Patrick Shaw’s Weblog

Yes. No. Maybe.

All correct answers! The free licenses from Salesforce.com haven’t really been around that long yet - but have been around long enough that the nonprofit community seems pretty aware of the offering. And the Foundation makes it easy to sign up and begin using Salesforce.com while they process your licence donation.

Still - I’ve been surprised at how quickly the phones calls to my office have begun to start with "we implemented Salesforce on our own . . ."

What comes next varies greatly. Some nonprofits implemented the nonprofit template offered by Salesforce.com. Some have used the Enterprise Edition as is. Some have used either of those options, and have customized those templates to better suit their needs.

A few have been exceptionally successful - and many have not. And that makes our work challenging. All too often, that means that a nonprofit has added data to Salesforce without taking time to map out their data gathering, analyses and reporting needs - and so when they call for help, it can be frustrating for me to tell them that they may have to take a giant step back to the planing phase.

Here are a few of the glitches we’ve noticed in the "do it yourself" world of Salesforce implementations:

1. Not understanding which template to install. Both templates have strengths and weaknesses, and can be more (or less) suited to a nonprofit. You’ll want to make a careful choice from the very start. If you don’t know which one you want - consult with a Salesforce expert!
2. Not considering the concept of "householding". Salesforce doesn’t easily or automatically help you group your constituents in a household - and if you need to track soft credits, have visibility into what a household is contributing to your agency, reduce your print mailing costs - you probably want to implement a householding scheme.
3. Entering dirty data. Salesforce makes it pretty easy to enter or import data - but if it is sloppy on the way in, it will be sloppy in Salesforce, too.
4. Not planning for a fundamental shift in how you work. This is perhaps the most important (and the easiest to overlook) item. You’ll need to re-think your workflow, how (and who) enters and reviews data, what (if any) automation can (and should) happen. Having a terrific CRM means that you have to commit to adding your notes, managing your giving pipeline, organize your campaigns and much much more.

Salesforce can make you much more effective at your work - as a matter of fact - it can transform your agency. But you still have to to the work!