4 Tips for Nonprofit Success This Year

By: Phil Burns, Director of Solution Architecture, Candoris

As we begin the year, New Year’s resolutions are top of mind. What better time than now to reflect on 2018 and plan for the year ahead?

But New Year’s resolutions aren’t just for your personal benefit. Reflecting on your goals and developing intentional plans can help energize your organization’s mission, too!

As you’re planning for 2019, below are some helpful insights to inspire your key initiatives. Watch our webinar with Wycliffe for a deeper discussion on becoming a better Connected Nonprofit.

1. UNDERSTAND Your People and Your Data

Sounds simple, right? But do you really know the people who engage with your mission? Internal staff, volunteers, and field workers are the heartbeat of your organization, and their impact ripples through the lives of the people with whom they connect. A CRM can help you understand the characteristics and individual connections of every person in your network, which will support the growth and impact of your mission. Nonprofit Cloud allows you to track the individual characteristics of everyone in your network, giving you a unique view of who they are across all aspects of their lives, who they interact with, and how they are impacting your mission.

2. COMMUNICATE with Purpose

With an enhanced understanding of your people, you can revisit the ways in which you communicate. Irrespective of the size of your network, marketing automation can help you share relevant and timely messages, specific to the unique identities of your people. Nonprofit Cloud will support you with advanced segmentation capabilities – helping to identify the optimal recipients of your messages and to personalize those messages for maximum impact. And segmentation is more than just identifying internal and external constituents. It’s about tracking and knowing the unique identifying characteristics and associated activities that define the people within your network. Segmentation is a way of personalizing your messages to fit the attributes of smaller subgroups. Designing strategies to better communicate with these different subgroups will increase the impact of your message. Why? 77% of ROI comes from segmented, targeted, and triggered campaigns, meaning that it’s worth the effort!

When you’re ready to share your message, Salesforce can help with that, too, through software like Pardot and Marketing Cloud that helps you automate processes, track messages and improve how you engage with constituents. Make 2019 the year you communicate with renewed purpose.

3. OPTIMIZE Processes and Procedures

In organizations large and small, it’s common for processes to vary by department or individual, often due to differing objectives. Additionally, traditional data management systems can’t always address the processes that are unique to your organization. That’s why many nonprofit and faith-based organizations are moving to Nonprofit Cloud – because YOU can define the processes, instead of the system. You have the opportunity to identify what’s working and to celebrate the best practices that are elevating your organization’s work and creating impact in support of your mission. Salesforce provides powerful tools that can automate your repetitive tasks and processes, including Approvals, Process Builder, Workflow, and Cloud Flow Designer. For instance, Lightning Flow can be used to set up automated tasks and processes, add automation to pages and apps, and connect your Salesforce to external systems. Learn more about choosing the right automation tool.

Did you know that Nonprofit Cloud supports system integrations? It’s true – Salesforce doesn’t have to replace all your existing systems. Instead, it’s built to support your existing systems by eliminating data silos across multiples platforms. For instance, consider the efficiencies gained if all your event data synced with all your online giving transactions, which also synced with all your marketing engagement touches! Use 2019 to imagine all the potential benefits of this unified view. Nonprofit Cloud can help you make it happen and streamline the important work throughout your organization.

4. ENGAGE Everyone in Your Network

Now that you’ve streamlined your process and gotten a better understanding of the people attached to your organization, there’s time to focus on a group that sometimes gets overlooked. Your volunteer or donor recruiting process places people into meaningful roles that lead to deep engagement and activity with the organization’s mission, right? But what about the people who raise their hand, yet don’t fit into a needed or desired role within the organization right now? In the past, you might not have had the resources to immediately and fully connect with this group, which meant they frequently fell off your radar. But this is an important group! And with the power of the Salesforce platform, you can create efficiencies throughout your organization to give focus where you were previously unable to do so. Many similar organizations are leveraging the power of Salesforce Communities to drive meaningful engagement with varied and diverse constituencies. So, remember – there is value in the lost group. They’ve raised their hand and expressed the desire to join your mission – make 2019 the year you reconnect!

All of this boils down to accelerating the impact of your mission and empowering the people in your organization and community. Nonprofit Cloud helps you put the R in CRM: Relationships that make up your network. Watch the webinar to learn how Salesforce.org and Candoris, a Premium implementation partner, can help you energize your mission and provide inspiration for 2019 to maximize your impact. Cheers!

WATCH THE WEBINAR

About the Author
Phil Burns is the Director of Solution Architecture at Candoris and a senior member of our software engineering team. His experience spans more than 20 years and includes roles in consulting, engineering, research & development, and senior management. He is a skilled nonprofit business analyst and is an expert at uncovering our customer’s true organizational needs and opportunities. Candoris provides consulting and implementation services for nonprofits, especially the faith-based sector.

Candoris is a Salesforce.org Premium Partner that helps nonprofits succeed with Nonprofit Cloud.