Events are a key part of your nonprofit’s fundraising strategy. Not only do they help you raise money as a part of your campaigns, but they also provide an opportunity for stewardship to help your supporters feel more involved with and connected to your mission.
How can your organization ensure that your next event runs smoothly? The first step is to ensure that your event management software stack is complete.
Your software stack should be comprised of customized solutions for your organization's specific needs. That’s why we’ve compiled our favorite event management software into this article.
Completing your nonprofit’s software stack ensures the planning of your event goes smoothly. But it also helps ease the registration process for your attendees and streamline the processing of important data between software systems.Ready to learn which one of these solutions for event software for nonprofits will complete your nonprofit’s software stack? Let’s dive in.
It is our favorite, but it's also the best!
There’s a lot that goes into nonprofit events. As you work to maximize your fundraising, stewardship, and overall impact of your event, you’ll realize how many tools you need to ease the process of planning an event from start to finish. Luckily, CharityEngine offers features that will help streamline this entire process.
Your organization can organize everything you need within the same solution, a unique aspect of this software that especially helps nonprofits accurately report metrics about your event from the beginning to end.
For instance, when someone purchases a ticket through a CharityEngine event page, that information will automatically transfer to your digital guest list. Then, you can quickly and easily see how the additional attendee will impact your venue capacity, food and drink orders, and the marketing material list segments.
Our advanced event forms allow clients to accept promo codes, offer early-bird ticket pricing, and even provide check-in QR codes. Volunteer management software is native to the platform, keeping data in one place.
CharityEngine is also a CRM, where you can record information such as the number of events a donor attends, the additional gifts donated at such opportunities, and other interactions they’ve had with your organization. This provides a holistic view of their engagement levels.
With CharityEngine’s robust event management tool, you can plan out each and every detail of the event preparation process. For instance, these tools will help your nonprofit:
With extensive tools to help you manage your upcoming event, your organization will also collect a lot of data to help you gain further insights into your nonprofit supporters as a whole.
Working with CharityEngine provides the tools your nonprofit needs to encourage supporters to embark on and continue their donor journey with your organization.
Many organizations have many different software solutions to help them accomplish various aspects of their nonprofit strategy. But when every aspect of your nonprofit’s strategy works together to help reach your goals, why shouldn’t your software do the same thing?
CharityEngine provides an all-in-one solution that will not only help your organization manage your event, but will also show how that event plays a part in your larger nonprofit strategy.
Blackbaud is a world-renowned software provider for nonprofit organizations. Their many solutions integrate with one another, creating an entire software ecosystem.
With a complete ecosystem of solutions, your organization’s event data will be recorded alongside the other important metrics. National organizations and large nonprofits benefit from this type of system because it helps better incorporate event plans as a part of the larger organizational strategy.
As we stated before, Blackbaud has many different products to choose from, all of which integrate together. Typically, Raiser’s Edge is the first solution these organizations invest in, launching their relationship with Blackbaud. Raiser’s Edge is a donor management and fundraising solution that integrates with other Blackbaud event management tools, such as:
Raiser’s Edge will help your nonprofit get started collecting donations for your event, and integrating with other tools will help your organization plan the event for success.
Large national nonprofit organizations find it easier to invest in a complete Blackbaud system. When you have all of the proper tools, you can effectively organize events and incorporate them into your larger strategy. This system takes some extensive budgeting to obtain all of the relevant Blackbaud tools. However, once you have everything you need, Blackbaud will enhance your event management strategy all-around.
If you’ve done any research about event planning, the name Cvent has probably crossed your path. It’s an incredibly popular platform for various organizations.
Specifically, this platform tends to be most effective for professional meetings, conferences, and similar get-togethers. Organizations like professional associations find the extensive features offered by Cvent to be helpful tools when gathering people from around the country or around the world to work together to develop individual professional skills and networks.
Larger events often run into the issues of not having enough functionality in lightweight event management solutions. They need a more robust solution to manage all of the different aspects of the event such as:
Cvent takes the standard event management tool to a new level with additional features that make it perfect for large events.
Associations and other professional organizations find Cvent to fit all of their needs when it comes to organizing a large networking or educational event. If you’re hosting a big event with lots of intricate, moving parts, check out Cvent for your next software solution.
If your organization is short on time, Eventbrite is a great event software solution to get you started quickly and easily. Eventbrite makes it fast and easy to configure your event registration page and start selling tickets fast.
If you’re hosting a free event, Eventbrite is also free!
Eventbrite’s event management software makes it easy to quickly configure an event page with all of the details about your event. With Eventbrite, your organization can:
The multiple ticketing options offered through Eventbrite make it a useful platform for selling. Plus, the ease of creating new pages makes it one of the fastest options to get started on your event.
Eventbrite offers the essential core features that any nonprofit needs to launch its event. But it’s more than that! It’s also a platform where you can post about your event, providing additional marketing for your organization.
Brown Paper Tickets is a fair trade ticketing company. This event management software is designed to make it easy for small organizations or individuals to plan and execute events quickly, easily, and on their own.
This simplified, do-it-yourself system makes it easy to get started. Plus, their 24/7 support staff will help you with any questions you may have.
