Avis clients sur Blackbaud Raiser's Edge NXT

High end product, poor customer service

Commentaires : Great product, but the lack of customer service for the price point leaves a bit of a sour taste in my mouth.

Avantages :

This is definitely a nice product that does everything that it promises, and helps us keep track of all of our donors.

Inconvénients :

The price point is high for what you are getting, and customer support for this product is extremely poor at best.

A Game Changer for Prospect Managers

Commentaires : I think the RE NXT interface is incredibly intuitive. It helps new team members get on the ground faster with learning how to search records and find the information that they need. That said, a strong background in the database view is helpful to any member of your team, whether they are on the road or not. I would strongly suggest having teams trained formally on both systems.

Avantages :

What I love about RE NXT is that it helps to visualize graphs, such as donor patterns and key financial data, automatically. You no longer have to have endless queries and exports and dashboards to access the data you want the most. This helps facilitate staff meeting discussions, and also keeps all team members informed on the fly. Secondly, the prospect profiles for managers. Gone are the days of exporting travel profiles in plain text. Now a PM can login from the road to see all the details they need in a useful manner -- and what's even better? They can change how the data is displayed so that it is personalized to them. It is clean, well constructed, and yet also flexible enough to be able to dig deeper with a couple of clicks. And if they need to find a new person to visit in their area, the map tools are perfect. Highly recommended for offices with lots of traveling teammates.

Inconvénients :

As with both versions of RE, you only get out what you put into it. You need to make sure you have the right policies and procedures in place, for example, to make sure that certain fields in actions are required. You'll also need to work with your team to make sure they understand the updated language from the database view to the NXT view. For example, proposals and opportunities are the same thing. This is a bit of a challenge in offices where the NXT vs. database team may not interact that much and will be speaking slightly different languages about this software. It is not a deal-breaker, just a trainable moment.

No customer support - aggressive re-subscription

Commentaires : RE has a lot of capabilities that are not user-friendly with little-to-no support from them, and very aggressive sales endeavors. Essentially, we did not have good experience with them at all and glad we switched to a service that is user-friendly and very responsive. We were very surprised by their strong-arm tactics to re-subscribe, although they were unsuccessful, thanks to the Better Business Bureau, at which time RE could not produce any contract to which they had claimed we were bound.

Avantages :

A lot of functionality for large nonprofits, yet with little to no customer support.

Inconvénients :

Very aggressive sales endeavors and dare I say devious re-subscription processes. They tried to re-subscribe us at a very high price quoting a timeline when we could decide to not re-subscribe. We tried to unsubscribe, but they said we were bound by a contract. We had been using RE for more than a decade, with no consideration. They insisted we missed the timeline to unsubscribe and demanded a very expensive fee for the following period. Ultimately, we reported them to the Better Business Bureau and they could not produce a signed contract from our agency, or even a template from them. We had a back-and-forth with RE via the BBB, at which time they stopped contacting us realizing they had no basis for their demands.

Valuable and versatile database

Commentaires : I'm speaking to RE7, i.e. the database view specifically, which many nonprofits use exclusively but those who purchase the NXT bundle also have access to the full database view as well. I've been using RE7 for 12 years and overall I love it, especially in combination with the NXT web view.

Avantages :

There is so much you can do with Raiser's Edge, it's a robust and powerful tool. It works "out of the box" without need for programming or customization per se (other than settings and configuration etc.) so you don't need to be a coder to set up and use. I particularly love queries to pull together lists of donors who meet certain criteria, which can then be used for mailing lists, reports, exports, etc. The acknowledgement letters are incredibly valuable, allowing variable data and personalized language, e.g. when a gift is designated to a particular program we pull in a paragraph about that program without our gift entry staff having to do any manual or extra work.

Inconvénients :

Can be a bit clunky, and not always intuitive (NXT web view is a huge improvement in those areas). The reports aren't pretty (again NXT is astronomically better there) and sometimes there isn't a report that will work for our needs so I have to set up with queries and exports. There is almost always a way to do what I need to do, but I sometimes have to go through some complicated digital acrobatics to get there.

Great Product, but Could be Overkill for Most Nonprofits

Commentaires : It's doubtful to me, especially after having worked with a few smaller nonprofits which have used Raisers Edge, that even the heaviest users in this arena are using even 50% of the product's out of the box functionality. So while I love the product, and especially love it because it integrates seamlessly with Financial Edge for the accounting reporting, smaller nonprofits are probably better served with something just as user-friendly but much cheaper for donations/events/membership management, like Avectra's Net Forum.

