02/17/2020
By Mohona Dutta | Reading time 6 mins
Microsoft, Dynamics 365 is one of the world’s most widely used Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) and customer relationship management (CRM) solutions, catering to sales, customer service, marketing domains and aiding operational tasks such as managing finances and human resources.
Different industries have vouched for Dynamics 365 for one reason: because it helps them to integrate their key business functions with a solo, all-encompassing cloud-based system; view and manage all the data from across the board in one appropriate place. And nonprofits can benefit as much as any other company or industry from the extra productivity and efficiency that Dynamics 365 makes possible.
Now the most pertinent question-Is it affordable?
Well, here’s the good news, Microsoft is committed to supporting nonprofits and has a deep understanding of the area. They know that such associations have a dearth of resources and revenue.
Microsoft feels that nonprofit organizations lack an all-inclusive digital strategy, and nearly half of non-profits are barely able to keep up their infrastructure.
In a notion to help the nonprofits with Dynamics 365, Microsoft offers a range of generous discounts. They have also created especially custom-made products, such as a non-profit data schema on Dynamics 365 Common Data Service (CDS) which can hasten innovation for such associations.
So, what can Dynamics 365 do for you?
It’s not only about great pricing or the discounts that are offered and makes Dynamics 365 an excellent choice for non-profits. The tool includes everything required to streamline and optimize operations, service, and relationships with sponsors, donors, volunteers. It can be used to:
- Unify and eliminate disparate systems
- Manage benefactors, sponsors, donors, and volunteers
- Track donations and grants
- Integrate marketing and social media activity
Dynamics 365 provides that crucial big picture of the entire operation, helping to minimize waste and increase productivity and efficiency.
With a robust CRM like Dynamics 365 at play, nonprofits can certainly concentrate better on maintaining a steadfast and a healthy relationship with their donor, sponsors to make fundraising easier.
Managing the donors
Most of the charitable gifts come from individuals, and each person comes with more information than you can remember. Storing their details isn’t an easy task but given the kind of operation that you run, this information should be accessible, and actionable.
Dynamics 365 offers tools and features that are available on a dashboard or menu screen. You can track and access data on donations, grants, and donor trends.
You can also create donor messages from templates, and send out automated emails thanking them. Keeping in touch with your donors can definitely have a positive aspect, as they will feel welcomed and appreciated for their efforts and you can guarantee a lifelong loyalty at their end.
Creating campaigns
Creating specific campaigns can help you focus on fundraising, and Dynamics 365 makes it easy to handle all of your campaign requirements. With its help, donors can easily register for events and purchase tickets.
Nonprofits can organize that information, and get notifications when a donation is made. Your donors need to be aware of the campaigns that you organize so that they can contribute to the cause.
Creating the appropriate campaign by understanding donor trends and assessing a certain demographic can boost your fundraising activities.
Fundraising stratagems are not easy to create. They need to understand your donors and keeping track of all the information that helps you know them. Fortunately, Dynamics 365 can streamline information and help you. There is an array of information that nonprofits need such as:
- Donor histories
- Reports on donor trends
- Mailing lists (email and direct mail)
Fundraising should be a cross-departmental activity skillfully coordinated by your members, volunteers. Dynamics 365 with its exceptional integration feature can help you extract, import, export and share information to make this a tad easier.
Once the fundraising activity is planned, you need to-
- Track fundraising actions on a calendar
- Assign team members to tasks
- Document and track donor interactions
With the list of donors and members associated with your cause, there will be a rise in the amount of data stored. Dynamics 365 provides the kind of flexibility that you need to handle the stored information and use it to harbor new relationships for the benefit.
It can’t be said that donations pop out of thin air. Fundraisers help create relationships with prospects, forged through a series of enthusiastic, resolute interactions. The conversation is at the core of obtaining and retaining donors, and Dynamics 365 can help you improve donor communications.
- You can create newsletter campaigns for email and direct mail
- You will be able to schedule message distribution
- And of course, track all of your communications
Dynamics 365 helps you enhance the way you run your operation and all these tasks will make it easier to understand your conversations with donors. You can also segment donors for email campaigns and social media messages. It can also help your organization improve productivity by automating different sections of the fundraising process such as:
- Automatically processing pledges
- Effortlessly scheduling recurring gifts
- Sending an acknowledgment letter
- Easily viewing donation histories
Implementing Microsoft Dynamics 365 will bring in a huge transformation to the way the processes run in your nonprofit. You will witness that conversations will be more focused and lead to more recurrent donations just by integrating Dynamics 365 into your fundraising management process.
Running a non-profit isn’t just about creating awareness amongst people regarding burning issues. It involves so much more and at times, it turns to be a harrowing task. And in a world with so many nonprofits, you must be more competent about fundraising.
You need to ensure that you talk to the right donors at the right time and convey the right messages. Remember, the less scattered all of these activities, tasks, information is, the easier the work.
At AhaApps, we offer full-suite of services with our Microsoft Dynamics 365 CRM expertise to support nonprofits to manage members, volunteers, track donors and grants from day one. With limited budget and resources, the cost is one of the main pain points for a non-profit organization. We understand that.
So, connect with us and we will help by creating a cost-effective and affordable solution.
Author’s bio:
Mohona is a Content Writer for the Marketing team in AhaApps since 2019. When she is not busy attending to her creative, technical side, she likes to binge on sitcoms on Netflix. She loves writing poems and reading short stories when she wants to break away from the humdrum of life.