A well-chosen CRM can help you consolidate data, automate communications, and enhance your organization’s impact. Whether you’re managing donors, volunteers, or internal operations, selecting the right CRM for your small or medium-sized nonprofit organization can make a world of difference. In this blog post, we’ll explain why CRMs are necessary and explore best practices to help you choose the right one!
Working in a nonprofit organization means you understand how important managing donor relationships is. With everything on your plate — fundraising campaigns, appeals, managing staff — ensuring your operations are streamlined is so crucial to your organization’s success. You’ve probably heard that a CRM for small nonprofits can help. However, if you’re part of the 46% of organizations using a CRM that’s separate from your fundraising software, this blog is for you!
You’ve probably seen a bunch of ads on social media singing the praises of various CRMs, and how they can totally revolutionize the way your small nonprofit operates. It’s so much more than that though, did you know a well-chosen CRM can help you consolidate data, automate your donor communication, and even enhance your organization’s impact?
Incredible, right?
We’ve put this guide together to walk you through the process of finding the best CRMs for small nonprofits like yours. Keep reading to see our top five picks for CRM platforms — each one, designed specifically with nonprofits in mind.
Let’s start with the basics, when we’re talking about a CRM platform, we mean a constituent relationship management platform. It’s a tool often framed as being vital for larger organizations, but your small nonprofit can benefit immensely from CRM platforms, too.
Many small to medium-sized organizations rely on software like Excel or similar functional (but limited) tools to manage and organize donor information — does this sound familiar to you? Now there’s nothing wrong with keeping things simple, especially when you’re just starting out, but one of the biggest limitations you’ll face is an inability to scale these tools as your nonprofit grows. And that’s where CRMs really shine because great ones are built to grow with your organization.
Think about your requirements… Do you need help collecting detailed donor information? Maybe you need support fostering deeper relationships with your donors. Or maybe, it’s managing staff tasks, automated communications, and tracking donations causing your headaches. Regardless of your unique pain point, there’s a CRM ready to step in and help lighten your load.
We live in a world where the only constant is change and technology is no different, the way we engage with and rely on the platforms and tools that help us do our jobs grows almost daily. And a tool that helps you schedule communications, manage staff tasks, track donations and transactions, and draw deep insights from reports that help inform your future fundraising plans, is a tool worth investing in — regardless of the size of your organization.
Before we get stuck into our top picks for CRMs for your nonprofit, let’s look at some of the things you need to consider before choosing a CRM.
No one understands your organization better than you. And when you make any decision that impacts how your nonprofit operates, you should first assess your objectives and consider how a CRM will help you meet them. Chat with your team and work on a wishlist — how should a CRM support you, and what will make the investment meaningful? Once you have a list in hand, order your objectives in terms of most to least important. Perhaps your marketing team needs a platform that can easily automate communications, maybe your finance team urgently needs better income tracking, or your program leads need access to reporting that easily highlights impact… The good news is, there’s a CRM that can address all of it. From your most urgent needs to the nice-to-have features.
The dreaded “B” word. Just mentioning your available budget can send an anvil of disappointment sinking into your stomach. Your nonprofit likely turns every cent it has over twice before spending it, it’s part and parcel of running a small organization. Income exists to further your cause and spending it on tools and software when your programs need funding too can be a hard sell. But most CRMs offer nonprofit discounts, free trials, or pricing based on the number of contacts you have. This is great for small nonprofits because a smaller donor base usually means a lower CRM fee! Remember to read the fine print and think about the resources and costs of implementation, training, and potential customization needs too — in our experience these tend to stack up!
Googling CRMs will feel overwhelming at first, there are just so many options. If we can give you one piece of advice it’s this: not every CRM will fit every organization. Your nonprofit will benefit from a CRM that’s specifically designed with your unique needs in mind.
As a nonprofit professional, you work in an industry with a high staff turnover. Your organization has probably experienced this a few times this year. Usually, when someone leaves, their knowledge of your systems and the history of their donor communication leaves with them. One of the things we absolutely love about CRMs is their ability to retain this vital information. If your team uses the CRM correctly and uniformly, it can become a vault of data that helps your organization grow.
So training is important. When deciding on a CRM for your small nonprofit, consider the following:
We mentioned this right at the beginning, but you’ll want a platform that grows with your organization. Right now, your organization might be small but mighty; one day it will be big and mighty. You need a CRM that’s agile, one that can adjust and evolve along with you.
