A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems: Research and Recommendations

Transcription

1 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems: Research and Recommendations January 2013 Authors Elizabeth Pope Laura Quinn Chris Bernard

2 Table of Contents Considering Synagogue Management Systems...3 Introduction...4 How We Researched This Report... 5 What Should a Synagogue Management System Do?... 6 Overview of the Marketplace...12 How To Decide...21 A Word on Pricing...25 How Do These Systems Compare?...26 How to Improve the Sector:. Paths Forward Index of Systems...31 Avectra s netforum...32 Chaverware...34 CiviCRM...43 Cloud for Synagogues...51 DonorPerfect...53 Fellowship One...55 GiftWorks...57 imis (Congregation Suite)...59 Members Microsoft Dynamics...63 MM NOAH PatronManager The Raiser s Edge(i)...78 Salesforce Nonprofit Starter Pack...87 Shelby...95 ShulCloud ShulSuite StarChapter SugarCRM Talisma Tessitura Appendices Appendix A: Methodology Appendix B: How We Rated the Systems Appendix C: Full Requirements Document Appendix D: Other Systems of Interest in the Synagogue Management Sphere About Idealware PAGE 2 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

3 Considering Synagogue Management Systems

4 Introduction Idealware s mission was to investigate the various constituent management systems available to meet the specific needs of synagogues. Even as synagogues look to better understand the many ways technology can help them interact with and manage their congregations, the marketplace is changing. New software options are available all the time. In hopes of more clearly defining synagogues specific needs and the ability of the current marketplace to meet them, UJA-Federation of New York convened an advisory consortium to address a common concern about what synagogues currently need to support operations and how synagogues can use database systems to support engagement and strategic decision-making. That consortium included the national staff and representatives of the North American Association of Synagogue Executives, National Association for Temple Administration, Orthodox Union, Union for Reform Judaism, and United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism. UJA-Federation of New York retained Idealware to conduct a large-scale research project into constituent management systems both those traditionally marketed to synagogues and from other sectors comparing their features and seeing how they might help synagogues meet their current needs and prepare them for the future. Idealware was selected as an independent third party, and this report reflects our research, recommendations, and findings and does not reflect the opinions of the consortium. This report serves as an overview of the market for synagogues looking to implement a new data management system or those that want to learn more about how their current system compares to others on the market. On page 26 you ll find a helpful chart that compares different options, and lists of systems helpful in different scenarios for systems, to help you make a decision on page 21. On page 32 you ll find summary writeups of 22 systems, including longer, feature-byfeature reviews of select systems. The appendix is chock-full of information, too, including a comprehensive look at the methodology of the project, the full requirements document Idealware wrote after analyzing interviews with synagogue staffers and experts in the area, and other systems and tools useful in the synagogue management sphere that came up in the course of our research that aren t specifically constituent management systems. Idealware s mission was to investigate the various constituent management systems available to meet the specific needs of synagogues. Keep reading to see what we found out. PAGE 4 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

5 How We Researched This Report To kick off the project, Idealware conducted conversations with synagogue staff members, consultants in the technology space, and representatives from other affiliated organizations. We wanted to understand not only what synagogues needed from a database in terms of the day-to-day business of their congregations, but also to identify and define what they felt the future of data management should look like. We then wrote and prioritized a comprehensive set of system requirements based on these interviews and focus groups. [See the entire requirements document in Appendix C.] This requirements document provided the foundation for two sets of vendor product demonstrations. Using fact-based criteria for rating, we participated in hour-long demos of 22 systems carefully chosen from an initial list of 60 systems designed for synagogue management, donor management, and membership and association management, Constituent Relationship Management (CRM), or church management. Idealware then wrote up narrative summaries of the systems describing their fit with the requirements of synagogues, pros and cons, and pricing. You can read those summaries beginning on page 32. We further narrowed that list to 12 systems based on how closely they met existing needs, their current market share among synagogues, their cost, and the vendors willingness to partner on a solution tailored to the synagogue marketplace. Three bowed out at various points during our process, so you ll see nine compared in this report. We participated in additional two-to-three-hour demos of the systems in which we addressed every area of the requirements document and compared each system on a function-by-function basis. We analyzed the results, determined where each system We wanted to understand not only what synagogues needed from a database in terms of the day-to-day business of their congregations, but also to identify and define what they felt the future of data management should look like. needed enhancement to fit the needs of this audience, and requested that the vendors or a consultant prove pricing specifications for these enhancements. You can see the apples-to-apples comparisons of nine systems on page 26. For a complete discussion of our methodology, please see Appendix A. PAGE 5 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

6 What Should a Synagogue Management System Do? A data management system for your synagogue can be an investment, but it will save you countless headaches as it consolidates and streamlines information. You may be questioning if you need a database to help manage your synagogue s database in the first place, especially if your congregation is small, your budget is tight, and you don t have a surplus of full-time tech-savvy staffers to help you maintain the system. Perhaps you re wondering, Hey, what s wrong with Microsoft Excel? Absolutely nothing Excel is a great tool, but it s a spreadsheet program, not a database. Databases help you to link different pieces of information together so you can see, for example, who in your congregation is related to each other, if a family has come to the high holidays each of the past five years, whether an individual has given multiple times through his business as well as his personal accounts, and more. A data management system for your synagogue can be an investment, but it will save you countless headaches as it consolidates and streamlines information about the people who have interacted with your synagogue whether or not they are members. So now that we ve convinced you that synagogues need a system to help manage data, what can you expect such a system to do? We ve broken out some of the traditional features you would find in a conventional synagogue management system, but we ve also described some of the more aspirational trends emerging in the larger world of nonprofit databases that synagogues might find useful in taking a strategic view of their congregations. You ll find that these categories line up with the categories we ve used in our rubric to evaluate the nine systems selected for detailed comparison in this report. Family Unit and Household Management The family unit (or household, as it is generally known in the nonprofit world) is the building block of your congregation. You ll want to make sure that the database you choose helps you immediately figure out how many households you have, who is in them, and what relationship they have to the synagogue. Can you see all the information about a household billing, and direct mail correspondence, event attendance, donations, and more in one helpful place on the constituent record, or do you have to hunt around to get the information you need to know about a particular family? Make sure you can keep track of nonmember families as well, whether they once paid dues and have now lapsed, are the grown children of member families, or simply came to an event once. The concept of congregational membership is evolving as synagogues try to connect with individuals who are not members but who interact with the synagogue through events or programs, and your database can help you keep track of these constituents, too. PAGE 6 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

7 You ll also want to make sure that the system lets you see information about the children of the household in a useful way, and track as much information as you want about them while still clearly delineating that they are minors and thus might have different kinds of information to track. For example, how does the system handle children of divorce with parents who share custody? Does it have an elegant solution, or must you manually make sure that both relationships are clear and easy to see? When the non-custodial parent wants to pick a child up from Hebrew school, for instance, this won t seem trivial. Basic Constituent and Relationship Tracking Look for a system that lets you record useful information about the individuals that make up the family units in the database, too, such as occupation, the tradition or movement in which they were raised, whether or not they keep kosher, their birthdays, and other relevant facts. Systems should also help you track the interactions these individuals have had with the synagogue including letters, s, calls, meetings, and other communications in a single place. Such information can be useful for fundraising, member renewals, and volunteer solicitation. Member Management and Dues Renewal With the right database, you can save a lot of staff time by automating much of the workflow around the annual dues renewal process. Systems can help you manage which families have renewed and which have not, track discounts given on the member dues rates, and batch invoice renewals for all members at once. Some systems let members pay their dues online and can manage flexible payment terms, such as quarterly or monthly payments. If your synagogue associates membership fees with High Holiday seating, look for a system that can help you manage this process through comprehensive event and member benefit management features. Systems should also help you track the interactions individuals have had with the synagogue including letters, s, calls, meetings, and other communications in a single place. Event, Honor, and High Holy Day Management The high holidays are traditionally the most hectic time for synagogue staffers, who must manage a major spike in attendance in addition to religious duties, so it s critical that the database selected has sophisticated support for special events. Expect a system to help you bill for holiday seating including for specific seats if that s important to your congregation and view historical information about who has come in previous years. This functionality will help you run events throughout the year. Systems vary widely on whether they can help you manage waitlists, overflow, and ticketing, so pay close attention to their capabilities in this area. The system can also keep track of which congregants have been invited to receive aliyahs and organize listings for the program book, if appropriate. PAGE 7 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

8 Online event management even from a mobile device is becoming increasingly important to congregants, who want to be able to RSVP online for an event and pay for it with a credit card, too. Some of this overlaps with what congregants are looking for from school registration for Hebrew and religious schools, so it might be worth investing in a tool that helps you achieve this. Look for a vendor that s willing to work with you to build a Yahrzeit module, as well as one that has substantial support for fundraising as part of its out-ofthe-box infrastructure. Yahrzeits Many synagogue staffers reading this report may wonder why we suggest looking at non-traditional synagogue management software when vendors who have been in the synagogue space for decades have already built in support for Yahrzeits and the Hebrew calendar. Marking the anniversary of a loved one s death in the synagogue is not only a sacred religious experience for most constituents, but also an important donation opportunity. Staffers need to be able to track the dates of a person s passing on both the Hebrew and Gregorian calendar (and was that before or after sunset?), know who should be notified, track tribute gifts, and gather other important information about the Yahrzeit, such as how to pronounce the name of the deceased. It may surprise you that integrating Yahrzeit tracking into nontraditional synagogue software solutions didn t seem to be a substantial obstacle for the vast majority of vendors whose products we demoed. Most felt that integration with the Hebrew calendar could be accommodated with an algorithm, and almost all the rest of a Yahrzeit module could be built with custom fields. When choosing a system, look for a vendor that s willing to work with you to build a Yahrzeit module, as well as one that has substantial support for fundraising as part of its out-of-the-box infrastructure. Keep in mind that working with a vendor on this kind of customization is a major enterprise, though, and be prepared to commit the requisite time and funds to the process. Donation Tracking Member dues and event fees are only part of a synagogue s financial health; a database can also help you fundraise for gifts and pledges. Yahrzeits are a key piece of this. Look for a system that s strong in helping with donations and that can accommodate tribute gifts with both the honoree and the donor credited, grant solicitation and management, and solicitation of organizations and not just individuals. Again, online giving is becoming increasingly important to the synagogue sector. Observances and Gift Exchanges When Purim basket season is in full swing, you may want a database that helps manage this by keeping track of which families have donated and who they ve honored. Sophisticated tribute-gift-tracking is also important. Those who run Leagram fundraisers will also need a system that can give an organized list of anniversaries or birthdays in a given month, although this is a pretty basic report for most databases. Overall Online Constituent Interactions As mentioned throughout, congregants increasingly expect to be able to conduct much of their business with their synagogue online. This includes paying PAGE 8 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

9 Congregants expect to be able to conduct much of their business with their synagogue online. dues, registering for events and other activities, and updating their member profiles with demographic and contact details. You want a system that can pass this information in a meaningful way to your database and the constituents profiles, and financial information should eventually be able to go your general ledger software with account codes attached. Mobile-optimized sites are becoming more important, too, and a system might work well with your existing Content Management System (CMS) to help manage your website, or it might not. Check before you commit to a new system. Facility Management and Staff Scheduling Facility management came up repeatedly in our interviews and focus groups, but we remain unconvinced that this has substantial overlap with constituent tracking. Some systems have workarounds, and a couple of the very expensive ones can help you with facility rental, billing, and calendaring, but those who have sophisticated needs in this area might want to look into implementing a separate system, such as EMS Light. Hebrew and Religious School Management The two separate pieces here are registration and the day-to-day management of the school s students. For registration, a system should assist you in billing households for their children s enrollment, and possibly allowing them to register their kids online. For the daily management, you ll need a system that will let you keep track of such important data as emergency contact information and allergies for each enrolled child. You also might want a database that can assign children to specific classrooms and teachers, manage grading and promotion at the end of the year, and make attendance tracking a snap with quick entry forms. Synagogues associated with full-blown day schools will want to invest in a dedicated education management system. Cemetery Management Not all synagogues have cemeteries affiliated with them, so if yours doesn t, feel free to skip ahead. Those who are still reading know how important good plot management can be in the wake of a congregant s passing you want to make sure you have all the information about reservations and billing at your fingertips. Some systems help you see which of your plots are sold, occupied, and reserved with a digital map that graphically indicates each of these statuses. Others handle this through fields that capture this information. Some systems also let you link Yahrzeits to cemetery plots to help ease the observance process. As long as a system is readily accessible and dependable, it doesn t really matter if it s hosted on- or offsite. Access and Security You ve probably heard a lot about cloud-based or Software-as-a-Service systems, where the vendor hosts the system remotely (not at your synagogue) and you access your database over the internet. Some people worry about the security of congregants data being in the cloud, but Idealware has found that cloud-based systems are just as secure as installed PAGE 9 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

10 systems that live on your server (sometimes more so, since someone s job is to make sure that those systems are safe). As long as a system is readily accessible and dependable, it doesn t really matter if it s hosted on- or off-site. The software solutions in this report run the gamut from installed systems that you ll need to host on a dedicated server to subscription-based SaaS systems that you can enroll in on a monthly basis. Synagogue staffers are increasingly interested in having a system user-friendly enough to customize to their own particular needs, even if they aren t very tech-savvy. Which one you decide to go with depends largely on the particular needs of your synagogue, but don t let whether it s on your server or in the cloud be a makeor-break issue. Make sure that you can customize the permissions within the system to suit your synagogue s needs, such as hiding billing information from certain users based on User ID. and Direct Mail You want to avoid using a personal address for outgoing mail to send out broadcast s to your congregants those messages can end up in recipients spam filters all too easily. Many database systems help you manage your constituent correspondence with a broadcast tool, either one built into the system or through seamless integration with a third-party tool like Constant Contact. (Check to see if you ll have to pay for external software, or if it s included in the quoted price of the package.) Ideally, the software will let you easily create and manage lists of constituents, track such statistics as how many people opened one of your s, and let you send out invoices or event registration s through the system on sophisticated graphic templates unique to your synagogue. Let s not forget about snail mail your synagogue management software can help you automatically generate mailing labels, manage subscriptions for print newsletters, and verify addresses with a link to the USPS. It should absolutely help you mail printed thank-you letters for donations, Yahrzeit notifications, and tax letters at the end of the year. Again, look for a system that gives you lots of options in terms of merging the information in your database onto attractive templates, and that makes it easy for you to create letters with simple queries. Accounting Integration Some of the systems in this report are designed to be your general ledger software as well as your synagogue management software. Others offer additional tools from the same vendor that integrate into the program. Still others aren t designed to keep financial information in the system, but let you easily export data with the proper accounting codes to popular software like Great Plains, QuickBooks, or Sage 50 (formerly Sage Peachtree). If you want to stay with your third-party general ledger tool or are unhappy with what you re currently using, this is something to keep in mind. Customization Synagogue staffers are increasingly interested in having a system user-friendly enough to customize to their own particular needs, even if they aren t very tech-savvy. When looking at a system, make sure that staffers can hide pieces of functionality that aren t applicable to minimize screen clutter, customize dropdown menus, and add an unlimited number of custom fields all requirements without which our participants felt a synagogue could not effectively function. Other options to consider here include renaming or deleting existing fields and, for the very technically advanced, accessing the API or source code of a system to update it or add features. PAGE 10 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

11 Reporting and Querying A database should absolutely have standard reports that help you answer important questions about your synagogue, such as Who are the parents with kids in preschool? or Who gave last year but not this year? Queries should be easy to build, flexible, and not limited to certain fields. You ll also want to see if a system can help you report for data issues, such as duplicates or inconsistent practices, and if staff can create reports on the fly defining what formats and information are used. Customizable dashboards are becoming a more-attractive option for many synagogue staffers who want to quickly see up-to-date financial or program data pertinent to them. Synagogues should also think about reports that will help them share data with other congregations around the country to help improve processes and learn more about the landscape of synagogues today. Usability, Support, and Documentation No matter what kind of database you choose for your synagogue, you ll want to make sure it s reliable and easy to use, and that there s a vendor, consultant, or active user community (in the case of open source systems) available to help you out when you run into trouble. Make sure you understand the support package you sign up for will the vendor charge you every time you call with a problem, or can you enlist Synagogues should also think about reports that will help them share data with other congregations around the country to help improve processes and learn more about the landscape of synagogues today. their help as much as you want for a flat fee? We ve indicated how the systems handle customer support in their individual writeups as well as how easy-to-use and stable the system was during our demos. However, it s important to note that we didn t interview current clients of each system about their experiences with the vendor. PAGE 11 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

12 Overview of the Marketplace There s one obvious benefit of choosing a system designed for synagogues: Its vendors have built it with the intention that, right out of the box, it will have what synagogues require. So what kinds of systems will handle these synagogue needs? Certainly there are specific synagogue management systems, but we wanted to take a broader look to see if other systems such as those designed for membership management, donor management, or church management might fill the core needs as well or better, possibly with a little bit of customization. What options are there? For each software area, we researched the marketplace and identified systems that would be particularly relevant for synagogues. The list of systems that appears under each heading therefore reflect systems that have been reviewed for this report, not an exhaustive list of all choices on the market. Synagogue Management Systems Some vendors offer systems targeted directly at synagogue data management primarily to help with the management of membership and dues, events, and fundraising. There are more-established vendors in this space that have been around for decades and usually offer systems built upon installed systems with optional web-based components as well as newer vendors that have harnessed the power of CRM (Constituent Relationship Management) platforms and built specific products on top of them. It s worth exploring both those systems traditionally marketed to this market and those that are not in order to make an informed choice about what a database can do for your congregation. There s one obvious benefit of choosing a system designed for synagogues: Its vendors have built it with the intention that, right out of the box, it will have what synagogues require. You won t need to worry about calibrating the Hebrew calendar within the system or explaining what a Yahrzeit is to a consultant. However, not all synagogue management vendors have successfully incorporated important innovations into their products, and some are hard to learn. There are some great synagogue management products available should you choose to go down that path, but we ve found that the vast majority of requirements identified by synagogues in terms of fundraising, member management, PAGE 12 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

13 relationship tracking, event management, accounting, and other primary areas of concern can be very well accommodated by software systems not currently marketed to synagogues, and that functionality specific to the Jewish community can be incorporated relatively easily without a complete restructuring of the software s underpinnings. It s worth exploring both those systems traditionally marketed to this market and those that are not in order to make an informed choice about what a database can do for your congregation. We identified five candidate systems that had a large market share or were offering particularly innovative solutions. (See Appendix A: Methodology for more information on how we selected the systems for inclusion in this report.) Chaverware Chaverware, a product from Circuits & Systems, is a popular Windows-based synagogue management system. It s designed well to handle the day-to-day needs of a synagogue, with strong functionality to manage individuals and family units, billing and invoicing needs, and Yahrzeits. However, synagogues are given only a few custom fields to work with, and much of the interface can t be customized. It supports and merging letters into Microsoft Word. The process to create a new query to find constituents with whom you d like to communicate is a bit time-consuming and complicated, but is quite powerful in terms of granularity. Through an extension called ChaverWeb, the system also provides reasonable support for online event registration, online payments, and the ability to update their own profile information. Standard pricing starts at $3,100 and includes one year of support and three user licenses. The optional ChaverWeb costs an additional $1 per household per year. For more on Chaverware, see page 34. Cloud for Synagogues Cloud for Synagogues is a new and powerful webbased product built on the Salesforce CRM platform by Cloud for Good, a consulting firm that specializes in implementing Google Apps and Salesforce CRM with nonprofit clients so new, in fact, that the product wasn t done when Idealware conducted its demo. As of January 2013, the product is now complete and live with a few synagogues. Cloud for Synagogues is very capable at handling family units, member tracking, and Yahrzeits, and helpful in running events. Since we demoed the product, Cloud for Good has also added an accounting module and a donation acknowledgement feature as part of the basic package. It recently completed an outward-facing web portal to allow synagogue members to edit their own demographic data and settle their accounts, although Idealware was not able to demo this new feature as of press time. Cloud for Synagogues starts at $2,400 a year for the most basic package of up to 10 synagogue staff users, with additional costs for staffers beyond that. Data migration is also available from about $3,000 and up, and onsite training is an option for $125 an hour. For more on Cloud for Synagogues, see page 51. MM2000 MM2000 is a comprehensive synagogue management system with a useful integrated web module called MMOnTheWeb. It s strong in accommodating family units, membership- and donation-tracking, customer support, and specialized modules designed specifically to meet the needs of the Jewish community, but isn t as strong in terms of ease of use, broadcast , or user experience. The software starts at $2,750 for a single user for MM2000, with considerably higher charges for additional users and to add on modules that manage such important functions as schools and broadcast . MMOnTheWeb is an additional $1,000 plus monthly hosting charges. For more on MM2000, see page 65. ShulSuite ShulSuite, a synagogue management software solution from Pogstone, is a powerful and customizable web-based system that uses the open source CiviCRM platform to operate, with additional (and strong) capabilities in accounting, event management, Yahrzeits, and member management added to the basic CiviCRM package. The software is robust in most areas we looked at, but isn t immediately intuitive for new users; the learning curve may be steep. Implementation costs are optional and can range up to $5,000. Monthly subscription costs between $125 PAGE 13 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

14 and $325, or an upfront annual subscription costs between $1,200 and $3,000 per year. For more on ShulSuite, see page 105. Membership and association management systems would be quite useful in helping a synagogue manage its annual dues renewal process. ShulCloud ShulCloud is a more-affordable-but-less-robust newcomer to the synagogue management software market. The software is entirely web-based and has excellent member management and billing capabilities, as well as a content management system to help manage your entire website. It also provides support for donations, event management, and broadcast and direct mail. Developed by a synagogue for its own use, the system is friendly, easy-to-use, and doesn t require any special hardware or a server to implement. The premium tier, which most synagogues choose to implement, costs $2,400 a year. For more on ShulCloud, see page 104. Membership Management Systems Membership management systems (as well as the similar association management systems) are databases specifically tailored for managing members of an association, professional network, or other dues-paying group. In addition to tracking members and dues, these databases will often also help manage newsletter subscriptions, special gifts, and invitations to events and workshops, among other things. Some available solutions will also allow you to manage multiple membership tiers, and the related dues and benefits. Membership and association management systems would be quite useful in helping a synagogue manage its annual dues renewal process, as that infrastructure is very robust in the systems we examined. Event management also tends to be strong, as the types of events membership organizations run tend to translate relatively well to the synagogue world. However, the more general fundraising needs of synagogues might be problematic with these systems out of the box. Most don t accommodate tribute gifts or sophisticated moves management processes that help advance supporters to major donors. Interestingly, the member and association management tools we demoed that focused on performance and box office management fit the requirements of the synagogue sector quite well. We identified seven member and association management systems that had not only strong member and event functionality but also offered compelling solutions for fundraising needs. (See Appendix A: Methodology for more information on how we selected the systems for inclusion in this report.) Avectra s netforum Avectra s netforum is a sophisticated member management tool marketed as an all-in-one solution for associations. It s strong in member management, of course, and also has great event, billing and invoicing, and reporting capabilities. It s not as strong in donation management, though, and not all parts of the system can be easily customized to the needs of synagogues. netforum is a web-based tool with an intuitive graphic interface, and its constituent portal integrates with your current synagogue website to preserve a unified appearance. The system costs $3,000 per year per staff member, which includes up to 150,000 constituent records. Support is included in the subscription cost, but implementation costs an additional $10,000. For more on netforum, see page 32. Tessitura The Tessitura Network offers donor, member, and event management software and services, and is interested in partnering with synagogues to configure the software to the specific needs of the sector. PAGE 14 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

15 Tessitura has thus far worked mostly with arts and cultural organizations with sophisticated ticketing and box office management needs. The software is very strong in membership management, donation tracking, and event management, and although it s a complex system, it doesn t seem as difficult to learn as some others in its price range. The Tessitura license varies based on the size of the organization and whether the organization chooses a perpetual licensing structure or a Software as a Service approach but the vendors reported a license fee range between $4,000 and $15,000 for organizations of comparable size to most synagogues. For more on Tessitura, see page 126. Members360 Members360 is a web-based association management software program from Affiniscape. Strong at handling family units and memberships, special events, and member communications through broadcast and direct mail, it is less robust in donation management. Though the software is not currently targeted at the Jewish community, and thus lacks some of the built-in features important to synagogues, we were impressed with Members360 s customizability, power, and user-friendliness. The software is available at three tiers, but the lowest-end wouldn t allow synagogues to manage family units. M360 Core, the mid-level option, is $5,500 per year for unlimited user licenses and substantial customer support. The top tier, M360 Connected, costs $8, 500 per year and also includes a Professional Development module. Both of these choices also require one-time website and database implementation costs that start between $4,500 and $5,500. Shortly before this report went to press, Affiniscape was acquired by another company, YourMembership. com, and we were unable to determine what this acquisition might mean to the synagogue management space. For more on Members360, see page 61. NOAH NOAH is an impressive web-based member management system from JL Systems that has strengths in member tracking, customizability, invoicing and billing, broadcast , and event management. It s a strong and flexible system which could accommodate many synagogues needs, but it might be prohibitively expensive. Pricing for the system is based on concurrent users and costs $5,940 per year for the minimum five-user package, with each additional user costing $1,188 per year. On top of this, NOAH has a required fixed-price implementation and data conversion cost of $29,900, and charges $600 per 1,000 contacts in the database per year if you choose to have the system hosted by JL Systems. For more on NOAH, see page 74. imis (Congregation Suite) In comparison to other tools reviewed in this report, imis is a very powerful but very expensive member and donation management solution. A third party company, (C) Systems, has developed a set of synagogue-specific add-ons for the software called the Congregation Suite. The Congregation Suite for imis is very strong in member management, constituent and relationship tracking, event management, donation management, and Yahrzeit tracking. It s a complicated system, however, and isn t designed to meet the needs of small or mid-sized synagogues that are less data-savvy. The pricing for imis combined with the Congregation Suite from (C) Systems can range in price from $50,000 to $150,000 for upfront license fees depending on the size of the congregation and the scope of the configuration and customization. For more on imis, see page 59. PatronManager PatronManager CRM is a web-based constituent management system from Patron Technology built upon the Salesforce CRM platform and targeted at arts and cultural organizations. It s got great abilities in donation tracking, event management, broadcast , and customizability, and has lots of potential for helping to keep track of various types of constituents for a synagogue, but out of the box it has very limited invoicing and billing abilities and can t yet support automatic recurring member dues although that feature is planned for an upcoming release. PatronManager has a mandatory setup, customization, and data-migration fee that starts at $2,500. Many of its organizations are billed on a per-ticket basis, but for synagogues, PatronTechnology would probably levy an annual subscription fee which the vendor says would start around $2,500 per year. For more on PatronManager, see page 76. PAGE 15 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

16 StarChapter StarChapter is an association management product with strength in member and event management but limited functionality in billing and invoicing, managing family units, and tracking donations. It s a cloudbased platform that s easy to navigate and customize, but may not have all the power a synagogue needs in terms of core accounting functionality. The software comes in three pricing offerings: $699 per year for limited customization, storage, training, and five included addresses; $899 per year for more robust features; and $1,499 for the top-of-the-line product, with additional fees for e-commerce support. For more on StarChapter, see page 114. Donor Management Systems A donor management system is a database specificallytailored to the needs of fundraising staff. As such, these tools feature strong reporting and querying functionality in order to better understand each donor s history with your organization and help identify your best donation prospects. Many products will also be able to create visual representations of these reports, such as a Key Performance Indicator (KPI) gauge or thermometer or other charts and graphs. Donor databases will typically either include out-of-the-box online payment processing and donation functionality, or will integrate with third-party systems, to allow for one-time or recurring credit card transactions. Donor management systems aren t, however, all that great at tracking constituents who aren t also donors. Because these databases are intended to give you a top-to-bottom look at just the constituents who give you money, they often don t help you get a sense of the big picture of constituents. Individuals are usually stored in donor records, so even if you re recording a volunteer or someone who came to an event just once, they might still be considered a donor. Additionally, some of them aren t very substantial when it comes to helping a synagogue manage its annual dues renewal process. We identified four donor management systems that had strong donation functionality and also substantial workflows for member dues renewals and tracking interactions with all of a synagogue s constituents. These tools feature strong reporting and querying functionality in order to better understand each donor s history with your organization and help identify your best donation prospects. (See Appendix A: Methodology for more information on how we selected the systems for inclusion in this report.) The Raiser s Edge(i) for Synagogues The Raiser s Edge(i) by Blackbaud is a wellestablished, higher-end donor management tool that s created a specific solution for synagogues. The software can help you manage your synagogue s gifts, grants, and tributes with ease. It s very strong in donation tracking, billing and invoice management, events, Yahrzeits, and customer support, but isn t as strong in representing family units. The Raiser s Edge(i) is a very powerful system with great power comes great complexity, however, and you ll need to have a pretty high comfort level with technology to easily navigate The Raiser s Edge(i). Pricing is based on concurrent users and starts at $6,300 for a perpetual license for a single user for the most basic implementation, which doesn t include the events module. For more on The Raiser s Edge(i) for Synagogues, see page 78. Talisma Donor management tool Talisma is a compelling, higher-end choice for synagogues looking to devote resources to fundraising. Talisma is also strong in PAGE 16 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

17 Systems like Salesforce and CiviCRM are fairly blank slates out of the box, and you ll likely want (or need) a consultant to help you set them up for your organization. member management, event management, and customization, with broadcast functionality being slightly less powerful. You can obtain Talisma as either an installed, hosted, or cloud-based option. Prices vary. Mid-sized synagogues looking to implement the installed version would pay about $17,000 for four user licenses, plus training and migration costs. For the Software-as-a-Service product, expect to pay about $10,000 a year plus training and migration. The first 15,000 records are included in the cost, after which a fee of $10 per 1,000 additional records applies. If you choose to have the vendor host the software, that charge is estimated at close to $21,000 per year. For more on Talisma, see page 124. DonorPerfect DonorPerfect is a reasonably priced donation management system that s fairly easy to use and to customize. The software is very strong in household management, event management, and donation tracking and strong enough in member management and broadcast to handle most synagogues requirements. DonorPerfect is available as both an installed system and Donor- PerfectOnline, the web-based version of the platform. Most organizations are choosing to implement DonorPerfectOnline, which ranges from about $708 per year for one user with 1,000 constituent records but without events, , or technical support to about $5,600 per year for all these features and up to 25,000 constituent records. Setup is an additional $100 to $1,000, and migration quotes are available by request. For more on DonorPerfect, see page 53. GiftWorks GiftWorks is a user-friendly, reasonably priced donor management tool. It s helpful in donor management, but doesn t have all the member and event management functionality most synagogues would need to function. GiftWorks comes in four editions, one of them cloud-based, and the installed versions range from $549 to $2,499 per one-time user license plus support and implementation costs. GiftWorks Anywhere, the cloud-based edition, is $75 per month per user license. For more on GiftWorks, see page 57. CRMs (Constituent Relationship Management systems) While some databases are designed to provide a deepdive into only one constituent group, a Constituent Relationship Management system (CRM) provides a high-level look over all of your constituents. These systems are typically very flexible but will often require a fair amount of customization in order to meet your needs. Systems like Salesforce and CiviCRM are fairly blank slates out of the box, and you ll likely want (or need) a consultant to help you set them up for your organization. With some modification, you ll be able to track constituents in a number of different groups not just donors, members, and volunteers, but also students, alumni, parents, and more. You may well have to build in features that go beyond basic constituent tracking, like dues renewal workflows, seating and ticketing, and Yahrzeits, to name a few. But it s pretty straightforward to find a consultant to help you do this, and often the investment upfront is evened out by a lower ongoing cost. CRMs share a strength and a weakness: their inherent customizability. Since most systems come out of the box without much built in, the transition process will require a lot of oversight from your staff as they work with a consultant to build a system that works for your synagogue. However, once you re done, you ll have a system that s tailored for your needs without needing to build a whole system from scratch. PAGE 17 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

18 Alternatively, you can choose to partner with a vendor who offers a managed package based upon one of the platforms geared to specific needs. For this report, we ve reviewed ShulSuite (based on CiviCRM) and Cloud for Synagogues (based on Salesforce) both included in the Synagogue Management section and PatronManager (based on Salesforce), which is included in the Membership Management section. There are only four commonly used systems that meet Idealware s definition of CRM platform; we reviewed all four. (See Appendix A: Methodology for more information on how we selected the systems for inclusion in this report.) CiviCRM CiviCRM is an open source, web-based Constituent Relationship Management system that can be downloaded for free, but you ll almost certainly need a consulting firm to configure the software to a synagogue s needs. (You can also buy an implementation of CiviCRM that s already been customized for synagogues, called ShulSuite, that s reviewed elsewhere in this guide.) It s strong in constituent tracking and household and individual management, event management, broadcast , and member management, but the out-of-the-box donation management and invoicing capabilities don t meet the requirements identified by synagogues. With customization, though, it s a user-friendly system that could help your synagogue function more smoothly. Customization of the software could cost anywhere between $2,000 and $50,000 based on the complexity of the organization s needs. For more on CiviCRM, see page 43. Microsoft Dynamics Microsoft Dynamics CRM is the software giant s answer to an integrated Constituent Relationship Management system, and is designed to be an all-inone database accommodating all of an organization s needs. The Nonprofit Template, developed by Microsoft and available at no charge, transforms the out-of-the-box sales-centric tool into a nonprofitcentric platform. It s pretty user-friendly and fairly strong in donation management, reporting, member management, correspondence, and . Event management and web portal capabilities are available but require additional configuration and more advanced technical knowledge to implement. Dynamics also lacks a Yahrzeit module, and it s not clear how easily the software could be customized to meet this need. For nonprofit organizations, the price for the hosted option is $ per year per user; the nonprofit pricing for the installed option is $212 for the server licensing and $30 per license. For more on Microsoft Dynamics, see page 63. Salesforce Nonprofit Starter Pack Salesforce is a CRM platform used widely in the for-profit world. The company offers up to 10 user licenses free-of-charge to qualifying organizations with its Nonprofit Starter Pack. Strong in household management, donation management, and member management, Salesforce is not as strong in event management, and doesn t include a portal where members can interact with your synagogue online. Salesforce is technically free, but to properly configure and support the system, you ll need the services of someone tech-savvy enough to navigate its substantial technical intricacies and possibilities. In addition, the apps you d need to assemble a system that meets the requirements for most synagogues could potentially cost you thousands of dollars per year. You can purchase Cloud for Synagogues, a version of Salesforce that s been customized for synagogues and reviewed elsewhere in this report. For more on Salesforce s Nonprofit Starter Pack, see page 87. SugarCRM SugarCRM is an open source, web-based Constituent (or Customer) Relationship Management system designed for for-profit businesses. Its power, userfriendliness, and customizability might make it worth considering for the synagogue sector, although out-of-the box it lacks many features important to synagogues, such as donation tracking, event support, and Yahrzeit tracking. A synagogue looking to implement SugarCRM would need to work closely with a consultant to tailor the software to the organization, but once the customization process was completed, SugarCRM might be able to meet many synagogues needs. Pricing for SugarCRM is based on a tiered system the most basic implementation is free. Most synagogues would want to start at the higher-level PAGE 18 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

