Finding software can be overwhelming. We've helped dozens of nonprofits choose the right online fundraising software so they can create custom campaigns and accept online donations.
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Aplos is a cloud-based system designed specially to serve the needs of nonprofit and church organizations. The Aplos platform includes fund accounting, online donation management, reporting functionalities, fundraising tools, membership... Read more
Platforms: MacWinLinux
Deployments: Cloud, On premise
Business Size:
DonorPerfect Fundraising Software
DonorPerfect is a fundraising solution suitable for all nonprofits. It helps users manage donations, contacts, receipting, reporting, email and fundraising initiatives from a single system. Dashboard analytics and reporting provide... Read more
Platforms: MacWinLinux
Deployments: Cloud, On premise
Business Size:
Salsa CRM is a cloud-based constituent relationship management platform that helps nonprofits track supporter relationships, manage online and offline fundraising, and intelligently report on everything. Salsa CRM features include... Read more
Platforms: MacWinLinux
Deployments: Cloud, On premise
Business Size:
Keela from Networks for Change is a cloud-based nonprofit management solution that helps small and midsize nonprofits manage projects and events, measure donor engagement and send notifications to volunteers and members. Keela offers... Read more
Platforms: MacWinLinux
Deployments: Cloud, On premise
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Kindful is a cloud-based online fundraising and donor management solution designed specifically for growing nonprofit organizations. With this solution, nonprofits can manage three core aspects of fundraising - managing online giving,... Read more
Platforms: MacWinLinux
Deployments: Cloud, On premise
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NationBuilder is a cloud-based website, database and fundraising solution designed for nonprofits to connect with their communities and scale their organizations. It includes features to identify key supporters, turn them into donors,... Read more
Platforms: MacWinLinux
Deployments: Cloud, On premise
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Charityproud is a cloud-based nonprofit management solution suitable for small to midsize nonprofit organizations. Key features include constituent management, donation and pledge tracking, campaign and event management, email integration... Read more
Platforms: MacWinLinux
Deployments: Cloud, On premise
Business Size:
Eleo is a cloud-based donor management solution designed to help nonprofits build donor databases, manage donor interactions, track fundings, plan events and more. The donor database and contact management features help users build... Read more
Platforms: MacWinLinux
Deployments: Cloud, On premise
Business Size:
MobileCause is a cloud-based fundraising and communication management solution for nonprofits of all sizes. Key features include online giving, text-to-donate, event fundraising with live thermometer, peer-to-peer and crowdfunding... Read more
Platforms: MacWinLinux
Deployments: Cloud, On premise
Business Size:
EveryAction is a cloud-based fundraising solution for nonprofits of all sizes. Key features include online donations, event management, pledge tracking and compliance reporting. It helps advocacy associations interact with their prospects... Read more
Platforms: MacWinLinux
Deployments: Cloud, On premise
Business Size:
ClubExpress is a cloud-based management tool for any association or club. The solution is suitable for arts and cultural clubs, environmental groups, healthcare and hospitals, higher education groups, human services organizations,... Read more
Platforms: MacWinLinux
Deployments: Cloud, On premise
Business Size:
MemberClicks offers a configurable, cloud-based software solution to small associations and member-based organizations. The system can stand alone as a membership website and social community or integrate with an existing website... Read more
Platforms: MacWinLinux
Deployments: Cloud, On premise
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GrowthZone, formerly MemberZone, is an online platform designed to help non-profits manage their members, fundraising, marketing, donors and volunteers. An online application form facilitates member signup, and the data from that... Read more
Platforms: MacWinLinux
Deployments: Cloud, On premise
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Trail Blazer Non-Profit Manager
Trail Blazer's non-profit manager offers nonprofit organizations a complete cloud-based solution to manage every aspect of fundraising and donor management. From collecting and centralizing donor information to targeted outreach to... Read more
Platforms: MacWin
Deployments: Cloud, On premise
Business Size:
Virtuous is an integrated, cloud-based solution for small to large non-profit organizations. It assists with various aspects of a non-profit’s needs, from managing donors and fundraising, as well as marketing and outreach. It’s... Read more
Platforms: MacWinLinux
Deployments: Cloud, On premise
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Findjoo membership management solution is a software platform developed for non-profit organizations of scaling sizes and segments. Arts and cultural organizations, associations, higher education, human services, environmental, education,... Read more
Platforms: MacWinLinux
Deployments: Cloud, On premise
Business Size:
With NetSuite's unified business management solution, nonprofit organizations can manage their entire end-to-end operations with a single business application. It integrates accounting, fundraising, customer relationship management... Read more
Platforms: MacWinLinux
Deployments: Cloud, On premise
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SWEET! by Blue Sky Collaborative is a cloud-based peer-to-peer fundraising solution, which provides users tools and functionalities to manage their fundraising routines and mission-related communications with donors. Key features include... Read more
Platforms: MacWinLinux
Deployments: Cloud, On premise
Business Size:
Donor Engine is a comprehensive nonprofit software solution that can be configured to meet a wide variety of nonprofit organizational needs with the goal of creating a single database for all data and providing a 360-degree view of... Read more
Platforms: MacWinLinux
Deployments: Cloud, On premise
Business Size:
SmartSimple is a cloud-based platform trusted by foundations of all sizes, Fortune 500 companies, and governments to create greater efficiencies in their funding processes and enrich their impact story. Key features include end-to-end... Read more
Platforms: MacWinLinux
Deployments: Cloud, On premise
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Whether it’s for an annual appeal, capital campaign or special event, nonprofits in every sector use online fundraising tools to collect donations and connect with supporters. In fact, according to a report on charitable giving, online donations accounted for nearly 7 percent of all contributions in 2014: an 8.9 percent increase over the previous year.
