Really Simple Donor Databases

I like tools that just work, even when they do not necessarily do everything I could hope for. Most database tools have features that do not work well, that I just wish they would have not included at all. Our food has too much sugar and refined flour, our economy has too much credit, and our databases have too many features - all of which can lead to serious systemic problems.

In a follow up to my post last year covering Really Simple Databases, here are a few simple online donor management tools to consider.

DonorTools:

A relatively new donor management service that got its start providing donation services to churches. Since then the developers have grown the tool to be appropriate for all kinds of nonprofits with simple donor management needs. DonorTools tracks basic donor information with options for multiple salutations, addresses, and methods for contact. Donors are then "tagged" with one or more categories that you determine, creating a simple and robust way to categorize donors into a wide variety of groups.

Donations include options to track the source and the fund, and include options for tracking the gift type, splitting the gift and more. Viewing a donor provides a nice prominent view of their total giving, and their are buttons available to quickly find donations over preset time periods.

Online donation forms can be configured to automatically related donations to the correct fund. There is not a website management tool, but the donation forms can be linked to your site via "Donate Now" buttons, or using the various APIs available these forms can be rendered directly onto a website. Donating online requires either Amazon or Paypal, but DonorTools does not take any percentage of the transactions.

DonorTools current price is $30/month - they say this is for a "limited time", which does not surprise me given the nice array of features offered for this simple system. This price includes unlimited records and logins, including some basic levels of access control to the system.

BlackbaudNow:

While I maintain they made a very poor choice in naming their service, they did succeed in making a very simple & usable donor database. If you need a quickie website + online donation system up in a hurry take a look.

It really just tracks very basic contact info per donor - name, address, phone, fax, email - and a few extra tidbits such as contact type and birth date. There is a simple, integrated email blast tool - you either email everyone, or one person in your database, either text or html emails. Blackbaud teamed up with Paypal and ingeniously decided to offer their integrated donor and payment solution for a rather steep 4.95% + $0.30 per donation transaction. Other than these transaction fees, the BlackbaudNow service itself is cost free.

A very simple 6 page website tool is integrated, with over 20 templates to choose from. Only offers one login for managing the system. In general, I would expect that folks looking for a simple online donor management solution would be more satisfied with DonorTools over BlackbaudNow unless the integrated website feature is key. Check out Michelle Murrain's post as well for more information.