Verizon's new Mifi 4G LTE card. It sucks.

I’ve been in love with my Verizon 3G Mifi card since I first got it two years ago.  It was light years ahead of my previous roaming USB stick, was very dependable, and up to 5 people could use it at the same time.  It had one button, and it worked- all of the time. It is likely the best, most impressive piece of technology I have used since the invention of the cell phone.

Mifi cards allow you to carry the Internet in your pocket.  You simply turn it on, and presto!  You have an instant wifi spot where up to 5 computers, laptops, ipods, etc. can connect to the Internet.

So imagine my delight when I was contacted by Verizon and asked if I wanted a FREE 4G LTE mifi card!  Not only that, but they would LOWER my monthly billing to $50/month.  Too good to be true, right?  Nope, it was zero dollars and they shipped it to me for free too.

Up until yesterday, I used it for 4 weeks.  In one word – it sucks.  I can’t believe people use this device other than for a paperweight:

• It didn’t work out of the box.  After 4 calls to technical support (which I admit was fast), they shipped me a new SIM card, and then it worked. But not for long.  You see, it has to run off of the battery and you cannot use it simultaneously while being powered by your computer.  That means you can only get 2 hours out of it- max.  (The old 3G one does not have that limitation and works for as long as your laptop battery)
• It doesn’t hold a connection- at any speed.  About once every 5 minutes, it disconnects from the network, anywhere from 15 to 60 seconds.  While this is fine while you are surfing or responding to email, it’s absolutely worthless when trying to view a YouTube video or making a Skype call.
• 4G coverage is pathetic.  Yes, Verizon admits that they are building out their 4G network, but I found the coverage incredibly spotty in and around Philadelphia.
• One network bar in 4G is 10 times slower than full bars in 3G.  There were times it would try to hook into a 4G signal, but it was weak.  It would have been better to be at 3G speeds with full bars.  Of course, you can’t configure the card to force it into 3G mode.  This is a MAJOR problem and must be addressed.
• You can’t use it while moving.  I travel a lot, especially by train.  The card was useless on an Amtrak train from Philadelphia to DC.  My old 3G card worked everywhere along this route, except for the tunnels near Baltimore.  The 4G one would constantly lose a connection- for minutes at a time- making it impossible to use.  Amtrak Connect (Amtrak’s free wifi service), is not an alternative.  It too is painfully slow to the point that only using it for email is reasonable.

So in the end, I walked into my not so favorite Verizon store, and told them they could keep their 4G and reactivate my old 3G card.

And you know what?  I love it.

I always liked "Back to the Future!"

Again it’s been some time since I blogged.  The fact is, things have been so busy this year, it was hard to take time out and let people know.  Yes, this is a complete cop-out and I take responsibility for it, but like working out at the gym, I need to get back on the blogging treadmill.

Let’s see how long it lasts!

Work at DonorPerfect could not be better.  We are averaging our highest percent growth rate- year over year- since we launched DonorPerfect Online in 2001.  Yes- DonorPerfect Online turned 10 (along with my son, Michael), and who would have thought how far we have come.

Long before people talked about the ‘cloud’ or even SaaS (Software as a Service), we launched DonorPerfect as one of the first ASP’s (Application Service Provider).  As I have mentioned in the past, we only had a few online customers that first year.  We now have a thousand times that!  Likewise, we went from 25 people to over 100+ dedicated employees.  While much of our success is attributed to hard work, there was certainly a bit of luck involved and I know I am very grateful for being in the right place at the right time *and* be surrounded by a great group of people.

As for the last few months, we hosted our second annual DonorPerfect Community Network Conference.  We had over 30% more people attend this year then last, so we’re already making preparations for next year.  It was fantastic meeting so many new and old friends (aka clients), and learning a few things about how they use DonorPerfect to build their mission in ways we never imagined.  It was a great and humbling experience.

Finally, just in the last few weeks I had two opportunities to travel to Europe.  The first was a speaking engagement with the Charity IT Conference 2011 in London, UK, and I had the opportunity to share how segmentation and IT services can help organizations raise money more profitably.  Held in the center of London and hosted by the great people at CivilSociety, the conference was a fantastic experience to share and learn fundraising techniques from both continents.  From a logistics viewpoint, I was incredibly impressed with the organization and communication aspect- I think we may have a few things to learn for our own conferences in the States!

I also had the opportunity to visit Madrid, Spain, as well as Barcelona.  We continue to expand our relationship with a rather large multi-national organization, and once again it was a great opportunity to learn how fundraising in Spain is unique vs. other countries.  For example, one time gifts are virtually unheard of within Spain- most donations come in the form of monthly commitments.  If only the US would be this forward thinking, sigh.