19 Church management systems generally focus on helping staff keep track of the individuals and households who come to worship services and events. options, which range between $540 and $1,200 per year per staff user. Additionally, there are fees charged by a consulting company to work with you on getting the system up and running, which come in around the $10,000 mark. For more on SugarCRM, see page 116. Church Management Systems The church management software sector is sophisticated and thriving, and its vendors have begun to incorporate innovations from other systems marketed to handle general nonprofit data management. Unlike the most widely used synagogue management systems, which aren t explicitly marketed to certain movements of Judaism, vendors here often specialize in the mainline Protestant, Catholic, and evangelical denominations and the particular data needs of each. Some larger companies, like Shelby and ACS Technology, market different products to each of these sectors. The landscape is varied, with both installed and cloud-based options. Megachurches, defined as those with more than 2,000 people who come to worship on average each weekend, have their own special data management needs, and are also accommodated by the marketplace. Church management systems generally focus on helping staff keep track of the individuals and households who come to worship services and events, broadcast and direct mail management, fund- raising efforts, Sunday schools and prayer groups, and reporting on finances, programs, and attendance. The sector is robust enough to merit its own publication, Christian Computing Magazine, which publishes a helpful online chart each October comparing the products and their features. Most churches don t operate on a membership basis, so the member/nonmember structure integral to the operating of the majority of synagogues isn t well-supported in many church management systems. Additionally, not all the systems have accounting workflows that will be useful for synagogues especially around the collection of dues and tribute gifts. Synagogues would also need to work with the vendor of a system to ensure that it could accommodate the Hebrew calendar for Yahrzeits and other Hebrew date tracking. However, much of the rest of the functionality aligns with what a synagogue would need, with out-of-the-box support for fundraising, excellent relationship management for constituents, and helpful event and attendance tracking. There is considerably more variety in this sector than currently offered by vendors in the synagogue management space. For this report, we focused on systems that had the ability to help synagogues manage membership and accounting needs and that seemed customizable enough to fit this sector. (See Appendix A: Methodology for more information on how we selected the systems for inclusion in this report.) Shelby Shelby Systems offers two products to the church management sector: Shelby v.5, the installed version of the software; and Arena, a web-based product designed to be a CRM. The systems currently work in tandem most of the accounting power of Shelby is in the installed version, while event management and household and individual records are mostly maintained in Arena. Synagogues will find most of their needs met out of the box with Shelby, and many features that aren t included could be customized with reasonable ease. Arena is slightly more user-friendly than the installed version, but both systems could likely be learned relatively quickly by synagogue staffers. For larger churches, Shelby currently charges between $8,000 and $60,000, depending on the size of the project, not including highly customized PAGE 19 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

20 installations. Pricing includes unlimited concurrent users of the software, implementation, and some data migration; ongoing annual fees that include support and updates are about $3,200 to $24,000 per year. For more on Shelby, see page 95. Fellowship One Fellowship One, a church management software product from ACTIVE Network, is a web-based software tool that serves a mix of evangelical and mainline congregations of various sizes. Strong in tracking individuals and households and in managing events, the software doesn t have the ability to support membership dues or tribute gifts. Some of its features can t be customized to accommodate synagoguespecific terminology and functions. Pricing depends on average weekly attendance, and ranges between $720 and $2,700 per year for the most basic edition. For more on Fellowship One, see page 55. ACS ACS is a major church management software vendor that we identified as a possible system of interest for synagogues. The vendor declined to participate in Idealware s report. PAGE 20 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

21 How To Decide Let s dive down into some different scenarios that might help narrow the systems of interest for your congregation. We ve provided considerable information in this report about the systems we reviewed, but much of the work will rest upon your shoulders. No two synagogues have needs exactly alike, and it s simplistic to suggest that one system will fit all we know that. So Idealware recommends that you assess your own resources, including the budget allocated for your synagogue s technology infrastructure. (If you don t currently have a budget for technology, it s time to make the case for one to your board.) Those synagogues looking to implement a new data management system will find that there is somewhat of a gap in the marketplace. There are a few newer synagogue management systems available that offer sophisticated relationship tracking, customizable interfaces, and integration with a synagogue s website, but they are fairly new and don t have a robust client base. Software vendors who have marketed to synagogues for decades haven t incorporated these innovations, and their systems are built on older relational models that aren t very flexible and can be slow and unstable. Finally, a synagogue can choose to go with a vendor that hasn t traditionally worked in the Jewish faith-based community and get a sophisticated system that meets many of their needs, but they will need to devote considerable time and financial resources to working with the vendor to customize a solution that can accommodate functions specific to synagogues. With that said, let s dive down into some different scenarios that might help narrow the systems of interest for your congregation. These scenarios are meant to be a starting place please see our detailed overviews, pricing section, and comparison matrix for more information about each of these options. Want to Get Started Quickly, With a Smaller Budget? Is your budget for technology small, and do you have limited requirements for customization and power from your data management system? These synagogue management systems are preconfigured for synagogue needs and are at the lower end of the pricing spectrum they fit a budget of about $4,000 or less per year for the first five years: Chaverware MM2000 ShulCloud ShulSuite Please see our detailed overviews, pricing section, and comparison matrix for more information about each of these options. PAGE 21 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

22 Willing to Invest Time and Money Upfront, With a Smaller Budget? Let s say you still have a small budget, but you re interested in taking advantage of some of the newer models for synagogue data management systems: robust communications, powerful reporting, and sophisticated relationship management. If you re willing to work with a vendor or consultant to build in synagogue-specific features, you ll have more choices. This list assumes a budget of $4,000 per year or less for the first five years, either upfront or ongoing: CiviCRM Cloud for Synagogues* ShulSuite PatronManager* Looking For a Pre-Configured System, With a Medium-Sized Budget? Perhaps you ve got a couple hundred households in your synagogue and need more power in terms of reporting and relationship tracking. You may have outgrown some of the systems that will fit the needs of smaller congregations quite well, but still want a system that will work for synagogues right out of the box. These options will fit within a budget of $10,000 per year in the first five years: Cloud for Synagogues ShulSuite The Raiser s Edge(i) for Synagogues Want Flexibility With a Medium- Sized Budget? If you re a mid-sized synagogue interested in taking advantage of the newer models for synagogue data management systems mentioned above robust communications, powerful reporting, and sophisticated relationship management you ll want to seek out a * Depending on the complexity of your needs, this system may cost more than the price listed for the scenario If you re willing to work with a vendor or consultant to build in synagogue-specific features, you ll have more choices. system with sophisticated functionality already built in. However, let s say you re willing to work with a vendor or consultant to build in some specific features and terminology that makes a system work for your synagogue. With a budget of up to $10,000 per year in the first five years, you have a lot of options: ShulSuite Members360 (Please note that this system has been recently acquired by YourMembership.com.) DonorPerfect Cloud for Synagogues SugarCRM Tessitura Salesforce Shelby* Need More From Your Database, and Looking For An Established Vendor? Do you have more money to work with and need a very sophisticated system that can help you manage a complex set of processes and constituents? Maybe you have a whole religious day school but still want a system preconfigured for synagogues? These systems are major players in the donor management and member management sector that offer software tailored for synagogues. They ll fit a budget of $50,000 per year PAGE 22 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

23 or less in the first five years, and so are appropriate for very large synagogues: imis Congregation Suite The Raiser s Edge(i) for Synagogues Got a Larger Budget, and Willing to Invest? What if you have the capital to invest in lots of upfront customizations and are looking for a powerful system with substantial online integration? Say you have the time and patience to partner with a vendor or consultant to tailor a system to your congregation s needs for a budget of $50,000 per year or less in the first five years, there are a lot of options to choose from: SugarCRM Tessitura Salesforce CiviCRM Talisma Shelby imis The Raiser s Edge(i) for Synagogues NOAH Hopefully, the information in this report will help you understand what s available and narrow your search to a handful of options. Think through your needs carefully which of the features described here are critical for you? Which are only nice to have, or not useful for your congregation? What other features not discussed here might be useful? With that list of important features in hand, contact the vendors and ask for demos. Ask them to show you exactly the features you consider important. Consider giving them a script which walks through the tasks you ll be doing every day at your synagogue for example, I add a tribute gift to the system, and then create a thank-you letter for both the donor and the honoree. This can be very useful to help compare different systems to each other. We ve tried to give a Each available option has its own strengths and weaknesses. It doesn t matter how good a particular system is if it doesn t fit your synagogue s needs. description of the user-friendliness and learning curve for the systems included in this report and to indicate how comprehensive the training and tech support is for each. Each available option has its own strengths and weaknesses. It doesn t matter how good a particular system is if it doesn t fit your synagogue s needs. It s nice to think that a system that s really tech-forward will improve your synagogue s day-to-day workings, but if you re only at the synagogue half-time, or the volunteer in charge of your database isn t comfortable with a very sophisticated system, it may not make sense to invest time or resources in software that will require tons of upkeep. Regardless of what we say in this report, it s critical to take a look for yourself and make your own decision. When making a decision, keep in mind that your list of constituents could grow quickly especially if you re beginning to keep better track of constituents who aren t members but who interact with your synagogue through events and programs. Ask a vendor during the selection phase if pricing will change depending on how many individuals and households are in the system. Budget for upfront and ongoing costs, including the costs to train staff members to use the system properly. It s worth checking on the PAGE 23 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

24 financial viability of the vendor, too, including the number of customers currently using the system you wouldn t want to choose a new system only to have the company fold months later. There are less-quantifiable aspects of software selection, too. You ll want to ensure that a vendor has a culture that fits with that of your synagogue, and that understands that the primary objective of your organization is to be a religious anchor for the community. A system should ideally match the mental model of your staff and be easy for them to learn and maintain with proper training. You ll want to ensure that a vendor has a culture that fits with that of your synagogue. PAGE 24 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

25 A Word on Pricing If a tool appears to be near the top-end of your budget but you could stretch to accommodate it, ask for pricing specific to your synagogue s data needs and congregation size very early on in the process. We ve mentioned this throughout the report, but it s worth calling your attention to the salient fact that the prices for the systems we ve profiled were all quoted either by vendors or consultants and should therefore be taken with a grain of salt. If a tool appears to be near the top-end of your budget but you could stretch to accommodate it, ask for pricing specific to your synagogue s data needs and congregation size very early on in the process. Otherwise, you might be in for some sticker shock after you ve added all the modules and features your synagogue needs to function. Some of the tools in this report are free, specifically the CRM platforms SugarCRM, CiviCRM, and Salesforce Nonprofit Starter Pack. Free in this context means free as in puppies, as we say at Idealware sure, they don t cost any money to acquire, but you ll need to pay for care and feeding, or in this case, pay a consultant to tailor the systems to the specific needs of your synagogue. Those fees can be significant and can add up to tens of thousands of dollars. In addition to the upfront costs, remember that you ll need to upgrade the system periodically to keep it stable, and will need to pay a consultant for tech support. If you choose to implement apps to increase the power of the Salesforce Nonprofit Starter Pack, factor in those ongoing costs, too. PAGE 25 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

26 How Do These Systems Compare? ShulSuite CiviCRM Salesforce NPSP - No Apps Salesforce NPSP with Apps Tessitura Shelby SugarCRM Raiser's Edge for Synagogues Chaverware MM2000 Family Units and Households Basic Constituent and Relationship Tracking Member Management and Dues Renewal Event, Honor, and High Holy Day Management Yahrzeits Donation Tracking Observances and Gift Exchanges and Direct Mail Overall Online Constituent Interactions Facility Management and Staff Scheduling Hebrew and Religious School Management Cemetery Management Access and Security Customization Invoicing and Payments Reporting and Querying Usability, Support, and Documentation Accounting Integration None Fair Good Excellent PAGE 26 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

27 How to Improve the Sector: Paths Forward Over the course of our research and analysis, Idealware looked for possible ways to close the aforementioned gap in the synagogue management marketplace. We were asked to identify ways in which potential investors in the sphere could enhance products already on the market, either through an ongoing entity or an upfront investment. We were also asked to weigh the possibility of building a product entirely from the ground up. This research can help inform the thinking of anyone considering a major partnership to give synagogues a better solution to manage their constituents. We drew our conclusions based entirely on our demos and research we didn t analyze a vendor s financial stability, culture, leadership, or other factors of relevance for anyone considering such a major decision. We also made pricing assessments based solely on what vendors reported to us. Due to our strict conflict-of-interest policy, which prevents working with a specific vendor or group that might act as a vendor, we couldn t go any further. In other words, any investor in the space would need to do much more than we did, but we believe this research can help inform the thinking of anyone considering a major partnership to give synagogues a better solution to manage their constituents and resources. For those looking to invest in the synagogue management sphere, we see four potential options: Build From Scratch. Build a custom system from scratch for a synagogue. Considering that there are systems on the market already very close to what synagogues need, including systems that require no licensing fees and are quite flexible, Idealware does not recommend this option. Make a One-Time, Upfront Investment In a Product. In this strategy, an investor would make an upfront investment to customize a system to the needs of synagogues. This investment might be directed to create synagogue-specific features in a system that has not traditionally been active in the synagogue management space or to boost the functionality of an existing Synagogue Management System. After the one-time investment was made, the investor wouldn t need to have any ongoing relationship with the vendor. Instead, they would rely on synagogues buying the product directly from the vendor. Ideally, this would provide the vendor enough revenue to be able to continue to offer and support the system. The next two options would require the creation of a sponsoring entity for instance, a Synagogue Data Consortium, which could hold the legal rights to a software license and oversee the creation, rollout, and ongoing support of the system. For ease of reference, we ll refer to this entity as the Hypothetical Synagogue Data Consortium. Purchase One License from a Vendor for Many Synagogues. In this model the Hypothetical Synagogue Data Consortium would purchase the software license to a single deployment of a vendor s system and customize it to the most common needs of synagogues. It would then sub-license the PAGE 27 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

28 Tessitura quoted an upfront investment of $8,400 to customize the system to satisfy the basic requirements of synagogues. The Hypothetical Synagogue Data Consortium would then pay Tessitura an upfront licensing fee, likely in the five-figure range, for the use of all synagogues in the network, and a substantial (upwards of $10,000) ongoing maintenance fee. The Consortium could then charge synagogues to help defray its own expenses. Tessitura has substantial experience with this model and has a number of active partners who already support many organizations with one implementaright to use the system to individual synagogues. The system would need to be structured to ensure that multiple organizations can all be supported in one implementation of the system. They wouldn t be able to see each other s data, but there are likely to be limitations to the amount of flexibility that each synagogue has customizing the system to their own needs. In practical terms, this option would require a vendor who has the interest in and, ideally, the experience with, supporting this type of model, often referred to as a multi-tenant model. The vendor would still be in the picture to provide software upgrades and provide support, but the Hypothetical Synagogue Data Consortium would likely also need to be involved on an ongoing basis to manage customization and upgrade decisions, as well as the individual relationships with synagogues. It s difficult to assess up front the possible cost to the synagogues for this model, as it would depend greatly on the number of synagogues that participate. Both Shelby and Tessitura could be compelling partners for this option. Customize an Existing Platform. With a consultant s help, a new synagogue management product could be developed from scratch on top of a CRM platform. In this option, an investor would provide a sizable investment to build out a system based specifically on synagogue needs starting from a CRM like Salesforce or CiviCRM. Once the system was built, a Hypothetical Synagogue Data Consortium would sell or even give away the system to individual synagogues. The Consortium would need to define how the system would be supported, upgraded, and maintained for the longterm. In this option, the Hypothetical Synagogue Data Consortium begins to fill the role of software vendor in a long-term commitment to serve the synagogue space. Salesforce and CiviCRM in particular stand out as candidates to serve as the underlying platform for a new system. Make A One-Time, Upfront Investment In a Product For investors looking to make an upfront investment with minimal ongoing costs to create a system tailored to the requirements of synagogues, Idealware s research was inconclusive in this area. We are unable to provide suggestions for specific vendors with which to partner at this time. Due to the aforementioned gap in the synagogue marketplace, and our lack of surveying the vendors in terms of finance, sustainability, and culture, we are not comfortable articulating this path forward with any of the systems included in this report. We remain confident, however, that independent investigation may indicate that one of these products would be a reasonable platform in which to invest. Purchase One License From a Vendor for Many Synagogues For an option that costs considerably less money upfront, but requires more ongoing commitment, both Shelby and Tessitura provide compelling feature sets in a way that can be licensed once by the Hypothetical Synagogue Data Consortium and then used by many synagogues. This option is the most difficult to define accurate pricing for, as the cost would vary greatly depending on the size of the consortium, how much flexibility a vendor had on the sticker price of the license, and whether the Hypothetical Synagogue Data Consortium would be willing to subsidize ongoing costs. Tessitura. The Tessitura Network offers donor, member, and event management software and services, and is interested in partnering with synagogues to configure the software to the specific needs of the sector. The software is very strong in membership management, donation tracking, and event management. It s a complex system, and may have more of a learning curve than Shelby. PAGE 28 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

29 tion of the system. It s difficult to provide specifics on pricing, however. This scenario requires a substantial conversation with the vendor and the Consortium about the number of synagogues participating in the network and what a potential partnership would look like. Shelby. Shelby Systems offers two products to the church management sector: Shelby v.5, the installed version of the software, and Arena, a webbased product designed to be a CRM. The systems currently work in tandem. Most of the accounting power of Shelby is in the installed version, while event management and household and individual records are largely maintained in Arena. Shelby supports a surprising amount of synagogue needs out of the box. It needs only minimal upfront investment to meet all the core requirements specifically, functionality to implement the Hebrew calendar and some specific reports. The vendor reports that this could be done for as low as $1,500 for the custom code. As described for Tessitura, the Hypothetical Synagogue Data Consortium would then pay Shelby a likely five-figure upfront licensing fee and a substantial ongoing maintenance fee, and could then charge synagogues to help defray its own expenses. For more specific pricing, it will be necessary to have more detailed partnership conversations. Customize an Existing Platform Rather than investing with a specific vendor, it s possible to instead to build a synagogue-specific tool on top of the open platform of a Constituent Management System. Our research demonstrates that the following two CRM platforms are closest to what synagogues require: CiviCRM. CiviCRM is an open source web-based Constituent Relationship Management system that can be downloaded for free. It s strong in constituent tracking and household and individual management, event management, broadcast , and member management, but the out-of-the-box donation management and invoicing capabilities don t meet the requirements identified by synagogues. An upfront investment would be needed to customize the software specifically for synagogues. The consulting firm we worked with to demo the product quoted about $50,000 for this customization work, but other consultants might do the project at different rates. Once this initial cost was outlaid, the Hypothetical Synagogue Data Consortium would own the system and the implementation, and could provide it to synagogues at whatever cost it liked, including for free. However, the Hypothetical Consortium would need to provide or arrange for any support, update, and maintenance the system received. Salesforce Nonprofit Starter Pack plus external apps. Salesforce is a CRM platform used widely in the for-profit world. The company offers up to 10 user licenses free of charge to qualifying organizations with their Nonprofit Starter Pack. It s strong in household management, donation management, and member management, but not as strong in event management, and doesn t include a portal where your members can interact with synagogues online. An investment would be needed to pay for a consultant to customize the software, which could range up to the low five figures. It would probably make sense for an investor to rely not only on a consultant but on one or multiple of a set of proprietary products designed to augment Salesforce for specific needs (i.e. mail-merging, creating a membership portal, or others), from companies such as PICNet, Groundwire, or Cloud for Good (vendor of Cloud for Synagogues). Salesforce is technically free for up to 10 licenses per synagogue, but the proprietary products required to augment Salesforce would likely cost each synagogue in the realm of thousands per year. Depending on precisely what third party products were used, the central entity might need to support and maintain the product, functioning much like a vendor itself. PAGE 29 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

30 Benefits and Drawbacks of Each Option Invest in an Existing Vendor* One License/Many Synagogues Build on a Platform Shelby Tessitura CiviCRM Salesforce Upfront Customization Cost Low Low High Medium Requires a Central Entity? Yes Yes Yes Yes Responsibility of Central Entity Medium Medium High High Ongoing cost to the Synagogue Requires specific Requires specific Very Low Medium definition definition Existing marketshare/ Buy-in Very Low Low Medium Medium * Idealware s research was inconclusive in this area. PAGE 30 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

31 Index of Systems

32 Avectra s netforum Avectra s netforum is a sophisticated member management tool marketed as an all-in-one solution for associations. It s strong in member management, of course, and also has great event, billing and invoicing, and reporting capabilities. It s not as strong in donation management, though, and not all parts of the system can be easily customized to the needs of synagogues. netforum is a web-based tool with an intuitive graphic interface, and its constituent portal integrates with your current synagogue website to preserve a unified appearance. The system costs $3,000 per year per staff member, which includes up to 150,000 constituent records. Support is included in the subscription cost, but implementation costs an additional $10,000. Avectra s netforum member management software deems itself a CRM, and is meant to be an all-in-one database to take care of an organization s constituent management needs. The web-based product helps keep track of your members and nonmembers by tracking information at the individual level as well as at an organizational level, which would accommodate a synagogue s family units. (Those terms can t be customized, which might be confusing if you actually want to track your constituent s organizational affiliations.) You can hide information that doesn t apply to a particular synagogue staffer on a functional level for instance, concealing billing information but not down to a field-by-field level. The software has a friendly, web-based interface that s easy to navigate and query. The tab-based constituent dashboard displays a wealth of data, including contact information, membership standing, fully customizable relationships to other individuals and organizations, and a financial snapshot of the account associated with the individual or family unit. To accommodate a young child as part of a family unit, the makers of netforum suggested that a synagogue could either make a note on the demographic area of the parent member s record or create a fully robust profile for the children and link to the parent record through relationships, but there isn t a sub-level of constituent to indicate that a child is a part of a household. This latter scenario would ensure that in the event of a divorce, children could be associated with two different households, although they would derive their member benefits from only one. Broadcast is built in to netforum, and a synagogue staffer could easily generate one-off or mass s to constituents from templates. Those s are automatically summarized in the constituent dashboard area, where synagogue administrators can also log notes about phone calls or other constituent interactions and assign follow-up to other staffers. Data from the system can be exported to MS Word, Excel, html,.pdf, and.csv formats. Donation tracking isn t quite as robust as a synagogue might need, though. There isn t the capacity to track multistage pledges to donate over the course of several years or to track grant applications, although members can set up recurring donations on their credit cards. Gifts are handled through the shopping cart area of the system, so constituents have the option to buy a donation and enter however much they would like to give. They can associate the gift with the account of the member being honored, too. Since netforum is primarily a member management solution, that area of the software is quite comprehensive. You can customize member types and dues terms and can adjust members dues amount without affecting their member types. Invoicing is straightforward, and there are lots of helpful built-in financial reports that are simple to generate. Accounting information imports into QuickBooks, Peachtree, GP, and Financial Edge general ledger software with a one-click batch summary report. PAGE 32 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

33 netforum lets member groups set up their own event calendars, viewable only to their log-ins, on the publicfacing member portal so, for example, a steering committee could arrange its own meetings. The events module, included in the general subscription cost, is very powerful, and allows users to register themselves, members in their family unit, or guests to an event. You can generate a report of who registered for the event, who actually attended, and who of those invited haven t RSVPed. Ticketing for specific sessions is available in netforum s conference module, which could be helpful in managing larger events. Assigned seating is coming in a future release. The member portal works with a synagogue s existing CMS; Avectra won t host your website, though. Yahrzeits aren t a current module within the system, but the developers from Avectra feel confident that the important functionality of conversion from the Hebrew to the Gregorian calendars, the ability to track what Yahrzeits a constituent should be notified of on their member profile, and the ability to generate a report of Yahrzeits to be observed within a particular date range would be handled by adding fields that track the information to the demographics field and commissioning a developer to work with netforum s API to generate a module that tracked the information. The front and back end of netforum look pretty similar, and the system is completely web-based you don t need any special hardware to host it. The public side of the website (but not the staff side) is optimized for mobile devices. The system costs $3,000 per year per staff user, which includes up to 150,000 constituent records. Support is included in the subscription cost, but implementation costs an additional $10,000. PAGE 33 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

34 Chaverware Chaverware, a product from Circuits & Systems, is a popular Windows-based synagogue management system. It s designed well to handle the day-to-day needs of a synagogue, with strong functionality to manage individuals and family units, billing and invoicing needs, and Yahrzeits. However, synagogues are given only a few custom fields to work with, and much of the interface can t be customized. It supports and merging letters into Microsoft Word. The process to create a new query to find constituents with whom you d like to communicate is a bit time-consuming and complicated, but is quite powerful in terms of granularity. Through an extension called ChaverWeb, the system also provides reasonable support for online event registration, online payments, and the ability to update their own profile information. Standard pricing starts at $3,100 and includes one year of support and three user licenses. The optional ChaverWeb costs an additional $1 per household per year. Circuits & Systems Chaverware is a Windows-based synagogue management system that is currently one of most popular synagogue management programs on the market. Though Chaverware is a desktop-based system, the vendor has also rolled out a web extension called ChaverWeb that s currently used by an estimated 20 percent of clients. ChaverWeb provides members with the opportunity to edit their data, view an online member directory, and pay their balances with a credit card. Synagogues can create events in ChaverWeb and allow members to sign up for them online. RSVP data doesn t sync up automatically with ChaverWeb database administrators must use a wizard to reject or confirm the web entries within the desktop-based system, and then the data flows automatically into the system. Chaverware is well-structured to accommodate information at both the household and individual levels, and changes to family structure are simple to make. Customization is limited Chaverware gives synagogues the ability to customize only six fields at the individual and household levels; the rest of the fields are fixed and can t be hidden or modified. Through the process of category-building, Chaverware users can create customized groups of individuals. Family members age dynamically according to the birth date entered into the system, which means you don t need to manually advance members through life stages. Member correspondence and other interactions are logged manually in a notes field at the individual level, and correspondence sent through the system can also be automatically logged in the note system if the user chooses. Chaverware seamlessly integrates with up-to-date versions of QuickBooks and Sage 50 accounting software, and doesn t require any exporting or importing of data. The built-in payments and billing functionality is feature-rich and tailored to the needs of synagogues. Users can generate Accounts/Receivable aging reports reports that show what sums Accounts Receivable will have due in the next 30, 60, or 90 days, or any other time period defined by the user to represent what members owe, define membership levels and invoice for them in batches, and associate gifts and pledges with specific households. You can track tribute gifts and pledges, but Chaverware doesn t have any specific grant-tracking functionality. It does have a powerful-but-complex query building process, and creating some queries could be confusing to those unfamiliar with database structure. For instance, to generate a query finding households that have donated towards a specific campaign within a given time frame, users must remember to enter FamilyID is like * or the system won t recognize that it s supposed to search among families. However, queries are reusable, so synagogue staffers can PAGE 34 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

35 save their favorites and make them available to other users. Thank-you notes and other correspondence are systemgenerated through MS Word mail merges. The templates themselves are powerful, although the merge process itself is time-consuming when being set up for the first time. Broadcast s are sent with the help of Constant Contact. A graphic interface provides a number of features for synagogues to assign and track high holiday seating, although members don t have the ability to register for seats online through ChaverWeb. Also useful is the graphical cemetery management module, which allows administrators to assign and track plots. The software fully accommodates Yahrzeit tracking in both the Jewish and Gregorian calendars. Chaverware has a traditional-looking Windows interface. The makers of Chaverware plan to offer a fully browserbased system in the next version, but will continue to offer an installed version of the software. In our demo, the software seemed to run fairly slowly, although the vendor conducting our demo acknowledged that the hardware setup being used was known to be slow. It s a networked system that requires a server or dedicated hard drive to host it as well as a PC running the Windows operating system. No remote capabilities are built-in, although users could connect to a remote desktop to enter data. However, ChaverWeb has a mobile interface for smartphones and tablets. The functionality between ChaverWeb and Chaverware will be merged in the next release of the software. Standard pricing for Chaverware is $3,100 for three concurrent user licenses, with one year of support included. Support contracts beyond the first year range from $1,200 to $3,500 per year based on concurrent users. Data conversion and the school module also require additional costs, which could bring the upfront costs total close to $6,000. Chaverware offers a considerable discount for synagogues willing to make a five-year commitment, which includes locked-in support costs, data conversion, and the school module. The optional ChaverWeb costs an additional $1 per household per year. Family Units and Households Family Unit Summary: Lets you easily see in one place all individuals associated with a particular family unit, including kids and any other household members. Family Unit Details: Lets you track main address, contact information, and membership status for a family unit. Same Name Tracking: Lets you easily track multiple family units with the same first and last name. Deceased Household Members: Lets you mark deceased members as such, and you must then manually update each category that the person was in and decide to keep or reassign each to a survivor. If you delete a person from a category to indicate that they are no longer in it, you will never be able to see that category history on their record. Additionally, if you accidentally mark a person as deceased, you need to call Chaverware to fix the record. The deceased no longer appear on the mailing labels, and reports automatically exclude people who are marked as deceased. Note: The program crashed when we marked someone as deceased. Member Status: Lets you mark that a family unit is Inactive, Active, Resigned, or Suspended. Lets you mark that each individual in the family is a Member or a Nonmember but not resigned, suspended, or another status. If one person in the family unit is a Member, the entire family unit also becomes a Member. Alumni Members: The means demonstrated to track an alumni is to select Move Individual, which moves to her a new or an existing family unit. You must then manually add back her relationships to her old family members and put her into an alumni category. To track alumni, you can build a query once for that category and save it. Divorce and Alternative Family Scenarios: The means demonstrated to associate a child with two family units (i.e. for divorced parents) is to create a relationship that represents a noncustodial parent-child relationship. You re able to designate that the custodial parent receives mailings for the child. Lets you move existing constituents with all their history into a new or existing family unit (i.e. child starts their own family, divorce, aged parents moving back in), but you must manually add back all of their superceded family relationships. Lets you account for nontraditional families (i.e. long-term non-married couples, same-sex marriages). Note: In the staff view of Chaverware, all children are referred to as students. Multiple Addresses: It s possible to maintain multiple addresses for a household and note dates for seasonal addresses using the system s Mail to function, which adjusts the mailing addresses on the dates set and can be set to repeat. PAGE 35 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

36 Basic Constituent Tracking Activity and Attendance: It s possible to see all the recent activity for an individual associated with a family unit, such as event attendance, donations, and correspondence, in one place by tracking these activities as categories and seeing all the category activity on the Category tab of their record. Relationship Tracking Outside Households: Lets you track non-family relationships between individuals in the database. A synagogue can add or change existing relationship types within the system. Member / Nonmember Tracking: Lets you enter any individual into the database, even if not a member, and exclude nonmembers from member datasets because they are separated into another category from members. Demographic Tracking: Lets you track but not customize basic demographic information of every constituent, such as , phone number, birthday, age, gender. Faith and Observance Tracking: It s possible to track what tradition or movement an individual was raised in, how kosher they keep, if they ve been to Israel, whether an individual is Jewish (in a mixed-marriage household) and other faith and observance information, by creating multiple categories to represent this information. Occupation Tracking: Lets you track the occupation and organization of all adults in the household, but not their job history. Volunteer Matching: It s possible to track an individual s interests and skills though categories to match them with potential volunteer opportunities. Full Name Tracking: Lets you track the full name for each constituent in a household to account for spouses or kids with different last names. Constituent Source: It s possible to associate the source of a constituent with a campaign, an event, or a staff member through creating multiple categories to represent each campaign, event, or staff member. Social Media: It s not possible to link to constituents social media pages within their records. Group and Committee Tracking: It s possible to see who in a household is a member of a group, committee, or auxiliary, and to see everyone who s in that group if you track them through categories. You are able to differentiate between Plain, Financial, or Class categories. Batch Constituent Entry: It s not possible for a staff member to add or import basic information about a number of constituents at once. Children: Lets you track a child s age, day school, or college through built-in fields. Note: All children in Chaverware are called students. Relationship Tracking Communications Tracking: It s not possible to see a quick summary of all recent communications and constituent actions, such as phone calls or personal meetings, and a record of all system-generated letters and s for each constituent in one place. Duplicate Tracking: It s not possible for a staff member to merge two records if it becomes apparent that those records are duplicates. Prospecting Workflow for Constituents: There s no clear way to assign a priority and a stage to a constituent to manage a prospecting workflow. Prospecting Workflow for Organizations: There s no clear way to assign a priority and a stage to an organization to manage a prospecting workflow. Autoreminders: It s possible to create reminder for yourself or another staff member for a particular constituent, task and date and show it prominently at that time through creating notes and having a popup show to remind you that it s due. Clergy Interactions: It s possible to track who has had recent interactions with a clergy member (to be able to find those who haven t) by creating categories to represent the different points of interaction and manually adding them to the categories, as well as by using notes on the individual s record. PAGE 36 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

37 Pastoral Care: It s possible to track when a member is in the hospital or homebound by creating categories to represent the housebound, ill, or hospitalized and manually adding them to the categories. It s not possible to coordinate visitation schedules for groups of constituents who have volunteered. Buddy System: It s possible to run a buddy system program, where new members are paired up with an existing member, by marking them as relatives with another member family. Membership Tracking Member Payments: Lets you associate payments for events and membership dues with family units for billing purposes. Membership Types: Lets you track the membership type for a family unit (i.e. single, family, senior etc.). Membership Benefits: Lets you easily associate membership prices with desired seating for the high holidays or other benefits, and bill for them. New Member Signup: There is no quick- or bulk-entry process to enter new members. There is an Add Family wizard that guides a staffer through the steps to enter an individual family unit each time. Batch Invoicing: Lets you automatically generate invoices for a new cycle of membership dues in batch for all members. Outstanding Payments: Lets you see who has paid outstanding membership dues or event fees and who has not. Member Fee Discounts: Lets you define a discounted membership fee for a particular family member, which is then billed accordingly, but the discounted amount is tracked. You can enter one reason why the discounted amount is being tracked on the note for the individual invoice. For multiple reasons, the vendor suggested creating multiple categories. Online Payments: Lets you accept payments online via credit card only. Online New Member Signup: It s not possible to sign up online for a membership. Event Management Event Seating (High Holidays): Lets you easily book and bill seat purchases for specific seats (i.e. C7), and see what seats are still available. Lets you arrange or rearrange the seating plan. Lets you automatically assign members to areas of seating based on their membership levels. Online Registration: Lets people RSVP for the events ONLINE for general admission, with member and nonmember prices, but has no waitlist management. Seat Map: Lets staffers see a map of seat offerings with status of seats and who allocated ones are allocated to, but members cannot see an online map of seats and select their own. RSVPs: Lets you log, view and print who has RSVP d or registered for a particular event. Historical Event Attendance: It s possible to see what constituents came to which event on their constituent record pages through their categories. Batch Event Importing: It s not possible for a staff user to add or import basic information about a list of event attendees. Honor Tracking: Lets you track who served as aliyahs or other honors in past, with what specifically they did on what date, through built-in fields. Lets you track the Hebrew date that an honor took place. Lets you easily input honors for a constituent based on a customized list of possible honors. Lets you easily create an ordered listing of aliyahs and honors for a given service for the program book. Lets you easily identify a group of people and send them a letter asking them to perform a particular honor. It s not possible to track responses for those invited to perform a particular honor. Online Event and School Registration Registration and Payment: Lets constituents RSVP online for a free event, which is then captured in the database. Lets constituents register and pay online for an event or class, which is then captured in the database and the accounting information. Multiple Registration: Lets household members easily register other individuals in their household for an event or class, without having to login as someone else. Back end Event Setup: Lets you easily create an online registration or RSVP form for a new event or class and lets you set various event registration fees for a single event (i.e. adult/child or member/nonmember). PAGE 37 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

38 Confirmation and Reminder s: Lets constituents automatically receive a confirmation with customizable text when they register online, but it s not possible to send event reminders through the system. Custom Fields: Lets you include custom fields in an online registration form, which are then segregated from the rest of the event information. Mobile Registration: There s no optimization for event signup for a smartphone or tablet. Wait List/Full Event: Lets you define the maximum number of people that can attend an event, and the online system will stop taking registrations with no wait list when the max is reached. Autofill: Lets you auto-populate online registration forms with constituent information (demographics, family members) if the constituent is logged in. Calendaring: It s not possible to update a public or internal calendar when scheduling events through the system, but the system has an API that accomplishes this. Observances and Gift Exchanges Anniversaries and Birthdays: Lets you easily create a list of all people with anniversaries or birthdays in a particular month (for Leagrams) in a built-in report. Gift Messages: Lets you track personal message from a donor for Purim baskets. You can also track this online through a cobrand with an external tool, Purim Project. Batch Entry: Lets you enter multiple tributes in support of physical gifts at once. Gift Acknowledgement and Delivery: Lets you print a letter that provides all the names and messages of those who supported an individual Leagram or Purim basket. Yahrzeits Hebrew Calendar Functionality: Lets you track dates, like Yahrzeits, on a Hebrew calendar. Hebrew Language Functionality: It s possible to track words or names in Hebrew, with Hebrew letters, in any field. Yahrzeit Constituent Tracking: Lets you track the individual constituents who should be notified (i.e. surviving family members) of each particular Yahrzeit. Lets you view all the Yahrzeits that a particular constituent should be notified about. Yahrzeit Notification: Lets you generate letters notifying family members about an upcoming Yahrzeit. Gregorian or Hebrew Tracking: Lets you track whether a particular person s Yahrzeit should be observed based on the Gregorian or Hebrew calendar. Lets you autofill a Hebrew date of death based on a Gregorian date. Yahrzeit Listing: Lets you create a list of all Yahrzeits that will be observed in a particular timeframe (based on the desired observance timeframe/ calendar). Specific Yahrzeit Info: Lets you track, but not customize, the following specific information about a Yahrzeit: Is there a plaque? Hebrew name? How do you pronounce the name? Did they die during the day or evening? Online Yahrzeit Info: It s possible for your congregants to enter information online about Yahrzeits they d like to be observed in ChaverWeb. A staffer manually syncs up the information entered with a constituent s Yahrzeit record. Yahrzeit Plaques: It s not possible to automatically turn on the physical lights for the appropriate plaques for the week s Yahrzeits. Donation Tracking Individual vs. Family vs. Organization: Lets you track whether a gift was given by a whole family unit or an individual within it, or by an organization primarily for thankyou letters. Quick Entry: It s not possible to quickly enter a number of gifts at one time through a streamlined quick-entry interface. Tributes: Lets you enter tribute gifts, with both the donor and the person honored and lets you track who has donated for a particular event and in support of what other family unit (Leagrams, Purim baskets). Multiple Campaigns: Lets you assign gifts to a particular source, campaign or fund, or split the gift across multiple of these. PAGE 38 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

