Where is the Love? January 31, 2007 By RussBurke

Sounds so lame, so accusatory....want some crackers with that "whine"?  But here's the rub.

One of GiftWorks' best features is your ability to share your GiftWorks customizations with others.  The Mission Research developers who put GiftWorks together were really thinking that we ALL can do something simple to help those who work, like you...day in and day out, to make our world a better place.

It starts by clicking the Settings button on your GiftWorks screen and selecting Manage Your Database.  'Bout midway down that page is the entry "Share your GiftWorks Customizations with Other Nonprofits".  Clicking that link allows you to share with these three choices:  Create the customization data document and place in on your computer, create document and email to a friend, or create document and send it to Mission Research.  The customization document is a standard Giftworks data file, with all your donor and donation data stripped clean out.  Other stuff stays, like your fund and account set up, your Honoraria and Memorials, groups, and custom fields and associated drop-down lists.

I learned today that no one had ever sent us their customizations to post.  I was totally dismayed.

Our intent was to feature these "samples" on our website so people could download the documents, open them with their GiftWorks, and see some great examples of the kind of customizations that experienced users have developed.  This could be a wonderful gift to small organizations, folks new to GiftWorks, folks new to fundraising, as well as CEO's and board members looking for better ways to manage critical relationships and move missions forward.  Think of what it might mean for a housing agency to share its customizations with other housing organizations or, alternatively, for a lead organization to share its preferred codings with its member organizations.  The possibilities are limited only by our imagination.

I've already shared my training database with many customers who really needed some help getting more from GiftWorks.  It was totally painless.  In fact, it felt really good to help others gain from my experience.  You too can join this "giving club". 

Lets show them the love....

Ice Cream, Anyone? January 30, 2007 By Steve Fafel

Ben Cohen of Ben & Jerry's recently invested in Mission Research. While I think we're a great investment for customers, employees, and investors, I think for Ben it's more than the possibility of upside. It's about our triple bottom line of people, planet, and profit. Here's what he said for the press release:

“The founders at Mission Research, through their contribution to the Underdog Foundation, are providing a great example for the next generation of corporate leaders”, said Ben Cohen (founder of Ben and Jerry’s and investor in Underdog Ventures).

He's referring to a substantial donation of stock Dave, Chris, and I made, which  I'll talk about separately sometime soon. David Berge leads Underdog and is a force of nature himself. here's what he said:

“A lot of people seem to think that you can either get involved in business or get involved in helping your community.  The founders of Mission Research are showing that your business can be one of the best ways to help your community”, said David Berge, CEO of Underdog Ventures Legacy Fund.  He added, “At a time when you read so many stories about the harm that businesses are doing to the environment and to their communities, it’s particularly important to support companies like Mission Research, whose products help smaller non-profits and who have set aside part of their company to give back to charitable organizations.”

Last year we donated over $1 million of software to needy nonprofits. We made GiftWorks free to any Katrina-affected nonprofit (sadly, many of those never recovered after their donor bases were scattered across the country). Next month we'll announce another series of software donations as well.

But philantrhopy and community support is just one leg of our mission. Our internal culture is one of respect and autonomy. Respect includes what we think is a smart investment: full health coverage for our employees. We pay higher than a living wage, and all employees have stock options. And our turnover is very low--we have great employees who work hard for our customers. Perhaps it's our application of the golden rule, perhaps it's the free m&ms provided by Barb, but there's something to that.

Finally, we're committed to changing the world through our work. When nonprofits work more efficiently, they can spend more time and money on their missions and less on technology and training. We know we're having impact, and it drives us to work harder to help nonprofits do more with fewer resources.

So next time you go for ice cream, keep us in mind and grab some Ben & Jerry's. And read Ben's new book called Values-Driven Business, which he co-wrote with Mal Warwick, our friend and advisor.

Price Plan Mea Culpa January 30, 2007 By Steve Fafel

Earlier this month we changed our pricing to a subscription plan, and, well, it didn't go over so well. The response wasn't terrible, but we learned something: some nonprofits would rather pay everything up front and have the choice of paying for upgrades later, rather than paying annually. We reverted to our regular pricing after a few weeks while we study it more and get your input.

If you're a customer currently, nothing changed. If you're looking at GiftWorks now, you might have heard we were a traditional software company with a one-time purchase and paid upgrades down the line. What we were trying to accomplish was this: simplify the maintenance and upgrades, keep costs down for customers, and simplify our development and marketing processes.