As 2011 comes to a close, we’re also watching our clients on-line fundraising with a keen eye.  Our WebLink component will be processing thousands of donations a day from now until the end of the year, with New Year’s Eve easily being the busiest day of the year for online giving.  If you haven’t done so already, make sure to remind your donors that it’s not too late to donate, especially on the last day of the year.

As 2011 comes to a close, I wish everyone happiness, less stress, and more major gifts in the coming New Year!

My first reaction when I read about the IRS revoking the tax exempt status of nonprofits who had not met the required filing requirements for three consecutive years was that most of the organizations were probably defunct.  However, when I looked at the list in our area (easily accessed via this IRS page ) I was really shocked to see so many organizations that I knew — and that were certainly not out of business.

My advice to all non-profits is to check the list for their State.    The IRS has a process to apply to retroactively reinstate your tax exempt status.  There is a fee of as much as $850, but the fee can be reduced for smaller organizations that can prove they had good reason to not comply.

Another useful link is for an IRS website with guidance on Staying Exempt

I was pretty sure this subject would attract some folks!  If you are new to the blog, Welcome!  If you are returning and wondering why I haven’t posted anything about Fundraising software or Donor Management software since January, your RSS feeder isn’t kidding- this really is a new blog post.

Recently, I was asked by Laura Quinn (Director at Idealware) my opinions about “Social CRM”- the definition (I believe) is that it’s a process of knowing all the social interactions (as well as the more tradional CRM data points) of your constituency base.  Here’s what I wrote to her:

Hi Laura,

No problem.

The current “Social CRM” thought process is very much in its infancy.  In fact, I would compare it to the same period about 12-15 years ago when people/constituents first started using the Internet and email.

The real problem right now is the overwhelming vast majority of the constituents of your average non profit are not active members of any social network.  This is especially true of what most people consider their most important constituency- major donors.  By their very nature, major donors are much older, and adopt new technology much slower.  While this may be the ‘fastest growing segment’ on Facebook, Twitter, or Linked-In, this important group is still very under represented on any electronic social network.

As for DonorPerfect, right now we do have the ability to track and link to the constituent’s identifying social network (Facebook id, Linked-in id, Twitter name, even MySpace    ).  In addition, through our very close relationship with Constant Contact, we can track how people are following, liking, and tweeting a particular non profit’s cause or even specific campaign.

While I can’t go into too much detail, we do have plans for broadening the data non-profits track for their constituents, including the depth of their social networks and the ability to monitor their constituents’ interactions with the organization.

Even today, online donations only account for less than 5% of total giving, and most of that is driven by disasters, email appeals, and ‘traditional’ friends/family asking friends events (Think Walkathons, Races, etc.).  Facebook and Twitter account for just a fraction of that total as well, and it’s not surprising- the average active Facebook user is simply too young and not in the same demographic as your average donor.

Clearly, this is going to change- just like email adoption started very small and grew over time (and according to this article has reached 94%+ ( http://www.magillreport.com/email-dead-nope-not-even-gasping/)) Social networks will have the same or similar growth curve.  I just looked on-line, and there are a ton of various studies that show social-network use among older adults is still less than 50%, and drops to only about 25% for those 65 or older. (See http://www.wlfi.com/dpp/news/local/more-older-adults-using-facebook)

To be candid, I cringe when I read the various stories explaining how a non-profit spends 20 hours a week for months at a time trying to get the most votes to win some $5000 prize when at the same time they do not have a fundamental annual or major donor campaign plan.

Social CRM is just going to be one of the many tools nonprofits will be able to use to grow and sustain their organization, and the time spent on it should be proportionate to both the near and long term returns.  Right now those returns are tiny- but growing.

I hope this helps- feel free to bounce back with any questions you may have.

-Jon

So I guess I will need to amend the subject of this post to “Why Social CRM is a Terrible Idea…”, if that is your only focus at the moment.  Combined with a solid plan for Annual and Major Donor Giving (among others), it will likely drive your organization’s success.

Never forget about the fundamentals- it doesn’t matter if your organization is liked by 7,658 people if no one donates.

A couple of months ago, we held our first full-fledged DonorPerfect User and Community Conference.  It was a truly fantastic event with a lots of great sessions and presenters.  For me, the high point of the conference was the keynote speech by Bill Strickland.   His presentation simply told the  story of his life’s work creating Manchester Bidwell, a Pittsburgh based non-profit that uses the arts to inspire at-risk children to recognize their potential and also provides a unique job training program.   Bill’s presentation was certainly entertaining, but more importantly inspirational and motivational.