39 LYBUNT, SYBUNT: Lets you report on who gave to a particular campaign last year or at another time, in order to target them again this year. Pledges: Lets you enter pledges for future gifts, including the amount and scheduled date. This is then handled as an invoice and consolidated into statements. Last Donation: Lets you see the date and amount of a constituent s last donation. Recurring Donation: Lets a back end staffer set up a recurring donation (i.e. $10 per month to the Rabbi s discretionary fund), but it s not possible for a member to do so online. Checkoff Contributions: Lets you automatically add a line item on invoices for constituents opting in for a checkoff contribution, alongside their membership fee, and it will go to a separate account code. Lets you track whether a constituent is opted in or out for a checkoff contribution, such as ARZA. Grant Management: It s not possible to track and manage grants. Overall Online Interactions Payment Codes: Lets you automatically pass online payment data to the system, and eventually to accounting, coded as to what the payment was for. Online Profile: Lets constituents view their own profiles online and update their contact information. Lets you receive a notification when constituents update their profiles. Lets constituents update information online about their children (names, birthdates, schools). Lets constituents update their own online profile of interests, skills, and occupation. It s not possible for constituents to unsubscribe from lists in the online profile. Online Surveys: It s not possible to conduct online surveys. Mobile: There is a mobile app for the ChaverWeb program. CMS: Does not help manage synagogue s website. Facility and Staff Scheduling Calendaring for Space Rentals: No billing or booking. Calendaring for Rabbi and Cantor: It s not possible to see and manage a Rabbi s or Cantor s calendar. Billing for Space Rentals: Lets you bill for the booking of a space if you create the booking as a Financial Category. Contract and Deposit Tracking for Space Rentals: It s not clear how to track whether a contract or deposit has been received for a rental. Access and Security Remote Access: There s an option to access constituent data through a remote browser if you choose to use an external vendor like Citrix, Terminal Server, GoToMyPC, or others. Data Access: Lets you create and enforce access to different types of data for different staff users. Constituent Access: There s no granularity in terms of access to different types of constituents for different staff users. Personalized View: Screens are customizable by user in terms of data and order of data displayed. There are also Favorite reports by user. Sending Broadcast s: Lets you send broadcast s directly from the constituent database to defined or ad-hoc groups through an integration with Constant Contact. Opt-Out: Lets you generate a list of members for whom there s no address (i.e. to target them by mail instead). Unsubscribe: It s not possible to use the system to subscribe and unsubscribe constituents from all or particular lists, but this is available in Constant Contact, which integrates directly with Chaverware. Graphic Templates: The system doesn t let you use graphic templates to send broadcast s, but this is available in Constant Contact, which integrates directly with Chaverware. PAGE 39 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

40 Statistics: It s not possible to see information about opens and click-throughs within Chaverware, but that information is available in Constant Contact, which integrates directly with Chaverware. Forwarding: It s not possible for constituents to forward s to a friend and still track the statistics, although you can do this in Constant Contact. Discussion Lists: It s not possible to create discussion lists for particular subsets of constituents. Statements: A synagogue can choose to send an invoice through to either the entire congregation or a subset of those who elected to receive electronic statements. They receive a personalized link to the member s account for them to log in and go directly to pay their balance. Direct Mail Labels: Lets you easily generate labels for an ad-hoc query of constituents. Templates: Lets you create flexible templates to receive mail-merged data. Lets you easily mail-merge information for a selected group of constituents into a defined template. Response Tracking: Lets you track the response to a particular or direct mail campaign through an integration with Constant Contact Acknowledgements: Lets you easily create a one-off thankyou letter and label for a donation from a constituent record screen. Lets you easily create one-off tribute gift letters, which prints a letter and label for both the donor and the person honored. Lets you queue thankyou letters in order to print out a batch of letters and labels at one time. Lets you queue one-off tribute gift letters to print a whole series of letters for both the donors and the honorees. Tax Letters: Lets you easily create yearend tax letters which summarize all tax-deductible donations, for each constituent, by associating a goods/services level with each gift or dues renewal. Publication Management: Lets you use the system to manage mailing of physical publications, including special formatting for impression printers. Accounting Integration Accounting Overview: Lets you easily pass data to standard accounting systems including QuickBooks and Peachtree. Billed Revenue: Billed revenue is batched and electronically transferred to the accounting system by general ledger account. Received Revenue: Received revenue is batched on a daily basis and electronically transferred to the accounting system by general ledger account. Batches: Lets you set up the types of transactions that should be batched into each account code for the accounting system. Lets you create and track accounting batches in order to ease the reconciliation process with an accounting system. Lets you link a batch to a deposit slip number to tie it back to the accounting system. Customization Concealing Functionality: A superuser can hide pieces of functionality that don t apply to your temple, including categories and modules, by staff login. Dropdowns: You can control dropdown values for fields such as campaigns, type of relationships and most other characteristics of the system, except for Gender and Bar Mitzvah. Custom Fields: No custom fields beyond six user-defined fields allotted for use throughout the system. Custom fields in ChaverWeb don t show up in Chaverware. Renaming/Deleting Fields: It s not possible to rename or delete existing fields. Customization Process: The system has limited customization options available to employees of the synagogue. For most major changes to the system, the vendor would need to be contacted and can provide changes on a fee-for-service basis. API: It s possible to access the API in order to update or add functionality, but the vendor would need to approve this on a case-by-case basis. PAGE 40 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

41 Invoicing and Payments Payment Plan: Lets you define a payment plan by entering a start date, end date, and number of payments, and the payments themselves will be automatically calculated. One-Offs: Lets you create a one-off invoice for a single payment. Viewing Invoices and Payment History: Lets you view a list of all invoices for a constituent and see the payment history for a constituent. What s Been Invoiced For: Lets you view which payments have been invoiced for when and which have not. Aging Report: Lets you run a built-in aging report, which includes a summary of overdue payments with information about how overdue they are. Other Invoicing: Lets you collect standard payment info: date, amount, payment types that are configurable, check number, etc. Lets you define how much of an applied payment is tax-deductible vs. non-deductible. Lets you write off an invoice as unreceivable. Payment without Invoicing: Lets you apply a payment for any specific event/ service without first creating an invoice in the system. Group Invoicing: Lets you create an invoice for a specific event/ service for everyone that meets a particular set of criteria (i.e. all members). Tax/Nontaxable: Lets you apply taxable and non-taxable amounts to a single invoice. Constituents Paying For Others: Lets you apply payment from one constituent to pay another s invoice. All Open Invoices: Lets you see a screen that shows all invoices in the system. You can then filter by dates, families, categories, open or settled. Usability, Support, and Documentation Ease of Use Overview: The system is difficult to navigate, and a novice user would have a hard time understanding its workflows. There are some step-by-step wizards, searches and quick lists for some features. IT Skills: The vendor reports that most synagogues who have implemented Chaverware don t have anyone with skills maintaining relational databases to support the database. During our demos of the system, it appeared that such skills might be useful. Help: There s no useful help in the system, and online help is very limited. Training: Vendor provides , phone support, and in-person training for the system. Workflows: It s not possible to tailor the system to quickly do common tasks. Process Documentation: There s no way to process documentation to help staff understand how they re supposed to enter data to aid consistency. Religious School Tracking Child Info: Lets you track and report on emergency contact information, doctor, insurance information for each enrolled child through built-in fields. Lets you track and report on allergies, diet (kosher?), and special needs for each enrolled child through built-in fields. Class Info: Lets you print out a class list with key student information for teachers, assign children to particular classrooms or teachers, and lets you track the current grade level of a child, both in day school and religious school, through a dedicated school module. Class Promotion: Lets you automatically promote all children to the next grade level at the end of the year, with the option to hold some back. Attendance: Lets you easily input children s attendance through quick entry forms. Grading: It s not possible to track children s overall grade for each class they ve enrolled in. The vendor suggests entering grades in the comment field on the class assignment page for each child. PAGE 41 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

42 Cemetery Management Billing and Invoicing: Lets you track the person who should be billed for a cemetery plot, but can t bill for the plot directly through the cemetery module. Plot Management: Lets you view which plots are sold and which are unsold. Lets you view who in the database has reserved a plot and who has not, in order to market plots. Lets you track who is buried in each plot number in a cemetery. Lets you view what section and/or plot a particular constituent has reserved. Yahrzeits and Cemeteries: Lets you associate an individual Yahrzeit with a cemetery plot. Lets you track the date of death for each individual in a cemetery plot. Lets you notify people associated with a cemetery plot of the Yahrzeit associated with the person buried. Constituents and Cemeteries: Lets you track the names and relationship of surviving relatives for an individual buried in the cemetery. Lets you associate the deceased person buried in the cemetery, and their plot, with their family unit. Digital Map: Lets you view a digital map to see allocated and unallocated plots, with names of those buried. Plaque Management: Lets you track if there s a memorial plaque associated with a plot, and if so, where it is (free text). Reporting and Querying Standard Reports: Lets you view a set of standard reports that account for typical synagogue needs (for instance, parents with kids in preschool, parents of kids in 6th grade, LYBUNT and SYBUNT reports, constituents with a particular set of skills or interests, who came to event X but not Y). Ad Hoc Reports: Lets you create ad hoc reports that allow staff to define what rows, columns, formulas, and formats are used. Querying: The query-building process for a set of constituents who meet criteria for a standard set of fields is complicated. The vendor reports that you can create a flexibility query for a set of constituents based on almost any field in the database. Reporting For Data Issues: There are no standard reports in the system to identify possible data issues (i.e. duplicates, inconsistent data entry). The vendor reports that queries could identify these or recommends reaching out to their support team. Dashboards: There aren t useful dashboards that help you track overall metrics about programs and finances. Excel: Lets you export a report or query to a friendly Excel file. Searching: It s possible to search the database for an existing person from anywhere in the interface by hitting Shift-F1. PAGE 42 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

43 CiviCRM CiviCRM is an open source, web-based Constituent Relationship Management system that can be downloaded for free, but you ll almost certainly need a consulting firm to configure the software to a synagogue s needs. (You can also buy an implementation of CiviCRM that s already been customized for synagogues, called ShulSuite, that s reviewed elsewhere in this guide.) It s strong in constituent tracking and household and individual management, event management, broadcast , and member management, but the out-of-the-box donation management and invoicing capabilities don t meet the requirements identified by synagogues. With customization, though, it s a user-friendly system that could help your synagogue function more smoothly. Customization of the software could cost anywhere between $2,000 and $50,000 based on the complexity of the organization s needs. CiviCRM is an open source, web-based Constituent Relationship Management system (CRM) that can be downloaded for free from the organization s website CiviCRM is itself a nonprofit. Unless you are particularly tech savvy, though, you ll probably need to engage a consulting firm to configure the software to suit your needs. (You can also buy ShulSuite, a version of CiviCRM that s already been customized for synagogues, reviewed elsewhere in this guide.) Indeed, a consulting firm called Rayogram helped demo the software for us by looking at specific implementations of the software at different nonprofit organizations, along with a representative from CiviCRM. The software is customizable to most scenarios a synagogue would encounter, and many of the installations we saw had an attractive, user-friendly interface. You can even drag and drop fields and tabs to move them around and configure the system s dashboards to your liking. CiviCRM is quite strong in constituent relationship-tracking and can help you track the households and individuals in your congregation with ease. You can easily see who makes up a household and define other customizable relationships between people in the database. You ve got lots of customizable fields at your disposal, too. Representing children requires some out-of-the-box customization work, but Rayogram reports that it s been done successfully by several organizations and that the system can easily handle a divorce in a member household while preserving the children s relationships to each of their parent s records. Indeed, relationships in CiviCRM can have a start and end date to easily accommodate a marriage or partnership s end. The Activities tab on a constituent record keeps track of all sorts of information you can filter to see all of an individual or household s donations, s you ve sent them through the system, meetings and phone calls you ve noted, and events they ve attended. CiviCRM provides a member portal that allows members of the public to pay and RSVP for events and to give online, whether a gift or a pledge. It can be customized to accommodate tribute gifts, and some nonprofits have had success adapting the case management capabilities of CiviCRM to track grant proposals and applications. The software lets you automatically or generate letters to donors thanking them for their contributions, but tends to default toward correspondence. CiviMember is CiviCRM s membership management module, and you can automate dues cycles and payments, allow members to sign up and renew online, associate membership with either households or individuals, and customize membership levels. You can send invoices using the system and quickly see whose membership has expired and who is still in a (customizable) grace period, but it s hard to quickly see which constituents owe what payments. CiviCRM exports to QuickBooks and other general ledger software in a.csv format, but before you do this for the first time, you ll need to map the export fields to make it understandable to QuickBooks. Financial reporting like PAGE 43 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

44 A/R aging reports don t come out of the box, but you can build and share reports using the system, and the Civi user community is supportive and known to share information like custom reports with each other. CiviCRM also works with a dozen different payment processors for credit card transactions. Event management is accomplished through CiviEvent, which allows organizations to create and manage events including waiting lists, registration, required approval by staffers, and a bill me later function. Events tie in nicely with the rest of a synagogue s website, matching the CSS of the site, but you don t need to know any code to make it look uniform. Yahrzeit tracking is not yet a part of CiviCRM, but it has been accommodated in ShulSuite, so it seems that the basic structure could be adapted to fit this tracking against separate calendars. CiviCRM lets you sort and save your constituents into dynamic groups based on any criteria you d like, for example, all board members or everyone who gave over $10,000 last year. You can use the system to create templates for mass mailings, like for a newsletter, and you can also send out broadcast using Civi s tool, which is comparable to Vertical Response and MailChimp in its reporting functionality. You can also export the list to a third party tool. Security and permissions within the tool are fairly granular you can limit what areas of the system each staff login sees or can edit within the system from the administrative controls area, which we found a little complicated. All you need to run it is an internet connection. CiviCRM is technically free to download, but to configure and support it you ll almost certainly need to engage a consultant to handle data migration, customization of the tool to your synagogue s needs, and support. Rayogram estimated that this would cost between $2,000 and $50,000 based on the complexity of the organization s needs. Vendors like Pogstone, the makers of ShulSuite, also offer versions of CiviCRM pre-configured for organization s needs. Family Units and Households Family Unit Summary: Lets you easily see in one place all individuals associated with a particular family unit, including kids and any other household members. Family Unit Details: Lets you track main address, contact information, and membership status for a family unit. Same Name Tracking: Lets you easily track multiple family units with the same family name. Deceased Household Members: Lets you mark and easily print out mailing labels with the deceased member excluded if an individual is marked as deceased. Member Status: Lets you mark that a family unit has resigned, has been suspended, or is no longer active if you create a status to indicate one of these. A default set of commonly used membership statuses are provided out of the box (New, Current, Grace, Expired, Deceased). Alumni Members: Lets you track an alumni someone who is no longer a member through a custom field. Divorce and Alternative Family Scenarios: Lets you easily move an existing constituent with all their history into a new or existing family unit. Lets you associate a child with two family units. Lets you account for nontraditional families (i.e. long-term non-married couples, same-sex marriages) if you create a status to represent this relationship. Lets you account for mixed-marriage couples if you create a status to represent this relationship. Multiple Addresses: Lets you track seasonal addresses for a family unit, including start and end dates. Basic Constituent Tracking Activity and Attendance: Lets you see all the recent activity for an individual associated with a family unit, such as event attendance, in one place. Relationship Tracking Outside Households: Lets you track and customize non-family relationships between individuals in the database. Member / Nonmember Tracking: Lets you enter any individual into the database, even if not a member, and easily exclude nonmembers from member datasets. Lets you you distinguish between different tiers of members and nonmembers in the database, if you add the tiers. PAGE 44 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

45 Demographic Tracking: Lets you track and customize basic demographic information of every constituent, such as , phone number, birthday, age, gender. Faith and Observance Tracking: Lets you track what tradition or movement an individual was raised in, how kosher they keep, if they ve been to Israel, whether an individual is Jewish (in a mixed-marriage household) and other faith and observance information, through custom fields. Occupation Tracking: Lets you track the occupation and job history of adults in the household, and link to the organizations associated with them. Volunteer Matching: Lets you track an individual s interests and skills through customizable fields to match them with potential volunteer opportunities. Full Name Tracking: Lets you track the full name for each constituent in a household to account for spouses or kids with different last names. Constituent Source: Lets you track the source of each constituent using the built-in Source field. Events, contributions, and membership signups can be linked to campaigns using a dropdown form field. Social Media: Lets you link to constituents social media accounts through built-in fields that can store the URLs for Facebook, Twitter, and Linked-in account pages as well as an unlimited number of other URLs. Group and Committee Tracking: Let you track who in a household is a member of a group, committee, or auxiliary, and easily see everyone who s in that group. Batch Constituent Entry: Lets you add or import basic information about a number of constituents at once from a CSV file or spreadsheet using an import wizard, which also does a basic validation of imported data. Children: Lets you track a child s age, day school, or college through custom fields. Relationship Tracking Communications Tracking: Lets you see a quick summary of all recent communications and constituent actions in one place, including a manual log of communications with each constituent, such as phone calls or personal meetings, and a record of all system-generated letters and s for each constituent Duplicate Tracking: Lets you easily merge two records if it becomes apparent that those records are duplicates, through a wizard that allows you to decide which data prevails; the system will also alert back-office users if they seem to be creating a duplicate record. Prospecting Workflow for Constituents: Lets you assign a priority, a stage, and a next action to a constituent to manage a prospecting workflow using the CiviCase function. Prospecting Workflow for Organizations: Lets you assign a priority, a stage, and a next action to an organization to manage a prospecting workflow using the CiviCase function. Autoreminders: Lets you create a reminder for yourself or other staff for a particular constituent, task and date and show it prominently at that time through ical. Clergy Interactions: Lets you track which constituents have had recent interactions with a clergy member by tracking those interactions as activities, and see who hasn t by reporting who hasn t been associated with that activity. Pastoral Care: Lets you track when a member is in the hospital or homebound and track who will visit them through CiviCase process management. Buddy System: It s not possible to conduct a buddy system program, where new members are paired up with existing members. Membership Tracking Member Payments: Lets you associate payments for events and membership dues with family units for billing purposes. Membership Types: Lets you track the membership type for a family unit (i.e. single, family, senior etc.). Membership Benefits: It s not possible to easily associate membership prices with desired seating for the high holidays or other benefits. New Member Signup: Lets you easily enter the information to sign up a new member. PAGE 45 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

46 Batch Invoicing: Lets you automatically generate invoices for a new cycle of membership dues in batch for all members. Outstanding Payments: Lets you easily see who has paid outstanding membership dues or event fees and who has not through a dashboard. Member Fee Discounts: Lets you define a discounted membership fee for a particular family member, which is then billed accordingly, and the discounted amount is tracked through specifying a discount title and method (amount or percentage). Online Payments: Lets you accept payments online via credit card only. Online New Member Signup: Lets prospective members fill out their membership forms online, and pass data into the database. Event Management Event Seating (High Holidays): Lets you easily book and bill seat purchases, for general admission to specific areas, with member and nonmember price, but not a specific seat. Online Registration: Lets people RSVP for the events ONLINE for general admission, with member and nonmember prices. The system helps you manage overflow and waitlists. Seat Map: It s not possible to see a seating map for staffers or online. RSVPs: Lets you easily log, view and print who has RSVP d or registered for a particular event. Historical Event Attendance: Lets you easily flag which constituents came to a particular event on their records. Batch Event Importing: Lets you import basic information about a list of event attendees, including ones not currently in the database. Honor Tracking: Lets you track who served as aliyahs or other honors in past, with what specifically they did on what date, through custom fields. Lets you track the Hebrew date that an honor took place if you customize the system to include the Hebrew calendar. Lets you customize a list of honors and associate them with a constituent. Lets you easily create an ordered listing of aliyahs and honors for a given service for the program book, if you track the honor through custom fields. Lets you easily identify a group of people and send them a letter asking them to perform a particular honor, if you track the honor through custom fields. Lets you track responses for those invited to perform a particular honor, if you track the honor through custom fields. Online Event and School Registration Registration and Payment: Lets constituents RSVP online for a free event, which is then captured in the database. Lets constituents register and pay online for an event or class, which is then captured in the database and the accounting information. Multiple Registration: Lets a front end user register other household members for an event or class without logging in as someone else, but does not recognize the other household members based on a login. The front end user can type in the data pertaining to their household members during registration, and that information can be captured and passed to the database. Back end Event Setup: Lets you easily create an online registration or RSVP form for a new event or class. Lets you set various event registration fees for a single event (i.e. adult/child or member/nonmember). Confirmation and Reminder s: Lets constituents automatically receive a confirmation with customizable text when they register online. Lets you send reminders of events participants have registered for. Custom Fields: Lets you include substantial custom fields (meal preferences, interests, seating requests) on an online registration form that are then easily viewable as a summary of event attendee information. Mobile Registration: Lets constituents sign up and pay for events from a smart phone or tablet, with mobile-optimized design if the appropriate CMS theme is chosen. Wait List/Full Event: Lets you define the maximum number of people that can attend an event, and the online system will stop taking registrations and create a wait list when the max is reached. Autofill: It s possible to auto-populate online registration forms with the information about other household members if configured with Drupal. Calendaring: Lets you automatically update a public website calendar when scheduling events through the system. PAGE 46 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

47 Observances and Gift Exchanges Anniversaries and Birthdays: Lets you easily create a list of all people with anniversaries or birthdays in a particular month (for Leagrams). Gift Messages: You can track personal messages for gifts through custom fields. Batch Entry: It s not possible to batch enter tributes in support of physical gifts. Gift Acknowledgement and Delivery: Lets you easily print a letter that provides all the names and messages of those who supported an individual Leagram or Purim basket if you associate them with a specific campaign. Lets you create a list of who should receive what size gift basket and at what address. Yahrzeits Hebrew Calendar Functionality: It s possible to track dates on a Hebrew calendar through an external plugin. Hebrew Language Functionality: Lets you track words or names in Hebrew, with Hebrew letters. Yahrzeit Constituent Tracking: Lets you track the individual constituents who should be notified (i.e. surviving family members) of each particular Yahrzeit if you track that information in a custom field. Lets you view all the Yahrzeits that a particular constituent should be notified about if you track that information in a custom field. Yahrzeit Notification: Lets you easily generate letters notifying family members about an upcoming Yahrzeit if you track that information in a custom field, but the system defaults to . Gregorian or Hebrew Tracking: It s not possible to track whether a particular person s Yahrzeit should be observed based on the Gregorian or Hebrew calendar without customization. Yahrzeit Listing: It s not currently possible to create a list of all Yahrzeits that will be observed in a particular timeframe (based on the desired observance timeframe/ calendar) but this could be done if the system were customized to accommodate the Hebrew calendar and a Yahrzeit field was configured. Specific Yahrzeit Info: Lets you track AND CUSTOMIZE specific information about a Yahrzeit: Is there a plaque? Hebrew name? How do you pronounce the name? Did they die during the day or evening? Online Yahrzeit Info: Lets those with a login enter information online about Yahrzeits they d like to be observed. Yahrzeit Plaques: With configuration to an external facilities management system, lets you automatically turn on the physical lights for the appropriate plaques for the week s Yahrzeits. Donation Tracking Individual vs. Family vs. Organization: Lets you track whether a gift was given by a whole family unit or an individual within it, primarily for thankyou letters. Lets you associate gifts with an organization as opposed to individuals. Quick Entry: Lets you enter a number of gifts at one time through a streamlined quick-entry interface. Tributes: Lets you easily enter tribute gifts, with both the donor and the person honored. Lets you track who has donated for a particular event and in support of what other family unit (Leagrams, Purim baskets). Multiple Campaigns: Lets you assign gifts to a particular source, campaign or fund, but not split it across multiple of these. LYBUNT, SYBUNT: Lets you easily see who gave to a particular campaign last year or at another time, in order to target them again this year. Pledges: Lets you enter pledges for future gifts, including the amount and scheduled date. This is then handled as an invoice and consolidated into statements. Last Donation: Lets you easily see the date and amount of a constituent s last donation. Recurring Donation: Lets a back end user set up a recurring donation (i.e. $10 per month to the Rabbi s discretionary fund) by creating a pledge. Lets a front end user set up a recurring donation online to a fund and add an end date or leave it open-ended. Checkoff Contributions: Lets you automatically add a line item on invoices for constituents opting in for a checkoff contribution, alongside their membership fee, but it won t go to a separate account code. Grant Management: Lets you track and manage grants through CiviGrant, a free module that is part of the core package. PAGE 47 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

48 Overall Online Interactions Payment Codes: Lets you automatically pass online payment data to the system, but without accounting codes. Online Profile: Lets constituents view their own profiles online and update their contact information. Lets constituents update information online about their children (names, birthdates, schools). Lets constituents update their own online profiles of interests, skills, and occupation. Lets constituents unsubscribe from lists in their online profiles. Lets a staffer opt-in to receive an notification when a constituent updates their profile, or create a change log report that summarizes changes to all outward-facing pages. Online Surveys: It s possible to conduct online surveys through CiviCampaign. Mobile: Optimized for a smartphone or a tablet from back and front ends. CMS: Helps manage a synagogue s website through the Drupal CMS. Facility and Staff Scheduling Calendaring for Space Rentals: It s not possible to view what spaces are booked and which are available in a calendar format, or who has booked which space Calendaring for Rabbi and Cantor: It s not possible to see and manage a Rabbi s or Cantor s calendar. Billing for Space Rentals: Lets you easily bill for the booking of a space if you create the booking as a pledge. Contract and Deposit Tracking for Space Rentals: Lets you track whether a contract or deposit has been received for a rental. Access and Security Remote Access: There s no option to access constituent data through a remote browser, but the system is web-based so you can access it remotely. Data Access: Lets you create and enforce access to different types of data for different staff users. Constituent Access: There s no granularity in terms of access to different types of constituents for different staff users. Personalized View: Lets multiple staff people each see a personalized view of the tasks and data that apply to them. Lets staffers customize their own dashboards Sending Broadcast s: Lets you send broadcast s to specific groups identified in the database. Lets you send broadcast s to ad-hoc segments of constituents. Opt-Out: Lets you easily generate a list of members for whom there s no address (i.e. to target them by mail instead). Unsubscribe: Lets you easily subscribe and unsubscribe constituents from all or particular lists. Graphic Templates: Lets you use graphic templates to send broadcast s. Statistics: Lets you track information about Intended Recipients, Successful Deliveries, Forwards, Replies, Bounces, Unsubscribe Requests, and Opt-Out Requests, including percentage rates, and what links within the message were clicked on. Forwarding: Lets constituents easily forward s to a friend, and a staffer can decide whether to track statistics about forwarded s. Discussion Lists: It s possible to create discussion groups for particular subsets of constituents. Statements: Lets you send out invoices and statements via rather than mail. Direct Mail Labels: It s not possible to generate labels for an ad-hoc query of constituents. Templates: Lets you create flexible templates to receive mail-merged data. Lets you easily mail-merge information for a selected group of constituents into a defined template. PAGE 48 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

49 Response Tracking: Lets you track the response to a particular or direct mail campaign. Acknowledgements: Lets you easily create a one-off thankyou letter and label for a donation from a constituent record screen. Lets you easily create one-off tribute gift letters, which prints a letter and label for both the donor and the honoree, but defaults to . Lets you queue thankyou letters in order to print out a batch of letters and labels at one time. Lets you queue one-off tribute gift letters, to print a whole series of letters for both the donors and the people honored. Tax Letters: Lets you easily create yearend tax letters which summarize all tax-deductible donations, for each constituent. Publication Management: You can t use the system to manage mailing of physical publications. Accounting Integration Accounting Overview: Lets you easily pass data to standard accounting systems including QuickBooks and Peachtree. Billed Revenue: Billed revenue data is NOT automatically passed to standard accounting systems at a Chart of Accounts account code level, but you can batch it. Received Revenue: Received revenue data is NOT automatically passed to standard accounting systems at a Chart of Accounts account code level, but you can batch it. Batches: Lets you create and track accounting batches in order to ease the reconciliation process with an accounting system. Lets you batch and transfer payments received online into the accounting system. Customization Concealing Functionality: Lets a temple opt to hide pieces of functionality that don t apply to them. Dropdowns: Lets you customize dropdown values for fields such as campaigns, type of relationships and others. Custom Fields: Lets you add an unlimited number of custom fields, which can be placed on most screens in the system. Renaming/Deleting Fields: Lets you rename or delete existing fields. Customization Process: The system is customizable by the vendor or extensively customizable by any qualified person. API: Lets you access the source code or access an extensive API in order to update or add functionality. Invoicing and Payments Payment Plan: Lets you define a payment plan by entering a start date, end date, and number of payments, and the payments themselves will be automatically calculated. One-Offs: It s not possible to create a one-off invoice for a single payment; you have to go through a batch process. Viewing Invoices and Payment History: Lets you view a list of all invoices for a constituent. Lets you easily see the payment history for a constituent. What s Been Invoiced For: Lets you view which payments have been invoiced for when and which have not. Aging Report: Lets you run a built-in aging report, which includes a summary of overdue payments with information about how overdue they are. Other Invoicing: Lets you collect standard payment info: date, amount, payment types that are configurable, check number, etc. Lets you define how much of an applied payment is tax-deductible vs. non-deductible. Lets you write off an invoice as unreceivable. Payment without Invoicing: Lets you apply a payment for any specific event/ service to a constituent record without first creating an invoice in the system. Group Invoicing: Lets you create a payment for a specific event/ service for everyone that meets a particular set of criteria (i.e. all members). Tax/Nontaxable: It s not possible to apply taxable and non-taxable amounts to a single invoice. Constituents Paying For Others: It s not possible to apply payment from one constituent to pay another s invoice. All Open Invoices: Lets you see all open invoices and filter by key information (member/ nonmember, amount, event). PAGE 49 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

50 Usability, Support, and Documentation Ease of Use Overview: The system is designed to be free of clutter, but requires training in order to navigate the interface. IT Skills: You ll need someone with CiviCRM skills to support the database. Help: Lets you access online help through the form of the CiviCRM community to help you understand how to use the system. Training: The options for and phone support and web or live trainings conducted through the vendor are nonexistent since the system is open source, but there is an active user community. Workflows: Lets experts use the system to quickly do common tasks, tailored to their own workflow. Process Documentation: There s no way to process documentation to help staff understand how they re supposed to enter data to aid consistency. Religious School Tracking Child Info: Lets you track emergency contact information, doctor, insurance information for each enrolled child, if you create a custom field to track that information. Lets you track information like allergies, diet needs, and special needs for each enrolled child if you create a custom field to track that information. Class Info: Lets you print out a class list with key student information for teachers through the CiviSchool extension. Lets you assign children to particular classrooms or teachers. Lets you track the current grade level of a child, both in day school and religious school. Class Promotion: You must manually promote all children to next grade level at the end of the year in order to hold some back. True if you use the CiviSchool extension? Attendance: Lets you track children s attendance at religious school if you use the CiviSchool extension. Grading: Lets you track children s overall grade for each class they ve enrolled in if you use the CiviSchool extension. Cemetery Management Billing and Invoicing: No cemetery-specific billing functionality. Plot Management: No plot management-specific functionality. Yahrzeits and Cemeteries: It s not possible to associate an individual Yahrzeit with a cemetery plot. Constituents and Cemeteries: It s not possible to associate the deceased person s cemetery plot with people in the database. Digital Map: It s not possible to view a digital map to see allocated and unallocated plots, although you can upload a static digital image you ve created elsewhere. Plaque Management: It s not possible to track if there s a memorial plaque associated with a plot. Reporting and Querying Standard Reports: Lets you create a set of standard reports that account for typical synagogue needs (for instance, parents with kids in preschool, parents of kids in 6th grade, LYBUNT and SYBUNT reports, constituents with a particular set of skills or interests, who came to event X but not Y). Ad Hoc Reports: Lets you easily create ad hoc reports that allow staff to define what rows, columns, formulas, and formats are used, but doesn t intuitively save a report. Querying: Lets you query for a set of constituents who meet criteria for a standard set of fields. Lets you create a flexibility query for a set of constituents based on almost any field in the database. Reporting For Data Issues: Lets you identify possible data issues (i.e. duplicates, inconsistent data entry) from reports provided by the system. Dashboards: Lets you easily view and customize a dashboard that helps you track overall metrics about programs and finances. Excel: Lets you export a report or query to a friendly Excel file. Searching: Lets you quickly search the database for an existing person from anywhere in the interface. PAGE 50 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

51 Cloud for Synagogues Cloud for Synagogues is a new and powerful web-based product built on the Salesforce CRM platform from Cloud for Good, a consulting firm that specializes in implementing Google Apps and Salesforce CRM with nonprofit clients so new, in fact, that the product wasn t done when Idealware conducted its demo. As of January 2013, the product is now complete and live with a few synagogues. Cloud for Synagogues is very capable at handling family units, member tracking, and Yahrzeits, and helpful in running events. Since we demo ed the product, Cloud for Good has also added an accounting module and a donation acknowledgement feature as part of the basic package. Cloud for Synagogues recently completed an outward-facing web portal to allow synagogue members to edit their own demographic data and settle their accounts, although Idealware was not able to demo this new feature as of press time. Cloud for Synagogues starts at $2,400 a year for the most basic package of up to 10 synagogue staff users, with additional costs for staffers beyond that. Data migration is also available from about $3,000 and up, and on-site training is an option for $125 an hour. Cloud for Synagogues is built upon the Salesforce CRM platform, and can therefore use products from Salesforce s AppExchange to enhance its abilities. Some of these apps are available for free or at significant discounts for nonprofits. When we tested Cloud for Synagogues, the software wasn t quite finished, but enough of the functionality had been built to get a good idea of what it could handle. User testing is now complete, and a final version is available as of January The tool s strength lies in its powerful customizability and up-to-date technology. For instance, users can quickly build reports or real-time dashboards that contain any data they think might be helpful. It s got built-in links to social media tools like Twitter and Facebook, making it easy to engage your congregation and keep them in the loop, and integrates with both Outlook and Google Apps. As with other Salesforce products, Cloud for Synagogues appears pretty user-friendly and easy to learn, but if you run into trouble, 2.5 hours of customer service is available each month with subscription costs. Most of the synagogue specific features that we reviewed for are included with the basic package. For instance, you can easily record demographic and religious information about members at the individual and household levels and see a graphic representation of their relationships to other members and nonmembers in the database. Member billing cycles and tiers are flexible and easy to tailor, too. Volunteer management is included as well, to help a synagogue keep track of its congregation s interests and donated service. Broadcast can be handled by VerticalResponse, a third-party provider, which donates 10,000 s a month to qualified nonprofits. Online donation integration allows constituents to pay by credit card. You can merge invoices in from Excel and export information to accounting software, like QuickBooks, although the vendor reports that this may incur an additional fee depending on which general ledger software you use. Event management is sophisticated a user can quickly build a microsite for a special event, track RSVPs and attendance, manage waitlists and overflow, and see a member s historical event attendance. Yahrzeit tracking is simple and easy to update and allows for automatic reminders and tracking against both the Hebrew and Gregorian calendars. Synagogues can easily generate a list of Yahrzeits occurring in a particular Hebrew date range against the Gregorian calendar, and all constituents to be notified (members and nonmembers). A school management module, which allows for attendance tracking and batched entry and promotion of students, seems useful, but comes with additional cost. PAGE 51 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

