While many businesses have a primary objective of raising as much money as possible for shareholders, life in a nonprofit or government organization is quite different. You’re not trying to boost those profits through the roof – your goal is to make as much difference to your service users, and society, as you can. However altruistic your aims may be, the harsh realities of the business world still apply to some extent. After all, you need money to do your good work. While marketing automation software may seem like something that’s been developed for profit-chasing businesses, the truth is that using it well can works wonders when it comes to increasing donations and, therefore, the reach of your nonprofit organization.
Marketing automation software is designed to work for ALL businesses, not just those with shareholders to keep happy. They have shareholders, you have stakeholders, and serving them well requires money. Great marketing automation software ensures that you reach out to the right people at the right time – maximizing the reach of your nonprofit, whilst also saving time which can be better spent on more beneficial tasks. When you can automate your emails, use analytics to identify your best-performing strategies, and target your communications with minimal effort, the employees and volunteers can use their very valuable time to help your service users. Marketing automation is the way to go in 2019, regardless of what industry you operate in.
1. Integrate Marketing Automation Software with Your Financial Software
Every business operates in its own unique way, meaning that your marketing automation software must work exactly how you do. One way to maximize the benefits of using such software is by integrating it with your nonprofit’s financial software. How? By leveraging existing integrations or using a tool like Zapier. Without having to write a single line of code (your life in a nonprofit involves wearing enough hats already!), you can make your marketing automation work seamlessly with your chosen financial software, incorporating Facebook leads, subscribers to your newsletter, people who make donations, and more. Basically, it makes life a lot easier, and who doesn’t want that? In a world where fintech is king, it’s time to make that tech work for you. For example:
- A potential supporter fills in your contact form. If you’ve integrated your marketing automation with your financial software, their details will be saved across the various platforms you use, with no manual entries required.
- An existing supporter tends to make the same donation every 6 months. Using this integration, you can pre-empt their next transaction, perhaps offering some incentive to continue their loyalty.
- An existing subscriber updates their contact details on one of the platforms you use, and your integration means that it is updated across the board. More time saving for you, and no missed opportunities through using incorrect details in future mailings, campaigns, or other communications.
This software integration can benefit more than just your marketing – your organization will be compliant with requirements to keep contact information up to date, including removing those who wish to unsubscribe completely, your subscribers and supporters will enjoy an excellent customer experience throughout the customer journey (perhaps even more important in nonprofits which rely on goodwill), and you, your employees, and your volunteers will not be swamped by time-consuming admin.
2. Create Smart Automated Work Processes
While the name may suggest that marketing automation software is all about, well, marketing, it goes far beyond just boosting your income. The main advantage of using this software, particularly in conjunction with your financial software, is time. We all only have 1,440 minutes per day, but we get to choose how we use them. You know there are better things to do with your time than tedious, repetitive work, and here are a few ideas on how to avoid much of it:
- Automated welcome emails – everyone wants, and expects, an excellent customer experience now. Make sure you deliver just that by setting up automated welcome emails, giving each person who contacts you a personalized welcome and thanks for signing up.
- Automated account updates – no more manually copying changes from one system to another. Smart automated account updates make sure that any amendments are reflected across the board, and that outstanding experience is maintained.
- Promotions and newsletters – email promotions and newsletters can be an excellent way to drum up support and business, and even more so when you use marketing automation software which can segment your audience, target communications accurately, and respond to customer behavior when visiting your website or otherwise interacting with your online presence.
3. Marketing Automation and MIP Fund Accounting
MIP Fund Accounting has been developed specifically to cater for nonprofit and government organizations, ensuring your organization’s mission productivity is achieved. Through integrating marketing automation with your MIP Fund Accounting, you can benefit from the financial aspects such as:
- Accurate and multi-dimensional reporting of your accounts
- Advanced security and fraud protection
- Unlimited forecasting of “what-if scenarios”
- Compliance with GASB and FASB reporting
All this and more with the added advantages of streamlined, effortless management of your CRM, cross-channel presence and subscribers, and efficient and effective use of your employees’ and volunteers’ time. In a nonprofit organization, time is most definitely the most valuable resource, and this is a sure-fire way to maximize utility. We understand that your service users are more important than your bottom line, but you need that bottom line so you can deliver. Integrating excellent marketing automation software with MIP Fund Accounting takes the work out of the necessary yet boring tasks, so you can free yourself up to concentrate on what’s important to your organization. Taking care of your data means great donor relationships and effective fundraising, and with the right tools, this is easy.
Anyone who has spent any time working with a nonprofit knows just how much pressure the fundraisers and management are constantly under. There’s rarely enough staff and volunteers to provide the great service you want to maintain, there’s always a mountain of tedious admin to keep on top of, and fundraising is most definitely an ongoing pursuit. Such is life at a nonprofit and, while there is no way to avoid this reality, there is certainly a way to remove a lot of the associated stress. With marketing automation software integrated with your MIP Fund Accounting software, updates, targeting, segmentation and more can ensure that your fintech, social media, and other platforms work for you, rather than the other way round. When your background tasks can be automated, your service users reap the rewards of an always-efficient, always-compliant organization.
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