Avantages :

Blackbaud's Raisers Edge is great software for donations management, including special events and memberships. It's very easy to use, and very easy to get information from, whether through any of the many canned reports, or through queries and exports. Support is extra, but well worth the cost, at least in the initial years after set-up.

Inconvénients :

The cost - upwards for just the donations management - is considerable. And things like the Special Events module and Membership and Tributes and Memorials modules are not included in the base package. Like most other software, a lot of thought needs to happen when setting Raisers Edge up. But seriously for every con that I could list, the customer support that comes extra with the annual maintenance, if purchases, offsets the con with quick answers and fixes, so that even the most complicated thing in RE is easily addressed with a quick phone call to support.

Raiser's Edge NXT is a big improvement!

Commentaires : Raiser's Edge NXT has notified us when prospect donor pledges are ending and recommendations for cultivation which has increased our major giving donors.

Avantages :

The Raiser's Edge database was very outdated however with the addition of NXT it's now very visually appealing and user-friendly. They took the old database look and revamped it to include charts, recommendations for donor cultivation and alerts daily referencing which donors to reach out to. It's very mobile friendly and great for major giving officers so they could make notes and assign tasks to their team while on the road. You could easily look up donor records and it's all accessible from Blackbaud.com so you don't need to download an app. It's good to have when on meetings and if you have to be an exhibitor for your Foundation and quickly look up donor records.

Inconvénients :

NXT shows consecutive donor years at the top of each profile however the years are not always accurate with the years in Raiser's database. Sometimes the years are way off. Also, they should make it easier to view outstanding pledges in NXT. NXT is a bit pricey however worth the cost and your return on investment is improved as it notifies you when you have major giving prospects to reach out to.

Robust product that's still a work in progress

Commentaires : Raiser's Edge NXT has so much potential and is a worthwhile product as long as you have a team that's comfortable using both web and database view. As a non-profit CRM, it's still hard to beat - especially for organizations with a large donor base and fundraising capacity.

Avantages :

I love the user interface and the ability to "drag and drop" objects within constituent records to customize how I want to see information. The dashboard design is lovely and, after a bit of a learning curve, can be used to display some really helpful information for fundraisers.

Inconvénients :

This is not yet a completed product and shouldn't be used without the RE 7 database view. RE NXT has all the basic functionality needed for fundraisers to use exclusively, but not database admin staff. A lot of gift processing functionality, and even reporting fields, have not been moved over from RE 7. For any detailed reporting using OR or NOT, custom attributes, or gift amounts requires one to go back into database view to use queries/exports/canned reports.

Database Searching Made Easy

Avantages :

I love web-based software that gives more freedom in filtering and report setup. I get to decide what columns I do and don't want to see. RE NXT makes searching so much easier than the desktop software, as there are fewer steps to take for searching. It's intuitive in the search box, and you don't have to enter in all information to get a list of possible answers.

Inconvénients :

The pages are aesthetically bland. I wish the categories inside a search result were differently colored to quickly navigate where one category ends and another begins.

We do all our Donation processing with Raiser's Edge. All data entry, constituent 'touches' & repor

Commentaires : Database for all donations - information is kept reliable, complete (can be used to store a lot of data/facts) and accessible for reports

Avantages :

Data entry is easy and reports are dependable. Versatility in the type of information that can be stored in each constituent record.

Inconvénients :

the software programmers I know say the set up is very 'old school.' I use batches a lot in RE - and the setting up of each is not as intuitive as some software programs out there.

Useful but outdated

Avantages :

Useful for tracking donors for fundraising purposes and managing gifts. Can integrate with enrollment system to track alumni and parents of alumni.

Inconvénients :

Clunky and not intuitive to use. Design is outdated.