52 Cloud for Good has also rolled out an outward-facing member portal, which will allow users to log in, update their profile, and register for events. This feature was recently completed, so Idealware was not able to test its functionality. Also planned for the near future is a graphical inventory control module which can help synagogues manage cemeteries as well as seating for high holidays. For now, Cloud for Synagogues is a compelling option for synagogues looking to move to the cloud and interested in a user-friendly, but still evolving, system. Cloud for Synagogues starts at $2,400 annually for a 10-user staff logon package, with additional fees for more staff logons, and increased cost for add-on modules to support advanced mail merge capabilities and school management, which many synagogues will need to implement. When asked about the cost of these additional modules, Cloud for Good stated that the price for the additional modules will depend on the volume of their clients needs. Data migration is also available from about $3,000 and up, and onsite training is an option for $125 an hour. PAGE 52 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

53 DonorPerfect DonorPerfect is a reasonably priced donation management system that s fairly easy to use and to customize. The software is very strong in household management, event management, and donation tracking and strong enough in member management and broadcast to handle most synagogues requirements. DonorPerfect is available as both an installed system and DonorPerfectOnline, the web-based version of the platform. Most organizations are choosing to implement DonorPerfectOnline, which ranges from about $708 per year for one user with 1,000 constituent records but without events, , or technical support to about $5,000 per year for all these features and up to 25,000 constituent records. Setup is an additional $100 to $1,000, and data migration quotes are available by request. DonorPerfect is a reasonably priced donation management system that s been implemented at a few JCC s and synagogues. The system can track individuals, households, and organizations, and both the individual and household screens are completely customizable by the user with an unlimited number of fields and attributes. In the household view, you can easily see who s in a family by adding relationships and keep track of children by adding a special kind of constituent type. In the event of a divorce, you could create a new household for the non-custodial family member and add relationships linking that person to the former household s children and ex-spouse. Donation tracking in DonorPerfect is quite robust. The software lets you customize a pledge schedule, invoice for it by exporting the information to MS Word, and automatically send out payment reminders. Tribute gifts can be associated with both the donor s account and the person being honored, with acknowledgements for the gift sent to both parties, or with a particular event or other commemoration. There s no specific grant tracking ability, but DonorPerfect has very sophisticated moves management to help manage your major donors. DonorPerfect has the ability to handle basic member management scenarios. To coordinate automatic dues renewal, staffers could set up SmartActions essentially automated workflows based on user-defined queries. You can also issue a report to see who has balances due on their account. However, the software had trouble with some more advanced billing scenarios important to synagogues, such as a built-in A/R aging reports to see who is coming due within defined periods. DonorPerfect integrates with QuickBooks general ledger software, and you can export information from one system to another at the detail or summary level. DonorPerfect lets you manage your synagogue s events through the system and allows public-facing event registration through WebLinks, live forms that integrate with your synagogue s website. The system doesn t have the ability to handle assigned seating, but it does let you sell tickets that are capacity-controlled to ensure that events don t become oversubscribed. Event creation is straightforward, and you can track event expenses to make sure that they are revenue-generating. DonorPerfect s third party vendor of choice is ConstantContact, and the two platforms integrate directly. ConstantContact can help manage your list in DonorPerfect and allows you to send out broadcast messages on templates from the database. s sent through the system appear in a log of constituent communications on the individual or household record. You re able to manually log details about phone calls and meetings, and you can even use DonorPerfect s new mobile app to record speech-recognized notes from your smartphone or tablet. You can also use DonorPerfect to manage your physical mailings and ensure that only one publication gets sent to a household full of individual members, for instance. PAGE 53 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

54 Yahrzeits are not yet a built-in feature in DonorPerfect, but the vendor felt that the information could be tracked by creating a custom field and then creating an automated SmartAction to generate reminder letters regarding the anniversary. DonorPerfect also allows for customized security levels, and administrators can control access through staff logins to read-only view or to conceal parts of the system entirely. DonorPerfect also allows for the restriction of certain constituent records between staff logins, which could be a helpful feature. DonorPerfect is available as both an installed system and as web-based DonorPerfectOnline. Most users now choose to implement the web-based platform. It s an easy-to-use tool without much of a learning curve. The online version starts at about $708 per year for one user and a cap of 1,000 constituent records without events, support, or management. Most synagogues will need one of the higher-end tiers, which range from about $2,500 per year to about $5,000 per year with support and unlimited user licenses and a maximum of 25,000 records. Setup charges range from about $100 to $1,000. PAGE 54 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

55 Fellowship One Fellowship One, a church management software product from ACTIVE Network, is a web-based software tool that serves a mix of evangelical and mainline congregations of various sizes. Strong in tracking individuals and households and in managing events, the software doesn t have the ability to support membership dues or tribute gifts. Some of its features can t be customized to accommodate synagoguespecific terminology and functions. Pricing depends on average weekly attendance, and ranges between $720 and $2,700 per year for the most basic edition. Fellowship One, a church management software product from ACTIVENetwork, is a web-based software tool that serves a mix of mainline and evangelical congregations. The vendor has a strong orientation toward Christian organizations for instance, our demo opened with a prayer. Synagogue staffers can customize their home dashboard screens to display only information pertinent to them. You can track individuals as well as family units and designate a head-of-household for a family. The individual and family records can track a lot of information, but the only heavily customizable part of these records is the Attributes tab, which collects free-form text information about the constituents in your database, such as special interests or talents, and can be sorted into categories and queried. You can see at-a-glance summaries of the individuals that make up a household and can also track other relationships between people in your database, such as co-workers or relatives that don t live in the same household. You can associate your constituents with customizable groups, like Great Golfers or a women s club, and track their attendance and involvement with those groups. Indeed, the ability to track and monitor a constituent s involvement in different areas of the synagogue is a notable strength throughout the software. Fellowship One comes out of the box with a robust ability to track lots of information about the children in your congregation and distinguish them from adults, and if two congregants get a divorce, you don t need to manually move the child s record after you ve represented the division of the household. Fellowship One does allow constituents to log into a portal to register for events, see and edit their information in a member directory, and pay their balance using a credit card. The system requires an address to get a logon. Fellowship One doesn t have the built-in ability to handle member dues, so a synagogue would have to configure a workaround through an ongoing giving model to manage its members essentially, setting up recurring pledges but it was unclear during our demo how much work this would create for synagogue staffers, or if Fellowship One would be able to automatically determine who was a member and who wasn t. For instance, staffers might have to manually send dues renewals for every household in the system. Pledges need to be associated with a campaign tribute gifts in honor of another member aren t accommodated in Fellowship One, nor are grants. The software can accommodate check scanning and can integrate with standalone giving kiosks that accept credit card donations in a synagogue, too. Fellowship One does not integrate with any third-party general ledger software platforms, but can generate a.csv report that includes information about funds from accounts receivables. The software can accommodate broadcast and can reach out to groups that your congregation defines by conducting queries called mass actions. Event management capabilities are quite strong, and if you opt for one of the more expensive versions of the software, can handle automated check-ins. Fellowship One can also handle posting an event on your organization s website, event check-in, and calendaring through a tool called Service U. As of now, Yahrzeits are not part of Fellowship One s functionality, but the system has an open API and could potentially be configured to work with an external tool. PAGE 55 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

56 Fellowship One gives users the ability to create custom reports and save them, although the process is somewhat complicated for a novice user. The software only requires an internet connection to run, and pricing is based on a combination of Typical Worship Attendance the average number of adults and children that attend worship services each week and the level or edition of the software purchased. Fellowship One has three product tiers that vary by price and feature inclusion: Core, Select, and Premier. Pricing depends on average weekly attendance. The vendor provided pricing information only for Core, the most basic edition, which ranges between $720 for a 250-member synagogue and $2,700 per year for a 1,000-member synagogue, which doesn t include implementation costs. PAGE 56 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

57 GiftWorks GiftWorks is a user-friendly, reasonably priced donor management tool. It s helpful in donor management, but doesn t have all the member and event management functionality most synagogues would need to function. GiftWorks comes in four editions, one of them cloud-based, and the installed versions range from $549 to $2,499 per one-time user license plus support and implementation costs. GiftWorks Anywhere, the cloud-based edition, is $75 per month per user license. GiftWorks is a user-friendly donor management tool with a clean drag-and-drop interface that allows you to arrange the system dashboards to your liking. The system can track individuals, households, and organizations, as well as customizable relationships between constituents not in the same household. In GiftWorks, children are tracked as affiliate donors in a household and are automatically excluded from certain queries (like for solicitations). The process for handling a divorce between two household members was a bit complicated and would require a synagogue staffer to manually relate the children and gift history with the non-custodial household. The only broadcast client that integrates with GiftWorks is Constant Contact, which is seamlessly connected to the system. GiftWorks will log broadcast s sent through Constant Contact in the constituent record, and you can also manually add notes about phone calls and meetings. There s no real member portal in GiftWorks those on your list can manage their own preferences and subscriptions, but they can t edit their contact or household information. Donation management in GiftWorks handles most of what a synagogue would require. Pledges are straightforward and payment schedules easy to modify, the process of issuing receipts and acknowledgements is simple, and there s a useful honors and memorials module that would be helpful in managing tributes. GiftWorks doesn t have the capacity to track grants. It integrates directly with QuickBooks, so if you choose to use that particular platform for your general ledger software, the process of exporting your data would be straightforward, but if you use another platform expect the process to be more labor-intensive. GiftWorks is able to do very basic member tracking, such as designating who is and isn t a member, but doesn t have a built-in structure to accommodate dues and renewals. A synagogue staffer could create dynamic queries to differentiate between members in good standing and those overdue for renewal, but the process of sending out renewal letters would require some manual work on the staff side. It s hard to see who is overdue for payments in GiftWorks. There s no built-in aging report to help you see who is coming due, either, although you can create a report to see every payment due in a certain date range. GiftWorks also offers an online donations service through a partnership with QGiv. GiftWorks lets staffers collect RSVP information for events online and to send out s related to the event to SmartLists of registrants, but the software can t integrate with your synagogue s website. The software doesn t yet have any customization for Yahrzeits, but the vendor reported that it has the built-in capacity to keep track of deceased constituents and that Yahrzeits could be managed by customizable relationships. The Hebrew calendar could be accommodated through a plugin. There are four editions of GiftWorks three installed and one cloud-based. GiftWorks Standard, which is less customizable and does not have the ability to manage seasonal addresses, is a one-time $549 license fee per user. The events module is an additional charge. For unlimited customer support and more robust training and upgrades, you can elect to pay $40 per month. GiftWorks Premium, which includes extra custom fields, advanced security, support PAGE 57 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

58 for bulk mailings, seasonal addresses, and increases the number of files you can attach to records, is $749. There s also a Pro edition for larger congregations. The cloud-based version, GiftWorks Anywhere, includes the features of Premium plus the volunteer management module, and is a flat fee of $75 per user license per month including support. Implementation and data migration fees range based on the complexities of the project, and begin at $1,000. PAGE 58 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

59 You can also manage your events in imis, which even has a facility management module which can help manage rooms and resources. The events module also handles ticketing and assigned seating through etouches, an external, web-based event management tool fully integrated by (C) Systems. Members of the synagogue can pay their balimis (Congregation Suite) In comparison to other tools reviewed in this report, imis is a very powerful but very expensive member and donation management solution. A third party company, (C) Systems, has developed a set of synagogue-specific add-ons for the software called the Congregation Suite. The Congregation Suite for imis is very strong in member management, constituent and relationship tracking, event management, donation management, and Yahrzeit tracking. It s a complicated system, however, and isn t designed to meet the needs of small or mid-sized synagogues that are less data-savvy. The pricing for imis combined with the Congregation Suite from (C) Systems can range in price from $50,000 to $150,000 for upfront license fees depending on the size of the congregation and the scope of the configuration and customization. imis is a very powerful but expensive member- and donation-management solution from ASI. Another software company, (C) Systems, created a set of synagogue specific addons called the Congregation Suite, originally developed for several of the larger New York City congregations. We demoed the Congregation Suite rather than the standard version of imis to see the system as it had been implemented for synagogues. (C) Systems noted that the Congregation Suite would not be appropriate for the typical 400-household congregation, but rather for very large synagogues looking to manage their constituent data. imis has a straightforward, unfussy, slightly dated-looking interface that will look familiar to those who have worked with MS Access or other database tools. In imis, even the Congregation Suite version, individual constituents are deemed customers, although like many aspects of imis, most field labels are configurable. imis does have the ability to manage families, and you can quickly see who is in a particular household, and who is a child, through an option on the household record screen called Roster. On a separate screen, you can also track non-household relationships between people in the database, such as grandparents, friends, and colleagues. You can distinguish between members and nonmembers within a family. You can also quickly see reminders and important facts (Nine-year Member, Discount Dues 5 percent) about the family in question through a friendly, icon-based dynamic Customer Service Alert that appears on the screen and can define an automated workflow for each task. Tabs in the system are customizable and can be hidden from view if they don t apply to a staffer (say, if you have a volunteer who shouldn t see financial information) and you can input user-defined fields to capture information you d like to track that s not already included in one of those built in. In the event of a divorce, the children in a household could remain with the custodial parent s record while the non-custodial parent could still be associated with the kids through relationship. The Congregation Suite for imis has a very comprehensive and complex donation management system in its Fundraising tab, which should handle everything most synagogues need and more. Tributes are not only handled in the system but encompass a whole module, and you can see who a gift honors and who gets the acknowledgement. There isn t any grant-tracking capacity in imis, though. The Congregation Suite for imis has a full-fledged Accounts Receivable system to help a synagogue manage its accounts, and can accommodate member dues, special dues and scheduling, and generate lots of financial reports. Most organizations that use imis don t use third party accounting software. PAGE 59 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

60 ances, RSVP for events, and see and edit their contact information online. Reporting is available through and SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS). The Congregation Suite for imis has full Yahrzeit tracking functionality built-in, and can accommodate both the Gregorian and Hebrew calendars. You can also quickly see all the Yahrzeits for a family with the relationship to the deceased associated with the individual who will be notified. As for broadcast , imis uses Informz as its preferred built-in tool, so you can send blasts to your congregation or to groups that you define using the software. imis has been a primarily installed system throughout its long history, but ASI is currently building out a more web-centric version and lower-cost version of the software that will also allow it to manage an organization s website through a user-friendly drag-and-drop content management model. Congregation Suite for imis runs on a Microsoft SQL Server, and ideally, synagogues will want a staff member onsite who knows how to maintain a database. The pricing for imis combined with the Congregation Suite from (C) Systems can range in price from $50,000 to $150,000 depending on the size of the congregation and the scope of the project. License fees are calculated based on named users, and expect to pay an annual Software Update Program that allows clients to access enhancements, bug fixes, and improvements to the platform. PAGE 60 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

61 Members360 Members360 is a web-based association management software program from Affiniscape. Strong at handling family units and memberships, special events, and member communications through broadcast and direct mail, it is less robust in donation management. Though the software is not currently targeted at the Jewish community, and thus lacks some of the built-in features important to synagogues, we were impressed with Members360 s customizability, power, and user-friendliness. The software is available at three tiers, but the lowest-end wouldn t allow synagogues to manage family units. M360 Core, the mid-level option, is $5,500 per year for unlimited user licenses and substantial customer support. The top tier, M360 Connected, costs $8,500 per year and also includes a Professional Development module. Both of these choices also require one-time website and database implementation costs that start between $4,500 and $5,500. Members 360 has an intuitive interface, and the dashboard which displays information about your individual constituents both members and nonmembers is both comprehensive and uncluttered. In its higher-end versions, Members360 has the ability to associate memberships with either individuals or family units (called companies in out-of-the-box language, but this can be customized), and you can see at a glance which individuals are in a household within the system. The software allows for customizable relationship types between members of the family and with other constituents in your database. Members360 also offers unlimited custom fields and customizable tabs throughout the system, so you can easily tailor the software to your synagogue s needs. There s no built-in capacity to differentiate children from adults in the database. However, kids can be accommodated by adding a different member type to the system, which could be configured to convert to a different kind of membership once the child hits a milestone birthday. For parents or guardians who might not live in the household, you can create a special relationship in Members360 to represent this connection to their child. Members360 also has a built-in, friendly querying system called SmartGroups, wherein synagogue staffers could easily call up all individuals in the database who match a particular criteria for instance, who have a mother-daughter relationship. Members360 s History feature not only timestamps all changes made to an individual record, but also gives a history of all system-generated broadcast s and notes. Anyone with a login to the system (member or not) can access a portal which allows them to view and edit their own demographic and contact information, their participation in boards and committees, register for events, access their receipts, and pay their balances. Administrators can tailor access to this portal as well as function- (but not field-) level access to the back end of the site for their staffers. The software allows for the collection of dues and customization of different dues terms and cycles and uses the third party collection client PlugAndPay to collect payments through credit cards. Members360 can t accommodate pledges, tributes given in honor of another constituent, or grants in its out-of-the-box functionality, though. It has some very sophisticated reporting tools, including an A/R aging report to see who is coming due on their accounts and which members are new, have dropped, or are in a grace period. The billing and invoicing information in Members360 can export to QuickBooks as journal entries with a few clicks. Broadcast is sent with the help of Members360 s own client, which doesn t provide open rates or other sophisticated reports. However, the software has an open API which can integrate with ConstantContact or another bulk system. You can choose to purchase some pre-formatted mail merge templates for and direct mail, PAGE 61 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

62 and synagogues can upload their own as well. Event management is very sophisticated, and it s easy to build an event from scratch, put an announcement on the website, a notice out to certain SmartGroups, and see who registered and who actually attended. Yahrzeits are not yet a part of Members360 s functionality, but the makers of the software felt that tracking and notification of the events could be handled by implementing a Hebrew calendar tracker with the API, building custom fields to track the Yahrzeit information on a member record, and creating SmartGroups who should be notified of upcoming Yahrzeits. Members360 is mobile-friendly on both the back- and front ends, and you don t need to know HTML or CSS to manage the website information that s public to your constituents. The software is available at three tiers, but the lowest-end wouldn t allow synagogues to manage family units. M360 Core, the mid-level option, is $5,500 per year for unlimited user licenses and substantial customer support. M360 Connected is $8,500 per year, and also includes a Professional Development module. Both of these choices also require one-time website and database implementation costs that start between $4,500 and $5,500. NOTE: Shortly before this report went to press, Affiniscape was acquired by another membership software company, YourMembership.com. We were unable to assess what this news means for the synagogue management space. PAGE 62 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

63 Microsoft Dynamics Microsoft Dynamics CRM is the software giant s answer to an integrated Constituent Relationship Management system, and is designed to be an all-in-one database accommodating all of an organization s needs. The Nonprofit Template, developed by Microsoft and available at no charge, transforms the outof-the-box sales-centric tool into a nonprofit-centric platform. It s pretty user-friendly and fairly strong in donation management, reporting, member management, correspondence, and . Event management and web portal capabilities are available but require additional configuration and more advanced technical knowledge to implement. Dynamics also lacks a Yahrzeit module, and it s not clear how easily the software could be customized to meet this need. For nonprofit organizations, the price for the hosted option is $ per year per user; the nonprofit pricing for the installed option is $212 for the server licensing and $30 per license. In Microsoft Dynamics, the software giant s integrated constituent management solution, individuals are constituents and family units are org/households made up of constituents. Both of these terms are flexible and customizable, and can be used to track lots of information. Ties between constituents, whether family members or business partners, are handled by making connections between them. Members and nonmembers are distinguished by checkboxes so that a household can be comprised of member constituents and nonmember constituents. As yet, constituents cannot log into their own accounts through a web portal through out-of-the box functionality, but some organizations have hired developers to work with the system s API to create this functionality in their implementations of the software. If you already use the Microsoft Office product suite, the look and feel of Dynamics will be somewhat familiar to you including the concept of a ribbon on the top of the screen on which many commands are clustered. The system also has a unique feature in the Record Wall, a back end social feature used to share insights about individuals and family units within a synagogue. Staffers can choose to follow specific records and be kept abreast of those activities. Synagogues concerned with restricting access to specific notes can assign different security restrictions to staffers logins. Microsoft Dynamics associates pledges and donations with specific campaigns, which can in turn be linked to specific accounting codes, and can distinguish between gifts to be recorded at the constituent or the household level. NPower Northwest, the consulting firm that conducted the software demo for us, has created an application so that Dynamics can work with QuickBooks, but the software doesn t have built-in capabilities to handle this. Dynamics CRM does integrate with Microsoft Dynamics GP. Grants are distinguished from gifts by a checkbox, but Dynamics doesn t have extremely sophisticated tracking abilities in this area. Memberships, too, may be tied to the creation of a campaign or related to a specific program, and dues are recorded as donations to these entities. Benefits tied to specific member levels, like reserved high holiday seating, would be considered Target Products in Dynamics. As a Microsoft product, Dynamics integrates seamlessly with the Office suite of products, including Word and Excel, as well as the Outlook and calendaring tool. Member direct mail correspondence is a snap to generate through mail merges, and one-off letters and s are also simple. All correspondence generated by the system is associated with the account of each constituent who received it. Broadcast can be sent through Dynamics own solution or through such mass tools as MailChimp, VerticalResponse, or Constant Contact. PAGE 63 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

64 Because Microsoft Dynamics doesn t have an outward-facing member portal as part of its out-of-the-box functionality, events created within the system wouldn t show up on a synagogue s website and members can t RSVP online. Assigned seating can be managed through the system, but not ticketing. The consultant who conducted our demo felt that accommodating Yahrzeit tracking and notification would be possible as a customization but would require a large amount of annual maintenance and some JavaScript capabilities on the staff end. Such standard reports as A/R aging reports are useful, but tech-savvy staffers could also write custom reports using Crystal Reports, Access, or other reporting tools and link to a dataset exported into Excel from Dynamics. Microsoft Dynamics CRM can be either a cloud-based or installed option, and pricing is based on which you choose to implement as well as how many concurrent users your organization will need. The criteria used to determine the best option for a given organization usually includes whether they already have a server available and wish to allocate staff time to manage and maintain the server, or have consultants who provide that service. For nonprofit organizations, the price for the hosted option is $ per year per user; the nonprofit pricing for on-premise is $212 for the server licensing and $30 per each client access license. PAGE 64 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

65 MM2000 MM2000 is a comprehensive synagogue management system with a useful integrated web module called MMOnTheWeb. It s strong in accommodating family units, membership- and donation-tracking, customer support, and specialized modules designed specifically to meet the needs of the Jewish community, but isn t as strong in terms of ease of use, broadcast , or user experience. The software starts at $2,750 for a single user for MM2000, with considerably higher charges for additional users and to add on modules that manage such important functions as schools. MMOnTheWeb is an additional $1,000 plus monthly hosting charges. For more than three decades, the makers of MM2000 have produced software specifically for synagogue management. They have successfully transitioned their system from MS-DOS to the Windows operating system, and are currently in the midst of building a web-based iteration of the program, scheduled to roll out in early The desktop-based software s design is somewhat dated-looking, but possesses impressive functionality and respectable power with many attractive features included in its basic package and an intuitive, menu-based interface that allows users to easily navigate between areas of the program and create reports. MM2000 is tailored to meet the needs of each individual staff person. For instance, the Executive Inquiry Dashboard is a read-only interface that displays a wealth of pertinent information about each member account, while a Clergy/Staff Inquiry displays the same information without the billing details. For broadcast , For broadcast , MM2000 includes an additional Blast module that handles broadcast either through its internal client or through export to Constant Contact or other broadcast providers that handle broadcast either through its internal client or through export to Constant Contact or other broadcast providers. Bulk direct mail is accommodated in MM2000 s basic functionality. With the Blast module, rather than having to build out a merge, you can quickly send out personalized notifications using.rtf templates to all members with an upcoming Yahrzeit in an upcoming date range, for example. You also have the option to export the data to a.csv file for a mail merge. Links to other clients for personal like Gmail and Outlook are seamless. MM2000 also handles children s records well if a child s parents get a divorce, the kid s member information can still be associated with both parents accounts without any difficulty. The user can create unlimited, customized groups to associate members with everything from the same blood type to a shared interest in art, and send those groups broadcast s using the Blast module. Accounting and billing is well-integrated with QuickBooks if one chooses to purchase the $250 QuickBooks Interface module, and information automatically syncs up with QuickBooks Journals. Customized A/R aging reports are easily generated, and thoughtful touches include the ability to assign a payment from a single check number from one member account to another, to split payments between check and credit card, and sophisticated tribute and pledge functionality. Member dues are easily tailored to different levels and billing cycles. Events, too, are wellaccommodated. You can assign revenue from the same event to different charge codes and see historical attendance data for anyone in the system. Optional add-ons include MMOnTheWeb, an online member portal that allows synagogue members to log in and edit their own demographic data, register for events, pay their balance with a credit card, and track their upcoming Yahrzeits. PAGE 65 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

66 Limitations to the online system feel well-thought out and not dictated by the difficulty of the programming task at hand for instance, the online portal doesn t allow members to edit their own Yahrzeit data to ensure the integrity of the data and prevent congregants from changing the dates to accommodate their own schedules. The data must be manually synced between the MMOnTheWeb platform and MM2000, but this is easily taken care of by an option in the MM2000 s MMOnTheWeb menu. Other modules that add to MM2000 s functionality include a school module, which has class, grade, and attendance functionality, and a cemetery management module which allows synagogues to keep track of open, reserved, and occupied plots and associate them with different member accounts. The cemetery management module, as well as the ability to manage event seating and track B nai Mitzvahs, are included in the basic MM2000 package. However, customization is somewhat limited. Each Inquiry Screen (Staff/Clergy or Executive) has a limit of five custom.rtf templates per staff login that can be associated with it, although you can also customize other correspondence templates that don t appear in the Inquiry Screen. Menus and fields also aren t customizable. Canned reports are plentiful and seem useful, but to create custom reports, a user must understand ODBC protocol or interface with Crystal Reports. The user is also somewhat limited to the out-of-the box interface in terms of member data to track and store. The aforementioned outdated design has a slightly negative effect on user experience, although this will probably be rectified in the upcoming web-based version. Right now MM2000 requires a Windows operating system, but smaller synagogues can get by without a dedicated server to run the platform. The software starts at $2,750 for a license for a concurrent user, and $3,350 for four additional users, with $600 buying an extra five-user license. Modules like the school and /mail functions are $300 to $500 more, and are also one-time payments. MMOnTheWeb is an additional $1,000 upfront plus hosting charges of $720 per year. Onsite implementation and training costs run $600 per day, and data conversion pricing is available by request. Family Units and Households Family Unit Summary: Lets you easily see in one place all individuals associated with a particular family unit, including kids and any other household members. Family Unit Details: Lets you track main address, contact information, and membership status for a family unit. Same Name Tracking: Lets you easily track multiple family units with the same family name. Deceased Household Members: Lets you mark and easily print out mailing labels with the deceased member excluded if an individual is marked as deceased, and automatically reconfigures the salutation to exclude the deceased member from the household. To exclude them from mailings, you need to enter 99 in the hold mailings field. Member Status: Lets you to mark that a family unit has resigned, has been suspended, or is no longer active. The member flag is changed to N, and the member type is changed to reflect why the family is not active. Alumni Members: It s not possible to track an alumni a young adult who is no longer a member but was a part of an active household in a way that relates the individual to their former household in a meaningful way. Divorce and Alternative Family Scenarios: Lets you associate a child with two family units (i.e. for divorced parents). It s possible to move existing constituents with all their history into a new or existing family unit (i.e. child starts their own family, divorce, aged parents moving back in.) Lets you account for nontraditional families (i.e. long-term non-married couples, same-sex marriages). Multiple Addresses: It s possible to track seasonal addresses for a family unit, including start and end dates. Basic Constituent Tracking Activity and Attendance: It s not possible to see all the recent activity tracked for an individual associated with a family unit, such as event attendance, in one place. You must record activities, clergy/staff interactions, and event attendance in different, compartmental places. To see constituents who are less involved, you d need to run an exception report. Relationship Tracking Outside Households: Lets you track family relationships outside a household in the Related PAGE 66 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

67 Families Inquiry Screen. Member / Nonmember Tracking: Lets you enter any individual into the database, even if not a member, and exclude nonmembers from member datasets. Different tiers of members in the database are identified by abbreviated codes. Demographic Tracking: Lets you track, but not customize, basic demographic information of every constituent, such as , phone number, birthday, age, gender. Faith and Observance Tracking: It s possible to track what tradition or movement an individual was raised in, how kosher they keep, if they ve been to Israel, whether an individual is Jewish (in a mixed-marriage household) and other faith and observance information, through creating Attributes and reporting on them. Occupation Tracking: Lets you track the occupation of the adults in the household, but not job history or organization. Volunteer Matching: It s not possible to track an individual s interests and skills though customizable fields to match them with potential volunteer opportunities, although you could accomplish this through attributes to match them with potential volunteer opportunities. There s no shift scheduling. Full Name Tracking: Lets you track the full name for each constituent in a household to account for spouses or kids with different last names. Constituent Source: It s not possible to associate the source of a constituent with a campaign, an event, or a staff member. Social Media: It s not possible to link to constituents social media pages within their records. Can manage temple s social media presence from the system s mobile app. Group and Committee Tracking: It s possible to see which adult in a household is a member of a group, committee, or auxiliary from the following screens: Individual activity entry/inquiry screen, Clergy/Staff Dashboard, Executive Dashboard. You can see everyone who s in that group by looking at the group view. Batch Constituent Entry: It s not possible to add or import basic information about a number of constituents at once. Children: Lets you track a child s age, day school, or college through built-in fields. Relationship Tracking Communications Tracking: It s not possible to see a quick summary of all recent communications and constituent actions in one place, including a manual log of communications with each constituent, such as phone calls or personal meetings, and a record of all system-generated letters and s for each constituent. Duplicate Tracking: It s not possible to merge duplicate records. Prospecting Workflow for Constituents: Lets you assign a priority, a stage, and a next action to a constituent to manage a prospecting workflow through campaigns. Prospecting Workflow for Organizations: There s no way to assign a priority and a stage to an organization to manage a prospecting workflow. Autoreminders: It s possible to create a reminder for yourself for a particular constituent, task and date, and show it prominently at that time by entering a note on the member record and recording a due date for it. It is not possible to do this for another staff member. Clergy Interactions: It s not possible to track who has had recent interactions with a clergy member (to be able to find those who haven t) unless that is tracked as an attribute. Pastoral Care: It s possible to track when a member is in the hospital or homebound through attributes, but not coordinate visitation. Buddy System: It s not possible to run a buddy system program, where new members are paired up with existing members. Membership Tracking Member Payments: Lets you associate payments for events and membership dues with family units, but not individuals, for billing purposes. Membership Types: Lets you track the membership type for a family unit (i.e. single, family, senior etc.). Membership Benefits: It s possible to associate membership prices with desired seating for the high holidays or other benefits, but not in a way that helps you manage your seating or other physical inventory. PAGE 67 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

68 New Member Signup: The process for entering a new member is complicated. Batch Invoicing: Lets you automatically generate invoices for a new cycle of membership dues in batch for all members. Outstanding Payments: Lets you see who has paid outstanding membership dues or event fees and who has not through a report. Member Fee Discounts: Lets you define a discounted membership fee for a particular family member, which is then billed accordingly, but the discounted amount is tracked. To record why a discount is given, staffers either enter a comment on the invoice screen or create a special self-defined discount code. Online Payments: Lets you accept payments online via credit card only. Online New Member Signup: It s not possible to sign up online for a membership. Event Management Event Seating (High Holidays): Lets you easily book and bill seat purchases, for general admission to specific areas, with member and nonmember price, and to a specific seat. However, in order to see what specific seats are still available, you can perform a report to see how many seats are taken. It s not possible to automatically assign members to areas of seating based on their membership levels. The system lets you create tickets with seating information in order to send them to the appropriate constituents by merging them out to templates. Online Registration: Lets people RSVP for the events ONLINE for general admission, with member and nonmember prices, but not specific seats. There s no overflow or waitlist management. Seat Map: It s not possible to see a seating map either for staffers or online. RSVPs: Lets you log, view and print who has RSVP d or registered for a particular event. Historical Event Attendance: It s not possible to see what constituents came to which event on their constituent record screens. Batch Event Importing: It s not possible to add or import basic information about a list of event attendees. Honor Tracking: Lets you track who served as aliyahs or other honors in past, with what specifically they did on what date, through attributes, which can be free text or validated. Lets you identify a group of people and send them a letter asking them to perform a particular honor, but you can t keep track of responses. It s not possible to easily create an ordered listing of aliyahs and honors for a given service, for the program book or to easily see who served as aliyahs or other honors in past, with what specifically they did on what date. Online Event and School Registration Registration and Payment: Lets constituents RSVP online for a free event, which is then captured in the database. Lets constituents register and pay online for an event or class, which is then captured in the database and the accounting information. Multiple Registration: Lets household members register other individuals for an event or class, but there s no way of keeping track of who they are or adding new people to the database from that registration. Back end Event Setup: Lets you create an online registration or RSVP form for a new event or class and set various event registration fees for a single event (i.e. adult/child or member/nonmember). Confirmation and Reminder s: Lets constituents automatically receive a confirmation with customizable text when they register online, but no reminders. Custom Fields: Lets you include custom fields in an online registration form, which are then segregated from the rest of the event information. Mobile Registration: There s no optimization for event signup for a smartphone or tablet, or from the mobile app. Wait List/Full Event: Lets you define the maximum number of people that can attend an event, and the online system will stop taking registrations with no wait list when the max is reached. Autofill: It s not possible to auto-populate online registration forms with constituent information. Calendaring: Lets you automatically update an internal website calendar when scheduling events through an outside calendaring system (Google Apps). PAGE 68 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

69 Observances and Gift Exchanges Anniversaries and Birthdays: Lets you easily create a list of all people with anniversaries or birthdays in a particular month (for Leagrams). Gift Messages: You can t track personal messages for gifts. Batch Entry: Lets you data enter a substantial number of tribute gifts in support of specific physical gifts (Purim Baskets). Gift Acknowledgement and Delivery: Lets you print a letter that provides all the names of those who supported an individual Leagram or Purim basket messages, but not their messages. Yahrzeits Hebrew Calendar Functionality: Lets you track dates, like Yahrzeits, on a Hebrew calendar. Hebrew Language Functionality: Lets you track words or names in Hebrew, with Hebrew letters. Yahrzeit Constituent Tracking: Lets you track the individual constituents who should be notified (i.e. surviving family members) of each particular Yahrzeit. Lets you view all the Yahrzeits that a particular constituent should be notified about. Yahrzeit Notification: Lets you generate letters or s notifying family members about an upcoming Yahrzeit. Gregorian or Hebrew Tracking: Lets you track whether a particular person s Yahrzeit should be observed based on the Gregorian or Hebrew calendar. Lets you autofill a Hebrew date of death based on a Gregorian date. Yahrzeit Listing: Lets you create a list of all Yahrzeits that will be observed in a particular timeframe (based on the desired observance timeframe/ calendar). Specific Yahrzeit Info: Lets you track, but not customize, the following specific information about a Yahrzeit: Is there a plaque? Hebrew name? How do you pronounce the name? Did they die during the day or evening? Online Yahrzeit Info: it s not possible for your congregants to enter information online about Yahrzeits they d like to be observed. Yahrzeit Plaques: Lets you automatically turn on the physical lights for the appropriate plaques for the week s Yahrzeits through an external program. Donation Tracking Individual vs. Family vs. Organization: All gifts are associated with family units, the basic unit of MM2000. To identify that a family unit is in fact an organization or a foundation, the synagogue would enter into the name as requested field the entity type. Quick Entry: It s not possible to quickly enter a number of gifts at one time through a streamlined quick-entry interface. Tributes: Lets you enter tribute gifts, with both the donor and the person honored and lets you track who has donated for a particular event and in support of what other family unit (Leagrams, Purim baskets). Multiple Campaigns: Lets you assign gifts to a particular source, campaign or fund, or split the gift across multiple of these. LYBUNT, SYBUNT: Lets you report on who gave to a particular campaign last year or at another time, in order to target them again this year. Pledges: Lets you enter pledges for future gifts, including the amount and scheduled date. This is then handled as an invoice and consolidated into statements. Last Donation: Lets you see the date and amount of a constituent s last donation. Recurring Donation: Lets a back end staffer set up a recurring donation (i.e. $10 per month to the Rabbi s discretionary fund), but constituents cannot do this through the member portal. Checkoff Contributions: Lets you track whether a constituent is opted in or out for a checkoff contribution, such as ARZA, and it goes to a separate account code. Grant Management: It s not possible to track and manage grants. PAGE 69 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

