Purple Patch Blog

Where does the Convio acquisition leave Blackbaud users?

So, one week on from the big announcement that Blackbaud is buying Convio (see our previous post), and people everywhere have been furiously blogging and commenting about what it all means. Some are asking questions, some are showing signs of fear, and some are just plain gossiping! Here are a few we enjoyed:

• The Agitator – Any colour you like as long as it’s black
• Nonprofit Force - The Convio-Blackbaud merger - one customer's perpective
• Appichar – Blackbaud/Convio: a match made in heaven or hell?
• Event 360 – Why I’m optimistic about Blackbaud’s acquisition of Convio

What we haven’t seen so far is very much serious consideration of what it means for a charity that has a Blackbaud product right now. Here in the UK, that is predominantly The Raiser’s Edge 7, since Blackbaud’s wider range of products (such as Enterprise CRM, BBDM and eTapestry) are less well established.

At Purple Vision, we work every day with clients who use The Raiser’s Edge. Most of our team have known it for many years as client-side database managers and practicing consultants. We’ve put in a lot of hours, and we know it to be a robust, reliable and trusted fundraising database. But we also know that the foundations have started to creak of late, not only with the announcement last year that development of RE8 has been discontinued, but also with the emergence of smart new alternatives. And now that we learn Blackbaud is buying Convio, organisations that use The Raiser’s Edge will be thinking about succession planning for their CRM system. A scary thought, but one that needs to be considered by anyone who is serious about ensuring excellent stewardship as well as real efficiencies.

Although Blackbaud’s product plans are not yet known, it seems clear that they have absorbed their emerging competitor because of their technical know-how; they understand that the future of fundraising lies ‘in the cloud’. This trend is accelerating, and we think it means that RE7 could soon be retired.  That’s OK for future clients, but existing customers will need to work out how to replace it. Just think about that for a second; it’s huge!  Imagine your CRM system – not just the database, but also the people and processes behind your strategy – taken out of the equation and replaced. And think about the project that will need to be built to support the process – business case, SMT buy-in, trustee engagement and support, scoping, project team, resourcing etc., and then the migration project itself. Are you ready for that? Can you afford not to be?

We’re not trying to be alarmist. Really, we’re not!  No matter what size your organisation is, it’s daunting, but not impossible. We work with many nonprofit clients, and can think of a number with projects already underway that this will affect:

• One large charity, looking to move up from RE, is not too far down that road – luckily they can stop and reassess now – or at least pause – to see what happens.
• Another client is just setting out to integrate its website and operational database with RE. They might want to take a step back and rethink that, as the risk of building a system based on an ageing product is a significant one.

What next then, and how best to proceed? To be honest, it is too early to tell. We recommend that anyone using The Raiser’s Edge should “pull up a chair” and watch as this acquisition (still to be approved by the US authorities) unfolds. The effects on the UK charity market will be real, profound and imminent. At Purple Vision, we’ll be keeping our eyes and ears open and, as always, we will be on hand to help charities that need guidance and support. Your CRM strategy should never, ever, be just about the database. That piece of technology represents your supporter community, the very heart of your organisation. Fail to protect it at your peril!

 

Meet The Raiser’s Edge 8: It’s called Convio Common Ground

There was surprise and excitement yesterday when it was announced that US nonprofit technology leader Blackbaud will acquire rival software firm Convio. The $300million price tag represents a 49% premium over Convio’s market value, so somebody really wants to make sure the deal goes through!

Few people in the UK have even heard of Convio, which up to now has provided fundraising and CRM solutions in the US and Canada, including 29 out of the top 50 charities.  However, last year Convio acquired Baigent Digital, a leading web agency in the UK, and are expected to launch here in the next few months.

So why pay out so much cash to buy out a rival?  The simple answer is they had no choice. Blackbaud has not delivered the much vaunted upgrade to its ageing flagship CRM product, The Raiser’s Edge, whereas Convio’s Common Ground, building on the massively successful salesforce.com platform, has become the solution of choice with its modern, cloud-based software oriented to the needs of digital fundraisers and online supporters. So Blackbaud bought Convio before Convio overtook them.

“That’s a shame”, you may say, “Convio never fulfilled its destiny and usurped its rival!”  But such is the nature of public companies in the software business.  Rumour has it that this wasn’t the first time Blackbaud tried to buy Convio. When faced with an offer they can’t really refuse, boards of directors sooner or later recommend shareholders to sell. 

So, what does all this mean?  Less choice, perhaps? At the top end of the market there is keen competition for the biggest international clients, and it will be interesting to see how Convio’s new Lumimate system shapes up against Blackbaud’s EnterpriseCRM.

