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CRMs: 18 top tips on using a fundraising CRM
Howard Lake | 18 January 2021 | News
UK Fundraising’s readers and followers have joined in this months’ focus on choosing and using a CRM to support their fundraising.
We asked them to share their best tip on using a fundraising CRM.
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Add your tip in the comments below.
https://twitter.com/StuartChell/status/1350929535836028928
https://twitter.com/johngreenn/status/1350929962950414337
CRM’s can provide joined up systems with integrations into web forms and popular third party websites such as Mailchimp, JustGiving, etc. This will drastically reduce the need for mainual data entry.
— Daniel Raphael (@Danielraphael1) January 17, 2021
Your CRM is only as good as the users. Remember a good database is about the relationships data. Embed, grow and lead a culture of "everything goes on the database" and everything else will start to fall into place.
— Sarah Goddard (she/her) (@FundraiserSarah) January 17, 2021
Data structures and data quality are essential for making a CRM useful. The outputs have to be reliable and trustworthy to be effectively used in fundraising.
— Roger Swannell (@rogerswannell) January 17, 2021
Consistency in entry and use make it easy for your staff teams to access and use and show them how
— Marion Currie (@LesandJonsMum) January 17, 2021
Ensure that all staff (not just fundraising colleagues) fall in ‘love’ with the CRM. They need to understand how it impacts on their work & ultimately makes their job easier.
— Michelle Boakes she/her (@MichelleBoakes) January 17, 2021
A CRM, no matter its functionality or whistles & bells, will not fix systemic development issues. Really thoughtfully, carefully, strategically determine what goals are & how the CRM supports those. Don't base goals off of what a CRM can do.
— T. Clay Buck, CFRE (@tclaybuck) January 17, 2021
My top is to think of it as much, much more than a way of recording transactions. Your most valuable assets are your relationships. Use your CRM to support and track how you manage them. Use it to produce reports that get buy in for this from leadership.
— Teresa Forgione (@TeresaMForgione) January 17, 2021
Also, it is far, far better to invest in training & revising your processes w/ a new system up front. In my experience, people easily learn bad habits & leap into workarounds. 'Have a play & get to kmow it' is good, too much reliance on that leads to old problems in new CRMs
— Teresa Forgione (@TeresaMForgione) January 17, 2021
Leverage your CRM to further good marketing. Segment your audiences, create content that is specific to their interests, and generate it on frequent and regular basis. Track engagement in your CRM so your users can integrate it into their one-to-one efforts.
— Inga Broerman (@IngaBroerman) January 17, 2021
Know what u want ur core customer experience & customer journeys to be and ensure your system can deliver…too often i have been told we couldn't do something because the system wouldn't allow it…so we were led by the tech not the CX also good data in = good data out
— Nix 💙 (@nix6573) January 17, 2021
1) If you cannot sketch on a piece of paper what's your view of supporter is and what journey you would like to take with them there is no CRM that will solve it for you https://t.co/aWT0ysJ9G9
— Franki (@FrancescoAm) January 17, 2021
2) CRM starts with supporter/customer at the centre, therefore the first question and functionality of a CRM is: how do I get what supporters think and their feedback on what we do and how I can take this seriously and act upon? https://t.co/aWT0ysJ9G9
— Franki (@FrancescoAm) January 17, 2021
1) You can only get out what you put in.
2) If everyone uses it consistently (ie recording the same data in the same fields), everyone's jobs will be easier, and you will raise more.— Emily Grint (@emilyreedsmusic) January 17, 2021
Make sure it collects and can report on the data you are capturing, and don’t set up your CRM in a silo otherwise it’s not going to be usable for staff. Does it talk to the other systems and software you upload data from and to? Do you have consistency across all these systems?
— Laura Anne Mackay (@lauraannebeth) January 18, 2021
Don't skimp on pre-launch planning. Verify and re-verify data mapping from your old system. Assuming your overall development plan is solid and your team is always learning, you won't regret paying for a system that's a notch or two more robust than you currently need.
— Lynette Johnson (@Just_LynetteJ) January 18, 2021
If you have a CRM complete with full donor profiles, don’t limit your fundraising lists to donors based on just a few features (recency, frequency, value of gifts). Add a machine learning layer to your CRM and target donors based on all available data
— Tim Paris (@tiimparis) January 18, 2021
Rapid access to this kind of experience and advice from other fundraisers is just one of the free CRM resources we featured in CRMs: where to go to for free advice and support (15 January 2021).
Find all our CRM coverage this month, supported by lead sponsor Salesforce.org CRMs: the heart of fundraising.
About Howard Lake
Howard Lake is consultant editor of UK Fundraising. He founded the site in 1994 and successfully sold it in 2022. As director of Giving X Ltd he is exploring growing giving on a massive scale.
He is the founder of Fundraising Camp and co-founder of GoodJobs.