70 Overall Online Interactions Payment Codes: Lets you automatically pass online payment data to the system, and eventually to accounting, coded as to what the payment was for, if you set up different funds. Online Profile: Lets constituents view their own profile online and update their contact information. Lets you receive a notification when constituents update their profiles. Lets constituents update information online about their children (names, birthdates, schools). Lets constituents update their own online profile of interests, skills, and occupation. Constituents cannot unsubscribe from lists in the online profile. All of these actions requre the additional MMOnTheWeb. Online Surveys: It s possible to conduct online surveys through an integration with Wufoo and Google Apps, third-party services, in MMOnTheWeb. Mobile: Not optimized for a smartphone or a tablet. A new mobile app is available. CMS: Does not help manage synagogue s website. MMOnTheWeb integrates with your CMS. Facility and Staff Scheduling Calendaring for Space Rentals: It s possible to view what spaces are booked and which are available in a calendar format, or who has booked which space through an integration with Google Apps. Calendaring for Rabbi and Cantor: It s possible to see and manage a Rabbi s or Cantor s calendar through an integration with Google Apps. Billing for Space Rentals: Lets you invoice for the booking of a space. Contract and Deposit Tracking for Space Rentals: It s possible to track whether a contract or deposit has been received for a rental by associating them with a particular code in Accounts Receivable. Access and Security Remote Access: Lets you access constituent data through terminal services or VMWARE on a remote server. Data Access: Lets you create and enforce access to different types of data for different staff users. Constituent Access: There s no granularity in terms of access to different types of constituents for different staff users. Personalized View: There are two set views of the tasks and data that apply to staffers: Clergy/Staff view and Executive. Sending Broadcast s: Lets you send broadcast s directly from constituent database to defined or ad-hoc groups, through the Blasts Module, an additional cost. Opt-Out: Lets you generate a list of members for whom there s no address (i.e. to target them by mail instead). Unsubscribe: It s not possible to use the system to subscribe and unsubscribe constituents from all or particular lists, but this is available in Constant Contact, which integrates directly with MM2000 through the Blasts Module. Graphic Templates: The system doesn t let you use graphic templates to send broadcast s, but this is available in Constant Contact, which integrates directly with MM2000 through the Blasts Module. Statistics: It s not possible to see information about opens and click-throughs within MM2000. That information is available in Constant Contact, which integrates directly with MM2000 through the Blasts Module. Forwarding: It s not possible for constituents to forward s to a friend and still track the statistics, although you can do this in Constant Contact. Discussion Lists: It s not possible to create discussion lists for particular subsets of constituents. Statements: Lets you send out invoices and statements via rather than mail, which handles broadcast through its internal client. Direct Mail Labels: Lets you generate labels for an ad-hoc query of constituents. PAGE 70 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

71 Templates: Only a few templates to receive mail-merged data can be saved within the system. It s possible to create an ad-hoc template in Word, Publisher, or another program that accepts a.csv file. Response Tracking: Lets you track the response to a particular or direct mail campaign through the Blasts Module, which handles broadcast either through its internal client or through exporting to Constant Contact or other broadcast providers. Acknowledgements: Lets you easily create a one-off thankyou letter and label for a donation from a constituent record screen. Lets you easily create one-off tribute gift letters, which prints a letter and label for both the donor and the person honored and defaults to a customizable RTF. Lets you queue thankyou letters in order to print out a batch of letters and labels at one time. Lets you queue one-off tribute gift letters, to print a whole series of letters for both the donors and the people honored. Tax Letters: Lets you easily create year end tax letters which summarize all tax-deductible donations, for each constituent, by associating a goods/services level with each gift or dues renewal. Publication Management: Lets you use the system to manage mailing of and subscription to physical publications, like newsletters. Accounting Integration Accounting Overview: Lets you easily pass data to standard accounting systems including QuickBooks and Peachtree. Billed Revenue: Billed revenue data is NOT automatically passed to standard accounting systems at a Chart of Accounts account code level, but you can batch it. Received Revenue: Received revenue data is NOT automatically passed to standard accounting systems at a Chart of Accounts account code level, but you can batch it. Batches: Lets you set up the types of transactions that should be batched into each account code for the accounting system. Lets you create and track accounting batches in order to ease the reconciliation process with an accounting system. Lets you link a batch to a deposit slip number to tie it back to the accounting system. Customization Concealing Functionality: You can hide the Accounts Receivable module for anyone who does not have permissions to see it. This is the only piece of the system that can be hidden from view. Dropdowns: Dropdowns are populated with sample text out of the box. Staff can add unlimited items to the dropdown menus. Custom Fields: Its not possible to add custom fields. Renaming/Deleting Fields: It s not possible to rename or delete existing fields. Customization Process: The system isn t customizable whatsoever by a consultant or employee. API: It s not possible to access the API in order to update or add functionality. Invoicing and Payments Payment Plan: Lets you define a payment plan by entering a start date, end date, and number of payments, and the payments themselves will be automatically calculated. One-Offs: Lets you create a one-off invoice for a single payment. Viewing Invoices and Payment History: Lets you view a list of all invoices for a constituent and see the payment history for a constituent. What s Been Invoiced For: Lets you view which payments have been invoiced for when and which have not. Aging Report: Lets you run a built-in aging report, which includes a summary of overdue payments with information about how overdue they are. Other Invoicing: Lets you collect standard payment info: date, amount, payment types that are configurable, check number, etc. Lets you define how much of an applied payment is tax-deductible vs. non-deductible. Lets you write off an invoice as unreceivable. PAGE 71 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

72 Payment without Invoicing: Lets you apply a payment for any specific event/ service without first creating an invoice in the system. Group Invoicing: Lets you create a payment for a specific event/ service for everyone that meets a particular set of criteria (i.e. all members). Tax/Nontaxable: Lets you apply taxable and non-taxable amounts to a single invoice. Constituents Paying For Others: Lets you apply payment from one constituent to pay another s invoice through the Same Check, Another Member feature. All Open Invoices: Lets you see all open invoices and filter by key information (member/ nonmember, amount, event). Usability, Support, and Documentation Ease of Use Overview: The system is fairly straightforward to navigate, but suffers from an outmoded design. A novice user would have a hard time understanding its workflows. There are not many easy step-by-step wizards, searches or quick lists for many features. IT Skills: You ll need someone with skills maintaining relational databases to support the database. Help: There are three levels of help text in the system: tutorials, field-level help, and task suggestions at the bottom of most data entry screens. Training: Vendor provides , online and phone support for the system. Workflows: It s not possible to tailor the system to quickly do common tasks. Process Documentation: There s no way to process documentation to help staff understand how they re supposed to enter data to aid consistency. Religious School Tracking Child Info: Lets you track emergency contact information, doctor, insurance information for each enrolled child through a mix of built in fields and comments. Lets you track allergies, diet (kosher?), and special needs for each enrolled child through a mix of built in fields and comments. Class Info: Lets you print out a class list with key student information for teachers. Lets you assign children to particular classrooms or teachers by enrolling the child and listing the kids. Lets you track the current grade level of a child, both in day school and religious school. Class Promotion: You can automatically promote all children, but not hold some back. Attendance: Lets you easily input children s attendance through quick entry forms. Grading: Lets you track children s overall grade for each class they ve enrolled in. Cemetery Management Billing and Invoicing: Lets you track the person who should be billed for a cemetery plot. Lets you easily bill for the upfront fees (reservation, perpetual care) for a cemetery plot under grave care, perpetual or annual. Lets you easily create invoices based on monthly, quarterly, or semi-annual payment schedules for up-front payment of cemetery plots in A/R. Lets you easily create yearly invoices for ongoing annual fees related to cemetery plots. Plot Management: Lets you mark each plot as Available, Reserved, or Occupied. Lets you track who is buried in each plot number in a cemetery. Lets you track who has reserved each plot number in a cemetery. Lets you view what section and/or plot a particular constituent has reserved. Yahrzeits and Cemeteries: Lets you associate an individual Yahrzeit with a cemetery plot. // Lets you track the date of death for each individual in a cemetery plot. Lets you notify people associated with a cemetery plot of the Yahrzeit associated with the person buried. Constituents and Cemeteries: It s possible to associate the deceased person with people in the database through the following fields: Owned by, Paid By, Reserved for, and Relative. Digital Map: It s not possible to view a digital map to see allocated and unallocated plots. PAGE 72 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

73 Plaque Management: Lets you track if there s a memorial plaque associated with a plot in the Yahrzeit and Cemetery Module. Reporting and Querying Standard Reports: Lets you view a set of standard reports that account for typical synagogue needs (for instance, parents with kids in preschool, parents of kids in 6th grade, LYBUNT and SYBUNT reports, constituents with a particular set of skills or interests, who came to event X but not Y). Ad Hoc Reports: Lets you create ad hoc reports that allow staff to define what rows, columns, formulas, and formats are used through MS Query. Querying: The query-building process for a set of constituents who meet criteria for a standard set of fields is complex, and you cannot create a flexibility query for a set of constituents based on almost any field in the database. Reporting For Data Issues: It s possible to run several reports in the system to identify data issues. Dashboards: Lets you view two different dashboard that helps an Executive Director or a Clergy member track overall metrics about programs and finances. Excel: Lets you export a report or query to a friendly Excel file through a data link. Searching: It s possible to search the database for an existing person from anywhere in the interface. PAGE 73 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

74 NOAH NOAH is an impressive web-based member management system from JL Systems that has strengths in member tracking, customizability, invoicing and billing, broadcast , and event management. It s a strong and flexible system which could accommodate many synagogues needs, but it might be prohibitively expensive. Pricing for the system is based on concurrent users and costs $5,940 per year for the minimum five-user package, with each additional user costing $1,188 per year. On top of this, NOAH has a required fixed-price implementation and data conversion cost of $29,900, and charges $600 per 1,000 contacts in the database per year if you choose to have the system hosted by JL Systems. Web-based membership management system NOAH can track individuals and family units by treating the relationship as that of a company and its employees. There can be a designated head-of-household, which would serve as the household s primary record, and a synagogue could add children to the household and track specific information about them with custom fields. In the event of a divorce, the children s records could be associated with both parents households. You can group individuals in an unlimited amount of different folders to capture different kinds of information about them and associate them with other individuals in the database, like where they work or what committees they serve on. In NOAH, Members would be a folder under which constituents with memberships in good standing would be grouped, and a synagogue could then create folders to represent different types of membership within that container. Fields are highly configurable to a synagogue s specific needs you can very easily change the name or delete a field altogether. Broadcast s and one-offs to constituents with up to four different attachments can be sent out by NOAH, and system-generated s are displayed automatically in an individual or family unit s record. Broadcast is included with the cost of NOAH, and includes such helpful statistics as open rates and click-throughs. Synagogue administrators can also export to Constant Contact or another vendor, but broadcast is unlimited and without cost within NOAH. Phone calls and visits with congregants would be logged in a queryable notes field. Compared to other member management software we saw, NOAH has very robust accounting functionality in its RainMaker module, which can track pledges, split gifts between accounts, accommodate tribute gifts, prospect for major donors, and generate customized thank-you notes. Right now grant tracking isn t part of the system s power, though. You can manage different levels of members, send or disable automatic dues renewal reminders, and override certain dues without affecting a member s level or status. It s easy to generate an A/R aging report to see which of your constituents are coming due for what, and it s also simple to report on who is overdue on their account now. NOAH integrates with QuickBooks and Sage 50 (formerly Peachtree) on the general ledger summary level. If constituents want to pay their balance online they can log in through the web portal and use a credit card with Authorize.net. Users with a login can also search a member directory, control and customize what information they want displayed, and register themselves or family members for events. NOAH has a module to accommodate such smaller events as talks, and the capability to handle large events like annual meetings. You don t have to know HTML to build event announcements to send out and post on your website, but if you do, it s easy to customize them to your liking. A synagogue staffer can access a helpful dashboard which summarizes information about an upcoming event, and the system has the power to generate event tickets and table numbers (but not assigned seating above that). Historical event attendance is also summarized at the individual and family unit level. NOAH s continuing education module could be useful for synagogues with attached schools PAGE 74 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

75 looking to accommodate grading, transcripts, and certificates. The developers of NOAH don t currently have any modules that can accommodate Yahrzeit data, but seemed open to working with synagogues on customizing that piece of the system through a web application. NOAH s web portal and back end are entirely integrated, and it uses the open source DotNetNuke CMS, which has a vibrant user community that supports a variety of mobile platforms. NOAH is powerful, but fairly expensive. Pricing for the system is based on concurrent users and costs $5,940 per year for the five-user package, the minimum amount required, with each additional user costing $1,188 per year. On top of this, NOAH has a fixed price implementation and data conversion cost of $29,900, and charges $600 per 1,000 contacts in the database per year if you choose to have the system hosted by JL Systems. The first 90 days of unlimited support are included, but above that, customer service tickets are $160 per hour. PAGE 75 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

76 PatronManager PatronManager CRM is a web-based constituent management system from Patron Technology built upon the Salesforce CRM platform and targeted at arts and cultural organizations. It s got great abilities in donation tracking, event management, broadcast , and customizability, and has lots of potential for helping to keep track of various types of constituents for a synagogue, but out of the box it has very limited invoicing and billing abilities and can t yet support automatic recurring member dues although that feature is planned for an upcoming release. PatronManager has a mandatory setup, customization, and data-migration fee that starts at $2,500. Many of its organizations are billed on a per-ticket basis, but for synagogues, PatronTechnology would probably levy an annual subscription fee which the vendor says would start around $2,500 per year. PatronManager CRM is Patron Technology s web-based member management system targeted at arts and cultural organizations and built upon the Salesforce CRM platform. Its Salesforce underpinnings mean that it is easy to customize the system and incorporate add-ons from the Salesforce App Exchange. In PatronManager, individuals can be associated with family members and other constituents through relationships and you can create household accounts to represent family units. Children don t have a specific record type, but the system seems like it could reasonably accommodate the different kinds of data a synagogue would want to capture, as each area of the system comes with 500 custom fields. Donation and gift management in PatronManager is very useful. For major gifts and grants, synagogue staffers can log correspondence and other documentation associated specifically with the cultivation and funding process and use the system to work with each other on prospecting and donor management. You can create a multi-year pledge and adjust its payment terms in the system, too. But PatronManager doesn t have a built-in membership module to handle synagogue dues. PatronTechnology suggested that the recurring or bulk donation features could be adapted to accommodate this task, but acknowledged that member dues would have to be manually renewed at the close of each cycle. Invoicing and billing also isn t the strongest we saw. PatronManager doesn t have any sort of accounting module, but several third-party companies that work on the Salesforce platform build one-to-one synchronizations with external accounting software like QuickBooks and Peachtree. PatronManager does allow its users to collect payments using the system. PatronManager aggregates the weekly intake and gives each organization a lump sum check for the amount minus their fee for the service and credit card processing fees. Synagogues may also choose to use their own credit card processor, in which case they receive their intakes immediately. PatronManager doesn t have the out-of-the-box ability to generate an A/R aging report so that synagogue staffers can see which constituents are coming due for payments and who is overdue, or to easily write off overdue payments. However, PatronTechnology reports that such a report could be built-in for synagogues during the implementation phase. Since the software is based on the Salesforce platform, though, synagogues can add on these features using the App Exchange, where many apps are available for free or at a discount for nonprofits. PatronManager is very strong in event management. The software was built specifically for theatres and orchestras to handle internal box office and online ticketing. Synagogue staffers can create events, generate sophisticated reports on their progress, assign seats in a graphical module (event attendees can select their own seats, too), and sell tickets PAGE 76 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

77 using the system. PatronPortal, PatronManager s web-based portal, allows event attendees to RSVP and pay on line they can even share on their social media accounts that they re going to an event. (Although they can edit their contact information, they can t see a member directory.) Event microsites are easy to build and to tie in with the rest of your synagogue website s CSS so the new pages look seamless. When asked about Yahrzeits, PatronTechnology pointed us toward Hebrew Reminders, an app on sale on the App Exchange that can accommodate the Jewish calendar and generate reports regarding upcoming Yahrzeits if the synagogue staff adds a custom field to track that information. PatronTechnology started by producing PatronMail, a proprietary broadcast tool for cultural organizations, so the functionality within PatronManager CRM is extensive. PatronMail is included in PatronManager, and allows users to track and report on statistics. Third party integration with mass clients like Mail Chimp or Constant Contact isn t supported. Built-in mail merge for written correspondence with your constituents is serviceable, but you can upgrade PatronManager s mail merge capabilities through the CongaMail app, which is an additional $96 per user per year. PatronManager comes with nine user logons, and you can tailor the level of access associated with each on a very granular, field-based level. Annual subscription costs include unlimited user support from 9 a.m. through 6 p.m. Eastern time, five days a week, with additional emergency hours during evening and weekend hours. PatronManager has a mandatory setup, customization, and data migration fee of $2,500. Many of its organizations are billed on a per-ticket basis, but for synagogues, PatronTechnology would probably levy an annual subscription fee that would start at around $2,500 per year for synagogues. PAGE 77 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

78 The Raiser s Edge(i) The Raiser s Edge(i) by Blackbaud is a well-established, higher-end donor management tool that can help you manage your synagogue s gifts, grants, and tributes with ease. It s very strong in donation tracking, billing and invoice management (with the addition of The Financial Edge), events, Yahrzeits, and customer support, but isn t as strong in representing family units. Raiser s Edge(i) is a very powerful system with great power comes great complexity, however, and you ll need to have a pretty high comfort level with technology to easily navigate The Raiser s Edge(i). Pricing is based on concurrent users and starts at $6,300 for a perpetual license for a single user for the most basic implementation, which doesn t include the events module. Some synagogues already use the Raiser s Edge(i) software, and its maker has created specialized modules to adapt the tool to the needs of this sector. Particularly notable is the system s optional Yahrzeit module, which has full Hebrew calendar functionality and can even generate a report of all Yahrzeits in a particular Hebrew date range to be observed in a Gregorian time frame. When a user marks a constituent as deceased, a Yahrzeit data entry form automatically pops up to ensure that data is captured. As expected, donation tracking is very robust. You can easily automate payments on pledges and associate tribute gifts in honor of other members with the accounts of those being honored. The Raiser s Edge(i) has some of the more-sophisticated grant management capabilities we saw, with an included prospect module and proposal tracking. If your synagogue is particularly interested in seeking grants from external organizations, this could be a useful feature. The software is also quite strong in major gifts and sponsorships. In The Raiser s Edge(i), individuals are constituents and you can distinguish between members and nonmember constituents with a simple checkbox. As with all connections between constituents, family units are represented by linking constituents together through attribute relationships. This can be a bit confusing at the relationship-dashboard level, since you can see relationships ranging from a member s daughter to his golf partner. Young children can be designated as a non-constituent record, and can still be associated with their parents even after a divorce, since there s no specific household to divide. Membership management is perfectly serviceable. With the optional membership module, the Raiser s Edge(i) can accommodate different dues structures and tiers, and associate such benefits as high holiday seating with specific levels of membership. The online portal, supported by Blackbaud NetCommunity, allows constituents to edit and restrict their own contact information, register for events, and pay dues online. Special event microsites can be easily created with the additional event module, and although the system can manage assigned seating through a drag-anddrop wizard, it doesn t have robust ticketing capabilities. Constituent correspondence generated by the system, like Word documents or one-off s, are logged automatically to an individual s account as long as the synagogue staffer selects an option called Save this document as an action. Actions are part of the Raiser s Edge(i) s moves management functionality, and can be used in action tracks, a feature of the system, to shepherd your members toward more dedicated financial commitments. Broadcast is handled by the included Blackbaud NetCommunity solution, which includes campaign management and statistical reports for open rate, click rate, and other metrics. PAGE 78 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

79 The Raiser s Edge(i) integrates seamlessly with several other Blackbaud products, like The Financial Edge for general ledger software and Blackbaud NetCommunity for content management of the synagogue s public website which isn t helpful if you use other tools, like QuickBooks, for accounting, or VerticalResponse for broadcast . However, you can import financial data from the system to third party software fairly easily, and don t need to navigate a lengthy field-mapping process. There are many different standard reports available, ranging from financial data to membership demographics, but ad hoc reporting requires more of a learning curve.. Creating customized reports within the system is possible through the Query function, but requires some report writing experience. The Raiser s Edge(i) also integrates with Crystal Reports for customers with more complex needs. The security permissions of The Raiser s Edge(i) are related to user logons, and administrators can exert very granular control over each individual account, restricting what areas of the system they can view and hiding particular actions from users accounts, for example. Remote access is possible because The Raiser s Edge(i) is hosted by Blackbaud. Users can also access information on-the-go through a nascent mobile app, which is primarily read-only constituent data. If you host the system locally not an option recommended by Blackbaud you ll need a designated SQL server and a staffer tech-savvy enough to maintain it, as well as a Windows-based PC. Pricing for the Raiser s Edge(i) is based on concurrent users, and starts at $6,300 for a perpetual license for a single user for the most basic implementation. In addition, synagogues would be charged maintenance each year (offered at three levels) that includes customer support and upgrades, starting at about $1,500 per year. In addition to the license fee and the annual maintenance costs, Blackbaud charges one-time fees to install and configure the software and to convert data from a synagogue s existing system to The Raiser s Edge about $3,750 for implementation, and $3,000 for data conversion. For synagogues with more than 500 families, Blackbaud s Temple Management Solution may be a fit. It includes The Raiser s Edge(i), The Financial Edge, The Education Edge and The Yahrzeit Module, The Temple Management Solution is customized for your synagogue. Blackbaud requests a prospective client contact them directly for a quote. Synagogues who need to prioritize fundraising and who have staff tech-savvy enough to manage this powerful software might find The Raiser s Edge(i) particularly useful. Family Units and Households Family Unit Summary: It s not easy to see all the individuals associated with a family unit; all relationships associated with a household are shown together and it s difficult to determine who actually lives there. Family Unit Details: Lets you track main address, contact information, and membership status for a family unit. Same Name Tracking: Lets you easily track multiple family units with the same family name. Deceased Household Members: Lets you mark and easily print out mailing labels with the deceased member excluded if an individual is marked as deceased, and is prompted to choose the appropriate salutation to use for the spouse record in the future. When you enter an individual as deceased, system prompts you to automatically enter a corresponding Yahrzeit into its module and add the existing relationships in the database to be notified. Member Status: Lets you mark that a family unit has resigned, has been suspended, or is no longer active through a relationship to the synagogue as an organization. Alumni Members: Lets you track an alumni someone who is no longer a member if you associate him or her with household benefits and create a status. Divorce and Alternative Family Scenarios: Lets you associate a child with two family units (i.e. for divorced parents) or more than two family units as necessary. Lets you easily move existing constituents with all their history into a new or existing family unit (i.e. child starts their own family, divorce, aged parents moving back in). Lets you account for nontraditional families (i.e. long-term non-married couples, same sex marriages). Multiple Addresses: Lets you track seasonal addresses for a family unit, including start and end dates. PAGE 79 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

80 Basic Constituent Tracking Activity and Attendance: It s not possible to see all the recent activity tracked for an individual associated with a family unit, such as event attendance, in one place. You must track as actions, clergy/staff interactions, and event attendance in different, compartmental places. Blackbaud can provide custom views (view only) that at the time of customization. Relationship Tracking Outside Households: Lets you track and customize non-family relationships between individuals in the database. Member / Nonmember Tracking: Lets you you distinguish between different tiers of members and nonmembers in the database. Non-constituent relationship records are also available to track those individuals who don t have a direct connection to the synagogue, such as guests to an event. Demographic Tracking: Lets you track and customize basic demographic information of every constituent, such as , phone number, birthday, age, gender. Faith and Observance Tracking: Lets you track what tradition or movement an individual was raised in, how kosher they keep, if they ve been to Israel, whether an individual is Jewish (in a mixed-marriage household) and other faith and observance information, through attributes, which track individual characteristics such as typeof kosher observed, or actions for trips to Israel, which can be assigned dates and marked as upcoming or completed. Occupation Tracking: Lets you track the occupation and job history of the head-of-household of all adults. Volunteer Matching: Lets you track an individual s interests and skills through customizable attributes to match them with potential volunteer opportunities. Also offers a dedicated volunteer module, which costs additional. On the Volunteer Tab, you can find jobs or volunteers that have the characteristics you re looking for, when they re available, and what they re qualified for. Constituents can express interest for specific jobs and enter biographical details themselves online, but a staffer would still need to perform data entry on the back end. Some volunteer information, like availability and skills, are not available to enter online. Full Name Tracking: Lets you track the full name for each constituent in a household to account for spouses or kids with different last names. Constituent Source: Lets you associate the source of a constituent with a specific campaign, an event, or a staff member. Social Media: Lets you link to constituents social media pages within their records as an electronic address. Group and Committee Tracking: Let you track who in a household is a member of a group, committee, or auxiliary, and easily see everyone who s in that group, through either attributes or actions. Batch Constituent Entry: Lets you easily add or import basic information about a number of constituents at once in.csv or.txt formats. Children: Lets you track a child s age, day school, or college through built-in fields. Another Blackbaud product, The Education Edge, also provides more functionality around schedules and grading. Relationship Tracking Communications Tracking: Lets you see a quick summary of all recent communications and constituent actions in one place, including a manual log of communications with each constituent, such as phone calls or personal meetings, and a record of all system-generated letters and s for each constituent. You must choose Save this document as an action to save system-generated correspondence to a constituent record. Duplicate Tracking: Lets you easily search for and merge two records if it becomes apparent that those records are duplicates. Prospecting Workflow for Constituents: Lets you assign a priority, a stage, and a next action to a constituent to manage a prospecting workflow in the Prospect tab. The system provides support for wealth tracking, ratings, and proposals. The system can help you provide a workflow that assigns that specific course of action to a record, and can record a point of action and send auto-reminders to staffers for next steps. Prospecting Workflow for Organizations: Lets you assign a priority, a stage, and a next action to an organization to manage a prospecting workflow using the Solicitation module. Autoreminders: Lets you create a reminder for yourself for a particular constituent, task and date and show it prominently at that time. PAGE 80 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

81 Clergy Interactions: Lets you track who has had recent interactions with a clergy member through Actions. A custom dashboard can be configured to show this information such as all members who do not have an interaction this month. Pastoral Care: it s possible to track when a member is in the hospital or homebound, but not coordinate visitation. Buddy System: It s possible to create a buddy system program, where new members are paired up with existing members, by creating relationships between the buddies. Membership Tracking Member Payments: Lets you associate payments for events and membership dues with family units for billing purposes. Membership Types: Lets you track the membership type for a family unit (i.e. single, family, senior etc.). Membership Benefits: Lets you associate membership prices with desired seating for the high holidays or other benefits, and totals the number of seats reserved, but can t help you manage the number of seats left. You would need to employ the events module, which is an additional cost. New Member Signup: Lets you easily enter the information to sign up a new member. Batch Invoicing: Lets you automatically generate invoices for a new cycle of membership dues in batch for all members. Outstanding Payments: Lets you easily see who has paid outstanding membership dues or event fees and who has not through a dashboard. Member Fee Discounts: Lets you define a discounted membership fee for a particular family member, which is then billed accordingly, but the discounted amount is tracked, and lets you track why a discount on membership is being given. Online Payments: Lets you accept payments online via credit cards or e-check. Online New Member Signup: Lets prospective members fill out their membership forms online, and pass data into a holding tank for online interactions. A user then must review and accept into The Raiser s Edge(i). Event Management Event Seating (High Holidays): Lets you easily book and bill seat purchases, for specific seats (i.e. C7), and see what seats are still available. Lets you arrange or rearrange the seating plan. It s not possible to easily view who has sat in what kind/ level or what specific seat for previous events. Lets you account for non-paid reciprocity seats, for members of other synagogues. Event registrations are treated as gifts, and the registrations as receipts, and thus not quite tickets, with seating information. Front-end users can request a particular seat or section online, but that request does not automatically translate into a seat or section assignment on the staff end. Online Registration: Lets people RSVP for the events ONLINE for general admission (not specific seats), with member and nonmember prices. The system helps you manage overflow and waitlists. You would need to employ the events module, which is an additional cost. Seat Map: It s not possible to see a seating map either for staffers or online, although this is available in another software package that integrates with RE, Patron Edge. RSVPs: Lets you log, view and print who has RSVP d or registered for a particular event. You would need to employ the events module, which is an additional cost. Historical Event Attendance: Lets you easily flag which constituents came to a particular event on their records. You would need to employ the events module, which is an additional cost. Batch Event Importing: Lets you easily add or import basic information about a list of event attendees, including ones not currently in the database. You would need to employ the events module, which is an additional cost. Honor Tracking: Lets you easily input honors for a constituent based on a customized list of possible honors as an action and a gift record. Lets you easily create an ordered listing of aliyahs and honors for a given service, for the program book. Lets you easily identify a group of people and send them a letter asking them to perform a particular honor. Lets you track responses for those invited to perform a particular honor. PAGE 81 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

82 Online Event and School Registration Registration and Payment: Lets constituents RSVP online for a free event, which is then captured in the database. Lets constituents register and pay online for an event or class, which is then captured in the database and the accounting information. You would need to employ the events module, which is an additional cost. The Education Edge, another Blackbaud product, has the capacity to help your synagogue s school conduct online admissions, applications, and enrollment. Multiple Registration: Lets household members easily register other individuals in their household for an event or class, without having to login as someone else. Back end Event Setup: Lets you easily create an online registration or RSVP form for a new event or class and lets you set various event registration fees for a single event (i.e. adult/child or member/nonmember). You would need to employ the events module, which is an additional cost. Confirmation and Reminder s: Lets constituents automatically receive a confirmation with customizable text when they register online, and lets you send event reminders through the system. You would need to employ the events module, which is an additional cost. Custom Fields: Lets you include custom fields in an online registration form that are then easily viewable as a summary of event attendee information. You would need to employ the events module, which is an additional cost. Mobile Registration: Lets constituents sign up and pay for events from a smartphone or tablet, with mobile-optimized design. You would need to employ the events module, which is an additional cost. Wait List/Full Event: Lets you define the maximum number of people that can attend an event, and the online system will stop taking registrations with no wait list when the max is reached. You would need to employ the events module, which is an additional cost. Autofill: Lets you auto-populate online registration forms with constituent information (demographics, family members). You would need to employ the events module, which is an additional cost. Calendaring: It s possible to update a public website calendar when scheduling events through the system when using NetCommunity (included with The Raiser s Edge(i)). An internal calendar for staff view would be available and access would be limited by security permissions. Observances and Gift Exchanges Anniversaries and Birthdays: Lets you create a list (including a dynamic list) of all people with anniversaries or birthdays in a particular month (for Leagrams). Gift Messages: It s possible to track personal messages for gifts on the Notes field in the Gifts area. Batch Entry: Lets you easily data enter a substantial number of tribute gifts in support of specific physical gifts (Purim Baskets) with or without GL codes. If you associate a gift with a GL code, you can store it on the fund record and export that information to your GL software. Gift Acknowledgement and Delivery: Lets you print a letter that provides all the names and messages of those who supported an individual Leagram or Purim basket. Yahrzeits Hebrew Calendar Functionality: Lets you track dates, like Yahrzeits, on a Hebrew calendar. Hebrew Language Functionality: It s not possible to track words or names in Hebrew, with Hebrew letters. Yahrzeit Constituent Tracking: Lets you track the individual constituents who should be notified (i.e. surviving family members) of each particular Yahrzeit. Lets you view all the Yahrzeits that a particular constituent should be notified about. Yahrzeits are tracked as attributes, and are represented in the system as equivalent to other kinds of tribute gifts. Yahrzeit Notification: Lets you generate letters notifying family members about an upcoming Yahrzeit. Gregorian or Hebrew Tracking: Lets you track whether a particular person s Yahrzeit should be observed based on the Gregorian or Hebrew calendar. Lets you autofill a Hebrew date of death based on a Gregorian date. Yahrzeit Listing: Lets you create a list of all Yahrzeits that will be observed in a particular timeframe (based on the desired observance timeframe/ calendar). PAGE 82 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

83 Specific Yahrzeit Info: Lets you track using free-text fields (which can be modified or hidden) the following specific information about a Yahrzeit: Is there a plaque? Hebrew name? How do you pronounce the name? Did they die during the day or evening? Online Yahrzeit Info: Lets your congregants enter information online about Yahrzeits they d like to be observed. Yahrzeit Plaques: It s not possible to automatically turn on the physical lights for the appropriate plaques for the week s Yahrzeits. Donation Tracking Individual vs. Family vs. Organization: Lets you track whether a gift was given by a whole family unit, an organization, or an individual within it, primarily for thankyou letters, and issue soft credit to multiple individuals associated with a gift. Soft credit can be automated through relationships. Quick Entry: Lets you quickly enter a number of gifts at one time through a streamlined quick-entry interface. Tributes: Lets you enter tribute gifts, with both the donor and the person honored and lets you track who has donated for a particular event and in support of what other family unit (Leagrams, Purim baskets). Multiple Campaigns: Lets you assign gifts to a particular source, campaign or fund, or split the gift across multiple of these. LYBUNT, SYBUNT: Lets you report on who gave to a particular campaign last year or at another time, in order to target them again this year. Pledges: Lets you enter pledges for future gifts, including the amount and scheduled date. This is then handled as an invoice and consolidated into statements. Last Donation: Lets you see the date and amount of a constituent s last donation. Recurring Donation: Lets a back end staffer or a member set up a recurring donation (i.e. $10 per month to the Rabbi s discretionary fund). Checkoff Contributions: Lets you automatically add a line item on invoices for constituents opting in for a checkoff contribution, alongside their membership fee, but it won t go to a separate account code. You can manually batch out the amount. Lets you track whether a constituent is opted in or out for a checkoff contribution, such as ARZA. Grant Management: Lets you track and manage grants being sought through a dedicated Prospects module, which allows you to upload the attachments like the initial proposal and subsequent repairs. Overall Online Interactions Payment Codes: Lets you automatically pass online payment data to the system, and eventually to accounting, coded as to what the payment was for. Online Profile: Lets constituents view their own profiles online and update their contact information, but the system does not send a notification when constituents update their profiles. Lets constituents update information online about their children (names, birthdates, schools.) Lets constituents update their own online profiles of interests, skills, and occupation. Lets constituents unsubscribe from lists in the online profile. Online Surveys: Lets you conduct online constituent surveys, and responses are automatically pulled into the database, if you use NetCommunity. Mobile: Not optimized for a smartphone or a tablet on back end, but front end. There is a mobile app for staff users. CMS: Helps manage the synagogue s website with NetCommunity, which can be the primary website management tool or can be used to an integration with a third-party CMS. Facility and Staff Scheduling Calendaring for Space Rentals: It s not possible to view what spaces are booked and which are available in a calendar format, or who has booked which space. Calendaring for Rabbi and Cantor: It s possible to see and manage a Rabbi s or Cantor s calendar when using NetCommunity (included with The Raiser s Edge(i)). Calendars can be made private through security permissions. PAGE 83 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