Satisfied Raiser's Edge 7 user Ready to Make the Jump to RE NXT

Commentaires : I previously worked with many other database interface software in the for-profit world, where I worked for the first 15+ years of my career. So when I started using Raiser's Edge, it came relatively easily to me as it reminded me of other previously used interfaces. We have a large database of over 350K donors, and Raiser's Edge has no problem handling our volume. The Raiser's Edge 7 is now showing some age in how it's structured and functions, but mostly in look and feel. We have been using Raiser's Edge with our database on premise. With the seismic shift into cloud computing, we are planning to move to a Blackbaud hosted environment, which will, in and of itself, bring us closer to feeling like it's not the 90's anymore. But the good news is that Blackbaud knows that the look and feel, usability, functionality and ability to play well with others need to catch up with the rest of technology, and so they introduced Raiser's Edge NXT a couple of years ago. RE NXT looks modern and fills many checkboxes of what fundraisers need to do their jobs in today's environment. (See Pros to find out more of what I like about RE NXT.)

Avantages :

Raiser's Edge 7 gives you the tools (and/or gives you optional add-on tools) to manage your donor relationships and data in just about any way you can think of. It's a great all-purpose fundraising tool for non-profit organizations. Raiser's Edge NXT (RE NXT) is the next generation, and we are most likely moving to that within the next year. The awesome things about RE NXT are 1. User access to your donor data from anywhere on any device, 2. Unintimidating ease of use for non-techie and techie alike, 3. Open API which means lots of more fantastic compatible tools are being built by Blackbaud partners, 4. Unlimited users - which means now our Board members and many other stakeholders will be able to login and get their reports on the dashboard instead of waiting for emailed or, even worse, hard-copy reports to be run and delivered to them by our staff.

Inconvénients :

My experience with the Customer Support has been less than stellar. Sometimes it seems like the Customer Support's go-to answer is, "No" or "No, you can't do that." Unless the answer is, "Well, if you buy this other tool we have, then you can do that." But since we have no plans to move off of Blackbaud products, thank heavens they have an amazing Blackbaud Community network where you can ask any question and get tons of advice from folks just like you working in this software daily. Blackbaud Community is now the first place I go when I need support. Many times the question I have has already been asked and answered in the past, and so just searching through the discussions will get me my answer or point me in the right direction, instead of wasting time trying to re-invent the wheel. My fairly high rating in this review on Customer Support is mostly because of Blackbaud Community and our fairly newly assigned account manager.

Raiser's Finally Got an Update

Commentaires : I use Raiser's Edge as our donor database and the data entry, reporting features are really updated. However, when they came out with NXT, it was a game changer. NXT is amazing! It has a very attractive interface and super user friendly. As soon as you search for a record, consecutive years and all information on the donor is clear to see and it lets you know which donors you should be reaching out to. You could assign donors to others to initiate contact. You could easily access information on your mobile device. It takes the Raiser's Edge data entry interface and completely gives it a makeover. You are easily able to review giving history and all donor information on one page and very clearly. The only thing I don't like about NXT is that the consecutive years aren't always the same as in the donor records in the database version.

Avantages :

I use Raiser's Edge as our donor database and the data entry, reporting features are really updated. However, when they came out with NXT, it was a game changer. NXT is amazing! It has a very attractive interface and super user friendly. As soon as you search for a record, consecutive years and all information on the donor is clear to see and it lets you know which donors you should be reaching out to. You could assign donors to others to initiate contact. You could easily access information on your mobile device. It takes the Raiser's Edge data entry interface and completely gives it a makeover. You are easily able to review giving history and all donor information on one page and very clearly.

Inconvénients :

The only thing I don't like about NXT is that the consecutive years aren't always the same as in the donor records in the database version.

Raisers Edge - IF you are good to it, it will give you GOLD

Commentaires : Raiser's Edge is great for development departments of medium to large nonprofits, schools, etc, especially those with sophisticated fundraising programs. It may not be the best fit for small nonprofits with limited resources in the budget. The Raiser's Edge is an excellent software for cultivation, solicitation, and stewardship and allows for easy tracking of each constituent's relationship with your organization. Raisers Edge is being used by the development department to track donations and our constituents relationship to us as an organization. Our database is not large but the relationships are long and often complicated. A database like this allows us to see the constituent and all of the interactions we have had with them over the years. The Raisers Edge in combination with some of the add on's like online express have been helpful for seamless tracking of newsletter readership and conversions from our website and online publications.