I'm sorry for the bad communication and the false start--it was my fault, frankly. I think in general we've done a pretty good job of communicating, being open, admitting the occasional mistake, taking care of customers well. As we grow the company and evolve, we're going to continue trying new things to improve the customers experience. Your feedback has always been such a great guide for our work, and we'll keep listening.

But this time, we didn't ask enough questions. We're asking now, and we'll listen. GiftWorks is still the most affordable, easiest to use fundraising software, and we plan on continuing to improve it for your benefit. And if we change anything, we'll ask first, let you know ahead of time, and always give you a choice. Of all the joys of growing and running Mission Research, your feedback and passion have been the greatest.

Thank you for your understanding, and feel free to contact me directly anytime with your concerns and feedback--email is charlie@ .

Great Resources...just fill in the spaces January 19, 2007 By RussBurke

I am always delighted when anyone offers learning resources to help development folks. If you are looking to choose or upgrade a donor database, check out NPower Seattle's free educational resources.  Their motto "Putting technology know-how in the hands of nonprofits" says it all.  Under the banner of "Getting the Most from Your Decision: Four Steps to Selecting Donor Management Software", they've created a Donor Management Toolkit Book (available here: http://www.npowerseattle.org/education/resources/donor_toolkit.htm ).

This publication, available to nonprofits free, can help you build perspective on data management tasks fundraisers face, define your needs and better understand the capacity of available technologies. NPower Seattle also provides downloadable, interactive documents to help with needs identification, tool selection, implementation and financing options. This is not only a great start for folks new to digital fundraising solution integration, but just as helpful for more experienced fundraisers in planning for conversions (check against your perceptions) or working with database consultants.

I offer just one caveat about these tools, or any guidance-tools: They are only a start.  You need to be vigilant about informing the process.  For example, the downloadable resource titled “Sample Major Donor Process Map” appears to ignore the critical task of cultivation which, for our truly major donors, is a purposeful, time- and data-demanding endeavor.  The process map starts with an “initial contact with donor” and moves next to a step labeled “verify intent to donate funds”.  Professional fundraisers recognize the very real variable path of relationship building, informing, donor engagement and solicitation which demands documentation and tracking.  And after the gift, for truly major donors, the process and requirements of appropriate stewardship cannot be ignored.

Even so, NPower Seattle has done a wonderful job of creating essential tools.  Their site abounds with many other technical education resources as well.  Time spent there can help you, your Board and staff members get moving in the same direction.  And that has to feel good.

Happy Hunting.

Online Applications: When Not to Use Them January 17, 2007 By Steve Fafel

I built the prototype for GiftWorks from 2000 to 2002, off and on. It was a web application because that's what was fastest to build. I didn't think about security issues, server problems, browser problems, etc.

When we decided to start Mission Research back in February 2002, we also wanted to have a research culture; we knew we needed to research early and often, and we still do. Part of that research was on whether nonprofits wanted online applications as I had built, or desktop software.

It turns out that many of you don't trust your donor data out on the web, and for good reason: sometimes it's just not safe. Your desktop is as safe as your network; if you have a firewall turned on, you're protected behind it, and you know who can access your computers: you.

Then Pipevine failed. It was an online application that collected online donations, and had marquee clients that we all have heard of, and they lost $18 million of donor contributions. It was supposed to be a highly trusted company for gathering online donations, but it didn't live up to the billing, and a lot of people got hurt. We understand why there's a bias against online software among nonprofits: it's a scary world out there. Hackers, viruses, dogs and cats living together--mass hysteria (I can't resist the occasional Ghostbusters quote).

Over the last year, a number of online applications (hosted) have crashed or been taken offline to fix something, preventing customers from using the software. This happened to us with three of our vendors, after repeated outages and "maintenance", and it's happening now with our support tracking vendor, which is driving us nuts.

We dropped one of the vendors and created our own solution (that's just the way software folks are--not recommended for anyone else). The other two vendors are TypePad and another vendor I won't name. We're dropping the support tracking vendor, and building our own, and keeping Typepad. Why?

Reliability. We need reliable access--all the time--for our customer service, tracking, and communications functionality, and we need the data. We can not afford to have a vendor drop service. Many hosted applications have performance issues (click and wait, click and wait), and sometimes just go offline for "maintenance". With blogging, it's not as critical if it's temporarily down (it's a pain, believe me), but with customer data...nope. We really need to know that every day it's going to work. 

So we run it on a version of GiftWorks internally. We can access it remotely through Remote Desktop Connection, which is like GoToMyPC or PC Anywhere , and is part of Windows.