His message was simple:  we should never give up — on people or lofty goals!  His unlikely story demonstrates that nothing is impossible.  He also reminded me, again, about the tremendously important work done by non-profits in this country.  It is easy to get frustrated by the challenge your nonprofit probably encounters every day, but don’t be discouraged.  Keep at it!  If you ever need a little inspiration, I strongly encourage you to attend a conference, listen to a great speaker (or watch a video of Bill).   Bill has also written a book Make the Impossible Possible that is worth reading.

This week I received a call from a breast cancer charity.  The organization was new to me.  And clearly I was an unknown to them as well.

Within the first fifteen seconds, the professional paid solicitor asked if I would make a pledge.  She said that they would follow up with a pledge card so I could send in my donation.  Since I wasn’t prepared to make a commitment without knowing more about the organization, I suggested that they send me the information so I could give it some consideration.

So what happened?  I was informed that they would not send information unless I made a pledge.

That’s right.  To learn more, I would need to give.  I had to conform to their rules or I couldn’t give.  Take that!

One thing is certain: This paid solicitation firm is highly efficient.  They were “churning and burning,” as the sales people say, or cold calling and pitching within seconds, then politely tossing away any lead that wasn’t an immediate close.

Of course, this is the worst kind of selling.  Why?

1)   It only works with low-level donations, which means you lose most or all of the best long-term donor prospects.

2)   It relies entirely on identification with the cause and not the organization, which means you fail to establish any bond that might result in continued giving to the organization if someone agrees to give.

3)   It is entirely organization-centered, giving little or no concern to the prospective donor and therefore potentially leaving a negative impression…if in fact it leaves any impression at all.

How could this be better and still efficient?  By asking a series of triage questions, noting the responses in the calling software and acting according to those preferences.  These steps would be as important to a museum or a blood bank as to a breast cancer charity and could include the following:

• On a scale of 1 to 5, how important is this cause to you?

• Are you familiar with this organization?

• Do you support other similar organizations? (And, if so, who?)

• How would you prefer to donate to us?

• How and when would you like to be contacted by us in the future?

What these questions lack in efficiency they make up for in showing a genuine interest in the prospective contributor, determining interest in the cause and organization, gathering important information for future contacts and establishing preferences for follow up cultivation and solicitation.

For many donors, “no” could easily mean “not now” or “not this way.”  For this organization and their professional phone solicitor, “not now” means “never.”

This is just one more for the growing mountain of stories I hear every day as people grow weary of what is delivered in the mailbox, what passes for charitable solicitation on the phone, what is “blasted” into our increasingly ignored email accounts and what flows through our twitter stream.  They all have one thing in common: They treat prospective donors all as expendable.  They say give because the organization has a need.  But of course that’s not why people give at all.

Why do we give?  We give because it makes OUR lives meaningful.

When a charity calls and says “my way or the highway” they are really saying they couldn’t care less about our feelings.  If they are going to take that tactic, best that they not bother asking at all.

It’s the new year and I’ve decided to refocus energy on this blog.  Like trying to lose weight, I’ve got a lot of excuses for not keeping the blog updated and none of them are rather compelling enough to make sense.

So I decided to log back in, and to my surprise I had 892 comments waiting to be monitored.

Seriously- 892.  Did my lack of blogging somehow inspire hundreds of people to suddenly post?  Were people that riveted to everything I wrote?

No, of course not.  Unfortunately, the simplest answer is usually the correct one, and in this case the blog was a victim of SPAM posting by- at last count- a few thousand auto-posters.

The good news is that WordPress catches these spammers, and I’m glad to report that you won’t find, “It’s a little bit off-topic, but…” comments here as you do on every single CNN article ever published since 2009.

So what’s the update?  Read on.

Business at DonorPerfect has exceeded expectations- I could go into more detail but I always have to worry about Michael from Blackbaud reading too much into this blog, lol.  It’s one of the excuses that has kept me busy, and at least it’s semi-legitimate.  For example, on-line donations in the last week of the year are up 78% over last year.  New sales are on the same track.  We had one client process $450,000 in just ONE day, on 12/31/2010.  It’s absolutely true that the busiest day of the year for on-line giving is December 31st.

I caved in and finally bought a new iPad.  While exceedingly easy to use, there are some serious limitations, not the least of which is that it’s very hard to use as an everyday computer to write business email, for example.  Apparently, Apple just doesn’t want to play nice with Google yet, so the native iPad email interface is clunky, and it doesn’t support the desktop version of Gmail.  Ugh.