84 Billing for Space Rentals: Lets you bill for the booking of a space, but it would be treated as a gift record. Contract and Deposit Tracking for Space Rentals: Lets you track whether a contract or deposit has been received for a rental. Access and Security Remote Access: Lets you access constituent data through a remote browser only if you choose to have Blackbaud host the system. Data Access: Lets you create and enforce access to different types of data for different staff users. Constituent Access: Lets you create and enforce access to different types of constituents for different staff users. Personalized View: Lets multiple staff people each see a personalized view of the tasks and data that apply to them. Lets staffers customize their own dashboards. Sending Broadcast s: Lets you send broadcast s to specific groups identified in the database, but not ad-hoc segments, using NetCommunity. Opt-Out: Lets you easily generate a list of members for whom there s no address (i.e. to target them by mail instead). Unsubscribe: Lets you easily subscribe and unsubscribe constituents from all or particular lists, using NetCommunity. Graphic Templates: Lets you use graphic templates to send broadcast s, using NetCommunity. Statistics: Lets you track information about opens and click-throughs using NetCommunity. Forwarding: It s not possible to let constituents forward s to friends and still track the statistics. Discussion Lists: Lets you create discussion lists for particular subsets of constituents (i.e. committees, those in a particular class) using NetCommunity. Statements: Lets you send out invoices and statements via rather than mail through NetCommunity. Statements are sent as a hyperlink within an , not attachments. Direct Mail Labels: Lets you easily generate labels for an ad-hoc query of constituents. Templates: Lets you create flexible templates to receive mail-merged data. Response Tracking: Lets you track the response to a particular or direct mail campaign. Acknowledgements: Lets you easily create a one-off thankyou letter and label for a donation. Lets you easily create one-off tribute gift letters, which prints a letter and label for both the donor and the person honored. Lets you queue thankyou letters in order to print out a batch of letters and labels at one time. Lets you queue one-off tribute gift letters, to print a whole series of letters for both the donors and the people honored. Tax Letters: Lets you easily create year end tax letters which summarize all tax-deductible donations, for each constituent. Publication Management: Lets you use the system to manage mailing of and subscription to physical publications, like newsletters. Accounting Integration Accounting Overview: The system is designed to integrate with and offers a one-click wizard to The Financial Edge, another Blackbaud product. Billed Revenue: Billed revenue data is automatically passed to standard accounting systems at a Chart of Accounts account code level. Received Revenue: Received revenue data is automatically passed to standard accounting systems at a Chart of Accounts account code level. Batches: Lets you set up the types of transactions that should be batched into each account code for the accounting system. Lets you create and track accounting batches in order to ease the reconciliation process with an accounting system. Lets you PAGE 84 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

85 link a batch to a deposit slip number to tie it back to the accounting system. Lets you batch and transfer payments received online into the accounting system. Customization Concealing Functionality: Lets you hide or rename fields that don t apply to your temple. Security can be configured to hide areas from particular user groups. Dropdowns: Lets you customize dropdown values for fields such as campaigns, type of relationships and others. Custom Fields: It s not possible to add unlimited number of custom fields, which can be placed on most screens in the system. An attributes tab is available for each record type for configuration. Renaming/Deleting Fields: Lets you rename or hide existing fields. Customization Process: The system not customizable by the vendor, but is by consultants or staffers. API: It s possible to access the API in order to update or add functionality, in a non-hosted environment, for an additional cost. Invoicing and Payments Payment Plan: Lets you define a payment plan by entering a start date, end date, and number of payments, and the payments themselves will be automatically calculated. One-Offs: Lets you create a one-off invoice for a single payment. Viewing Invoices and Payment History: Lets you view a list of all invoices for a constituent and lets you easily see the payment history for a constituent. What s Been Invoiced For: Lets you view which payments have been invoiced for when and which have not. Aging Report: Lets you run a built-in aging report, which includes a summary of overdue payments with information about how overdue they are. Other Invoicing: Lets you apply a payment to any specific invoice or pledge in the system. Lets you collect standard payment info: date, amount, payment types that are configurable, check number, etc. Lets you define how much of an applied payment is tax-deductible vs. non-deductible. Payment without Invoicing: Lets you apply a payment for any specific event/ service without first creating an invoice in the system. Group Invoicing: Lets you create a payment for a specific event/ service for everyone that meets a particular set of criteria (i.e. all members). Tax/Nontaxable: Lets you apply taxable and non-taxable amounts to a single invoice. Constituents Paying For Others: Lets you apply payment from one constituent to pay another s invoice, or to any outstanding balance within the system. All Open Invoices: Lets you see all open invoices and filter by key information (member/ nonmember, amount, event). Usability, Support, and Documentation Ease of Use Overview: The system is largely free of clutter and straightforward, but staffers will require substantial training before using this powerful system. There are some helpful step-by-step wizards, searches and quick lists. IT Skills: You ll need someone with technical skills to support the database and its server if you host it yourself. You can also opt to have Blackbaud host the implementation of The Raiser s Edge(i) and outsource that process. Help: Lets you access a useful combination of help text throughout the application, online help, written manuals and recorded trainings to help staff understand how to use the system. Training: The vendor provides substaintial options for and phone support and web/live trainings are plentiful. Blackbaud has tiered customer service options at different price points. Workflows: Lets experts use the system to quickly do common tasks, tailored to their own workflow. PAGE 85 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

86 Process Documentation: It s possible to process documentation to help staff understand how they re supposed to enter data, aid consistency, through user forums online. Religious School Tracking Child Info: Lets you track emergency contact information, doctor, insurance information for each enrolled child through built-in fields on their non-constituent records. Lets you track allergies, diet (kosher?), and special needs for each enrolled child. Class Info: Lets you track the current grade level of a child, both in day school and religious school, through built-in fields. It s possible to create attributes to represent teacher and room and thus to print out a class list with key student information for teachers, and assign children to particular classrooms or teachers. Class Promotion: It s not possible to automatically promote all children to the next grade level at the end of the year, with the option to hold some back in The Raiser s Edge(i), but this is a feature in The Education Edge, a separate Blackbaud tool that integrates with RE. Attendance: It s not possible to track student attendance in The Raiser s Edge(i), but this is a feature in The Education Edge, a separate Blackbaud tool that integrates with RE. Grading: It s not possible to track a student s overall grade in The Raiser s Edge(i), but this is a feature in The Education Edge, a separate Blackbaud tool that integrates with RE. Cemetery Management Billing and Invoicing: It s possible to track the person who should be billed for a cemetery plot if you opt to add Financial Edge to your implementation. Plot Management: It s possible to track who is buried in each plot number in a cemetery, track who has reserved each plot number in a cemetery and view what section and/or plot a particular constituent has reserved through Attributes on the constituent s record. Yahrzeits and Cemeteries: It s not currently possible to associate an individual Yahrzeit with a cemetery plot. Date of death is a standard field within a constituent record. Constituents and Cemeteries: It s possible to track the names and relationship of surviving relatives for an individual buried in the cemetery, and lets you associate the deceased person buried in the cemetery, and their plot, with their family unit through Attributes on the constituent s record. Digital Map: It s not possible to view a digital map to see allocated and unallocated plots. Plaque Management: Lets you track if there s a memorial plaque associated with a plot, and if so, where it is, through an attribute on the Constituent Record. Reporting and Querying Standard Reports: Lets you view a set of standard reports that account for typical synagogue needs (for instance, parents with kids in preschool, parents of kids in 6th grade, LYBUNT and SYBUNT reports, constituents with a particular set of skills or interests, who came to event X but not Y). Ad Hoc Reports: You can create ad hoc reports, but you must use Crystal Reports. Querying: Lets you query for a set of constituents who meet criteria for a standard set of fields and lets you create a flexibility query for a set of constituents based on almost any field in the database. Reporting For Data Issues: Lets you identify possible data issues (i.e. duplicates, inconsistent data entry) from reports provided by the system. Dashboards: Lets you view and customize dashboards that help you track overall metrics about programs and finances. Excel: Lets you export a report or query to a friendly Excel file. Searching: Lets you quickly search the database for an existing person from anywhere in the interface. PAGE 86 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

87 Salesforce Nonprofit Starter Pack Salesforce is a CRM platform used widely in the for-profit world. The company offers up to 10 user licenses free-of-charge to qualifying organizations with its Nonprofit Starter Pack. Strong in household management, donation management, and member management, Salesforce is not as strong in event management, and doesn t include a portal where members can interact with your synagogue online. Salesforce is technically free, but to properly configure and support the system, you ll need the services of someone tech-savvy enough to navigate its substantial technical intricacies and possibilities. In addition, the apps you d need to assemble a system that meets the requirements for most synagogues could potentially cost you thousands of dollars per year. You can purchase Cloud for Synagogues, a version of Salesforce that s been customized for synagogues and reviewed elsewhere in this report. Salesforce is a CRM platform used widely in the for-profit world. You can choose to implement the Core version of Salesforce, but the company offers up to 10 user licenses free of charge to 501(c)(3) organizations. Salesforce also offers a Nonprofit Starter Pack customized to fit some basic requirements of the general not-for-profit sector that includes five managed packages: Contacts and Organizations, Households, Affiliations, Relationships, and Recurring Donations. In the nonprofit edition, you can track individuals (known as contacts ), organizations, and households. The information that you track about all these entities is extremely customizable, and it s easy to add, rename, or remove fields on the constituent record screen. You can even customize the software so that it has a different appearance for each staff user and tailor the areas they can see and edit. There s no out-of-the box way to track children in Salesforce, but adding custom fields to track their information wouldn t be difficult. In the event of a divorce, you could add a new relationship type to represent a noncustodial parent-child situation, and the parent who moved out would keep his or her history of giving and activity with the synagogue in the new household, too. Salesforce allows you to blind carbon copy, or bcc, the system in s to people in your database and automatically includes that correspondence in the constituent record screen. Donation management is strong in the Salesforce Nonprofit Starter Pack. You can use the software to manage pledges, schedule reminders, and write off or adjust payments on those pledges. You can also set up recurring donations in the system, which could conceivably be used to manage member dues renewal. Indeed, the software comes out of the box (with the Nonprofit Starter Pack) with the ability to manage membership tiers, start and end dates, and exclude membership transactions from donation summaries should you choose to do so. Grant management on the Salesforce platform is the strongest we saw in the systems reviewed for this report, and you can track proposals, reports, and opportunities with ease. The platform is also excellent in terms of prospecting and moves management to help you find donors and move them to higher levels of support. Salesforce has a robust App Exchange where developers offer plugins to extend the software s capabilities in various areas. This a-la-carte approach means that some functions important to synagogues aren t included in the Salesforce Nonprofit Starter Pack, and the free user licenses don t include these add-ons. For instance, there s no clear way to manage your synagogue s events in Salesforce without an external app like Acteva, nor can you give your constituents access to a member portal to register for events or other useful online interactions or integrate the software with your synagogue s website out of the box. For this you d need to implement an app called SiteForce, which could potentially cost your synagogue thousands of dollars per year. Most mail merge and broadcast functionality would PAGE 87 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

88 also need an external app, like the popular Conga Merge. Salesforce doesn t have the built-in ability to manage the Hebrew calendar, but the system is very strong in automated Triggers that could help a synagogue manage Yahrzeit reminders. There s also an existing Hebrew calendar plugin on the App Exchange called Hebrew Reminders that converts from the Gregorian to Hebrew calendar, which would be useful in customizing Salesforce for synagogues. In terms of reporting, there s no built-in A/R aging report, but the Nonprofit Starter Pack includes some useful reports like who gave last year, or who has given in any year. Salesforce has a powerful search function that lets you do a full text search from almost anywhere in the system, but it has some limitations in querying across different types of records for example, it s hard to build a query against overall household data and pull up individual information for the head of the household. Salesforce is free for up to 10 nonprofit user licenses, but to properly configure the system you ll need the services of someone proficient in working with databases and willing to take on a substantial learning curve or a consultant. For advanced customization, you ll need to be able to work with Apex, Salesforce s proprietary coding language. There s also no tech support for the Nonprofit Starter Pack, so you d have to engage a consultant if you needed help. In addition, the apps you d need to assemble a system that meets the requirements for most synagogues could potentially costs thousands of dollars per year. Family Units and Households Family Unit Summary: Lets you easily see in one place all individuals associated with a particular family unit, including kids and any other household members. Family Unit Details: Lets you track main address, contact information, and membership status for a family unit. Same Name Tracking: Lets you easily track multiple family units with the same family name. Deceased Household Members: Lets you mark an individual as deceased through a custom field, but without excluding them from labels or mailings. You could configure the system to trigger a Do Not function if deceased was selected. Member Status: Lets you mark that a family unit has resigned, has been suspended, or is no longer active if you create a status to indicate one of these through a custom field. Alumni Members: Lets you track an alumni someone who is no longer a member through a custom field. Divorce and Alternative Family Scenarios: Lets you easily move an existing constituent with all their history into a new or existing family unit. Lets you associate a child with two family units. Lets you account for nontraditional families (i.e. long-term non-married couples, same-sex marriages) if you create a status to represent this relationship. Lets you account for mixed-marriage couples if you create a status to represent this relationship. Multiple Addresses: Lets you track seasonal addresses for a family unit, including start and end dates. Basic Constituent Tracking Activity and Attendance: Lets you see all the recent activity tracked for an individual associated with a family unit, such as event attendance. You can report on activity if you add the external Groundwire Engage app, which allows you to manage different levels of constituents and automatically calculates an engagement score based on event attendance, donations, open rate, and other factors. Relationship Tracking Outside Households: Lets you track and customize non-family relationships between individuals in the database. Member / Nonmember Tracking: Lets you enter any individual into the database, even if not a member, and easily exclude nonmembers from member datasets. Lets you distinguish between different tiers of members and nonmembers in the database, if you add the tiers. Demographic Tracking: Lets you track and customize basic demographic information of every constituent, such as , phone number, birthday, age, gender. Faith and Observance Tracking: Lets you track what tradition or movement an individual was raised in, how kosher they PAGE 88 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

89 keep, whether an individual is Jewish (in a mixed-marriage household) and other faith and observance information through custom fields. For tracking trips to Israel it was suggested that either custom fields capturing historical date information or associating trips with specific campaigns could work well. Occupation Tracking: Lets you track the occupation and job history of adults in the household, and link to the organizations associated with them. Volunteer Matching: Lets you track an individual s interests and skills to match them with potential volunteer opportunities through a free external app, Volunteers for Salesforce, which also lets you schedule specific shifts on a shared calendar. Full Name Tracking: Lets you track the full name for each constituent in a household to account for spouses or kids with different last names. Constituent Source: Lets you associate the source of a constituent with a specific campaign, an event, or a staff member. Social Media: Lets you link to constituents social media pages within their records through the Social Profile feature. Group and Committee Tracking: Let you track who in a household is a member of a group, committee, or auxiliary, and easily see everyone who s in that group. Batch Constituent Entry: Lets you easily add or import basic information about a number of constituents at once. Children: Lets you track a child s age, day school, or college through custom fields. Relationship Tracking Communications Tracking: Lets you see a quick summary of all recent communications and constituent actions in one place, including a manual log of communications with each constituent, such as phone calls or personal meetings, and a record of all system-generated letters and s for each constituent. Duplicate Tracking: Lets you easily merge two records if it becomes apparent that those records are duplicates through a dedicated Merge Contacts tool. Prospecting Workflow for Constituents: Lets you assign a priority, a stage, and a next action to a constituent to manage a prospecting workflow using the Opportunities module. External apps like Soapbox Engage also help with move management. Prospecting Workflow for Organizations: Lets you assign a priority, a stage, and a next action to an organization to manage a prospecting workflow using the Opportunities module. External apps like Soapbox Engage also help with move management. Autoreminders: Lets you create a reminder for yourself or other staff for a particular constituent, task and date, and show it prominently at that time through a built-in calendar tool. Clergy Interactions: Lets you track which constituents have had recent interactions with a clergy member by tracking those interactions as activities, and see who hasn t by reporting who hasn t been associated with that activity. Pastoral Care: Lets you track when a member is in the hospital or homebound and trigger reminders on staff accounts to visit them. Buddy System: It s possible to conduct a buddy system program, where new members are paired up with existing members, by configuring a Relationship type of Buddy and associating the two. Membership Tracking Member Payments: Lets you associate payments for events and membership dues with family units for billing purposes. Membership Types: Lets you track the membership type for a family unit (i.e. single, family, senior etc.) through custom fields. An external app, Soapbox Engage, adds considerable functionality. Membership Benefits: It s not possible to easily associate membership prices with desired seating for the high holidays or other benefits without an external app. New Member Signup: Lets you easily enter the information to sign up a new member. Batch Invoicing: It s not possible to generate invoices for a new cycle of membership dues in batch for all members without an external app. Outstanding Payments: Lets you see who has paid outstanding membership dues or event fees and who has not through PAGE 89 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

90 standard reporting. Member Fee Discounts: Lets you define a discounted membership fee for a particular family member, which is then billed accordingly, and the discounted amount is tracked, but you can t see why it s being given. Online Payments: It s not possible to collect payments online without an external app. Online New Member Signup: It s not possible to sign up online for a membership without an external app. Event Management Event Seating (High Holidays): It s not possible to book and bill seat purchases without an external app like Acteva. Online Registration: It s not possible to RSVP online for events without an external app like Acteva. Seat Map: It s not possible to see a seating map for staffers or online without an external app like Acteva. RSVPs: It s not possible to log, view and print who has RSVP d or registered for a particular event without an external app like Acteva. Historical Event Attendance: It s not possible to see what constituents came to which events without an external app like Acteva. Batch Event Importing: Lets you easily add or import basic information about a list of event attendees, including ones not currently in the database. Honor Tracking: Lets you track who served as aliyahs or other honors in past, with what specifically they did on what date, through custom fields. It s not possible to track Hebrew dates without an external app like Hebew Reminders. If the aliyah is tracked as an activity: Lets you easily input honors for a constituent based on a customized list of possible honors. Lets you easily create an ordered listing of aliyahs and honors for a given service, for the program book. Lets you easily identify a group of people and send them a letter asking them to perform a particular honor. Lets you track responses for those invited to perform a particular honor through campaigns. Online Event and School Registration Registration and Payment: It s not possible to let constituents RSVP online for a free or paid event without an external app. Multiple Registration: It s not possible to register other household members for an event or class without logging in as someone else. Back end Event Setup: It s not possible to easily create an online registration or RSVP form for a new event or class or set fees without an external app. Confirmation and Reminder s: It s not possible to send event reminders or confirmations through the database without an external app. Custom Fields: Lets you include substantial custom fields (meal preferences, interests, seating requests) on an online registration form that are then easily viewable as a summary of event attendee information. Mobile Registration: Lets constituents sign up and pay for events from a smartphone or tablet, with mobile-optimized design. Wait List/Full Event: It s not possible to define the maximum number of people that can attend an event without an external app. Autofill: Lets you auto-populate online registration forms with constituent information (demographics, family members). Calendaring: Lets you automatically update an internal calendar when scheduling events through the system, which can only be shared within Salesforce. External apps are available to publish a shared calendar online or in another program. Observances and Gift Exchanges Anniversaries and Birthdays: Lets you easily create a list of all people with anniversaries or birthdays in a particular month (for Leagrams) if you track that information in a custom field. Gift Messages: You can t track personal messages for gifts. Batch Entry: It s not possible to batch enter tributes in support of physical gifts without an external app. PAGE 90 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

91 Gift Acknowledgement and Delivery: It s not possible to report on who supported or who should receive an individual Leagram or Purim basket without an external app. Yahrzeits Hebrew Calendar Functionality: It s not possible to track dates on the Hebrew calendar out of the box, but there are external apps like Hebrew Reminders. Hebrew Language Functionality: It s not possible to track words or names in Hebrew, with Hebrew letters. Yahrzeit Constituent Tracking: Lets you track the individual constituents who should be notified (i.e. surviving family members) of each particular Yahrzeit if you track that information in a custom field. Lets you view all the Yahrzeits that a particular constituent should be notified about if you track that information in a custom field. Yahrzeit Notification: It s not possible to generate letters notifying family members about an upcoming Yahrzeit without customization and an external mail merge app. Gregorian or Hebrew Tracking: It s not possible to track whether a particular person s Yahrzeit should be observed based on the Gregorian or Hebrew calendar without customization and an external app. Yahrzeit Listing: It s not currently possible to create a list of all Yahrzeits that will be observed in a particular timeframe (based on the desired observance timeframe/ calendar) but this could be done if the system were customized to accommodate the Hebrew calendar and a Yahrzeit field was configured. Specific Yahrzeit Info: Lets you track AND customize specific information about a Yahrzeit: Is there a plaque? Hebrew name? How do you pronounce the name? Did they die during the day or evening? Online Yahrzeit Info: It s not possible for your congregants to enter information online about Yahrzeits they d like to be observed without an external app. Yahrzeit Plaques: It s not possible to automatically turn on the physical lights for the appropriate plaques for the week s Yahrzeits. Donation Tracking Individual vs. Family vs. Organization: Lets you track whether a gift was given by a whole family unit or an individual within it, primarily for thankyou letters. Lets you associate gifts with an organization as opposed to individuals. Quick Entry: It s not possible quickly enter a number of gifts at one time through a streamlined quick-entry interface out of the box. Tributes: Lets you enter tribute gifts, with both the donor and the person honored, with minimal customization by creating a lookup field on the Opportunity (gift). Multiple Campaigns: Lets you assign gifts to a particular source, campaign or fund, or split the gift across multiple of these. LYBUNT, SYBUNT: Lets you easily see who gave to a particular campaign last year or at another time, in order to target them again this year. Pledges: Lets you enter pledges for future gifts, including the amount and scheduled date. This is then handled as an invoice and consolidated into statements. Last Donation: Lets you easily see the date and amount of a constituent s last donation. Recurring Donation: Lets you set up a recurring donation (i.e. $10 per month to the Rabbi s discretionary fund) or lets a member set up a recurring donation (i.e. $10 per month to the Rabbi s discretionary fund. Checkoff Contributions: It s not possible to track checkoff contributions without customization. Grant Management: Lets you track and manage grants being sought through a dedicated module. Overall Online Interactions Payment Codes: Lets you automatically pass online payment data to the general ledger system. You could track accounting codes in a custom field and export to the GL system. Online Profile: Lets constituents view their own profile online and update their contact information, receive a notifica- PAGE 91 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

92 tion when constituents update their profiles, lets constituents update information online about their children (names, birthdates, schools) and lets constituents update their own online profile of interests, skills, and occupation with an external tool, Soapbox Engage. Online Surveys: It s not possible to conduct online surveys without an external app. Mobile: Optimized for a smartphone or a tablet on front or back end with a native HTML5 mobile interface. CMS: Helps you manage the synagogue s website if you use another tool, SiteForce, in conjunction. Facility and Staff Scheduling Calendaring for Space Rentals: It s not possible to view what spaces are booked and which are available in a calendar format, or who has booked which space. Calendaring for Rabbi and Cantor: It s not possible to see and manage a Rabbi s or Cantor s calendar. Billing for Space Rentals: It s not easy to bill for the booking of space. Contract and Deposit Tracking for Space Rentals: It s not clear how to track whether a contract or deposit has been received for a rental. Access and Security Remote Access: The system is web-based so you can access it remotely. Data Access: Lets you create and enforce access to different types of data for different staff users. Constituent Access: Lets you create and enforce access to different types of constituents for different staff users. Personalized View: Lets multiple staff people each see a personalized view of the tasks and data that apply to them. Lets staffers customize their own dashboards. Sending Broadcast s: It s possible to send broadcast s directly from the database without an external app, but has limitations in terms of number of s sent per day and spam issues. Broadcast apps include Vertical Response, Predictive Response, and Exact Target. Opt-Out: Lets you easily generate a list of members for whom there s no address (i.e. to target them by mail instead). Unsubscribe: It s not possible to use the system to subscribe and unsubscribe constituents from all or particular lists, without an external app, like Vertical Response, Predictive Response, and Exact Target. Graphic Templates: It s not possible to use graphic templates to send broadcast s without an external app, like Conga Merge. Statistics: It s not possible to see information about opens and click-throughs, without an external app, like Vertical Response, Predictive Response, and Exact Target. Forwarding: It s not possible for constituents to forward s to a friend and still track the statistics without an external app, like Vertical Response, Predictive Response, and Exact Target. Discussion Lists: Lets you create discussion groups for particular subsets of constituents (i.e. committees, those in a particular class) using the Chatter feature. Statements: It s not possible to send out invoices and statements via rather than mail without an external app, like Conga Merge. Direct Mail Labels: It s not possible to generate labels for an ad-hoc query of constituents without an external app like Conga Merge. Templates: It s not possible to mail-merge information for a selected group of constituents into a defined template without an external app, like Conga Merge. PAGE 92 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

93 Response Tracking: Lets you track the response to a particular or direct mail campaign through the Campaigns module. Acknowledgements: It s not possible to send out thankyou letters, labels without an external app like Conga Merge. Tax Letters: It s not possible to automatically generate yearend tax letters which summarize all tax-deductible donations, for each constituent. Publication Management: You can t use the system to manage mailing of physical publications without an external app, like Conga Merge. Accounting Integration Accounting Overview: Lets you easily export data for any standard accounting systems. Generally, users have a standard financial report that they export to Excel and then to the GL system. Billed Revenue: You can t pass billed revenue data to standard accounting systems. Received Revenue: You can t pass received revenue data to standard accounting systems. Batches: It s not possible to create and track accounting batches in order to ease the reconciliation process with an accounting system or batch and transfer payments received online into the accounting system. It s not possible to link a batch to a deposit slip number to tie it back to the accounting system or batch and transfer payments received online into the accounting system. Customization Concealing Functionality: Lets a temple opt to hide pieces of functionality that don t apply to them. Dropdowns: Lets you customize dropdown values for fields such as campaigns, type of relationships and others. Custom Fields: Lets you add up to 500 custom fields per object (module), which can be placed on most screens in the system. Renaming/Deleting Fields: Lets you rename or delete existing fields and modules. Customization Process: The system is extensively customizable by any qualified person who knows the programming language Apex, including a variety of consultants. API: Lets you access the source code or access an extensive API in order to update or add functionality. In addition, the App Exchange offers a plethora of options. Invoicing and Payments Payment Plan: Lets you define a payment plan by entering a start date, end date, and number of payments, and the payments themselves will be automatically calculated. One-Offs: It s not possible to create a one-off invoice for a single payment; you have to go through a batch process. Viewing Invoices and Payment History: Lets you view a list of all invoices and the payment history for a constituent. What s Been Invoiced For: Lets you view which payments have been invoiced for when and which have not. Aging Report: There s no built-in aging report, but you could create one without too much difficulty. Other Invoicing: It s not currently possible to apply a payment to any specific invoice or pledge in the system, or to collect standard payment info: date, amount, payment types that are configurable, check number, etc. in a way that s passed to the GL system. It s not possible to define how much of an applied payment is tax-deductible vs. non-deductible or to write off an invoice as unreceivable. Payment without Invoicing: This is not in the system so would need to be built. Group Invoicing: Lets you create a charge or pledge (not payment) for a specific event/ service for everyone that meets a particular set of criteria (i.e. all members). Tax/Nontaxable: It s not possible to apply taxable and non-taxable amounts to a single invoice. PAGE 93 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

94 Constituents Paying For Others: It s not possible to apply payment from one constituent to pay another s invoice All Open Invoices: Lets you see all open invoices and filter by key information (member/ nonmember, amount, event). Usability, Support, and Documentation Ease of Use Overview: The system is designed to be free of clutter, but requires training in order to navigate the interface. IT Skills: You ll need someone with Salesforce Administration skills to support the database. Help: Lets you access online help to help staff understand how to use the system. Training: There s no support for the NSP from the vendor per se besides pre-recorded presentations, but there is a robust community of users and consultants who work with Salesforce. Workflows: Lets experts use the system to quickly do common tasks, tailored to their own workflow. Process Documentation: Lets you process documentation to help staff understand how they re supposed to enter data, aid consistency. Religious School Tracking Child Info: Lets you track and customize emergency contact information, doctor, insurance information for each enrolled child. Lets you track and customize information like allergies, diet needs, and special needs for each enrolled child. Class Info: Lets you print out a class list with key student information for teachers. Lets you assign children to particular classrooms or teachers. Lets you track the current grade level of a child, both in day school and religious school. Class Promotion: You must manually promote all children to next grade level at the end of the year in order to hold some back. Attendance: This system does not do attendance tracking. Grading: It s not currently possible to track students overall grade for each class they re enrolled in at religious school. Cemetery Management Billing and Invoicing: This system has no cemetery-specific billing functionality. Plot Management: It s possible to upload a custom object in Salesforce, which may help to manage cemetery plots, but this is as yet untested. Yahrzeits and Cemeteries: It s not currently possible to associate an individual Yahrzeit with a cemetery plot. Constituents and Cemeteries: It s not currently possible to associate the deceased person s cemetery plot with people in the database. Digital Map: It s not currently possible to view a digital map to see allocated and unallocated plots, although you can upload a custom digital object. Plaque Management: It s possible to track if there s a memorial plaque associated with a plot through custom fields. Reporting and Querying Standard Reports: The standard reports don t account for typical synagogue needs, but could be reasonably customized to accommodate them. Ad Hoc Reports: Lets you easily create ad hoc reports that allow staff to define what rows, columns, formulas, and formats are used. Querying: Lets you query for a set of constituents who meet criteria for a standard set of fields but it s difficult to create a flexibility query for a set of constituents based on almost any field in the database. Reporting For Data Issues: Lets you identify possible data issues (i.e. duplicates, inconsistent data entry) from reports provided by the system. Dashboards: Lets you easily view and customize a dashboard that helps you track overall metrics about programs and finances. PAGE 94 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

95 Shelby Shelby Systems offers two products to the church management sector: Shelby v.5, the installed version of the software; and Arena, a web-based product designed to be a CRM. The systems currently work in tandem most of the accounting power of Shelby is in the installed version, while event management and household and individual records are mostly maintained in Arena. Synagogues will find most of their needs met out of the box with Shelby, and many features that aren t included could be customized with reasonable ease. Arena is slightly more user-friendly than the installed version, but both systems could likely be learned relatively quickly by synagogue staffers. For larger churches, Shelby currently charges between $8,000 and $60,000, depending on the size of the project, not including highly customized installations. Pricing includes unlimited concurrent users of the software, implementation, and some data migration; ongoing annual fees that include support and updates are about $3,200 to $24,000 per year. Shelby Systems has developed church management software for decades and currently supports three out of the five largest churches in America. Though it originally provided only an installed software program, it has now introduced a web-based platform called Arena. These two sides of Shelby Systems are designed to work together, with most of the accounting power in the installed version while event management, contributions, and household and individual records are mostly maintained in Arena. Arena has a powerful, customizable, user-friendly approach to tracking individual constituents both members and nonmembers and family units. You can capture lots of information in a constituent s record, edit right from the dashboard screen, easily see who s in a household, and link individuals in your database together through customizable relationship types. Custom fields to track information important to your congregation are unlimited and easy to create throughout the system, and you can rename fields so they re more specific to synagogue needs. Children are already accounted for as a record type in Arena, and the system includes not only the ability to seamlessly associate children with a noncustodial parent or caregiver, but security measures to ensure that synagogue staffers know who can and can t pick up a child from a sponsored program. You can track education, employment, contact information even background checks. In a constituent record s History, Arena captures all edits staff have made to the record in question as well as event registration, program attendance, and correspondence generated from the system. Shelby places a lot of emphasis on measuring the level of an organization s congregants involvement within the system in charts and reports. Shelby s installed system has a very robust general ledger accounting module that could allow an organization to do all of its accounting using the system, including invoicing and payment collection. Some smaller churches use QuickBooks in tandem with Arena, but others rely on Shelby s installed system alone. Some churches even use the system to collect tuition for their associated day schools, so the vendors of Shelby feel confident that it could be adapted to accommodate member dues and renewal. Anyone can donate or pay their balance online using a credit card on an organization s website using Shelby s Arena product, and that information, including pledges, is represented on a family or individual record. Tribute gifts in honor of another person are not yet accommodated, but the vendor says this will be added in a future release. There is support for grants management in Shelby s installed version. PAGE 95 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

96 Event management is very sophisticated. You can set up an event microsite from within the online system that closely matches the look of the rest of the organization s website, and anyone can RSVP as a member, guest, anonymously, or on behalf of members of their household, and pay online. You can also send out event announcements through Arena s built-in broadcast tool, which also handles blasts to defined groups. Direct mail can be customized and sent out using MS Word mail merges. Many reports are built in to Arena, but you can also build customized reports fairly easily using Microsoft Reporting Services. You can also query to build customized lists of anyone in the system to create associated groups. The makers of Shelby suggested that this could be a useful feature in Yahrzeit tracking. The system already can capture the death date of an individual in the system with its built-in functionality, and the programmers of Shelby felt that adding conversion to the Jewish calendar from the Gregorian could be accomplished by adding a simple algorithm to the system. Yahrzeit tracking could then be accomplished by creating a list of individuals to be notified of that anniversary and then sending out an or a letter to that group. Shelby s Arena includes field-level security permissions for different staff logins so you can exert powerful control over what information a staffer or volunteer can edit or even see. For Shelby s installed version, a synagogue would need a dedicated PC with the Windows operating system or a dedicated database server for larger implementations. For Arena, you ll need to either provide infrastructure to host the software yourself or contract another provider to do so. Shelby bases its pricing structure on average weekend attendance, and offers unlimited concurrent users with the license fee. For larger churches, Shelby currently charges between $8,000 and $60,000 depending on the size of the project, not including highly customized installations. Pricing includes unlimited concurrent users of the software, implementation, some data migration, and ongoing annual fees that include support and updates are about $3,200 to $24,000 per year. Family Units and Households Family Unit Summary: Lets you easily see in one place all individuals associated with a particular family unit, including kids and any other household members. Family Unit Details: Lets you track main address, contact information, and membership status for a family unit. Same Name Tracking: Lets you easily track multiple family units with the same family name, as the program tracks records by a unique GUID (Globally Unique Identifier). Deceased Household Members: Lets you mark deceased members as such and exclude them from mailing labels if you configure the list-writer to do this at the time of setup. Member Status: Lets you mark that a family unit has resigned, has been suspended, or is no longer active if you create a status to indicate one of these. Alumni Members: Lets you track an alumni someone who is no longer a member if you create a status to reflect this. Divorce and Alternative Family Scenarios: Lets you associate a child with two family units (i.e. for divorced parents). Lets you easily move existing constituents with all their history into a new or existing family unit (i.e. child starts their own family, divorce, aged parents moving back in). Lets you account for nontraditional families (i.e. long-term non-married couples, same-sex marriages). Multiple Addresses: Lets you track seasonal addresses for a family unit, including start and end dates, but Arena only allows one seasonal/alternate address per individual. Basic Constituent Tracking Activity and Attendance: Lets you see all the recent activity tracked for an individual associated with a family unit, such as event attendance. Lets you customize and auto-calculate a person s level of activity or engagement and show their activity over time in a line graph and compare to others in the database. Relationship Tracking Outside Households: Lets you track and customize non-family relationships between individuals in the database. PAGE 96 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

97 Member / Nonmember Tracking: Lets you enter any individual into the database, even if not a member, and easily exclude nonmembers from member datasets. Demographic Tracking: Lets you track and customize basic demographic information of every constituent, such as , phone number, birthday, age, gender. Faith and Observance Tracking: Lets you track what tradition or movement an individual was raised in, how kosher they keep, whether an individual is Jewish (in a mixed-marriage household) and other faith and observance information, by setting up different kinds of custom fields: free text, dropdown, dated. You are able to track the history of changes to these fields. Occupation Tracking: Lets you track the occupation and job history of adults in the household, and link to the organizations associated with them through appointments. Volunteer Matching: Lets you track an individual s interests and skills to match them with potential volunteer opportunities through a dedicated volunteer tracking module, where you can set up jobs, quickly identify vacant placements, report on who can fit a particular vacancy, fill vacancies, and track correspondence with volunteers. Full Name Tracking: Lets you track the full name for each constituent in a household to account for spouses or kids with different last names. Constituent Source: Lets you associate the source of a constituent with a specific campaign, an event, or a staff member. Social Media: It may be possible to link to constituents social media pages within their records with customization. Group and Committee Tracking: Let you track who in a household is a member of a group or a committee through two separate modules. Groups lets you see everyone in a group who lives in a particular geographic zone through an API with Mapquest, and you can have up to six subgroup levels within groups. Committees are based on tags. Batch Constituent Entry: Lets you add or import basic information about a number of constituents at once through an API with Microsoft SQL Database, but not through an internal tool. Children: Lets you track a child s age, day school, or college through built-in fields. Relationship Tracking Communications Tracking: Lets you see a quick summary of all recent communications and constituent actions in one place, including a manual log of communications with each constituent, such as phone calls or personal meetings, and a record of all system-generated letters and s for each constituent. Duplicate Tracking: Lets you easily merge many duplicate records at a time through a dedicated wizard. Prospecting Workflow for Constituents: Lets you assign a priority, a stage, and a next action to a constituent to manage a prospecting workflow in the Donor Information tab by associating the constituent with a specific campaign. Prospecting Workflow for Organizations: Lets you assign a priority, a stage, and a next action to an organization to manage a prospecting workflow in the Donor Information tag by associating the organization with a specific campaign. Autoreminders: Lets you create a reminder for yourself or other staff for a particular constituent, task and date and show it prominently at that time in a customizable dashboard or through alerts. Clergy Interactions: Lets you track which constituents have had recent interactions with a clergy member if you track those interactions in a custom field. Pastoral Care: Lets you track when a member is in the hospital or homebound, track who will visit them, and assign visits to staff or constituents. Visitors can also use their smart phone or tablet to add notes to the constituent s record. Buddy System: It s possible to track a buddy system through Arena s Assignment module. A mentor could be assigned to work with a new member/family, and also be tracked by supervisors for status/completion of the assignment. Membership Tracking Member Payments: Lets you associate payments for events and membership dues with family units for billing purposes. Membership Types: Lets you track the membership type for a family unit (i.e. single, family, senior etc.). Membership Benefits: Lets you associate membership prices with desired seating for the high holidays or other benefits. New Member Signup: Lets you easily enter the information to sign up a new member. PAGE 97 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

