Big Investment, Minimum Return
You paid for Salesforce license (Or you get 10 free licenses), you spent thousands of dollars and many months on implementation to then realize the team are still using spreadsheets.
Not just you spent so much time , effort and money for nothing, you returned to the same problems you had before
Data scattered across sheets.
Getting answers requires digging.
Nothing is automated.
No single view of constituent data.
What happened?
Why did we stop using this amazing good-looking pretty CRM we spent months building?
Before I tell you the possible reasons, you could find out on your own.
A good system is one that meets the objectives of your Nonprofit and aligns with the business needs of your Nonprofits.
Anything else is just secondary
Beautiful components and nice borders.
Happy font and sporty animations.
Features that we never used nor asked for.
The first step I would encourage you to take is to talk to the team, put on the investigation hat and let’s find out what happened. 👓
Why did we stop using the system?
Why did we use it first then stopped later?
In an ideal world, what would encourage you to use the system?
What problems did you face with the system?
If we were to start over, what would you think we should have done differently?
The reason behind these questions is to find out what the problem is first, what went wrong.
To solve a problem, we need to know what the problem is.
The Plan
Upon identifying the problem, it's time to start working on a solution.
After working on hundreds of projects, I can tell you the problem is usually one or more of the following:
Missing Charts
Yes, the biggest objective of any CRM is to perform analysis, read metrics and know at a glance how we are doing.
Metrics gives you the information you need to make big decisions
How much did we generate in revenue this year
Which fundraise campaign was the most successful
How many recurring donors do we have this year vs last year
Are we growing in revenue?
How many people attended our events?
Leadership in particular need a quick overview, leadership is looking for instant answers. If it takes us hours or days or even minutes to share those metrics, it is a problem.
No tangible outcome
If it takes me 2 hours to do it in spreadsheets and it takes me the same 2 hours to enter it in the CRM, what difference did it make. As a matter of fact, it may be taking end users more time to do the same thing in the CRM, as they have to log in and navigate a new system.
No data quality enforcement
I keep forgetting to enter some information about an interaction with a constituent
Users enter dates differently , some users type Jan, some type January, reporting suffers.
I get asked to answer 20 questions to enter a simple transaction.
No automation
I still enter and calculate everything myself.
I am still sending all emails manually.
I am still setting reminders to follow up with donors.
No extra features
I can do data in excel just fine, what are you giving me that I can't do in excel?
Processing donations?
Sending tax letters?
Sending SMS or Whatsapp messages?
A portal for our volunteers?
What are you giving me beyond just data cells
Features must solve a problem we have, not just random features
These are some reasons users refuse to adopt a new system, but why get here in the first place
Get everyone involved early on, from the very early discussions , before putting the first stone in this building, early feedback is best feedback.
Let the driver be the business, not the system. List your business needs first and then find a System or build a system that checks and addresses those needs.
Go with milestones, don’t build a massive system that takes months and thousands of dollars at once, instead, break it down into smaller milestones, build the first one, go live, collect feedback, enhance, iterate.
Empower Superusers, a few team members must be part of the project from early days, trained and empowered, they act as the ambassadors, they talk to the team about this awesome new system, they train the team, they make announcements and they build the hype, they make it happen.
The biggest reason systems fail is not knowing what the end goal is, let’s identify the destination first, the journey follows.