Brown Paper Tickets has all of the features small nonprofits need to get started with their events. These features include:
Brown Paper Tickets is completely free to get started. Your organization will have no set-up fees, sales fees, or long-term contracts. Instead, there’s a simple low-cost fee of $0.99 plus 5% added to each ticket sale. This means ticket sales are completely free for your organization and cheap for purchasers.
Brown Paper Tickets is a perfect solution for small nonprofits or one-off events. Their completely free platform makes it easy and cheap to get the most out of your ticketing system. The do-it-yourself software helps organizations get started quickly and start getting the word out about the event faster.
OneCause is a complete event solution for organizations hosting an auction event. With OneCause, your organization can plan out all of the important details of these events and even combine your online and in-person auctions for the best fundraising outcome.
OneCause offers all of the tools your organization needs if you’re planning a charity auction, from the first mention of the event to your supporter until after the event itself. Some of the features that help with this engagement include:
When you set up your auction with OneCause, you give your attendees the power of mobile bidding. There’s no need for a loud auctioneer or to leave seats and bet on silent auction tables. Instead, everyone can keep their seats, mingle with other guests, and place bids from their phones.
OneCause offers everything your organization needs for your upcoming auction. Promotion tools get the word out while management tools keep you organized. Mobile bidding and simple ticketing make the process easy for your attendees as well. Everyone wins!
Regpack is a comprehensive event software solution perfect for organizing complicated conference data in a single location. When you plan a conference, you need to keep records of information such as scheduling, venue, to-do lists, speakers, and lots of paperwork. Keep all of this stored together and communicate the important information effectively to attendees.
Regpack is designed to help keep your organization well-organized and your events well-managed. Some of the key organization features that help with this process include:
With Regpack, your organization can store and communicate all of the important information related to your conference event. From venue rooms to scheduling times and organizing speakers, you can handle everything in a single system.
Conferences have a lot of moving parts associated with them. Regpack will help you organize all of this key information in a single location while ensuring a positive user experience for your conference attendees.
Soapbox Engage is built to be used on one of the most popular CRM solutions available: Salesforce. When attendees register for your event through a Soapbox Engage-powered registration system, all of the registration information is automatically saved in the Salesforce database.
If your nonprofit is already using Salesforce for your donor database, working with a Salesforce-native event management app reduces manual input to sync records.
With Soapbox Engage, your organization can create and manage an unlimited number of events. Don’t forget to create an event calendar to post on your website and send out newsletters to keep your supporters up-to-date about upcoming events. Make sure they’re aware of all of the opportunities you offer.
Some of the management features that will help ensure all of these events are well-run include:
Soapbox Engage offers other tools that integrate with their nonprofit event management software. For instance, their donation tool, online store app, and online petition builder can all add exciting new elements to your organization’s event.
If your nonprofit is already using Salesforce, you know about the vast array of apps and integrations with the CRM. Finding native solutions is key for collecting and storing the most important information in a convenient place. Soapbox Engage is that native solution.
Doubleknot is an event management software solution built to meet the needs of specific industry verticals. While we tend to think of nonprofits as traditional charities for the community, to limit this definition also forgets about zoos and museums. Many of these organizations also exist in the nonprofit sphere, making it important to invest in the proper software.
Doubleknot offers software for these verticals. This system offers event management alongside a regular admission ticketing solution because it centralizes all of this important data.
Doubleknot’s event management software makes it easy to encourage your current supporters to get involved with your upcoming opportunities. Some of the features they offer include:
Another key feature Doubleknot offers is the ability to add on a donation to ticket purchases. At the end of the purchase, supporters can include a small gift to support the overall mission of the organization.
Doubleknot’s major advantage to the verticals they serve is that they offer event management alongside regular admission software. This means that consumers can purchase their event tickets very much in the same way as they do standard admission tickets.
This system makes it easier for the purchaser to buy the tickets and easier for your organization to keep records.
Eventzilla is an event management tool that’s especially effective when it comes to marketing your organization’s event. If you’re looking to get the word out about your event and work to acquire new supporters through event attendees, Eventzilla may be the software for you.
With Eventzilla, your organization can personalize content to help it resonate better with the supporter you’re reaching out to. Some of the tools they offer to help boost your event marketing strategy include:
Once you’ve established your marketing campaigns, check-in with the data collected by Eventzilla using their data dashboard to decide which strategies were most effective. Carry these strategies into future campaigns for continuous marketing improvement.
With Eventzilla, you can market your event effectively while encouraging supporters to take control of their own engagement. With a self-service module, attendees can register, update, and cancel all at their own leisure.
Planning Pod is a complete event software solution built for educational institutions. It’s perfect for planning events such as alumni fundraisers, commencements and graduations, conferences, galas and dinners, and networking events.
Planning Pod offers features that will help you manage and organize events of all sorts for your educational institution. All of these features are designed to:
Planning Pod has all of the core features educational institutions need to accomplish their main goals. However, they also offer additional flexibility so that your institution can use the software to fit your specific needs.
With so many things going on around campus, find a solution that will help you plan your event and keep everyone in-the-know about detail changes. Both alumni and current students can use this software and it’s not difficult to learn.
Completing your software stack with nonprofit event tools ensures your next event will be well-managed, planned effectively, engaging to supporters, and a key part of your overarching strategy.
Whether you use a comprehensive nonprofit CRM with event management tools or you choose integration with independent event management software, making events part of your fundraising strategy is a winning idea!