While it’s hard to pinpoint the exact number of nonprofits with chapters, there are a lot! Many national nonprofits, such as the Association of Junior Leagues International or Girl Scouts of the USA, rely on chapters to grow their mission and extend their reach.
But with chapters can come complications. It’s not always easy to manage an army of organizations – how, for example, do you track the metrics at the chapter level? And then analyze them to identify trends and forecast growth?
Staff at headquarters will talk about being overwhelmed by data. It can be a struggle to organize and manage data from so many different platform sources on top of the many chapters. Fortunately, software like CharityEngine can help organize and streamline data! I’ve been an active volunteer at the chapter, state, and national levels of professional associations and nonprofits like the Junior League. In this article, I will draw from that experience—and my knowledge of CharityEngine!—to share my thoughts on how the right fundraising software can support nonprofits that have chapters.
Fundraising software can help nonprofits manage and engage donors and raise more money. But when you’re a national nonprofit organization with chapters, you might be wondering if it’s necessary to have software designed just for chapter management.
While those platforms can be helpful, most of our clients who use the native chapter management functionality built into our CRM take advantage of many more features that might not be readily available in chapter-specific software.
CharityEngine offers the only authentic all-in-one fundraising platform with native tools that give you a 360-degree view of your donor—or your chapter. When all metrics across the platform are tracked in real time, you can quickly see how anything you care to measure is tracking. This live data is advantageous when an individual switches chapters: without interruption, the contact record is updated, and your communications will go to the right place.
Let’s review some other ways CharityEngine is an excellent solution for chapter-based nonprofits.
CharityEngine offers a centralized management solution with chapters for organizations. Headquarters can use our software to manage fundraising efforts and track metrics across chapters, making it easy to spot trends or identify areas that need support. HQ can use data to support chapters and offer collaboration and learning when necessary. Headquarters staff can also drill down into the performance of each individual chapter to track their progress.
While it’s easy to have a view of all chapters, each chapter can maintain its own identity. This can mean branding, as long as it complies with national brand standards, as well as choosing campaigns and outreach based on the local community. If a chapter has a connection to local schools or clubs, for example, fundraising efforts could be combined, or (if it fits your mission) children could be the recipients of your efforts.
There are steps between viewing individual chapters and looking at them through a national lens. Organizations can segment chapters by region and see how cities in a particular area compare to others. View contacts and transactions to identify the demographics that best support your mission and see how different regions compare.
Our donation forms offer many data points that can be customized. Any field you care to enter can be tracked and attributed, such as initiative, fund, region, or even GL code, for easy reporting. Given that donation forms are a primary way donors will interact with your chapters, gathering this information and being able to report on it in the aggregate is a critical feature. An added benefit of our donation forms is the ability to create a dropdown field so donors can attribute their gift to a specific chapter or initiative.
One of our nonprofit clients tells us that they love using CharityEngine’s peer-to-peer features. Because data is always in real time, they can report on how states and regions perform as the event happens. This unique insight into campaigns helps you tweak messaging or solve issues immediately without waiting to review campaigns after they’ve ended. With email marketing automation, text to give, advocacy, major gifts, and events – as well as e-commerce, payment processing, and sophisticated reporting – CharityEngine is the only software your nonprofit needs.
With a feature built for chapter-based nonprofits, an organization can grant access to pages in our CMS based on membership type. While not completely available out of the box, the membership concept can also capture dues and automate billing for renewals.
Regardless of how many chapters or donors your organization has, CharityEngine’s database captures data from every source. You’re given a complete view of all your donors and chapters in real time, making it easy to view the data and see trends. Our dashboards can be customized any way you want, so your most relevant data is always in front of you. Segment and analyze chapters or initiatives and run custom reports.
CharityEngine is the best choice for nonprofit payment processing. We talk to the big card companies directly, meaning there aren’t layers of middlemen taking a cut from your funds. We are PCI- and SOC 2-certified, meaning your donor data is safe. And we offer advanced fraud protection, which is 99% effective at preventing sophisticated fraud attacks.
CharityEngine works with many national, chapter-based nonprofits. We welcome the opportunity to discuss your specific needs and explore how the unique features of CharityEngine could serve your organization.