You: pretty, fast, cheap. Me: Poorly organised
September 23, 2016 6:06 AM Subscribe
Looking for AMS / membership software for non-profits. Again.
Follow-up on a question I put forth two years ago, I thought to check once more with the hive for recommendations since there are new solutions coming out all the time. I've spend a couple of weeks on-and-off with CiviCRM this summer, but have to accept the fact that it's unfortunately too messy for me to ever get anyone else to use it, and a pain to setup and maintain.
So, here are the feature requirements:
* membership profiles with custom fields edited by admins only
* membership access control - who can see what info
* mobile accessible as well as web or native app.
I have a ton of ponies to add, but above are the bare-bones requirements.
We're ≈500 members, and I'd like to software to be accessible by all members so that they can update their personal info and contact other members in their departments. Unfortunately, this puts most AMS solutions out of our reach since many charge $pu/pm and my budget for this is tiny.
An alternative would be to only let our dept admins access to the platform, but even so there's 30 people who need access and that too becomes expensive.
I've been trying to get people to use Trello.com for task management and @DM, but it's not taken off. So besides AMS/CRM software I've been looking into Slack, Ryver and similar group chat/forum solutions to solve both problems with one platform. So far I haven't found any such solution which allows creation of custom fields.
(This "custom fields" requirement is in order to be able to create lists of those have access to the graphic dept, woodshop, etc, as well as "member is renting locker 2 & 3")
Any solution which would fulfil the above requirements is kosher. I've even considered setting up LDAP/AD with custom fields on a QNAP and letting members access that somehow, but that seems overly desperate even for me.
Follow-up on a question I put forth two years ago, I thought to check once more with the hive for recommendations since there are new solutions coming out all the time. I've spend a couple of weeks on-and-off with CiviCRM this summer, but have to accept the fact that it's unfortunately too messy for me to ever get anyone else to use it, and a pain to setup and maintain.
So, here are the feature requirements:
* membership profiles with custom fields edited by admins only
* membership access control - who can see what info
* mobile accessible as well as web or native app.
I have a ton of ponies to add, but above are the bare-bones requirements.
We're ≈500 members, and I'd like to software to be accessible by all members so that they can update their personal info and contact other members in their departments. Unfortunately, this puts most AMS solutions out of our reach since many charge $pu/pm and my budget for this is tiny.
An alternative would be to only let our dept admins access to the platform, but even so there's 30 people who need access and that too becomes expensive.
I've been trying to get people to use Trello.com for task management and @DM, but it's not taken off. So besides AMS/CRM software I've been looking into Slack, Ryver and similar group chat/forum solutions to solve both problems with one platform. So far I haven't found any such solution which allows creation of custom fields.
(This "custom fields" requirement is in order to be able to create lists of those have access to the graphic dept, woodshop, etc, as well as "member is renting locker 2 & 3")
Any solution which would fulfil the above requirements is kosher. I've even considered setting up LDAP/AD with custom fields on a QNAP and letting members access that somehow, but that seems overly desperate even for me.
Ok I hope I have a good update for you. I just attended an event and learned more about an organization called TechSoup.
https://www.techsoup.global
They are an international organization that helps charities and not-for-profits access (expensive) technology.
I highly recommend you reach out to them. I've known about the Canadian provider and didn't realize it was global. The Canadian team is fantastic and I know a number of charities that have greatly benefited from their expertise and steep discounts.
I hope this helps!
posted by A hidden well at 7:16 PM on September 28, 2016 [1 favorite]
https://www.techsoup.global
They are an international organization that helps charities and not-for-profits access (expensive) technology.
I highly recommend you reach out to them. I've known about the Canadian provider and didn't realize it was global. The Canadian team is fantastic and I know a number of charities that have greatly benefited from their expertise and steep discounts.
I hope this helps!
posted by A hidden well at 7:16 PM on September 28, 2016 [1 favorite]
Response by poster: A hidden well: thanks for following up with the techoup link - much appreciated.
As to applying for grants to pay for an off-the-shelf solution, I'm looking into that as well.
posted by monocultured at 1:02 AM on October 4, 2016
As to applying for grants to pay for an off-the-shelf solution, I'm looking into that as well.
posted by monocultured at 1:02 AM on October 4, 2016
This thread is closed to new comments.
Instead of trying to cobble together a frustrating solution, what about instead looking at a grant to help you with your purchase or seeing if the software that can meet your needs has non-profit pricing (since many do)?
posted by A hidden well at 8:18 AM on September 23, 2016