Security is non-negotiable. You expect it every time you make an online purchase and your donors expect it every time they donate. Their financial information needs to be secure and safe in your hands. It only takes one breach for them to lose trust in your organization. Any CRM you end up choosing has to offer robust security features because protecting your donor’s financial information is almost more important than any gift they make. Don’t forget to double-check that these tools comply with nonprofit regulations like GDPR or CCPA.
We’ve all been there, you see a product or service advertised constantly, and your interest is piqued, but it’s usually a recommendation from someone close to you — a peer, colleague, or trusted friend — that sways your purchase decision. Google is great for research and reviews! Do a little brand stalking and see what other organizations have to say. Check customer satisfaction scores, and reach out to organizations in your community before you make any final decisions.
Booking a demo might feel a little daunting. But once you’ve identified your objectives and done your research, there really is no better way to get a feel for the CRM you’ve decided on. Most companies allow you to book a demo directly on their website. It gives you a chance to ask questions, see the tool in action, and ensure it aligns perfectly with your organization’s needs.
Check out our free resource: Read our guide to learn more about the 7 Best Practices When Choosing a New CRM for Nonprofits.
So many factors influence your decision to purchase new software, and like most nonprofits, cost is probably at the top of that list. The thing about a great CRM is that when you utilize it to its full potential, it almost always ends up paying for itself.
Here’s a list of five CRMs for small nonprofits that we love, and why we love them:
We believe Donorbox is at the top of the list when it comes to the best CRMs for small nonprofits, and there are a few really compelling reasons for this.
Firstly, the platform is rich with incredible features designed to simplify and enhance your organization’s daily operations. AI-driven, it offers you a powerful toolkit, specifically tailored to your unique needs as a growing nonprofit.
Think about a typical day in our organization. Tasks, outreach, communication, and appeals tend to exist in a cornucopia of urgency. Donorbox CRM makes streamlining your communication efforts easy. It gives you the tools you need to create personalized outreach that isn’t time-consuming while also optimizing your very important fundraising efforts.
Features we know you’ll love, include: Integrated email management, dynamic segmentation, contextual action tracking, tasks, and comprehensive donation management.
One of the best things about Donorbox CRM is the way it seamlessly collects donations made through your Donorbox fundraising campaigns — it’s a comprehensive, all-in-one platform.
What does that mean? It’s simple, really. No matter which Donorbox tool you’re using, whether it’s your donation form, a crowdfunding campaign, selling tickets to an event, collecting gifts at your live kiosk, or fundraising in some other way, it’s all recorded in our CRM. No need to switch between programs to check a campaign’s ROI, pull reports, or even record offline transactions — Donorbox CRM does it all.
Can we have a moment of silence for our burgeoning inbox-related responsibilities? You’ve probably been there… You need to send a donor email, but first, you need to open the communication tracking system you use, check the last mail sent to said donor, and then navigate back to your inbox to finally begin typing up the mail. Usually, this process involves flipping back and forth between multiple windows until you’re done. It’s time-consuming and can become frustrating when you have more than one mail to send.
This is where Donorbox’s Mail Center comes in. Like everything else about Donorbox CRM, Mail Center creates one destination for all donor communication — directly from your Donorbox account. Yes, you read that correctly, you can read, write, add variables, and send emails from the Donorbox platform, with all your vital donor data at your fingertips! Plus, each mail is automatically saved to your supporter’s profile, which makes tracking existing communication and planning future mailers a breeze.
Now let’s talk about email chains. Mail Center makes it so easy to assign email chains to your staff, meaning no more communication slipping through the cracks.
It’s no secret that the key to building incredible, long-lasting donor relationships is to truly understand who your supporters are. It helps you communicate authentically, which makes donors feel closer to your cause and ultimately leads to more donations for your organization.
With Donorbox CRM you can add comprehensive details about your donors, building a profile for each of them that includes:
Supporter profiles also have a field for custom notes, it’s the perfect spot to add special mentions or details that enrich your communication efforts.
It doesn’t stop there. Groups allow for incredible segmentation that allows you to organize donors according to various affiliations and qualities. This makes it easy for you to see their connections, influences, and potential interests – leading to more educated appeals.
Groups can be emailed directly from Mail Center, no need to export a list to use on another mail client!
If you need lighting-quick segmentation, our Segmentation “on the fly” tool is perfect for you, enabling you to gather deeper donor insights, quickly. Generate near-instant lists of supporter segments straight from your supporter dashboard.
Remember our first point, the one about truly understanding who your donors are? Our Supporter Timeline gives you a quick and detailed view of supporters’ histories, including outreach, communications, donations, ticket purchases, and more. It’s a powerful feature that goes beyond providing you with a historical timeline, it offers you crucial context for analyzing your fundraising efforts. With just one click you can see how many times you’ve reached out to a donor before they’ve donated — giving you insight into their communication preferences and giving habits. Additionally, you can see a list of their transactions, recurring payments, and communication.
