AFP and New Product Launch!

I just returned from the AFP conference this year in San Diego and I have one thing to say: I wish I lived here if I didn't already live in Philadelphia (does that make sense?)

San Diego has the nicest downtown area I have ever seen- it's like Downtown Disney on steroids. I don't recall seeing any trash, any graffiti, or anything that could remotely give a blemish to the city. Granted, I had a limited experience (we never ventured more than 10 blocks from the convention center), but still if you combine that experience with the glorious weather then I can understand why people love this city.

The conference itself was very, very, busy for us. From our success last year, we knew that people were understanding just how much we are an alternative to other software programs, including Blackbaud's Raiser's Edge. Our reception grew this year and folks got to see our latest innovations around prospect research, open API's and our new social fundraising solution, DonorPages.

For prospect research, we demonstrated our integration with industry leader Wealth Engine, and took a look at a certain Microsoft billionaire's public record. In our API review session, we helped explain the power of an open API, and showed how our clients have integrated the toolkit in their website to provide rich web content driven directly from their DonorPerfect Online database.

Finally, we also announced and demonstrated our latest product offering, DonorPages. I've been blogging about it for months now under the code name of spider.net.

Event Screen Shot of DonorPages. Click to Expand

With DonorPages, any organization can easily create a viral marketing campaign that empowers their constituents to create an easy-to-use 'DonorPage' and then invite their friends, family, and colleagues to visit their page and make a donation. In addition, DonorPages can easily integrate with other social networking tools, such as Facebook and MySpace, to create the perfect storm of fundraising activity and take advantage of your existing social networks.

Best of all, DonorPages is completely integrated with DonorPerfect, and allows both on-line and off-line gifts (from DonorPerfect) to display on the donor's individualized page. This new product is perfect for organizations that already raise money through sponsored events or want to tap into the enthusiasm of their constituents to spread the word. Finally, DonorPages is also available as a stand-alone product that can integrate with any other third party database via a simple download tool.

The conference also had a few surprises. For example, it was very interesting to see that Salesforce was absent from the exhibit hall after showing up in force for the NTEN conference. A few vendors had some splashy booths, while a few others chose a more conservative route. We ended up occupying a double booth, as we have done for years.

Overall, the conference was a huge success and we look forward to the coming months- the buzz on DonorPages has been fantastic, and I can't wait to see how it positively affects the fundraising successes for our clients for years to come.

In the Shoes of a Fundraiser...

Many of you know that I've been involved in the fundraising business for almost 15 years. During that time, I've participated and volunteered at many special events- everything from golf tournaments (my favorite), telethons (least favorite), bowl-a-thon's, walk-a-thons, beef-and-beers, spaghetti dinners, and even No Limit Texas Hold 'em tournaments.

However, I didn't chair and organize one- until now.

Our recent event over the weekend pulled in over 200 people over 3 days and I think we had everything thrown at us, especially Mother Nature (there was an ice-storm in St. Louis the day before the event, throwing off all the flights). However, we got it done and raised a record amount of money (small to some of our clients, but still a record for this very small organization).

The event was also one of the beta tests for our new DonorPerfect social fundraising solution, codenamed spider.net, that helped generate a 20% increase over the previous event with half the volunteers and half the work. I'll mention the event and the official product name for spider.net when we get closer to public launch, that will occur at the AFP International Fundraising Conference in San Diego on March 30th, 2008.

However, here are some things I learned during 3 consecutive 15 hour days:

• Wear comfortable shoes and switch out your socks half-way through.
• Grow eyes in the back of your head. Seriously.
• Stock lots of extra batteries. Wireless microphones eat batteries for a living.
• Remember to eat- at least twice.
• Remember to drink lots of water.
• Count on at least 2 critical things to go wrong, and have the faith and planning to be prepared for it.
• Recruit one key person as your back-up/executive assistant you can count on for anything.
• Remember to have fun!

All in all, it's an event I will never forget and we raised a lot of money for a very special charity. Though we already have many clients using it in our beta test period, I can't wait to launch it to all non-profit organizations. It's going to turn special event fundraising on its head and increase fundraising revenues while decreasing expenses- all while making it fun and easy!

Version 9 is OUT!

It's official!

Last Thursday, we launched our 14th revision of DonorPerfect over the last 19 years (it's 14 when you include our DOS and Windows 3.11 version)!

DonorPerfect Version 9 is simply the best PC fundraising solution we've released- ever.

Complete Outlook email and calendar integration, a new dashboard and home page, a new custom report writer, automated acknowledgement letters that integrate with Microsoft Word, easier to use selection filters and sophisticated financial reports.... the list goes on and on.... It's all here.

Want a sneak peak and download the upgrade yourself? It's available to all DonorPerfect installed clients on support- simply login to your client website account and click on the downloads link on the left hand side.

We're truly excited about this new launch for our installed product, as it reaffirms our commitment to our clients and it also provides some necessary infrastructure improvements for even more new solutions.

In fact, over the next several months, we'll also be announcing something phenomenally new- think Web 2.0- that is sure to knock your socks off. Code named "Spider.NET", this new web 2.0 tool will make web fundraising easier and more powerful than ever before. We already have several clients signed up, and I'm sure more will join soon before we make an official announcement.

In the meantime, enjoy Version 9 and here's a picture of our launch celebration- we had just enough donuts to make it work!