Management, Nonprofit Resources, Nonprofit Tech

fundraising ideasA study by SurveyMonkey made headlines last week when it revealed that social media users are far more generous than we might think. The survey, which polled around 1,000 adult users who identified their social media habits as ‘regular,’ yielded some very useful insights for nonprofits, including which social networks are the most effective for implementing fundraising ideas. In particular, LinkedIn users were found to be the most charitable, having given, on average, more than $100 and more than ten hours to various causes in the past year. What’s interesting, though, is that less than 1% of these same users find LinkedIn to be useful for finding out about charitable causes and events. When it comes to brainstorming fundraising ideas for your nonprofit, don’t underestimate the power of social media; further, don’t neglect to research which networks will work the best for your campaign. Though these tasks can seem daunting, they’re important, and Salesforce understands that. Here are a few handy ways to harness social media with Salesforce and to really propel your online fundraising.  Read More

Sep 15
0
501 Partners Logo

Salesforce API Announcement (September 2014)

By | CRM & Salesforce, Nonprofit Resources, Nonprofit Tech

Salesforce has made some changes, but you don’t have to worry about what they mean for your NPO. That’s what we’re here for. Salesforce has changed their API (Application Program Interface) a little bit and this may affect some of your connected apps. The impact should be minimal and you will be able to login, but some features may act strangely until the permissions are corrected. Outlined below are the specifics of this change, along with screenshots to better help you understand how to deal with the shift. Read More

Sep 15
0

Salesforce Demo for Nonprofits

By | CRM & Salesforce, Nonprofit Resources, Nonprofit Tech, Our Services

Thank you for your interest in our Salesforce Demo Webinar! This webinar is intended to give you a basic understanding of Salesforce and its capabilities. This Salesforce Demo is narrated by Stefanie Archer, our Director of Training and Support. Stefanie is a Certified Salesforce Administrator.

Simply enter your name and email into the provided space to gain access to this video.

Oct 30
0

Scary emails from Salesforce: What action does a nonprofit need to take about whitelists?

By | CRM & Salesforce, Information Technology, Nonprofit Resources, Nonprofit Tech

If you get the emails that Salesforce sends out to systems administrators, you probably got a baffling email last week with the subject “Action Required: Whitelist All Salesforce IP Ranges to Prepare for Login Pools.”

dog-dude-wait-what
If you’re a normal person, your reaction was probably “Wait, what?”

First things first: the chances of small and mid-sized nonprofits needing to do anything about this email is very slim.  Check with whoever manages your IT and network, they’ll know what this email means and whether you should do anything.

But because the question has come up a couple of times, we figured we’d try to translate.  This isn’t really about Salesforce, but it’s a quick peek into the inner workings of the internet for the curious.

Inner workings of the Internet
Many of us don’t even bother with the address bar on our web browsers anymore – we just type in what we want and whatever search engine we use goes out and fetches it.  So these days you can type “salesforce” into the top address bar of your browser, and more or less go to the right web site.  If you’re old enough to read this blog post, you’re probably old enough to remember when you had to type in “www.salesforce.com” or “login.salesforce.com,” or type in “google.com” and go search for whatever you were looking for.  If you deal with web pages at all, you know that you have to find the URL (human readable name) of a web site in order to link to it.

Screen Shot 2013-10-29 at 8.23.11 PM

That human readable web address (URL) has some magic behind it.  When you type it into your address bar, your computer first talks to your local network, which talks out to the world, to find out how to translate “login.salesforce.com” into a unique IP address.  A unique IP address is just a string of numbers tied to a unique computer somewhere, like a telephone number is tied to only your phone.  How a request gets from your computer to a global computer to Salesforce servers, back to your computer, is pretty neat, actually, but we’ll trust you to read more on your own.

IP Address assignment in today’s day and age
In the very old days, you got one IP address per human-readable address.  Your own organization’s web site probably has only one IP address.  For massively busy and distributed (cloud) systems like Salesforce, or Google, what actually happens is that any of hundreds, or thousands, of different IP addresses can actually answer a request for “login.salesforce.com.”

Whitelisting Salesforce.com’s IP Addresses
So Salesforce is just expanding the number of computers that can answer a request for “login.salesforce.com.”   This never impacts most people.  However, if you are dealing with systems that have to be absolutely sure that “login.salesforce.com” isn’t coming from some evil hacker, you will get a list from Salesforce of what IP addresses are legit, and you’ll whitelist those IP addresses.  If you’ve done that, you need to expand your list soon.  That’s all this is about.

Oct 30
0

Is live hands-on training passé?

By | Nonprofit Resources, Our Services

photo (1)

Given the huge amounts of video and webinar training available on the Internet, having a live instructor in a classroom is the exception to the norm. So when is it worth the time to leave work and sit in a classroom all day?

501Partners recently ran a Salesforce for Nonprofits Boot Camp session for fourteen nonprofit professionals. They came from a spectrum of agencies with a breadth of uses for the Salesforce platform. They took time to attend because integrating Salesforce into their organization is a vitally important decision. It’s also a process that requires an understanding of how the underlying structure of Salesforce creates a powerful engine to manage virtually all of their data across its entire life cycle.

TrainingSo, it’s worthwhile to invest time in classroom training when:

  • The subject matter addresses a wide spectrum of topics and processes
  • The subject matter allows a variety of approaches
  • The cost of pursuing incorrect approaches has far reaching implications
  • Understanding the complexities involved can be accelerated in a sandbox environment.
  • A concentrated, focused time frame creates more learning than disparate, short videos and webinars

While a classroom environment can’t be leveraged efficiently from the producer’s standpoint, the fact that people responded to the offer shows an ongoing demand for this type of learning. 501Partners will continue to offer the Boot Camp while refining the balance between our on-line learning resources and hands-on classroom teaching.

Click here to learn more about our next bootcamp

Aug 27
0
Saw Sharpening

Nonprofits and Steven Covey’s Seven Habits

By | Nonprofit Management, Nonprofit Resources

The_7_Habits_of_Highly_Effective_PeopleIn the Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, Stephen Covey codified a set of behaviors that can be applied to both personal conduct and organizational behavior.

The seventh habit he identified, Sharpen the Saw, seems to be one of the most obvious and least practiced.  Sharpen the Saw comes out of a story of a frustrated lumberjack who is working tirelessly to cut down a tree, and says he doesn’t have time to stop and sharpen his saw, when it would actually help him to cut the tree far more efficiently and save him time in the long run. Sharpen the Saw is about thinking beyond short-term needs and determining ways to build capacity.

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