NPSP Time Saving Features for Busy Nonprofit Professionals

By: Cindy Gavelek, Confluence Corporation

There are many fabulous features now available within the Nonprofit Success Pack (NPSP). Our focus is on several favorites because they automate processes that could otherwise be tedious. Below are those that, when setup to meet your Organization’s needs, can be incredible time savers (these features are organized in the order in which they appear in the NPSP Settings Tab in the ‘Nonprofit Starter Pack/Settings’ App, by italicized section)

People – Account Model = Household
People – Households

Household Naming Defaults
Automatically name Households using Last Name, First Name, and any other relevant field(s) from the Household member Individual/Contact records. Including first names in Household naming reduces search time for common surnames.

Address Options and Changes
Depending on address needs for Households and Accounts, this area of NPSP has been enhanced to significantly reduce time managing addresses within a household, between households and contacts and most recently, within accounts.

Most notable time savers include:
• Updates to Household default address copies to each household member’s mailing address field [unless the Override Address box is checked on the individual/contact record]
• Enables detailed tracking of seasonal addresses for mailings
• Enables adding new default address on Household, automating this update to household members’ mailing address field, on records that do not have the Override Address box checked
• Updates to individual/contact record’s home address updates the Household address [unless the Override Address box is checked on the individual/contact record]
• Organization Account rules are similar to the above when the Organizational Account Addresses option is enabled.
• Use of the Override Address checkbox to allow for an individual/contact’s address to be maintained regardless of changes to the Household or Account Address

Relationships – Relationship Reciprocal Settings

Auto-create Reciprocal Relationships
Create reciprocal relationships with and on a contact/individual record as the initial relationship is created. If Gender is not selected on the related record, a neutral relationship term is used to designate a reciprocal relationship. For example, an Aunt would update the reciprocal relationship on the record of the Niece/Nephew/Sibling’s Child as the Aunt’s relationship is created.

Reciprocal Relationships can be used to designate Account/Organization relationships as well, such as Referral/Referrer, Employee/Employer and other similar liaisons critical for tracking with your Nonprofit.

Donations – Opportunity Names

Automate Opportunity Naming
Automatically populate the name of your opportunities [donations, grants, memberships, etc.], using fields from the Opportunity record. The option includes the ability to create different naming conventions based on a combination of the following filters:
• Who is the Opportunity with [the Object – Account/Organization or Contact/Individual]
• Opportunity Record Type [ie, donation, membership, etc]
• Opportunity ‘Type’ field on the record.

So, for example, donations can be named by using the fields: “‘Account Name’ ‘Amount’ ‘Record Type’ ‘Close Date’ and ‘Campaign Name’” [Salesforce $350 Donation 9/15/16 Fall Gala]

Why do this? Consistency and accuracy in naming, searching and reporting.

Donations – Membership

Membership Grace Period
After a Membership ends, the length of the grace period (in days) before the ‘Membership Status’ field on the Account moves from Grace Period to Expired. The default value of 30 days can be modified.

Donations – Payment Mapping

Payment Mapping from Opportunity Record
When entering an opportunity [donation, grant, etc.], payment fields such as ‘check number’ and ‘payment method’ can be added to the opportunity record to be mapped to the payment record’s corresponding fields in order to complete a transaction in one step on the opportunity.

Donations – Donor Statistics

Donation Statistics Rollups & Exclusions
Determine which records are included in donation statistics that appear on individual/contact records and account/organization records, by choosing a combination of Opportunity Record Types and the value in the Opportunity ‘Type’ field.

Donations – Contact Roles

Soft Credit Enabling and Roles
Enabling soft credits provides the ability to select specific Contact/Individual Roles that will be included in soft credit calculations. Completely customizable, including separating soft credit calculations from donation calculations. Soft credits enable Nonprofits to track board member and other ‘solicitor’ revenue generation for annual goal setting and accountability, among other uses.

Donations – Campaign Members

Automatic Campaign Membership
Enabling this option adds the contact/individual who is selected in the ‘Primary Contact’ field on the Opportunity to the Campaign/Program that is designated in the field for ‘Primary Campaign Source’ on the Opportunity. When both fields are completed on the opportunity, adding the contact/individual to the campaign manually is no longer necessary.

Recurring Donations – Recurring Donations

Recurring Donation Campaigns & Behavior on RD Close
Automate fields to populate on recurring donations to eliminate error and save time.

Recurring Donations – Recurring Donations Custom Field Mapping

RD Custom Field Mapping for Child Opportunities
Similar to Payment Mapping, this mapping enables copying of specific fields on the recurring donation to each subsequent child donation record.

Bulk Data Processes – Refresh Household Names/Refresh Opportunity Names

Refresh Names of Opportunity and Household
Automatically update all records if your Organization changes a naming convention for either Opportunities or Households.

System Tools – Health Check

Health Check
A few clicks on a regular basis, and you are provided with explicit instructions to correct any resulting issues that could plague your database otherwise!

Within the Reports Object
The NPSP Health Check Report folder includes reports designed to assist with Health Check results.

Becoming more familiar with how NPSP can reduce error, improve data accuracy, save time and allow for more automated processes is paramount to achieving a Nonprofit’s overall objectives. Letting the data work for you so you can accomplish your mission/work is what every Nonprofit should strive for when implementing and using Salesforce’s NPSP. These and other NPSP features are designed to do just that.

NPSP Data Sheet