With this guide, you can learn more about how online fundraising platforms can help you handle these important donations.
Here’s what we’ll cover:
What Is Online Fundraising Software?
Common Functionality of Online Fundraising Systems
Key Considerations for Comparing Products
Case Study: Click & Pledge Online Fundraising Software
What Is Online Fundraising Software?
Online fundraising tools power online donation processing. When users arrive on a website’s donation page, they enter credit card billing, contact and other information into an online donation form. When the information in that form is submitted, the credit card is validated and charged.
Donation pages in Kindful
When processing is complete, the system typically sends donors to a confirmation screen and emails them a tax receipt. At the same time, the funds are electronically deposited in the nonprofit’s merchant account, minus processing fees.
Then, donor and contribution details can be reviewed and analyzed using reporting functionality. Reporting tools may be built into the online fundraising system, or users may choose to export the data and use different software.
Some online fundraising tools are more comprehensive, allowing users to:
- Customize donation forms, such as the visual design, URL and donation amounts
- Add custom fields to handle “in memoriam” donations and other unique data, including gifts targeted to a specific program
- Automatically track and process recurring donations and pledges
- Process payments using multiple methods, including credit card, PayPal or electronic funds transfer (EFT)
- Create peer-to-peer (P2P) fundraising pages that allow supporters to solicit donations from their friends, groups and social networks
- Accept and process text-to-give donations
Common Functionality of Online Fundraising Systems
Products can vary from vendor to vendor, but certain capabilities are offered by most systems. The most common are described in the table below:
| Custom donation forms | Allows users to define donation form-fields and contribution amounts, then generates code to embed it on websites. |
| Custom campaign pages | Helps users create complete campaign websites, including donation forms, videos and images, goal progress counters, supporter comments, social sharing functions and more. |
| Recurring payments | Donors can choose to make automatic contributions—for example, $20 every month or $200 every December—without having to re-enter credit card and contact information each time. |
| Mass communication tools | Allow users to connect with supporters via emails and text messaging. |
| Social sharing | Many cloud-based fundraising platforms include built-in social media publishing functions, which let supporters share campaign pages on Facebook, Twitter and other social channels. |
Campaign reporting dashboard in Classy
Key Considerations for Comparing Products
Nearly all online fundraising products let users create custom donation forms, process payments and acknowledge supporters. Here are five other factors to consider when comparing products.
Processing fees. Online fundraising platforms charge transaction and processing fees for each donation. The fee is either a flat rate (e.g., 30 cents per donation); a percentage of the total donation (usually between 1.5 percent and 9 percent); or a combination of both. Some vendors also charge a monthly or annual subscription fee to use the software, whether donations are processed or not.
Tip: To calculate how processing fees impact the software’s total cost, determine the number and dollar amount of donations your nonprofit expects to process through the platform in a month, year or single campaign. Then apply the processing fees for a ballpark estimate.
Social fundraising. Social (or “peer-to-peer”) fundraising functionality is built into many online fundraising systems. It lets supporters create and personalize campaign pages and share them with their friends through social media and email.
If your nonprofit hosts events or uses social fundraising in its campaigns, look for products that specialize in peer-to-peer fundraising and that support individual and team fundraising pages.
White label capabilities. If you’ve made online donations, you’ve probably noticed that some websites redirect you to a donation form on a different URL that doesn’t match the look of the rest of the site. This confuses supporters and can reduce a nonprofit’s trustworthiness. To prevent this, some products let users control the HTML and styles on the page, so donation forms match the core website.
If your nonprofit wants to accept donations on its website, look for “white label” or “custom donation pages” in the vendor’s features and benefits lists. Keep in mind that the skills of a Web designer or developer might be needed for this purpose.
Constituent relationship management (CRM). When someone makes a donation on a fundraising page, the system should automatically email a receipt to the donor. But most nonprofits want to build a relationship with supporters beyond this interaction. If this applies to you, look for systems that retain donor information.
Find out if the online fundraising platform lets you export donor information, or if it integrates directly with a best-of-breed donor management system. This allows your organization to track interactions and communicate with those donors in the future.
Usability. “Usability” refers to how easy it is for people to learn and use a product. If software is confusing and hard to use, employees won’t use it. So it’s important to find a product that is simple enough for everyone in an organization to understand—no matter what their technical ability.
Tip: If your organization relies on many short-term employees or volunteers to facilitate fundraising campaigns, usability is even more important, since there is less time to train them how to use the software. Look for such terms as “drag and drop,” “WYSIWIG” and “turn-key”: These often indicate that a product was built with usability in mind.
Case Study: Click & Pledge Online Fundraising Software
To learn more about how online fundraising platforms can help improve operations, consider the case of Immigration Equality, a New York-based legal services nonprofit that advocates for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender (LGBT) and HIV immigration rights. The organization realized many benefits after implementing the Click & Pledge online fundraising system.
In this case study, we explain how the software improved inefficiencies in the organization’s donation forms, multiple payment accounts and donor management tasks.