However, my 9 year old son highly recommends using an iPad to play games, especially SkeeBall.  Heck, I love playing it too, and my hi-score of 1680 is somewhere around 20,050th in the world!

DonorPerfect Online also works fairly well on the iPad too.  The only issue I found is that the iPad handles ‘list boxes’ rather interestingly, in the fact that it doesn’t display them at all and you need to touch/click on the list to see the options.  While somewhat annoying, it’s just a minor nuisance.

Moving forward, we have a ton of new initiatives in the pipeline for 2011- as always, you’ll need to wait and see.  In the meantime, here’s to a successful 2011 for you and your fundraising- I am convinced it will be the best year-over-year growth we’ve ever seen!

It’s the new year and I’ve decided to refocus energy on this blog.  Like trying to lose weight, I’ve got a lot of excuses for not keeping the blog updated and none of them are rather compelling enough to make sense.

So I decided to log back in, and to my surprise I had 892 comments waiting to be monitored.

Seriously- 892.  Did my lack of blogging somehow inspire hundreds of people to suddenly post?  Were people that riveted to everything I wrote?

No, of course not.  Unfortunately, the simplest answer is usually the correct one, and in this case the blog was a victim of SPAM posting by- at last count- a few thousand auto-posters.

The good news is that WordPress catches these spammers, and I’m glad to report that you won’t find, “It’s a little bit off-topic, but…” comments here as you do on every single CNN article ever published since 2009.

So what’s the update?  Read on.

Business at DonorPerfect has exceeded expectations- I could go into more detail but I always have to worry about Michael from Blackbaud reading too much into this blog, lol.  It’s one of the excuses that has kept me busy, and at least it’s semi-legitimate.  For example, on-line donations in the last week of the year are up 78% over last year.  New sales are on the same track.  We had one client process $450,000 in just ONE day, on 12/31/2010.  It’s absolutely true that the busiest day of the year for on-line giving is December 31st.

I caved in and finally bought a new iPad.  While exceedingly easy to use, there are some serious limitations, not the least of which is that it’s very hard to use as an everyday computer to write business email, for example.  Apparently, Apple just doesn’t want to play nice with Google yet, so the native iPad email interface is clunky, and it doesn’t support the desktop version of Gmail.  Ugh.

However, my 9 year old son highly recommends using an iPad to play games, especially SkeeBall.  Heck, I love playing it too, and my hi-score of 1680 is somewhere around 20,050th in the world!

DonorPerfect Online also works fairly well on the iPad too.  The only issue I found is that the iPad handles ‘list boxes’ rather interestingly, in the fact that it doesn’t display them at all and you need to touch/click on the list to see the options.  While somewhat annoying, it’s just a minor nuisance.

Moving forward, we have a ton of new initiatives in the pipeline for 2011- as always, you’ll need to wait and see.  In the meantime, here’s to a successful 2011 for you and your fundraising- I am convinced it will be the best year-over-year growth we’ve ever seen!

One of the biggest challenges to today’s professional fundraising operation is fitting social media into the development mix.

It is not enough to just “friendraise” or even just to ask people to click a link and give.  We must also obtain their contact data, acknowledge their support, determine their level of interest and capacity and then make staff assignments so potential major donors will get proper stewardship.

Fundraising research is a critical component here.  But fundraising researchers, already in limited supply, under-resourced and focused on investigating qualified opportunities, have been reluctant to invest time in social media since it can often seem both so tangential to development and also because it provides information which often cannot be independently confirmed.

The editors of “The Networker,” the publication of the Association of Professional Researchers for Advancement – Minnesota, recently asked me how to counter the perception that “non-professional social media (e.g. Twitter) is providing ever-increasing levels of distraction and reductions in productivity”.

My response?

First, we should acknowledge that social media channels are in fact disruptive.  They interrupt the usual trajectory of development work and have their own increasing demands, not to mention a certain addictive quality.

So why spend time on social media?  Quite simply, these channels provide access to a much deeper reservoir of current and pertinent information on a much wider universe of individuals than any resource we have encountered in the past.

The databases of insider securities ownership, biography, real estate and business ownership researchers have traditionally used are dwarfed by the rapidly growing datasets of Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and other social networks.

How much of this information is relevant?  That depends on our definition of relevancy.

One thing is certain: the information is highly relevant to those who are producing it.  It showcases their identity as they see it and want it to be seen, including their passions, peeves and peccadilloes, and even catalogs their circle of friends and influence.

In short, social media is providing us an unexpurgated view of what is important to our market, the donors.

If we are nimble and efficient, an investment of time in social media by fundraising researchers need not result in a loss of productivity.  Rather, it can accelerate the retrieval of information and bring fundraisers closer to its source.