98 Batch Invoicing: Lets you automatically generate invoices for a new cycle of membership dues in batch for all members, and can autorenew. Outstanding Payments: Lets you easily see who has paid outstanding membership dues or event fees and who has not through a dashboard. Member Fee Discounts: Lets you define a discounted membership fee for a particular family member, which is then billed accordingly, but the discounted amount is tracked, and lets you track why a discount on membership is being given, but only on the constituent record. Online Payments: Lets you accept payments online via credit card only. Online New Member Signup: Lets prospective members fill out their membership forms online, and pass data into the database. Event Management Event Seating (High Holidays): Lets you easily book and bill seat purchases for general admission to specific areas, with member and nonmember price, but not a specific seat. Lets you easily create tickets with seating information in order to send them to the appropriate constituents. Lets you account for non-paid reciprocity seats, for members of other synagogues. It s not possible to assign members to areas of seating based on their membership level. Online Registration: Lets people RSVP for the events ONLINE for general admission, with member and nonmember prices, and the system helps you manage overflow and waitlists. Seat Map: It s not possible to see a seating map either for staffers or online. RSVPs: Lets you easily log, view and print who has RSVP d or registered for a particular event. Historical Event Attendance: Lets you easily flag which constituents came to a particular event on their records. Batch Event Importing: Lets you import basic information about a list of event attendees, including ones not currently in the database, using the API. Honor Tracking: Lets you track who served as aliyahs or other honors in past, with what specifically they did on what date, through date-driven activities. Lets you easily input honors for a constituent based on a customized list of possible honors. Lets you easily create an ordered listing of aliyahs and honors for a given service, for the program book. Lets you easily identify a group of people and send them a letter asking them to perform a particular honor. Lets you track responses for those invited to perform a particular honor. Lets you track the Hebrew date that an honor took place. Online Event and School Registration Registration and Payment: Lets constituents RSVP online for a free event, which is then captured in the database. Lets constituents register and pay online for an event or class, which is then captured in the database and the accounting information. Multiple Registration: Lets household members easily register other individuals in their household for an event or class, without having to login as someone else. Back end Event Setup: Lets you easily create an online registration or RSVP form for a new event or class. Lets you set various event registration fees for a single event (i.e. adult/child or member/nonmember). Confirmation and Reminder s: Lets constituents automatically receive a confirmation with customizable text when they register online. Lets you send reminders of events participants have registered for. Custom Fields: Lets you include substantial custom fields (meal preferences, interests, seating requests) on an online registration form that are then easily viewable as a summary of event attendee information. Mobile Registration: Lets constituents sign up and pay for events from a smartphone or tablet if the temple chooses to implement a mobile-optimized design. Wait List/Full Event: Lets you define the maximum number of people that can attend an event, and the online system will stop taking registrations with no wait list when the max is reached. Autofill: Lets you auto-populate online registration forms with constituent information (demographics, family members) if someone is logged in. Calendaring: Lets you automatically update an internal website calendar when scheduling events through the system. PAGE 98 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

99 Observances and Gift Exchanges Anniversaries and Birthdays: Lets you easily create a list of all people with anniversaries or birthdays in a particular month (for Leagrams). Gift Messages: Lets you track personal message from a donor for Leagrams, Purim baskets. Batch Entry: Lets you easily data enter a substantial number of tribute gifts in support of specific physical gifts for Purim Baskets and issue soft credit to those who received them. Gift Acknowledgement and Delivery: Lets you easily print a letter that provides all the names and messages of those who supported an individual Leagram or Purim basket. Yahrzeits Hebrew Calendar Functionality: Lets you track dates on a Hebrew calendar through an external plugin and with additional programming. Hebrew Language Functionality: Lets you use with Hebrew letters only in the personal name fields first name, middle name, last name in the base application. Yahrzeit Constituent Tracking: It s not currently possible to track Yahrzeit information, but with the creation of a Yahrzeit tracking area, the system should be able to let you track the individual constituents who should be notified (i.e. surviving family members) of each particular Yahrzeit, view all the Yahrzeits that a particular constituent should be notified about, and track the individual constituents who should be notified (i.e. surviving family members) of each particular Yahrzeit if you track that information in a custom field. Lets you view all the Yahrzeits that a particular constituent should be notified about if you track that information in a custom field. Yahrzeit Notification: Lets you easily generate letters notifying family members about an upcoming Yahrzeit if you track that information in a custom field. Gregorian or Hebrew Tracking: It s not currently possible to track whether a particular person s Yahrzeit should be observed based on the Gregorian or Hebrew calendar. Yahrzeit Listing: It s not currently possible to create a list of all Yahrzeits that will be observed in a particular timeframe (based on the desired observance timeframe/ calendar) but this could be done if the system were customized to accommodate the Hebrew calendar and a Yahrzeit field was configured. Specific Yahrzeit Info: Lets you track AND CUSTOMIZE specific information about a Yahrzeit: Is there a plaque? Hebrew name? How do you pronounce the name? Did they die during the day or evening? Online Yahrzeit Info: Lets those with a login enter information online about Yahrzeits they d like to be observed. Yahrzeit Plaques: Lets you automatically turn on the physical lights for the appropriate plaques for the week s Yahrzeits through an external product, Cool Solutions. Donation Tracking Individual vs. Family vs. Organization: Lets you track whether a gift was given by a whole family unit or an individual within it, primarily for thankyou letters. Lets you associate gifts with an organization as opposed to individuals. Quick Entry: Lets you enter a number of gifts at one time through a manual entry of gifts in batches, or to enter gifts given online or through a mobile device in batches. The ShelbyTELLER program, a third-party product available at additional cost, allows staff to scan a batch of checks during the scanning process the program reads the checks and creates a file which is then imported into the program. It also creates a file that can be uploaded to a bank for remote deposit transactions. Tributes: Lets you easily enter tribute gifts, with both the donor and the person honored. Multiple Campaigns: Lets you assign gifts to a particular source, campaign or fund, or split the gift across multiple of these. LYBUNT, SYBUNT: Lets you easily see who gave to a particular campaign last year or at another time, in order to target them again this year. Pledges: Lets you enter pledges for future gifts, including the amount and scheduled date. This is then handled as an invoice and consolidated into statements. PAGE 99 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

100 Last Donation: Lets you easily see the date and amount of a constituent s last donation. Recurring Donation: Lets a staffer set up a recurring donation (i.e. $10 per month to the Rabbi s discretionary fund). /// Lets a member set up a recurring donation (i.e. $10 per month to the Rabbi s discretionary fund. Checkoff Contributions: Lets you automatically add a line item on invoices for constituents opting in for a checkoff contribution, alongside their membership fee, and can go to a separate account code. Grant Management: Lets you track and manage grants being sought through a reasonable customization. Overall Online Interactions Payment Codes: Lets you automatically pass online payment data to the system, and eventually to accounting, coded as to what the payment was for, and split between account codes. Online Profile: Lets constituents view their own profile and that of their family unit online and update their contact information. Lets you receive a notification when a constituent updates their profile. Lets constituents update their own online profiles of interests, skills, and occupation. It s not possible to let constituents unsubscribe from lists in the online profile, but they can unsubscribe using a link in the broadcast s. Lets constituents update information online about their children (names, birthdates, schools). Online Surveys: It s not possible to conduct online surveys. Mobile: Optimized for a smartphone or a tablet from back and front ends. CMS: Helps manage synagogue s website. Facility and Staff Scheduling Calendaring for Space Rentals: It s not possible to view what spaces are booked and which are available in a calendar format, or who has booked which space, but the system integrates with Cool Solutions. Calendaring for Rabbi and Cantor: It s not possible to see and manage a Rabbi s or Cantor s calendar. Billing for Space Rentals: It s not easy to bill for the booking of space. Contract and Deposit Tracking for Space Rentals: It s not clear how to track whether a contract or deposit has been received for a rental. Access and Security Remote Access: There s no option to access constituent data through a remote browser, but the system is web-based so you can access it remotely. Data Access: Lets you create and enforce access to different types of data for different staff users. Constituent Access: There s no granularity in terms of access to different types of constituents for different staff users. Personalized View: Lets multiple staff people each see a personalized view of the tasks and data that apply to them. Lets staffers customize their own dashboards. Sending Broadcast s: Lets you send broadcast s to specific groups identified in the database. Lets you send broadcast s to ad-hoc segments of constituents. Opt-Out: Lets you easily generate a list of members for whom there s no address (i.e. to target them by mail instead). Unsubscribe: Lets you easily subscribe and unsubscribe constituents from all or particular lists. Graphic Templates: The system doesn t let you use graphic templates to send broadcast s, but integrates with Constant Contact, which can do this. Statistics: It s not possible to see information about opens and click-throughs, but the system integrates with Constant Contact, which tracks this information. Forwarding: it s not possible for constituents to forward s to a friend and still track the statistics. Discussion Lists: It s not possible to create discussion lists for particular subsets of constituents. PAGE 100 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

101 Statements: Lets you send out invoices and statements via rather than mail. Direct Mail Labels: Lets you easily generate labels for an ad-hoc query of constituents. Templates: Lets you create flexible templates to receive mail-merged data. Lets you easily mail-merge information for a selected group of constituents into a defined template. Response Tracking: Lets you track the response to a particular or direct mail campaign. Acknowledgements: Lets you easily create a one-off thankyou letter and label for a donation. Lets you easily create one-off tribute gift letters, which prints a letter and label for both the donor and the person honored. Lets you queue thankyou letters in order to print out a batch of letters and labels at one time. Lets you queue one-off tribute gift letters, to print a whole series of letters for both the donors and the people honored. Tax Letters: Lets you easily create yearend tax letters which summarize all tax-deductible donations, for each constituent. Publication Management: Lets you track which physical publications someone has subscribed to and lets you flag someone to receive a single copy of a physical publication. Accounting Integration Accounting Overview: Lets you pass data to standard accounting systems including QuickBooks and Peachtree, through an API. The system is also designed to handle many accounting functionalites internally with the optional Shelby v.5 General Ledger. Billed Revenue: Revenue that is billed in the Accounts Receivable module can automatically be passed to General Ledger. However, Pledges in the giving modules do not. Received Revenue: All received revenue data can be passed to Shelby v.5 General Ledger. Batches: Lets you set up the types of transactions that should be batched into each account code for the accounting system. Lets you create and track accounting batches in order to ease the reconciliation process with an accounting system. Lets you link a batch to a deposit slip number to tie it back to the accounting system. Lets you batch and transfer payments received online into the accounting system. Customization Concealing Functionality: Lets a temple opt to hide pieces of functionality that don t apply to them. Dropdowns: Lets you customize dropdown values for fields such as campaigns, type of relationships and others. Custom Fields: Lets you add an unlimited number of custom fields, which can be placed on most screens in the system. Renaming/Deleting Fields: Lets you rename or delete existing fields. Customization Process: The system is customizable by the vendor or extensively customizable by any qualified person. API: Arena is sold as a Shared Source program. Customers that purchase at the Development level, a specific tier, are able to work with the API to create modules/applications and share their work with other Arena customers. Currently about 40 percent of Arena customers are also in the Developers community. Invoicing and Payments Payment Plan: Lets you define a payment plan by entering a start date, end date, and number of payments, and the payments themselves will be automatically calculated. One-Offs: Lets you create a one-off invoice for a single payment. Viewing Invoices and Payment History: Lets you view a list of all invoices for a constituent. Lets you easily see the payment history for a constituent. What s Been Invoiced For: Lets you view which payments have been invoiced for when and which have not. Aging Report: There is a built-in aging report in both Account Payable and Accounts Receivable, as well as a report that tracks pledged amounts by individual and their status in fulfilling the pledge. PAGE 101 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

102 Other Invoicing: Lets you apply a payment to any specific invoice or pledge in the system. Lets you collect standard payment info: date, amount, payment types that are configurable, check number, etc. Lets you define how much of an applied payment is tax-deductible vs. non-deductible. Lets you write off an invoice as unreceivable. Payment without Invoicing: Lets you apply a payment for any specific event/ service without first creating an invoice in the system. Group Invoicing: Lets you create a payment for a specific event/ service for everyone that meets a particular set of criteria (i.e. all members). Tax/Nontaxable: Lets you apply taxable and non-taxable amounts to a single invoice. Constituents Paying For Others: It s possible to apply payment from one constituent to pay another s invoice. All Open Invoices: Lets you see all open invoices and filter by key information (member/ nonmember, amount, event). Usability, Support, and Documentation Ease of Use Overview: The system is carefully designed to be free of clutter, and easy to understand by novice users. There are easy step-by-step wizards, searches and quick lists for many features. IT Skills: You ll need someone with relational database skills to support the database, but not to use it on a day-to-day basis. Help: Lets you access a useful combination of help text throughout the application, online help, written manuals and recorded trainings to help staff understand how to use the system. Training: The vendor offers many useful options for and phone support, web and live trainings. Workflows: Lets experts use the system to quickly do common tasks, tailored to their own workflow. Process Documentation: Lets your system administrator process documentation to help staff understand how they re supposed to enter data, aid consistency with contextual help tips that appear over most fields if your cursor hovers over the field. Religious School Tracking Child Info: Lets you track emergency contact information, doctor, insurance information for each enrolled child through fields on the child s constituent record. Lets you track allergies, diet (kosher?), and special needs for each enrolled child through fields on the child s constituent record. Class Info: Lets you print out a class list with key student information for teachers. Lets you assign children to particular classrooms or teachers. Lets you track the current grade level of a child, both in day school and religious school. Class Promotion: Lets you automatically promote all children to the next grade level at the end of the year, with the option to hold some back. Attendance: Lets you track children s attendance at religious school. Lets you easily input children s attendance through quick entry forms. Grading: Lets you track children s overall grade for each class they ve enrolled in. Cemetery Management Billing and Invoicing: Accounts Receivable in Shelby could handle the billing for cemetadry plots. Plot Management: It s not currently possible to track and manage cemetery plots. Yahrzeits and Cemeteries: No way of associating Yahrzeits and cemetery plots. Constituents and Cemeteries: It s possible to associate the deceased person buried in the cemetery with people in the database using the Other Relationships tab. Digital Map: It s not possible to view a digital map to see allocated and unallocated plots. Plaque Management: It s not possible to track if there s a memorial plaque associated with a plot. Reporting and Querying Standard Reports: Lets you view a set of standard reports that account for typical synagogue needs (for instance, parents PAGE 102 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

103 with kids in preschool, parents of kids in 6th grade, LYBUNT and SYBUNT reports, constituents with a particular set of skills or interests, who came to event X but not Y). Ad Hoc Reports: Lets you easily create ad hoc reports that allow staff to define what rows, columns, formulas, and formats are used. Querying: Lets you query for a set of constituents who meet criteria for a standard set of fields. Lets you create a flexibility query for a set of constituents based on almost any field in the database. Reporting For Data Issues: Lets you identify possible data issues regarding duplicates from reports provided by the system, but not inconsistent data entry. Dashboards: Lets you easily view and customize a dashboard that helps you track overall metrics about programs and finances. Excel: Lets you export a report or query to a friendly Excel file. Searching: Lets you quickly search the database for an existing person from anywhere in the interface. PAGE 103 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

104 ShulCloud ShulCloud is a more-affordable-but-less-robust newcomer to the synagogue management software market. The software is entirely web-based and has excellent member management and billing capabilities, as well as a content management system to help manage your entire website. It also provides support for donations, event management, and broadcast and direct mail. Developed by a synagogue for its own use, the system is friendly, easy-to-use, and doesn t require any special hardware or a server to implement. The premium tier, which most synagogues choose to implement, costs $2,400 a year. ShulCloud is an affordable web-based package relatively new to the synagogue management market, counting about 75 clients since debuting in The system provides comprehensive individual member and family unit dashboards that allow you to easily find information on a member or add new ones. However, the software couldn t robustly handle some more advanced member management scenarios such as what happens to a child s account when its parents get a divorce without requiring the user to create a duplicate account for the kid in question and attach it to both separated parents. Member contact info can be downloaded to the address book of a mobile device through vcards, which is a nice touch. You can t customize the information included in the member and household dashboards yourself, but ShulCloud staff can customize displays and fields for you. ShulCloud also serves as your synagogue s Content Management System (CMS), and includes a dozen attractive templates for the public web site. If you have web design-savvy staffers, or want to hire a web designer, they can also customize the site design. ShulCloud has a billing and invoicing module which allows data to be exported into QuickBooks. It can handle gifts and member dues, but grants are not accommodated. ShulCloud can track tribute gifts from one member in honor of another, with both parties receiving notifications and with the gift information represented in their member accounts. Correspondence tends to be focused on scheduling or billing needs for instance, generating a cover letter to an invoice, which is then exported to a PDF. The querying and reporting features seem powerful, and the user can easily call up all sorts of graphic reports to represent a synagogue s financial data. Broadcast s are also straightforward to generate, and ed invoices include a quick link to pay a balance online without system login required. The outward-facing member portal is smart and dynamic and includes functionality to allow members to edit their own information, and ShulCloud s creators have done some innovative work with calendaring. The software s calendaring tool automatically calculates the zmanim, or halachic times, based on time zone settings entered during the setup phase, which could be a timesaver for Orthodox and Conservative congregations. Events are also easy to manage, and the software creates a dedicated webpage with information about special events, customizable by the user. Yahrzeits can be tracked against both the Gregorian and Jewish calendars. ShulCloud doesn t have a school or cemetery management module, although both are currently being developed in consultation with synagogues. As for security measures, there are two levels of access to the system users who can see billing information, and users who can t. There are separate billing and member notes fields, and billing notes are not visible to staffers who do not have billing permissions, but member notes where one can enter possibly sensitive information about members are visible to billing staff. The system is entirely browser-based and doesn t require any special hardware or a server to implement, just an internet connection. It s optimized for search engines and for mobile devices, both on the administrative and public-facing levels. Pricing options include two lower-cost options and a Premium tier at about $2,400 a year, which most synagogues choose to implement, with discounts available for smaller synagogues and a two-week free trial included. In all, ShulCloud is a product with lots of potential that is growing quickly in response to member needs. PAGE 104 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

105 ShulSuite ShulSuite, a synagogue management software solution from Pogstone, is a powerful and customizable web-based system that uses the open source CiviCRM platform to operate, with additional (and strong) capabilities in accounting, event management, Yahrzeits, and member management added to the basic CiviCRM package. The software is robust in most areas we looked at, but isn t immediately intuitive for new users; the learning curve may be steep. Implementation costs are optional and can range up to $5,000. Monthly subscription costs between $125 and $325, or an unfront annual subscription costs between $1,200 and $3,000 per year. ShulSuite is built on the open source CiviCRM platform combined with the open source Drupal CMS. This combination means that website functionality is a core, well-integrated part of the software, and the entire system can be extensively customized to meet the needs of individual synagogues. The interface is user-friendly, with a graphic interface, although it s not immediately intuitive a user will need a degree of technological comfort to easily navigate the software, especially at first. Most language makes sense, but there are some terms that seemed less obvious to us. For example, to indicate that an individual is no longer a member of a household, you need to select that the relationship is disabled. The makers of ShulSuite have added considerable functionality to the basic CiviCRM platform, tailored specifically to meet synagogue needs. Perhaps most significantly, ShulSuite includes sophisticated billing and invoicing functionality, which includes batch billing capabilities for any user query, a financial summary tool for everyone within a household, and A/R aging reports. The software seamlessly integrates with QuickBooks and other widely used general ledger software. It has great dashboard functionality at the individual and household levels, and the information that you track about your constituents is highly customizable. ShulSuite lets you add an unlimited amount of custom information based on your needs or hide any information you don t need. Users can log interactions with constituents, choosing from phone, , letter, and several other options. Interactions generated from the system, such as thank-you notes, are automatically associated with each member s account. ShulSuite can generate one-off letters to constituents when a staff user is viewing the individual s contact record. The system favors for constituent correspondence, even in cases when paper mail might make more sense. For instance, it s much easier to send an than a letter to let someone know that a gift has been made in their honor. Event management capabilities are sophisticated and customizable. ShulSuite can handle registration, attendance, waitlisting, calendaring, and even facility management. Full functionality between the Hebrew and Gregorian calendar is included, and there are helpful tools to manage volunteers, Yahrzeits, cemeteries, Purim baskets, and Hebrew schools. ShulSuite is an entirely web-based tool hosted securely by Pogstone. It doesn t require a dedicated server space or any special hardware. There s no limit to number of members or users, and it s accessible anywhere you have an internet connection. The software provides content management for the synagogue s website, which also provides the infrastructure for a portal where anyone with a login can access and edit contact information, RSVP for events, and view and pay balances. Visitors to your synagogue s website who don t have a login can also RSVP for events and make payments. Mobile sites are supported and the optional implementation cost of ShulSuite can include a graphic designer to help design your website and mobile theme. PAGE 105 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

106 ShulSuite s implementation costs depend on the size of your congregation, and your synagogue can opt out of these fees. Pogstone reports that the most commonly opted-for services are data import and graphic design. These costs range up to $5,000, but discounts on data migration are offered to synagogues migrating from another synagogue management software platform. Subscription pricing is based on a three-tiered pricing structure, and totals between $125 and $325 a month, depending on the level of functionality chosen. Higher price points allow synagogues to provide staff members with different levels of data access, do more extensive customization of events, and receive access to more support. Upfront discounts are available should a synagogue choose to pay for a year s subscription at once. Pogstone s support offerings include a video library and group training to help with the software s learning curve. Family Units and Households Family Unit Summary: Lets you easily see in one place all individuals associated with a particular family unit, including kids and any other household members. Family Unit Details: Lets you track main address, contact information, and membership status for a family unit. Same Name Tracking: Lets you easily track multiple family units with the same family name. Deceased Household Members: Lets you mark and easily print out mailing labels with the deceased member excluded, if an individual is marked as deceased. Member Status: Lets you mark that a family unit has resigned, has been suspended, or is no longer active. Some common membership scenarios, including canceled and expired, come out of the box. You can configure the system to mark these statuses automatically if a member is in arrears. For other special statuses, a synagogue could create additional custom statuses to track. Alumni Members: Lets you track an alumni someone who is no longer a member but was through tracking the history of the person s membership on their record. Divorce and Alternative Family Scenarios: Lets you easily move existing contacts with all their relationships into a new or existing family unit. Lets you associate a child with two family units. Lets you account for nontraditional families (i.e. long-term non-married couples, same-sex marriages, mixed-faith marriages). ShulSuite comes with some common relationship types built-in, and a synagogue staffer could create additional relationships as needed. Multiple Addresses: Lets you track seasonal addresses for a family unit, including start and end dates. Basic Constituent Tracking Activity and Attendance: Lets you see all the recent activity tracked for an individual associated with a family unit, such as event attendance. You can also gather more quantitative data about activities like event attendance if you manually associate activities with an optional feature, the engagement index. Relationship Tracking Outside Households: Lets you track and customize non-family relationships between individuals in the database. Member / Nonmember Tracking: Lets you enter any individual into the database, even if not a member, and easily exclude nonmembers from member datasets. Lets you you distinguish between different tiers of members and nonmembers in the database, if you add the tiers. Demographic Tracking: Lets you track and customize basic demographic information of every constituent, such as , phone number, birthday, age, gender. Faith and Observance Tracking: Lets you track what tradition or movement an individual was raised in, how kosher they keep, if they ve been to Israel, whether an individual is Jewish (in a mixed-marriage household) and other faith and observance information, through a mix of custom and built-in fields. Occupation Tracking: Lets you track the occupation and job history of adults in the household, and link to the organizations associated with them. Volunteer Matching: Lets you track an individual s interests and skills through customizable fields to match them with potential volunteer opportunities. PAGE 106 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

107 Full Name Tracking: Lets you track the full name for each constituent in a household to account for spouses or kids with different last names. Constituent Source: Lets you manually associate the source of a constituent with an event or another constituent using a source field that is standard on every contact. The system also can automatically do this when an existing contact uses the tell-a-friend feature of the system. Social Media: It s possible to link to constituents social media addresses and accounts within their records through standard fields for electronic addresses. Group and Committee Tracking: Let you track who in a household is a member of a group, committee, or auxiliary, and easily see everyone who s in that group. Batch Constituent Entry: Lets you add or import basic information about a number of constituents at once from a CSV file or spreadsheet using an import wizard, which also does a basic validation of imported data. Children: Lets you track and automatically calculate a child s age through built-in fields. College and day school enrollment can be represented through relationships with the school or college as an organization. Relationship Tracking Communications Tracking: Lets you see a quick summary of all recent communications and constituent actions in one place, including a manual log of communications with each constituent, such as phone calls or personal meetings, and a record of all system-generated letters and s for each constituent. Duplicate Tracking: Lets you easily merge two records if it becomes apparent that those records are duplicates through a wizard that allows you to decide which data prevails; the system will also alert back-office users if they seem to be creating a duplicate record. Prospecting Workflow for Constituents: Lets you assign a priority, a stage, and a next action to a constituent to manage a prospecting workflow using the CiviCase function. Prospecting Workflow for Organizations: Lets you assign a priority, a stage, and a next action to a constituent to manage a prospecting workflow using the CiviCase function. Autoreminders: Lets you create a reminder for yourself or other staff for a particular constituent, task and date, and show it prominently at that time through ical. Clergy Interactions: Lets you track which constituents have had recent interactions with a clergy member by tracking those interactions as activities, and see who hasn t by reporting who hasn t been associated with that activity. Pastoral Care: Lets you track when a member is in the hospital or homebound and track who will visit them and when through the CiviCase process management feature. Buddy System: It s possible to conduct a buddy system program, where new members are paired up with existing members, using relationships, activities, or the CiviCase feature. Membership Tracking Member Payments: Lets you associate payments for events and membership dues with family units for billing purposes. Membership Types: Lets you track the membership type for a family unit (i.e. single, family, senior etc.). Membership Benefits: It s not possible to easily associate membership prices with desired seating for the high holidays or other benefits. New Member Signup: Lets you easily enter the information to sign up a new member. Batch Invoicing: Lets you automatically generate invoices for a new cycle of membership dues in batch for all members. Outstanding Payments: Lets you easily see who has paid outstanding membership dues or event fees and who has not through a dashboard. Member Fee Discounts: Lets you define a discounted membership fee for a particular family member, which is then billed accordingly. The discounted amount is tracked as an adjustment to the total amount pledged on the contact record. Online Payments: Lets you accept payments online via credit card only. A member can also elect to pay later. PAGE 107 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

108 Online New Member Signup: Lets prospective members fill out their membership form online, and pass data into the database. Event Management Event Seating (High Holidays): Lets you easily book and bill seat purchases for general admission to specific areas, with member and nonmember price. A new feature, introduced after our last demo with ShulSuite, has been debuted called CiviBoxOffice, which integrates with an external open source vendor, Fusion Ticket, and is currently being piloted with some ShulSuite clients. In the words of the vendor: This allows airline-style choice of a particular seat when someone is registering for the event, or this can be handled in the back-office areas by the staff. Multiple venues can be set up to accomodate different seating plans/prices for different events. Online Registration: Lets people RSVP for the events ONLINE for general admission, with member and nonmember prices. The system helps you manage overflow and waitlists. Seat Map: Lets you see a seating map for staffers or online through CiviBoxOffice, being piloted with some ShulShuite clients. RSVPs: Lets you easily log, view and print who has RSVP d or registered for a particular event. Historical Event Attendance: Lets you easily flag which constituents came to a particular event on their records. Batch Event Importing: Lets you easily add or import basic information about a list of event attendees, including ones not currently in the database. Honor Tracking: Lets you track who served as aliyahs or other honors in past, with what specifically they did on what date, through built-in fields. Lets you track the Hebrew date that an honor took place. Lets you easily input honors for a constituent based on a customized list of possible honors. Lets you easily create an ordered listing of aliyahs and honors for a given service, for the program book. Lets you easily identify a group of people and send them a letter asking them to perform a particular honor. Lets you track responses for those invited to perform a particular honor. Online Event and School Registration Registration and Payment: Lets constituents RSVP online for a free event, which is then captured in the database. Lets constituents register and pay online for an event or class, which is then captured in the database and the accounting information. Multiple Registration: Lets a front-end user register other household members for an event or class without logging in as someone else, but does not recognize the other household members based on a login. The front end user can type in the data pertaining to their household members during registration, and that information can be captured and passed to the database. Back end Event Setup: Lets you easily create an online registration or RSVP form for a new event or class. Lets you set various event registration fees for a single event (i.e. adult/child or member/nonmember). Confirmation and Reminder s: Lets constituents automatically receive a confirmation with customizable text when they register online. Lets you send reminders of events participants have registered for. Custom Fields: Lets you include substantial custom fields (meal preferences, interests, seating requests) on an online registration form that are then easily viewable as a summary of event attendee information. Mobile Registration: Lets constituents sign up and pay for events from a smartphone or tablet, with mobile-optimized design. Wait List/Full Event: Lets you define the maximum number of people that can attend an event, and the online system will stop taking registrations and create a wait list when the max is reached. Autofill: It s not possible to auto-populate online registration forms with the information about other household members. Calendaring: Lets you automatically update a public website calendar when scheduling events through the system. Staffers can also choose to update third-party calendars through ical and RSS feeds. Observances and Gift Exchanges Anniversaries and Birthdays: Lets you easily create a list of all people with anniversaries or birthdays in a particular month PAGE 108 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

109 (for Leagrams). Gift Messages: It s possible to track personal messages for gifts if you add custom fields on the gift record, via CiviCRM Profile. Batch Entry: It s possible to batch enter tributes in support of physical gifts. Gift Acknowledgement and Delivery: Lets you easily print a letter that provides all the names and messages of those who supported an individual Leagram or Purim basket if you associate them with a specific campaign. Lets you create a list of who should receive what size gift basket and at what address. Yahrzeits Hebrew Calendar Functionality: Lets you track dates on a Hebrew calendar. Hebrew Language Functionality: Lets you track words or names in Hebrew, with Hebrew letters. Yahrzeit Constituent Tracking: Lets you track the individual constituents who should be notified (i.e. surviving family members) of each particular Yahrzeit. Lets you view all the Yahrzeits that a particular constituent should be notified about. Yahrzeit Notification: Lets you easily generate letters notifying family members about an upcoming Yahrzeit, but the system defaults to . Gregorian or Hebrew Tracking: Lets you track whether a particular person s Yahrzeit should be observed based on the Gregorian or Hebrew calendar. Lets you autofill a Hebrew date of death based on a Gregorian date. Yahrzeit Listing: Lets you easily create a list of all Yahrzeits that will be observed in a particular timeframe (based on the desired observance timeframe/ calendar). Specific Yahrzeit Info: Lets you track AND CUSTOMIZE specific information about a Yahrzeit: Is there a plaque? Hebrew name? How do you pronounce the name? Did they die during the day or evening? Online Yahrzeit Info: Lets those with a login enter information online about Yahrzeits they d like to be observed. Yahrzeit Plaques: With configuration to an external facilities management system, lets you automatically turn on the physical lights for the appropriate plaques for the week s Yahrzeits. Donation Tracking Individual vs. Family vs. Organization: Lets you track whether a gift was given by a whole family unit or an individual within it, primarily for thankyou letters. Lets you associate gifts with an organization as opposed to individuals. Quick Entry: Lets you enter a number of gifts at one time through a streamlined quick-entry interface. Tributes: Lets you easily enter tribute gifts, with both the donor and the person honored. Lets you track who has donated for a particular event and in support of what other family unit (Leagrams, Purim baskets). Multiple Campaigns: Lets you assign gifts to a particular source, campaign or fund. A staffer may manually split them across multiple of these. LYBUNT, SYBUNT: Lets you easily see who gave to a particular campaign last year or at another time, in order to target them again this year. Pledges: Lets you enter pledges for future gifts, including the amount and scheduled date. This is then handled as an invoice and consolidated into statements. Last Donation: Lets you easily see the date and amount of a constituent s last donation. Recurring Donation: Lets a back end or a front end user set up a recurring donation (i.e. $10 per month to the Rabbi s discretionary fund) by creating a pledge, add an end date or leave it open-ended. Checkoff Contributions: Lets you automatically add a line item on invoices for constituents opting in for a checkoff contribution, alongside their membership fee, but it won t go to a separate GL account code. This can be reflected through reports, which can then be used to manually split the gift for export to the GL software. The vendor reports that this will be adjusted in the December 2012 release of ShulSuite. Grant Management: Lets you track and manage grants through CiviGrant, a free module that is part of the core CiviCRM package. PAGE 109 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

110 Overall Online Interactions Payment Codes: Lets you automatically pass online payment data to the system with the proper accounting codes. Online Profile: Lets constituents view their own profile online and update their contact information. Lets constituents update information online about their children (names, birthdates, schools). Lets constituents update their own online profile of interests, skills, and occupations. Lets constituents unsubscribe from lists in the online profile. Lets a staffer opt-in to receive an notification when constituents update their profiles, or create a change log report that summarizes changes to all outward-facing pages. Online Surveys: Lets you conduct online surveys through CiviEngage and CiviMobile, integrated into the ShulSuite product. Mobile: Optimized for a smartphone or a tablet from back and front ends. CMS: Helps manage a synagogue s website through the Drupal CMS. Facility and Staff Scheduling Calendaring for Space Rentals: It s possible to view what spaces are booked and which are available in a calendar format, or who has booked which space if you create the space as a CiviCRM subcontact. Calendaring for Rabbi and Cantor: It s not possible to see and manage a Rabbi s or Cantor s calendar without treating them as resources. Billing for Space Rentals: Lets you bill for the booking of a space if you create the booking as a pledge or a contribution, but this is not a straightforward means of tracking billing and reservations. Contract and Deposit Tracking for Space Rentals: Lets you track contracts and deposits for the booking of a space if you create the booking as a pledge or a contribution, but this is not a straightforward means of tracking these assets. Access and Security Remote Access: There s no option to access constituent data through a remote browser, but the system is web-based so you can access it remotely. Data Access: Lets you create and enforce access to different types of data for different staff users. Constituent Access: Lets you create and enforce access to different types of constituents for different staff users. Personalized View: Lets multiple staff people each see a personalized view of the tasks and data that apply to them. Lets staffers customize their own dashboards. Sending Broadcast s: Lets you send broadcast s to specific groups identified in the database. Lets you send broadcast s to ad-hoc segments of constituents. Opt-Out: Lets you easily generate a list of members for whom there s no address (i.e. to target them by mail instead). Unsubscribe: Lets you easily subscribe and unsubscribe constituents from all or particular lists. Graphic Templates: Lets you use graphic templates to send broadcast s. Statistics: Lets you track information about Intended Recipients, Successful Deliveries, Forwards, Replies, Bounces, Unsubscribe Requests, and Opt-Out Requests including percentage rates, and what links within the message were clicked on. Forwarding: Lets constituents easily forward s to a friend, and a staffer can decide whether to track statistics about forwarded s. Discussion Lists: It s not possible to create discussion lists for particular subsets of constituents. Statements: Lets you send out invoices and statements via rather than mail. PAGE 110 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

