Salesforce is a great tool that helps nonprofits manage activities. With the Nonprofit Success Pack, you can manage organization accounts, donation funds, affiliations, and contacts and track relationships, status of donations, and recurring donations. Your nonprofit’s CRM (Customer Relationship Management) significantly influences how your organization will conduct business, such as communicating with donors and organizing events. Salesforce prides itself on its flexibility, scalability, and accessibility. It is designed to serve nonprofits for their daily tasks.
Now that we know that Salesforce is the best solution for Nonprofits, let us see how it improves your business.
What Can Salesforce Do for Nonprofits?
Salesforce serves a broad range of organizations using Cloud-based platforms that can be configured to fit the specific organization’s needs. Nonprofits investing in Salesforce will use Nonprofit Cloud, the primary platform for nonprofits, which includes different tools compatible with industry-specific technology. Within the Cloud, Salesforce also offers a Nonprofit Success Pack (NPSP), a comprehensive package configuring the Salesforce CRM specifically for nonprofit needs.
Nonprofits that use Nonprofit Cloud can even integrate the system with other solutions on the Salesforce AppExchange, such as apps for volunteer management, email marketing, and donation gift matching.
Why Should you Choose Salesforce for your Nonprofit Needs?
There are so many reasons why you should choose Salesforce for your Nonprofit Needs that we may be unable to cover all of them in just one blog! Our team of experts has narrowed it down to the top five reasons why Salesforce would be the best choice for your nonprofit.
- One Unified System– sometimes, you may have several disconnected software solutions that seldom work together, making your operations more complicated and giving your team extra work. For nonprofits that are growing rapidly and seeking to expedite growth, you may be considering a solution for quick data synchronization and integrated analysis. Salesforce has many apps that can manage all software solutions on one platform. It even includes membership management tools and extends to various industry-specific products.
- Complete Customization– Do you need help to control your current org? There may be a specific feature you want to use, but it is either unavailable or unable to find it. You may have recognized that there are mundane tasks that you need to do manually, such as email campaigning. Salesforce can help your nonprofit configure your platform to have the exact features you need, especially with the extensive library of apps available on AppExchange and an open API to allow for more customization and integration.
- High-End, Top-Notch Security– Salesforce’s security is constantly being updated so that your organization will always use the most updated version of Salesforce that has been automatically stored in the cloud. It means that your software will constantly be updated to ensure that security requirements are being fulfilled to protect your data from any threats. Nonprofits can leverage Salesforce’s settings, such as quickly setting different permission levels for users so that only certain users can access specific databases.
- Flexibility is a mark of good organization in that you will sometimes offer different services or follow the same case management and fundraising practices. The Salesforce understands that your organization’s needs are constantly changing and growing, causing the need for constant upgrades. If there is no flexibility in your CRM, it can inhibit growth, meaning that any nonprofit will need to upgrade its CRM platform each time there is a change and relearn/retrain employees, wasting time and resources.
Salesforce can help with customization and provide a wide selection of constantly updated apps to ensure that the platform will work for your nonprofit regardless of size, service, or specialty. Though Salesforce is an extensive, comprehensive platform, it is compatible with many unique needs. Using AppExchange, you can look for an app that fits your needs or partner with a developer to reconfigure part of your task management system.
- A Supportive Developer Community– It may be easy to feel overwhelmed by the wide range of applications that Salesforce offers on AppExchange. Salesforce has developed a vast community of app developers, consultants, and other service providers to help you fully use your org’s potential. One of the biggest pros of Salesforce is that there is a broad developer community at the tip of your fingers to help you whenever you need anything. Consultants such as Prudent can help you quickly migrate data to Salesforce, assist you with navigating your org and customizations, and ensure that all your employees are trained on how to continue using Salesforce in the future.
Salesforce has a wide range of customizations, but they still need to remember the core features that Nonprofits can benefit from Nonprofit Cloud or NPSP.
What are the Top Features that Salesforce for Nonprofits offer?
- Fundraising– with the future of the Nonprofit Cloud, Salesforce will provide a new feature that allows nonprofits to track recurring donor management and build relationships with donors & volunteers by collecting data to make persuasive fundraising appeals. (Note: the fundraising feature still needs to be implemented; read more about the future of Salesforce Nonprofit Cloud). (Link our previous blog here)
- Marketing Cloud for Nonprofits– create personalized messages and targeted ads using pre-built messaging templates to send out relevant supporter details to create individualized communications automatically.
- Grantmaking– Nonprofit Cloud’s grant management tool can create new records for each foundation you plan to apply. You can also use it to track the status of the application, note grant requirements, and keep awarded funds organized. Salesforce has a separate Grant Management package that allows you to create unique grant applications, build user-friendly grant applicant portals, and standardize your grant review processes.
- Operations– Nonprofit Cloud allows nonprofits to view all their data, streamline their internal operations, and integrate, manage, and safeguard data with Salesforce’s user-friendly interface.
- Nonprofit Success Pack– NPSP is a free, open-source software package designed to connect volunteers with all constituents and provide organizations with insightful reports and analytics to help measure fundraising performance and smoothly manage all donations.
Considering all the features that Salesforce for nonprofits can offer, it can also be beneficial and fun to think about the benefits it can provide for your organization.
What are Some Benefits you can Reap from Salesforce for Your Organization?
- Keep Your Organization Organized– use Salesforce for nonprofits to cut clutter by using built-in functionalities that help Nonprofits create and design customized workspaces for everyone. You may have noticed difficulties managing activities like fundraising, grants, or your workforce. Still, Salesforce can come in to help you overcome any challenge by providing you with an extensive platform to allow you to build personalized dashboards and make sure everything runs smoothly.
- Boost Operational Efficiency– By helping increase communication relationships among the workforce, the Salesforce can help ensure that everything comes together smoothly, boosting operational efficiency.
- Customize Your Org Cloud allows you to customize whatever feature you need to fulfill operational requirements regardless of the features and functionalities you may need.
- Make Sure All Your Reports Are Accurate– reporting is critical to every nonprofit organization to make sure fundraising activities, programs, seminars, and donations work accurately. Salesforce is highly accurate, making it reliable to help your organization.
- Save Money While Taking Advantage of All Features– As a nonprofit organization, you may have heard of the Power of Us Program, designed to help nonprofits with affordable products and programs. As a part of the Power of Us Program, the first ten subscriptions are free for nonprofits, and then organizations will receive offers at discounted profits. This way, Salesforce can expand its reach swiftly and affordably.
Conclusion
There are many reasons to switch to Nonprofit Cloud for Salesforce. There are many distinct advantages to switching over to Salesforce. With a vast range of consultants, such as Prudent, to help you seamlessly integrate into the platform, you will never need to worry about anything again! Click here to see how to shift onto Salesforce and watch your worries flow away!