Avantages :

Queries are what we use to create lists of constituents with particular behaviors or similarities that we can use for creating mailings, invitations or actions. An amazing tool with endless possibilities. Raisers Edge is a beast of a program. It can do just about anything you could want for a donor database and Blackbaud offers several supplemental solutions that seamlessly integrate. Donor stewardship, from first contact, to donation, to acknowledgement letter, is a process that is handled particularly well with Raisers Edge

Inconvénients :

The program is quite complicated and if data is not entered correctly than the program just won't work well. "bad in, bad out'. But that is not unique to this program. That some of the features that I like to use like global changes for adding appeals is pretty buried and the way of finding it convoluted. Attributes could be more flexible: like I would prefer to have all events under one table (which it can do now) but then there is no step further where I can then say whether they RSVP and then also whether they attended and their name for easy export for nametags.

Great Product with Room for Improvement

Avantages :

This is such a great tool to keep track of your constituents. Everything is organized, making it easy to find the information you need with little hassle. It was also relatively to learn how to use it. I had never heard of Raiser's Edge before beginning an internship during college, and without any experience outside of that using it, I was able to find a job where I spend all day using Raiser's Edge. Not being particularly computer-savy, it's almost unbelieveable to me how comfortable I feel using this product.

Inconvénients :

There always seems to be little kinks and bugs that make little to no sense, and many times even those at Blackbaud don't seem to know why. For example, I work a lot with tributes. Recently I discovered that when you are entering a gift and you have a tribute open, if you go into one of the tribute acknowledgee's records and then back out, RE will check off all of the acknowledgees to acknowledge even if you previously did not have them all checked off. My manager asked why this was happening and how we can fix it, and the short-term suggestion we got was to exit out of the acknowledgee record instead of saving and closing. Frankly, that's a horrible suggestion. Obviously there are going to be times when we need to save and close. I understand you may not have an immediate answer, but I'd rather you not be able to give me a suggestion than to give me a bad one. In short, I think there are many kinks to be worked out and customer service can be improved.

Incredibly disappointed

Avantages :

NXT is easier to use than the traditional, back end with Raisers Edge when viewing records and can be accessed on your phone.

Inconvénients :

The ease of use is still light years behind other cloud-based CRMs. You only have limited access to the data and many fields are blocked (meaning you can't make changes unless you go into the more complicated back end). The biggest problem we have had has been with online gifts. We purchased Everyday Hero (which is Blackbaud's online giving module), and every time a gift comes in by a spouse, it overrides the current gift with that person's name, and only shows that they gave that one gift. There is no flag or warning that the address is a duplicate. So now that we purchased something that was supposed to expedite our online giving, we have to go back and do hours of clean up in our database. Also, they have "automatic upgrades" when your records reach another tier. The customer service is awful - takes hours on the phone or weeks to respond. It is exceptionally expensive for what it is offering. Also, doesn't integrate well at all with Financial Edge.

Robust donor management capabilities, but clunky legacy solution

Commentaires : The solution has served us well for many years, and the service from the sales and support teams has been one of the best parts of the relationship.

Avantages :

RaisersEdge 7 has tremendous capabilities - perhaps too many. Although an industry leader in market share, for a small organization, we don't use the majority of functions available. Service from our sales support contacts has been very good.

Inconvénients :

The overall solution is very clunky and difficult to use. While Blackbaud is in the (multi-year) process of migrating functions to their cloud NXT platform, this process is slow and leaves users straddled between an old clunky solution and the functions that have been migrated to their cloud platform. The solution is expensive compared to other simpler solutions that can be better suited to small organizations. The mobile app, while useful, is very limited in its capabilities and seems to be a v1 mobile app.

Raiser's Edge 7.94

Commentaires : Overall, Raiser's Edge is a great product with a lot of functionality. It can be pricey, but my research shows me that for many major fundraising organizations, they all use it. Raiser's Edge is the industry standard. If your organization uses it, I would not migrate away from it. If your organization is not using, it might be a worthwhile investment for the functionality it provides.

Avantages :

Relatively easy to use. Great functionality as a constituent database and donor giving software. Definitely top of the line.

Inconvénients :

Multiple modules needed for credit card processing, events, education/alumni. Each module is additional cost. Conversioncost could be high if converting away from Raiser's Edge due to its complexity compared to other providers. Customer support can take a long time to get through via phone. Sales really pushes to move you RE-NXT, which is cloud-based and costs several thousand more than server-based RE.

Easy to use product...even for non-technical people

Commentaires : I'd like to see search and list options included for Fund records, Events, and memberships. Adding this functionality would make it a more complete product for our development staff to use and be able to easily view information that is tracked in each of these key areas like lists of endowments, attendees of specific events, etc.