Built into Donorbox CRM is a hard-working AI Assistant ready to support you! Whether you’re looking for data-led insights into your donor retention rate, donor behavior, or fundraising strategies, it’s here to help. With a simple prompt, our AI Assistant can help you write impactful content, empowering you to deliver tailored messages and effective strategic plans.
Even a small organization like yours has many moving parts, and to realize your mission, these parts — staff, volunteers, etc — need to move as one unified entity. Easier said than done, we know! But with Tasks, you can simplify this process. These discreet actions are allocated to and completely managed by your staff and volunteers. They can be recurring or singular actions with start and end times.
If you’re dreading the administrative headache of getting started with a new CRM, have no fear – donor & data imports is here! Simply create a CSV file with all of your transaction and/or supporter data and import it to your Donorbox CRM account. We’ll have your account populated in no time. No stress, no mess.
Watch this video to learn how you can use Donorbox CRM:
Donorbox CRM custom pricing plans start at just $75 a month. Get started in your Donorbox account here. Not a Donorbox user yet? Sign up today!
Bloomerang is another nonprofit-specific CRM. Its features are designed to help manage programs, volunteers, and donations.
With tools like their interactive dashboard, your nonprofit can monitor donor retention rates, campaign successes, and incoming donations.
Bloomerang’s Constituent Timeline and Engagement Meter allows you to see donor history in one place so you can monitor past donor interactions, including giving, volunteering, and marketing.
We love their volunteer management system. It’s a streamlined feature that helps with volunteer recruitment, screening, and securing workflows. You can recruit, schedule, and track volunteers effectively with customized recruitment, scheduling, and administrative settings. Bloomerang’s CRM starts at $99 a month. However, additional features like fundraising and volunteer management come at an extra cost.
Nonprofit Cloud has a strong focus on donor profiles, allowing you to create profiles that reflect donor wealth and giving information, as well as customized alerts, donor segmentation, and campaign insights.
Salesforce also stores and alerts you about donor gift commitments like pledges, grants, and planned gifts. You know how frustrating it can be to collect these donations and a CRM that streamlines these donations can be a game-changer.
Salesforce’s Program Management is an excellent feature for donor impact reports. This program provides a holistic view of participants with urgent needs who must be prioritized. Salesforce’s Experience Cloud builds personalized case plans for these needs, tracking tasks and milestones (HIPPA compliant) that can be shared with donors.
Salesforce Nonprofit Cloud starts at $60 a month. Their Power of Us Program gives eligible nonprofits the first ten subscriptions free.
Charity Engine is a great all-rounder for fundraising and donor management. Their different tools work together to create a pretty strong platform.
Like other CRMs, Charity Engine records touch points with donors, which can help you turn donors into advocates. Their direct mail tool includes built-in segmentation and real-time insights to help with donor communication. Charity Engine’s packages are broken down by the number of donor contacts you have. Get in touch with their sales team to find out more.
Blackbaud is a stalwart in the world of CRMs and has been around the longest of all the options on our list.
Raiser’s Edge NXT is their nonprofit-specific option that allows organizations to build workflows that build and strengthen donor relationships.
We really love their Major Giving Work Center which helps you develop management plans to steward prospective donors. This feature also offers donor insights and “smart” recommendations.
Blackbaud is a great option if you have major donors and a significant planned giving strategy. Its features can simplify the process of identifying prospects, a target gift range, and donor cultivation opportunities.
Blackbaud does not include prices on its website. You’ll need to contact them directly for a quote.
Whether you’re new to CRMs or looking to switch to a powerful all-in-one solution, Donorbox CRM offers comprehensive features to help you forge strong relationships and empower your missions.
Investing in a CRM system is more than just a software upgrade for your small nonprofits; it’s a strategic move that can drive growth, efficiency, and better donor relations. With options available for a variety of budgets and needs, there’s a CRM that fits your organization’s needs.
Donorbox CRM is your perfect partner for scaling your small organization sustainably. With built-in productivity tools, donor communication outlets, strategizing support, and more, we’re here to help you help others. Sign up today to start making more meaningful connections with your donors!
For more fundraising tips and guides, check out the rest of our Nonprofit Blog. Subscribe to our newsletter to receive the best resources in your inbox every month.
Kristine Ensor is a freelance writer with over a decade of experience working with local and international nonprofits. As a nonprofit professional she has specialized in fundraising, marketing, event planning, volunteer management, and board development.
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Kristine Ensor