But what about the quiet majority – charities working hard to build positive and beneficial relationships with their supporters?  Having supported Blackbaud technologies and clients for many years, at Purple Vision we think this deal could be a good thing, and here is why: Readers of this blog may remember a few weeks ago we reported Blackbaud Marketing VP Jana Eggers explaining on YouTube how the company had abandoned development of RE8, and instead described the company’s various other tools in a kind of mix-and-match solution.  That was a sad day for Blackbaud; both the company and its many thousands of customers deserved a lot better.  But now the solution that they need may be coming their way after all. Convio’s Common Ground has been described as “Raiser’s Edge in the Cloud”.  If this turns out to be true, it could be a tremendous kick-start for digital fundraising, and a great opportunity for fundraisers everywhere.

 

Raiser's Edge - the next generation?

So, the cat is semi-officially out of the bag.

The next generation of The Raiser's Edge - called 'Raiser's Edge 8' by those interested in such things - isn't actually going to happen. There are, according to Jana Eggers, a Blackbaud VP, no "active development plans" for RE8.

Now, for those of us interested in Blackbaud's products, and there are enough of us, this is big, big news, and something of a change from what we've heard in the past.

Two years ago at the Blackbaud conference in London, then Chief Technical Officer Shaun Sullivan talked about RE8 but admitted that he was struggling to be able to announce when it would be ready for release. Similar conversations with Blackbaud people positioned the new RE8 as providing 'functional blades' within the wider BB Enterprise CRM solution, built on the 'Infinity' platform.

According to the video, RE7 customers will be offered solutions ranging from BB Enterprise CRM for larger organisations, Altru (a SaaS solution) for arts and cultural, and etapestry and RE(i) for smaller nonprofits. Or they could stay with RE7 which Blackbaud say will feature new bits of kit to support mobile giving and social CRM in early 2012.

All food for thought - and with increased competition in the non-profit technology sector in 2012 - it'll be interesting to see what happens to all those organisations currently on RE7.

The Americans are coming!

By Steve Thomas

To be precise, more Americans are coming! In the UK we already have dominant CRM solutions from Blackbaud and ASI, and soon they will be joined by US competitor Convio.

Earlier this year Convio bought Baigent Digital, the well-respected UK digital agency focusing on non-profits. Since then we haven't heard much - no doubt they are preparing their plans and products for the UK market. What can we expect when they launch here? Judging from the products and services available to US fundraisers, some very interesting things could be coming our way.

To find out more, we subscribed to Convio's US mailing list and this week a newsletter arrived about their main CRM tool, known as Common Ground. Convio products make use of the powerful SalesForce platform, and with Common Ground they claim that users get straightforward, easy-to-use tools to create, launch and manage fundraising campaigns direct to their social media sites.

A single, integrated solution delivering a true 360-degree view; all securely hosted in the cloud for a fixed monthly fee. No servers to manage, no technology snags and no integration headaches – all you need is a browser and you are away. That is quite a promise!

Watch the video for yourself here.  It lasts 6 minutes. This is a tantalising glimpse of how a CRM system should be – we look forward to seeing what it will look like when it becomes available to UK fundraisers. We’ll keep you posted – watch this space.

The sincerest form of flattery

We are delighted to hear that Blackbaud has followed Purple Vision’s lead by offering a health check service.

They are right to identify this as a valuable service for users. We have been offering our own Database Healthcheck for many years and our clients regularly report great value for money from the immediate and practical help that it delivers.

Quite often we arrive on site to hear strong criticisms of the database. But typically it is quite capable (with a bit of reconfiguration, restructuring or training) of delivering most, or all, requirements. The Database Healthcheck is a great way to demonstrate where, why and how the database can do its job. So, if you are annoyed with your system, think again – it may not be its fault!

And it’s not just about The Raiser’s Edge. Being independent, we are not limited to any particular vendor or technology. By working with all major CRM and fundraising tools, we suggest and implement best practice – regardless of the system in question.

(Virtually free) charity databases - market update May 2011

'The revolution will not be exported into a spreadsheet' - not my words, but those of Citizen CRM.

Now I know very little about Citizen CRM, other than it appears to have taken it's marketing spiel straight from Citizen Smith - and therefore may well be marching on Tooting Town Hall any day now...

But what I do know about Citizen CRM is that it's one of a new breed - one of the new software as a service ('SaaS to those in the know') solutions designed to give charities a decent database system without a) all the cost of something like Raiser's Edge b) all the complexity of something like Raiser's Edge and c) all the IT headaches associated with something like R...you know what I mean.

There are others out there - Convio, a non-profit solution increasingly popular in the US of A and based upon Salesforce. CiviCRM, an open-source, not necessarily hosted solution aimed perhaps more at those in the non-profit sector with a few more techy skills, and who have a Drupal or Joomla website/CMS.