Avantages :

The data is in an easy to use format, especially for non-technical people. In addition, the list and analyze features provide an easy way to view specific information easily. Our staff really likes the ability to move tiles around, the mapping feature, and integration with outlook.

Inconvénients :

The integration with Outlook doesn't allow the ability to change a completed date and add the name of a solicitor when creating an action. It does not allow searching or lists for fund, campaign, membership, or event records.

Donor data taken to the next level

Avantages :

Raiser's Edge is a powerhouse for the management of donor data. It is easy to track a donor's contributions and see their giving history at a glance. I especially like the ability to identify each donor with a constituent code, which makes it very convenient to pull reports on specific groups of people who donate (like volunteers, board members, or staff). With the ability to see giving trends in multiple ways, data analysis is much more comprehensive and quicker to review than with other similar software types I have used.

Inconvénients :

Certain custom reports or queries can be difficult to design for the desired output, requiring help from Customer Service. Unfortunately, the wait time to speak with a live customer service representative is always VERY long. The online chat option can work in some instances, but not always. It would be nice if there were more representatives available to help via phone. The product is also very expensive and there are additional costs to add new components, even modifications like changes to the online interface. Every new development for the product comes with a high price.

Great for Front Line Fundraisers

Commentaires : We have excelled using RE NXT. Our previous systems crippled our users, creativity, effectiveness, etc....RE NXT Has allowed us to create programs for our donors that we were unable to do previously.

Avantages :

Ease of use, layout, look...Blackbaud did a great job thinking of the front line fundraisers' busy schedule. It is great to use on the go or in the office.

Inconvénients :

Not all functionality in the database view hasn't been implemented yet it in the webview. For my position, the webview isn't quite ready. However, due to the limitations, pulling certain lists and other functionalities within actions - it can be hard to train users (you think the functionality is there, but it hasn't been implemented yet).

Excellent robust tool for fundraisers

Avantages :

The modern interface is intuitive, robust and incredibly mobile-responsive. The reporting options are great for CEOs, board members, and Development departments. The 360-degree view of each constituent is insightful and helpful. Love the ability to log in from anywhere with no additional downloads needed. Real-time constituent updates keep everyone in the loop. Blackbaud is continuing to develop and push out additional features that will make this more and more useful and relevant.

Inconvénients :

Honestly, for what I use it for, it's hard to find anything missing that Blackbaud isn't addressing and planning for future releases.

Great product if you

Avantages :

Ease of integration for the front line fundraisers

Inconvénients :

It is not yet as flexible as the Database View (RE7)

perspective on Raisers Edge

Commentaires : I would not recommend it for small organizations.

Avantages :

Raiser's Edge has wonderful reporting capabilities. It definitely personifies garbage in, garbage out though, so you want to be sure to set things up the correct way right from the beginning. Also if you want to be able to quantify your data you have to put in fields that you can do so - not something like notes.

Inconvénients :

It is not the easiest to learn and I don't feel like we ever used the full capability of the software. I wish there were more opportunities for general training's using it and learning how other companies are utilizing it.

Easy to use for everyone

Avantages :

RE NXT is very easy to navigate and colleagues who have little or no experience with the database view are able to find the information they need without a hassle. I like that NXT offers suggestions and specially prepared reports that provide useful information for reigniting lapsed donors and gauging capacity for future asks. I also love the visual analytics offered, as they help to segment and illustrate the entire scope of our constituent base rather than just looking at spreadsheets.

Inconvénients :

There are some limitations as to how much information can be added to lists in NXT, making it easier to generate more complex lists in the database view. I also think it would be beneficial to offer a complete guide of all of the training and webinars available as a benefit of NXT, as our team has not taken advantage of many useful resources because we have not been aware of them.

Great Resource for Non-Profits

Commentaires : Again, it's made it much easier for or satellite folks and fundraisers to coordinate with us. I look forward to using it 100% of the time when it's finally ready. I am looking forward to the mobility of being completely online.

Avantages :

It has made coordinating with our satellite staff and fundraisers much easier. I like that it's interface is easy enough for everyone from novice to pro.

Inconvénients :

I really would like for the gift entry in NXT to be more robust. I see how having everything in one place would be beneficial, but, there's some things that we do in the database view that we simply cannot do in NXT yet.