With GiftWorks, the data is always accessible as long as your computers are. You have control. In the next few months, you'll start seeing some cool new features, though, that are not running on your desktop. This is what we call the Hybrid Web: the merger of the power of the desktop with the utility of the web, and it's part of our technology platform, and has been from the beginning. You already have experienced some of this through our seamlessly applied remote updates.

Why the Hybrid Web? You have a powerful computer, even if you got it used. With the database right there, the performance is better, and your overall experience is better. Your data is as secure as your computer (for anti-virus and firewall software, go to McAfee.com or TrendPC.com). But there are some things you want from the web: information, email service, online donations, etc.

In GiftWorks, you notice you can map a donor against Microsoft Maps. We take the donor address and plot it against a map. Soon you'll be able to plot a SmartList of donor addresses on an online map. It's been in there for a couple of years. You can already send email through GiftWorks, but it's like sending email from your desktop; you don't get deliverability reports, so you can't tell if people receive and open their emails. We're offering a service soon that gives you that greater degree of control and insight over your emailing.

The home page in GiftWorks contains code called "AJAX", which goes out to the GiftWorks servers and checks for any changes, then shows those changes. We frequently send you new articles and updates to the software, and you don't have to do any new installation or know how to make it work. It just does. In fact, I've been blogging about how software should just work. It's s fundamental principle of this company, and is one thing differentiates us from other software makers.

In the next few weeks, we'll be announcing a lot of new initiatives. We'll ask for your feedback, as always; much of what we're announcing started as suggestions from you. In the meantime, when you look into software for your nonprofit, keep this blog post in mind.

The Consequence of Static January 8, 2007 By RussBurke

There are folks who tell us that, right now, there are 1.8 million American nonprofits registered with the IRS...ones which take in more than $25,000 in charitable donations per year.  Others sources report 3,000 to 4,000 new nonproifits register for nonprofit status each month in this country.  If you step back to look at this, and I think you should, what does this say about the environment that your nonprofit competes in?  Oops, there I said it.

"Compete" can be an ugly word for those of you who always seek the good.  But the simple fact is that with the mushrooming communication options that current technology delivers to us at an ever increasing speed, it won't be long until legions of American will selectively restrict what the see and hear, simply out of self-preservation.  Increasingly, the din of communication will appear just like static.

So, competition will be a reality whether we like it or not...competition for the attention and engagement of current and prospective supporters, donors and volunteers alike.  Of course, the conclusion we might draw, and correctly so I believe, is that we'll have to sharpen our marketing knowledge and skills.  But there is another conclusion that we might be drawn to consider.

Consider that when businesses consider environmental over-population and the resulting fog, many opt to reduce that static by acquiring other companies.  Whether characterized as eating the competition, generating economies of scale or gaining strategic placement in the marketplace, the net effect is the same: Fewer players. 

Nonprofits will not be immune from these forces.  Limited resources, in spite of the current largest transfer of charitable wealth in human history occurring right now, will demand it.  I just don't know when the turning point will come, though I believe it is inevitable.

Agree? Disagree?  Your thoughts and perspectives are appreciated.

New Year's Resolutions January 2, 2007 By RussBurke

For a fundraiser, there are many possible New Year's Resolutions beyond the usual personal ones.  Thanking your donors more, including your staff and colleagues might be a great one.  Resolving to get involved in professional and/or community associations can be another.  At the more personal but professional level, lie the "concentrate more on building community this year" or "personally visit each one of my major donors...and the 20 I think have that potential" or the ubiquitous "resolve to master the budget process and really use it as a planning tool" resolutions.  The list goes on and on.

From my point of view as a Mission Research corporate citizen I'd like to offer two more resolutions for your consideration:

First. get GiftWorks and really use it.  That means, if you don't have GiftWorks, make the sensible, strategic organizational investment and buy it.  If you already have GiftWorks, use it to expand your management tools and increase your and your staff's effectiveness.  If you are in the GiftWorks community, resolve to help your colleagues struggling in other nonprofits get into GiftWorks.  With the cost of GiftWorks so low, think of what a wonderful donation it would make to the nonprofit that you care most about on a personal level.

Second, please consider adopting the sustainability mindset in your work.  While some of us may adopt sustainable practices at some level at home, it will be up to us all to help our organizations adopt the sustainability philosophy.  The sustainability movement is not some esoteric tree-hugger fringe movement...it is a plea and plan for our very survival in a world of non-sustainable economies.  Sustainable business practices certainly don't have to be more expensive, just more strategic. 

We owe this to ourselves...and to our children, their children and all the children.

Happy New Year and best wishes for a hugely successful mission.