And then there's DonorForce - a new solution, again based upon the Salesforce platform, developed by AppiChar and recently soft-launched at the Institute of Fundraising.

CiviCRM and DonorForce are/will be available in the UK - and are/will be developed to meet the needs of the UK non-profit world. Convio and Citizen CRM - well, who knows. However, the Salesforce platform looks very strong - and now that it's being taken and developed away from it's traditional, vanilla sales-pipeline management functions, is surely going to be an ever stronger rival to those of Blackbaud, ASI, ThankQ, Iris etc.

Watch this space...comrades

 

 

 

 

 

 

Raiser’s Edge users are no longer stuck with Blackbaud as their only option

Time was, say back in the early 2000’s, when if you had Raiser’s Edge you had to go to Blackbaud for everything. Absolutely everything.

Need some training? Go on a Blackbaud classroom training course. Need someone to import some data for you? Ring Blackbaud and get one of their consultants in. Need Raiser’s Edge to do something different? Buy the RE:API.

But, slowly but surely, over the last few years, that’s been changing.

Blackbaud clients now have more options when they’re looking for training and consultancy – with companies like Purple Vision (that’s us!) in the UK – www.purple-vision.com, or Heller Consulting in the USA – www.teamheller.com – offering experience, capacity, independence and value for money that offers real competition to Blackbaud’s in-house professional services team. And there’s a legion of independent, one-man-band consultants out there too.

However, on the software side, things have moved a little more slowly – but there are now serious options for users that like Raiser’s Edge, but perhaps have needs that Blackbaud’s core offerings don’t cater for – or that are too expensive for!

One interesting company is Zeidman Development – www.zeidman.info – who offer supported customisations for Raiser’s Edge. In addition, their growing range of add-ons or ‘plugins’ offer tools that integrate with Raiser’s Edge and that often fill in the missing gaps in Raiser’s Edge functionality (there are also tools that work with other Blackbaud products such as Enterprise CRM and Blackbaud Direct Marketing)

One such product is ‘The Mergician’ – which offers the ability to merge files of multiple duplicate records – rather than the one-by-one merge record process that comes with the core product. This particular add-on comes with a price tag, but other downloads are freeware.

Of a different nature is a range of integrated modules from O-matic Software – a company based in Charleston, South Carolina (as are Blackbaud) – and who have a range of bits of kit that may prove to be a ‘Goldilocks’ solution for clients where things like Blackbaud Direct Marketing are just too big, complicated and expensive.

There three most popular tools for the UK market are Import-O-matic (touted as a more seamless, less clunky way of importing data into RE), Segment-O-matic (to help develop segments for direct marketing – sidestepping some of the limitations of the query tool) and RE Store (an integrated sales order processing and stock control system).

Now, Purple Vision haven’t yet tried out any of these tools, but we’re watching closely as contacts of ours, and clients, start evaluating them and getting a feel for them.

This is all good news, and fits in with the ‘partner ecosystem’ that certain Blackbaud luminaries have said that they are keen to develop. With Salesforce’s growth being at least partly down to their own ecosystem of partners – with software developers and consultants supporting their growing band of non-profit clients – this is surely the way for Blackbaud to go, and their clients can only benefit from this trend.

 

 

If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck … it must be The Raiser’s Edge!

The Raiser’s Edge version 8 revolution is coming (in 2010 we hear).

Using an all-new ‘Infinity’ platform based on Microsoft’s .net technology, Blackbaud’s flagship product will be transformed into an open and accessible tool that integrates with a growing range of third party solutions, especially online tools.

When (and if) existing users choose to accept the upgrade to version 8 they will automatically adopt the new technology, but to ease this transition it will be built to look and feel (and quack) much like the current beloved product.

But the big change comes for larger players. The same Infinity platform will be used for a new product called Enterprise CRM. This will enable Blackbaud customers to mix and match different solutions to suit the needs of the whole organisation – including back office, local branches, head office, web, service delivery, marketing – all in one joined up architecture.

This is important because it takes a big step towards the holy grail of the 360-degree customer view and total relationship management. In future, you will be able to look at an individual and see not only their recent donations and communications preferences but also their history of services used, online interaction and any other relevant links to your organisation.

Our sources at Blackbaud liken their new technology to lego!  Buy the simple model and it comes out just like the picture on the box; buy the big kit and you can build it the way you want.  Crucially, it all fits together all the time.

“Bring it on” I hear you cry!  But Blackbaud are not planning to launch these new products until they have credible anchor clients up and running successfully.  We have all read that Oxford University is the first high profile early adopter, and we hear that others are likely to be announced in the next few weeks.