111 Direct Mail Labels: It s possible to generate labels for an ad-hoc query of constituents. Templates: Lets you create flexible templates to receive mail-merged data. Lets you easily mail-merge information for a selected group of constituents into a defined template. Response Tracking: Lets you track the response to a particular or direct mail campaign. Acknowledgements: Lets you easily create a one-off thankyou letter and label for a donation from a constituent record screen. Lets you easily create one-off tribute gift letters, which prints a letter and label for both the donor and the person honored--but defaults to . Lets you queue thankyou letters in order to print out a batch of letters and labels at one time. Lets you queue one-off tribute gift letters, to print a whole series of letters for both the donors and the people honored. Tax Letters: Lets you easily create yearend tax letters which summarize all tax-deductible donations, for each constituent. Publication Management: You can use the system to manage mailing of physical publications such as newletters through mailing lists and subscription groups. Accounting Integration Accounting Overview: Lets you easily pass data to standard accounting systems including QuickBooks and Peachtree. Billed Revenue: Billed revenue data can be automatically passed to standard accounting systems at a Chart of Accounts account code level. Received Revenue: Received revenue data can be automatically passed to standard accounting systems at a Chart of Accounts account code level. Batches: Lets you create and track accounting batches in order to ease the reconciliation process with an accounting system. Lets you batch and transfer payments received online into the accounting system. Customization Concealing Functionality: Lets a temple opt to hide pieces of functionality that don t apply to them. Dropdowns: Lets you customize dropdown values for fields such as campaigns, type of relationships and others. Custom Fields: Lets you add an unlimited number of custom fields, which can be placed on most screens in the system. Renaming/Deleting Fields: Lets you rename or delete existing fields. Customization Process: The system is customizable by the vendor or extensively customizable by any qualified person on staff at the synagogue. API: Lets you access the CiviCRM source code to update or add functionality. Invoicing and Payments Payment Plan: Lets you define a payment plan by entering a start date, end date, and number of payments, and the payments themselves will be automatically calculated. One-Offs: Lets you create a one-off invoice for a single payment with a template. Viewing Invoices and Payment History: Lets you view a list of all invoices for a constituent. Lets you easily see the payment history for a constituent. What s Been Invoiced For: Lets you view which payments have been invoiced for when and which have not. Aging Report: Lets you run a built-in aging report, which includes a summary of overdue payments with information about how overdue they are. Other Invoicing: Lets you collect standard payment info: date, amount, payment types that are configurable, check number, etc. Lets you define how much of an applied payment is tax-deductible vs. non-deductible. Lets you write off an invoice as unreceivable. Payment without Invoicing: Lets you apply a payment for any specific event/ service to a constituent record without first creating an invoice in the system. PAGE 111 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

112 Group Invoicing: Lets you create a payment for a specific event/ service for everyone that meets a particular set of criteria (i.e. all members). Tax/Nontaxable: It s possible to apply taxable and non-taxable amounts to a single invoice by indicating what contribution types are taxable and non-taxable. Constituents Paying For Others: It s possible to apply payment from one constituent to pay another s invoice and indicate on recipient s billing page that a payment was received as the beneficiary of a third party. All Open Invoices: Lets you see all open invoices and filter by key information (member/ nonmember, amount, event). Usability, Support, and Documentation Ease of Use Overview: The system is designed to be free of clutter, but requires training in order to navigate the interface. IT Skills: It s possible to run the database without CiviCRM skills, and to consult the vendor for help and customer support. Customer support is built-in to the ShulSuite subscription fee. Help: Lets you access online help, written manuals and recorded trainings to help staff understand how to use the system. Training: Vendor provides useful options for training staff members or anyone at the syagogue via the internet or inperson on a fee-for-service basis. Workflows: Lets experts use the system to quickly do common tasks, tailored to their own workflow. Process Documentation: Lets you process documentation to help staff understand how they re supposed to enter data to aid consistency through adding help text to most fields and screens in the database. Religious School Tracking Child Info: Lets you track and customize emergency contact information, doctor, insurance information for each enrolled child. Lets you track and customize information like allergies, diet needs, and special needs for each enrolled child. Class Info: Lets you print out a class list with key student information for teachers. Lets you assign children to particular classrooms or teachers. Lets you track the current grade level of a child, both in day school and religious school. Class Promotion: Lets you manually promote some or all children to next grade level at the end of the year. Attendance: Lets you track children s attendance at religious school if you create each class as a recurring event at the beginning of the year. Grading: It s possible to track grades via custom fields per participant. Cemetery Management Billing and Invoicing: Lets a back-office user bill someone for a specific plot. Plot Management: Lets you track plots through custom fields. Yahrzeits and Cemeteries: It s possible to associate an individual Yahrzeit with a cemetery plot through custom fields. Constituents and Cemeteries: It s possible to associate the deceased person s cemetery plot through custom fields. Digital Map: It s not possible to view a digital map to see allocated and unallocated plots, although you can upload a static digital image you ve created elsewhere. CiviBox Office includes this functionality, and is currently being piloted with select ShulSuite clients. Plaque Management: It s possible to associate if there s a memorial plaque associated with a plot through custom fields. Reporting and Querying Standard Reports: Lets you view a set of standard reports that account for typical synagogue needs (for instance, parents with kids in preschool, parents of kids in 6th grade, LYBUNT and SYBUNT reports, constituents with a particular set of skills or interests, who came to event X but not Y). Ad Hoc Reports: Lets you easily create ad hoc reports that allow staff to define what rows, columns, formulas, and formats are used, but doesn t intuitively save a report. PAGE 112 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

113 Querying: Lets you query for a set of constituents who meet criteria for a standard set of fields. Lets you create a flexibility query for a set of constituents based on almost any field in the database. Reporting For Data Issues: Lets you identify possible data issues (i.e. duplicates, inconsistent data entry) from reports provided by the system. Dashboards: Lets you easily view and customize a dashboard that helps you track overall metrics about programs and finances. Excel: Lets you export a report or query to a friendly Excel file. Searching: Lets you quickly search the database for an existing person from anywhere in the interface. PAGE 113 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

114 StarChapter StarChapter is an association management product with strength in member and event management but limited functionality in billing and invoicing, managing family units, and tracking donations. It s a cloudbased platform that s easy to navigate and customize, but may not have all the power a synagogue needs in terms of core accounting functionality. The software comes in three pricing offerings: $699 per year for limited customization, storage, training, and five included addresses; $899 per year for more robust features; and $1,499 for the top-of-the-line product, with additional fees for e-commerce support. StarChapter, a web-based association management software solution already in use by some synagogues, takes a unique approach to tracking constituent relations. The system divides records into separate Member and Nonmember modules, both of which display constituent information through a nice visual point-and-click interface that prominently displays the individual s photo. Custom fields are plentiful so you can monitor information that your synagogue prioritizes, and you can easily move individuals between member and nonmember status with a simple button. Family units in StarChapter would be accommodated by associating individuals with companies, which would represent a particular household. However, this doesn t seem to correspond exactly according to synagogues needs for instance, the individual dashboard would display a household affiliation, but it s not easy to see who else is also in the household. Constituents can be added to any number of groups, which can represent committee affiliations or other interests, and member types are quite customizable. Kids would be attached as corporate members, without the same rights and privileges as full members, to their parents household record. The makers of StarChapter suggest that you note a child s relationship to a divorced parent in the notes field, but acknowledge that the field isn t searchable. An online portal allows members to log in and edit their own contact information, purchase items online in a shopping cart (which is how the software handles donations), and RSVP for events. A dues manager lets users easily tailor the amount of dues owed by a particular member. You can t track grants or tributes using the system, and donations are accommodated through a shopping cart module, which treats gifts like items for sale. StarChapter handles Yahrzeits through an external application called HebCal, which allows for the conversion of Hebrew to Gregorian dates. But one would need to manually add the constituents who need to be notified into specific groups and automate s to them in order to remind them of the upcoming anniversary. Constituents are automatically sent reminder s to renew synagogue membership. StarChapter handles correspondence with its own proprietary system, which can do blast s and track basic metrics. You can see who opened the based on an easy-to-generate report, but correspondence isn t summarized on the individual account dashboard. StarChapter doesn t integrate directly with QuickBooks or other third party accounting software, arguing that staff only needs to input summary journal entries in their accounting software. The makers of StarChapter suggest that users generate reports from StarChapter that give big-picture information about income and debits to enter into the accounting software used, since StarChapter stores all the transaction details and manages receivables. The reports that export to QuickBooks don t provide detailed information about what transactions were made and when. This may not fit the needs of synagogue users who want to have detailed billing and invoicing information at their fingertips in their synagogue management software as well as their accounting software. You can still invoice and forgive overdue payments, but you can t generate an A/R aging report to see which constituents are coming due on PAGE 114 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

115 their accounts in upcoming time periods. StarChapter can handle online payments, and the Order Manager feature lets staff see which constituents owe and who has paid. Events are well accommodated you can easily build a new event that displays on your organization s website in minutes, and you don t need to know HTML to build attractive templates. You can record who RSVP d and attended, and nonmembers who RSVP online (or member guests) are automatically added to the nonmember module. Ticketing is possible, but assigned seating isn t an included feature yet. StarChapter is customizable and support-oriented, and prioritizes being available and transparent with its customers. The software comes with three pricing modules: $699 per year for limited customization, storage, training, and five included addresses; $899 per year for more robust features; and $1,499 for top-level personalization, training, and 20 addresses. Ongoing training and support is included in the overall price. E-commerce support is an extra $15 per month for the two bottom-tier plans. PAGE 115 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

116 SugarCRM SugarCRM is an open source, web-based Constituent (or Customer) Relationship Management system designed for for-profit businesses. Its power, user-friendliness, and customizability might make it worth considering for the synagogue sector, although out-of-the box it lacks many features important to synagogues, such as donation tracking, event support, and Yahrzeit tracking. A synagogue looking to implement SugarCRM would need to work closely with a consultant to tailor the software to the organization, but once the customization process was completed, SugarCRM might be able to meet many synagogues needs. Pricing for SugarCRM is based on a tiered system the most basic implementation is free. Most synagogues would want to start at the higher-level options, which range between $540 and $1,200 per year per staff user. Additionally, there are fees charged by a consulting company to work with you on getting the system up and running, which come in around the $10,000 mark. SugarCRM is an open source, web-based Constituent Relationship Management system, designed to serve as an organization s all-in-one database. SugarCRM is targeted primarily at for-profit businesses, and some of the structure of the system reflects this orientation. For instance, the out-of-the-box tab synagogues would use to track organizations and individuals for prospecting and donations is called Opportunities in SugarCRM, and the tab that would accommodate family units is called Accounts. All layouts, fields, and tabs are entirely customizable by the user. Concentrix, the consulting firm that conducted our demo of SugarCRM, suggested that a major customization for synagogues could be done by the vendor at the time of implementation, but it s easy to make minor adjustments to the system even if you don t have any technological skills. After creating a new field to capture information say, to indicate that a member of a household is a child synagogue staffers could use a simple click-and-drag interface to add the information. You can also designate a head-of-household by identifying an individual as a lead. For children of divorced parents, Concentrix suggested that the relationship between a parent company and its subsidiaries could be adapted to reflect the ongoing tie. Custom fields could also be created to track membership levels and dues. Relationships between constituents are also customizable, and a synagogue staffer could add as many relationship types as needed to link individuals. To assemble groups of constituents with shared interests or other factors in common, SugarCRM has a tool called Target List, which allows the software s users to query any field in the database and save lists of people. These lists are dynamic, meaning that if someone who meets the criteria for Young Singles is added to the database, for instance, he or she would automatically show up on that Target List. This functionality could also be used to generate lists of members for batch renewal processes. Broadcast messages sent out using the system can be automatically associated with and displayed on an individual s or household s record. You can also schedule meetings and calls with constituents using the link to a sophisticated calendaring tool those scheduled meetings are also noted in a constituent record s history. Many features that a synagogue needs don t come out of the box in SugarCRM, and would have to be built in. Donation-tracking, event support, invoicing, and billing would need to be built into the system at the time of customization, but Concentrix was confident that SugarCRM could be customized to handle these tasks. Yahrzeits, too, could be accommodated by utilizing a Hebrew calendar add-on and custom fields. Constituents with a username and login can access the public SugarPortal, through which members of the congregation and visitors to could access a section of the synagogue s website. PAGE 116 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

117 Security and permissions for staff users can be controlled on a very granular level, and administrators can grant read-only access to certain parts of the system, assign groups of records to specific users or teams, and conceal certain modules from view altogether. Both the front and back end of the system are mobile-friendly, and there s no technical requirements other than a web connection and someplace to host the system which can be handled locally, either by SugarCRM or a consultant. Customer service would most likely be tied to the consultant that helps you implement the software on-site, and there is also a vibrant user community that can provide answers to your questions. Pricing for SugarCRM is based on a tiered system. You can get a very basic version of the software for free. Most synagogues would want to start at the second-tier SugarCorporate, which includes a member portal and is $540 per year per staff user. Higher-level options, which give you more storage and support, are $720 per year per staff user for SugarEnterprise and $1,200 per year per staff user for SugarUltimate. There s also a recommended implementation fee of $6,000 and $60 per hour to alter the code of the system to suit an organization s needs, plus the fees charged by a consulting company to work with you while you get the system up and running. Family Units and Households Family Unit Summary: Lets you easily see in one place all individuals associated with a particular family unit, including kids and any other household members. Family Unit Details: Lets you track main address, contact information, and membership status for a family unit. Same Name Tracking: Lets you easily track multiple family units with the same family name. Deceased Household Members: Constituents can be identified as Deceased, Active, or Inactive by adding a field to the Consitituent record layout. When pulling lists for mailings or labels, the value of that field can be used to exclude Deceased individuals from the list. Member Status: Lets you mark that a family unit has resigned, has been suspended, or is no longer active if you create a status to indicate one of these. Alumni Members: Lets you track an alumni someone who is no longer a member through a custom field. Divorce and Alternative Family Scenarios: Lets you easily move an existing constituent with all their history into a new or existing family unit. Lets you associate a child with two family units. Lets you account for nontraditional families (i.e. long-term non-married couples, same-sex marriages) if you create a status to represent this relationship. Lets you account for mixed-marriage couples if you create a status to represent this relationship. Multiple Addresses: Lets you track seasonal addresses for a family unit, including start and end dates. Basic Constituent Tracking Activity and Attendance: It s not possible to see all the recent activity for an individual associated with a family unit, such as event attendance, in one place, although custom coding could be used to create a method of showing all the activity of a family unit. Relationship Tracking Outside Households: Only lets you track relationships within a household out of the box. Member / Nonmember Tracking: Lets you enter any individual into the database, even if not a member, but it s not easy to exlude nonmembers from datasets. Lets you you distinguish between different tiers of members and nonmembers in the database. Demographic Tracking: Lets you track and customize basic demographic information of every constituent, such as , phone number, birthday, age, gender. Faith and Observance Tracking: Lets you track what tradition or movement an individual was raised in, how kosher they keep, if they ve been to Israel, whether an individual is Jewish (in a mixed-marriage household) and other faith and observance information, through custom fields. Occupation Tracking: Lets you track the occupation of all adults in the household, but not job history or organization. Volunteer Matching: Lets you track an individual s interests and skills through customizable fields to match them with potential volunteer opportunities. PAGE 117 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

118 Full Name Tracking: Lets you track the full name for each constituent in a household to account for spouses or kids with different last names. Constituent Source: Lets you associate the source of a constituent with a specific campaign, an event, or a staff member through a field on the Contacts table or between the constituent s record and the campaign. Social Media: Lets you link to constituents social media pages within their records. Group and Committee Tracking: Let you track who in a household is a member of a group, committee, or auxiliary, and easily see everyone who s in that group, through Target Lists. Batch Constituent Entry: Lets you import basic information about a number of constituents at once through an import utility in the interface which can be used for part, if not all, of a data import, but which doesn t identify potential data issues. Children: Lets you track a child s age, day school, or college through custom fields. Relationship Tracking Communications Tracking: Lets you see a quick summary of all recent communications and constituent actions in one place, including a manual log of communications with each constituent, such as phone calls or personal meetings, and a record of all system-generated letters and s for each constituent. Duplicate Tracking: Lets you easily merge two records if it becomes apparent that those records are duplicates and allows the user to choose which data prevails. Prospecting Workflow for Constituents: Lets you assign a priority, a stage, and a next action to a constituent to manage a prospecting workflow. Prospecting Workflow for Organizations: There s no current way to assign a priority and a stage to an organization to manage a prospecting workflow; this could be accomplished if entities such as organizations could be tracked in a custom module. Autoreminders: Lets you create a reminder for yourself or other staff for a particular constituent, task and date and show it prominently at that time through a built-in calendar tool. Clergy Interactions: Lets you track which constituents have had recent interactions with a clergy member by tracking those interactions as activities, and see who hasn t by reporting who hasn t been associated with that activity. Pastoral Care: Lets you track when a member is in the hospital or homebound and track who will visit them and when through the Opportunities function. Buddy System: It s not possible to conduct a buddy system program, where new members are paired up with existing members. Membership Tracking Member Payments: Lets you associate payments for events and membership dues with family units for billing purposes. Membership Types: Lets you track the membership type for a family unit (i.e. single, family, senior etc.). Membership Benefits: Lets you associate membership prices with desired seating for the high holidays or other benefits. New Member Signup: Lets you easily enter the information to sign up a new member. Batch Invoicing: It s possible to create a workflow to automatically renew members in batch. Outstanding Payments: Lets you easily see who has paid outstanding membership dues or event fees and who has not through a dashboard. Member Fee Discounts: Lets you define a discounted membership fee for a particular family member, which is then billed accordingly, but the discounted amount is tracked, but you can t see why it s being given. Online Payments: It s not possible to collect payments online without code customization. Online New Member Signup: It s not possible to sign up online for a membership without code customization. PAGE 118 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

119 Event Management Event Seating (High Holidays): Lets you easily book and bill seat purchases for general admission to specific areas, with member and nonmember price, but not a specific seat, through the Products function. Lets you easily view who has sat in what kind/ level or what specific seat for previous events. Lets you easily view who has sat in what kind/ level or what specific seat for previous events. Online Registration: It s not possible to RSVP online for events without code customization. Seat Map: It s not possible to see a seating map for staffers or online. RSVPs: Lets you easily log, view and print who has RSVP d or registered for a particular event. Historical Event Attendance: It s possible to see what constituents came to which event if this was tracked through the Campaigns module but would require either manual data entry on the part of office staff or an import to indicate attendees or absentees. Batch Event Importing: Lets you import basic information about a number of event attendees at once through an import utility in the interface which can be used for part, if not all, of a data import. Honor Tracking: There s no clear way to track honors in the system without code customization. Online Event and School Registration Registration and Payment: It s not possible to let constituents RSVP online for a free or paid event without code customization. Multiple Registration: It s not possible to register other household members for an event or class without logging in as someone else. Back end Event Setup: Lets you create a back end form for a new event or class. Lets you set various event registration fees for a single event (i.e. adult/child or member/nonmember). Confirmation and Reminder s: Lets you send reminders of events participants have registered for, if you manually indicate they ve RSVP d. Custom Fields: It s not possible to let constituents RSVP online for a free or paid event without customization. Mobile Registration: There s no built-in optimization for event signup for a smartphone or tablet. Wait List/Full Event: It s not possible to define the maximum number of people that can attend an event. There s no online RSVP system. Autofill: It s not possible to auto-populate online registration forms with the information about other household members. Calendaring: Lets you automatically update an internal website calendar when scheduling tasks and meetings through the system. They are not added to an external calendar but can be sync d with Outlook if using the Outlook connector. Observances and Gift Exchanges Anniversaries and Birthdays: Lets you easily create a list of all people with anniversaries or birthdays in a particular month (for Leagrams) if you track that information in a custom field. Gift Messages: It may be possible to track personal message from a donor for Leagrams and Purim baskets through customization of the Products module. Batch Entry: It s not possible to batch enter tributes in support of physical gifts. Gift Acknowledgement and Delivery: May be able to print a letter that provides all the names and messages of those who supported an individual Leagram or Purim basket if you associate them with a specific campaign. May be able create a list of who should receive what size gift basket and at what address. Yahrzeits Hebrew Calendar Functionality: It s not possible to track dates on the Hebrew calendar without customization. Hebrew Language Functionality: Lets you track words or names in Hebrew, with Hebrew letters. PAGE 119 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

120 Yahrzeit Constituent Tracking: It s not possible to track whether a particular person s Yahrzeit should be observed based on the Gregorian or Hebrew calendar without customization. Yahrzeit Notification: Lets you easily create a list of all Yahrzeits that will be observed in a particular timeframe (based on the desired observance timeframe/ calendar) if the system were customized to accommodate the Hebrew calendar and a Yahrzeit field was configured. Gregorian or Hebrew Tracking: It s not possible to track whether a particular person s Yahrzeit should be observed based on the Gregorian or Hebrew calendar without customization. Yahrzeit Listing: It s not currently possible to create a list of all Yahrzeits that will be observed in a particular timeframe (based on the desired observance timeframe/ calendar) but this could be done if the system were customized to accommodate the Hebrew calendar and a Yahrzeit field was configured. Specific Yahrzeit Info: Lets you track AND customize specific information about a Yahrzeit: Is there a plaque? Hebrew name? How do you pronounce the name? Did they die during the day or evening? Online Yahrzeit Info: It s not possible for your congregants to enter information online about Yahrzeits they d like to be observed. Yahrzeit Plaques: It s not possible to automatically turn on the physical lights for the appropriate plaques for the week s Yahrzeits. Donation Tracking Individual vs. Family vs. Organization: Lets you track whether a gift was given by a whole family unit or an individual within it, primarily for thankyou letters. Lets you associate gifts with an organization as opposed to individuals. Quick Entry: Lets you import basic information about a number of gifts at once through an import utility in the interface which can be used for part, if not all, of a data import. Tributes: It s not possible to enter tribute gifts, with both the donor and the person honored, without customization. Multiple Campaigns: Lets you assign gifts to a particular source, campaign or fund, or split the gift across multiple of these. LYBUNT, SYBUNT: Lets you easily see who gave to a particular campaign last year or at another time, in order to target them again this year. Pledges: Lets you enter pledges for future gifts, including the amount and scheduled date. This is then handled as an invoice and consolidated into statements. Last Donation: Lets you easily see the date and amount of a constituent s last donation. Recurring Donation: It s not possible to set up a recurring donation. Checkoff Contributions: It s not possible to track checkoff contributions without customization. Grant Management: Lets you track and manage grants being sought through a reasonable customization. Overall Online Interactions Payment Codes: It s not possible to automatically pass online payment data to the system, and eventually to accounting, coded as to what the payment was for. Vendor s recommendation would be to use an e-commerce site for payment processing. Online Profile: There s no out-of-the-box functionality for this, but could be adapted with customization varying in complexity. Online Surveys: It s not possible to conduct online surveys. Mobile: Not optimized for a smartphone or a tablet. CMS: Does not help manage a synagogue s website. PAGE 120 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

121 Facility and Staff Scheduling Calendaring for Space Rentals: It s possible to view what spaces are booked and which are available in a calendar format, or who has booked which space, if you create an account for each space. Calendaring for Rabbi and Cantor: Lets you easily see and manage a Rabbi s or Cantor s calendar. Billing for Space Rentals: Lets you easily bill for the booking of a space with the Contracts function. Contract and Deposit Tracking for Space Rentals: Lets you track whether a contract or deposit has been received for a rental. Access and Security Remote Access: There s no option to access constituent data through a remote browser, but the system is web-based so you can access it remotely. Data Access: Lets you create and enforce access to different types of data for different staff users. Constituent Access: There s no granularity in terms of access to different types of constituents for different staff users. Personalized View: Lets multiple staff people each see a personalized view of the tasks and data that apply to them. Lets staffers customize their own dashboards. Sending Broadcast s: Lets you send broadcast s to specific groups identified in the database. Lets you send broadcast s to ad-hoc segments of constituents. Opt-Out: Lets you track contact preferences through a custom field called Contact Preferences which could have values such as: Phone, , Text, Do Not Contact. Unsubscribe: You can use the system to manage your list. Graphic Templates: Lets you use graphic templates to send broadcast s. Statistics: Lets you track information about s sent, bounced, and opened. Forwarding: It s not possible for constituents to forward s to a friend and still track the statistics. Discussion Lists: It s not possible to create discussion lists for particular subsets of constituents. Statements: Lets you send out invoices and statements via rather than mail, although this may involve custom code. Direct Mail Labels: It s not possible to generate labels for an ad-hoc query of constituents. Templates: Lets you create flexible templates to receive mail-merged data. Lets you easily mail-merge information for a selected group of constituents into a defined template. Response Tracking: Lets you track the response to a particular or direct mail campaign. Acknowledgements: Lets you easily create a one-off thankyou and label for a donation from a constituent record screen. Lets you easily create one-off tribute gift s. The campaigns module provides the functionality to send mass s but not create labels or one-off letters. Tax Letters: It s not possible to automatically generate yearend tax letters which summarize all tax-deductible donations, for each constituent. Publication Management: Lets you track which physical publications someone has subscribed to. Lets you flag someone to receive a single copy of a physical publication. Accounting Integration Accounting Overview: It s possible to export data for any standard accounting system. Billed Revenue: Billed revenue data is NOT automatically passed to standard accounting systems at a Chart of Accounts account code level. PAGE 121 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

122 Received Revenue: Received revenue data is NOT automatically passed to standard accounting systems at a Chart of Accounts. Batches: There s no out-of-the-box functionality for this, but could be adapted with reasonable customization. Customization Concealing Functionality: Lets a temple opt to hide pieces of functionality that don t apply to them. Dropdowns: Lets you customize dropdown values for fields. Custom Fields: Lets you add an unlimited number of custom fields, which can be placed on most screens in the system. Renaming/Deleting Fields: Lets you rename or delete existing fields. Customization Process: The system is extensively customizable by any qualified person. API: Lets you access the source code or access an extensive API in order to update or add functionality. Invoicing and Payments Payment Plan: It s not possible to define a payment plan by entering a start date, end date, and number of payments, and the payments themselves will be automatically calculated. This would require custom code. One-Offs: It s not possible to create a one-off or a batched invoice for a single payment. This would require custom code. Viewing Invoices and Payment History: It s not possible to view a list of all invoices for a constituent or see the payment history for a constituent. This would require custom code. What s Been Invoiced For: It s not possible to see which payments have been invoiced for when and which have not. This would require custom code. Aging Report: There s no built-in aging report, but you could create one or work with a consultant to build one. Other Invoicing: It s not possible to collect standard payment info: date, amount, payment types that are configurable, check number, etc., define how much of an applied payment is tax-deductible vs. non-deductible or write off an invoice as unreceivable. This would require custom code. Payment without Invoicing: This would require custom code. Group Invoicing: It s not possible create a payment for a specific event/ service for everyone that meets a particular set of criteria (i.e. all members). This would require custom code. Tax/Nontaxable: It s not possible to apply taxable and non-taxable amounts to a single invoice. This would require custom code. Constituents Paying For Others: It s not possible to apply payment from one constituent to pay another s invoice. This would require custom code. All Open Invoices: It s not possible to see all open invoices and filter by key information (member/ nonmember, amount, event). This would require custom code. Usability, Support, and Documentation Ease of Use Overview: The system is designed to be free of clutter, but requires training in order to navigate the interface. IT Skills: The system does not require substantial IT skills to use, but the difficulty of supporting it depends upon where the system is hosted, how much configuration and customization has been done to the system, and how technically adept its users are. Help: Lets you access online help, written manuals and recorded trainings to help staff understand how to use the system, but you d need a consultant s help when dealing with specially configured aspects of the database. Training: Vendor provides useful options for training staff members via the internet for additional cost. Workflows: Lets experts use the system to quickly do common tasks, tailored to their own workflow. Process Documentation: You can process documentation to help staff understand how they re supposed to enter data to aid consistency, for additional cost. PAGE 122 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

123 Religious School Tracking Child Info: This system does not have a school module. Class Info: This system does not have a school module. Class Promotion: This system does not have a school module. Attendance: This system does not have a school module. Grading: This system does not have a school module. Cemetery Management Billing and Invoicing: No cemetery-specific billing functionality. Plot Management: No plot management-specific functionality. Yahrzeits and Cemeteries: It s not possible to associate an individual Yahrzeit with a cemetery plot. Constituents and Cemeteries: It s not possible to associate the deceased person s cemetery plot with people in the database. Digital Map: It s not possible to view a digital map to see allocated and unallocated plots. Plaque Management: It s not possible to track if there s a memorial plaque associated with a plot. Reporting and Querying Standard Reports: The standard reports don t account for typical synagogue needs, but could be reasonably customized to accommodate them. Ad Hoc Reports: Lets you easily create ad hoc reports that allow staff to define what rows, columns, formulas, and formats are used. Querying: Lets you query for a set of constituents who meet criteria for a standard set of fields. Lets you create a flexibility query for a set of constituents based on almost any field in the database. Reporting For Data Issues: It s possible to run reports in the system to identify duplicates but not inconsistent entries. Dashboards: Lets you easily view and customize a dashboard that helps you track overall metrics about programs and finances. Excel: Lets you export a report or query to a friendly Excel file. Searching: Lets you quickly search the database for an existing person from anywhere in the interface. PAGE 123 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

124 Talisma Donor management tool Talisma is a compelling, higher-end choice for synagogues looking to devote resources to fundraising. Talisma is also strong in member management, event management, and customization, with broadcast functionality being slightly less powerful. You can obtain Talisma as either an installed, hosted, or cloud-based option. Prices vary. Mid-sized synagogues looking to implement the installed version would pay about $17,000 for four user licenses, plus training and migration costs. For the Software-as-a-Service product, expect to pay about $10,000 a year plus training and migration. The first 15,000 records are included in the cost, after which a fee of $10 per 1,000 additional records applies. If you choose to have the vendor host the software, that charge is estimated at close to $21,000 per year. Talisma is a powerful donor management system used by a variety of nonprofit clients, available either as an installed program or as cloud-based software. The system offers synagogue staffers comprehensive and configurable constituent-tracking abilities, which can handle both individuals and family units and gathers information in the form of customizable attributes, around which you re able to save complex queries. You can easily see which individuals make up a household, and track customizable non-household relationships between people in the database, too. Talisma has some basic capabilities to keep track of a household s children, but you can t customize the information that you track on a child s record. A divorce scenario illustrates some of the system s strengths and weaknesses: you could simply change the relationship linking the household s couple to that of former spouses, and each ex-spouse would still get soft credit for gifts made by the household during the marriage. However, you d have to manually add the children to a former spouse s new household record to preserve that relationship. Talisma has impressive donation management capabilities. The system could easily handle most giving situations critical to the majority of synagogues it lets you manually adjust or combine pledge payments, track tribute gifts and associate them with the records of those being honored, and track major gift opportunities through a specific module that also works with WealthEngine prospecting software. Grant opportunities could be tracked by creating an individual record for the entity, which is useful but not quite perfect in our demo, the record for the U.S. Federal Government displayed a field to track Spouse Name. Member management is extremely robust in Talisma. The system can accommodate different member tiers and automatically handle dues renewal notices. It s easy to see who is due or overdue for payments, and see who is coming due in an A/R aging report. You can export financial data from Talisma to your general ledger software through batches, which you can schedule to be done automatically. Talisma integrates with most third-party general ledger software programs, but the platform of choice is Microsoft Dynamics GP, and the integration between them is the most fluid the export from Talisma to GP takes just a couple of clicks. Members can pay their dues or register for events online, but Talisma currently only works with one third-party credit card collection service, IATS. A synagogue staffer could send broadcast directly from the database to defined groups, or to everyone in the database. However, if you use Talisma s built-in client, you can t use a custom HTML template for s, so the communications will look pretty basic. Talisma allows for export files to be generated which contain addresses and can then be forwarded to third-party vendors for configuration and delivery (the most seamless integration is currently with Constant Contact). Those s will be automatically associated with the records of the constituents that received them, and a synagogue can also manually log other communications like phone calls or meetings. If you re worried about the confidentiality of your congregation s information, you can make certain notes PAGE 124 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

125 visible to only certain of your staff s logins. Certain tabs and menus can be hidden from view or made read-only based on login information, too. Events are easy to set up in Talisma, and the software can work with your synagogue website s existing CSS to match its look and feel in event sites. You can see who registered and attended events, and sell tickets, although Talisma can t do assigned seating. As for Yahrzeits, the representatives from the vendor who demoed the software for us had put in a custom Yahrzeit area on the constituent record screen. The vendor noted that tracking the dates could be handled through attributes, but didn t have a ready answer for how the system could accommodate the Hebrew calendar. Many fields throughout the system are user-definable, and for a complex system, Talisma appears easy to use. You can implement Talisma as an installed, hosted, or Software-as-a-Service product, and technical requirements and pricing vary widely based on the model chosen. For a mid-sized synagogue looking to implement the installed version, the cost for a perpetual license would run about $17,000, plus training and migration costs. For the Softwareas-a-Service product, expect to pay about $10,116 a year plus training and migration. The first 15,000 records are included in the cost, after which a $10 per 1,000 additional records fee applies. If you choose to have the vendor host the software, that charge is estimated at close to $21,000 per year. PAGE 125 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

126 Tessitura The Tessitura Network offers donor, member, and event management software and services, and is interested in partnering with synagogues to configure the software to the specific needs of the sector. Tessitura has thus far worked mostly with arts and cultural organizations with sophisticated ticketing and box office management needs. The software is very strong in membership management, donation tracking, and event management, and although it s a complex system, it doesn t seem as difficult to learn as some others in its price range. The Tessitura license varies based on the size of the organization and whether the organization chooses a perpetual licensing structure or a Software as a Service approach but the vendors reported a license fee range between $4,000 and $15,000 for organizations of comparable size to most synagogues. Tessitura is a donor-, member-, and event-management software nonprofit that initially designed its product for performing arts organizations but has recently branched out into more general arts and cultural organizations. Tessitura has expressed interested in partnering with synagogues to customize the software to the specific needs of the sector. In Tessitura, you can track individuals and households as well as organizations, foundations, and other entities. Dropdowns, tabs, and fields are highly customizable to the needs of your synagogue, and although the system is powerful, it doesn t appear to have a steep learning curve especially compared to other, comparably capable and priced systems we saw. Tessitura maintains that many of the organizations who run the software don t have any full-time staffers devoted solely to IT or the database s upkeep, but we could see how it might be useful to have a dedicated staffer for such a complex and powerful system. Many organizations that use Tessitura run educational programs, so the software can accommodate the records of children in a household and track special information about them that you are able to customize. As for a divorce between constituents, Tessitura recommends that you deactivate the original household record and then create two new household records, which would preserve the children s relationship to their custodial and non-custodial parents in the database. For notes about fundraising or other member interactions relating to donations, Tessitura has a Solicitations tab, where you can record communications or meetings. There s also a Customer Service module where you can track and associate complaints (or compliments) from people in your database. You can also enter personal, biographical notes on a constituent record, which you can make visible only to those with logons that have certain levels of security. Tessitura includes a web API which allows organizations to connect their website directly to their Tessitura database. Organizations can choose to allow constituents to pay their balance, edit contact info or demographic information, and RSVP for events, but you can t use the system to maintain an online member directory. As for donations, Tessitura can track pledges, gifts, and tributes. You can easily change a payment schedule, track the source of a contribution (Personal solicitation? Online campaign?) and batch out acknowledgement letters in Tessitura itself or by exporting the information to MS Excel and mail merging into MS Word. One-off thankyou letters would be created through this same batch process. You can also automatically deduct a taxable premium (like a tote bag) from the tax-deductible portion of a gift. For tribute gifts, you can represent soft credits on the tributee s record. Tracking of grant solicitations would be handled in Tessitura by creating an organization record for a foundation, marking the constituent type as foundation, and monitoring proposals, correspondence, and activity through PAGE 126 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

127 a constituent record. This seems useful, but doesn t translate exactly for instance, the ticket history tab remains visible in a foundation s record. Membership management is very powerful in Tessitura. When we looked at its full functionality during the demo, the area looked to be rather complicated, but the vendor noted that for a synagogue without complex membership management needs, the process would be more straightforward. You can associate membership drives with a particular campaign, automatically generate renewal letters, and control different membership tiers and their billing cycles and grace periods from a comprehensive membership dashboard. Exporting your data from Tessitura to whichever general ledger software you use is done with a simple command you can choose to run the report manually or schedule it to occur at regular intervals that you determine. Tessitura comes with a suite of 200 useful built-in reports to help you understand your synagogue s financials, membership, and event-attendance data. Though we didn t have the chance to see this particular feature during our demo, the vendor reports powerful data mining capabilities and useful dashboards appear throughout the system. Event management in Tessitura is quite strong. Since the software is intended to be a box office management tool, you can manage ticketed events and assigned seating, and you can also manage events with general admission. Tessitura can handle your synagogue s seat map for assigned seating during the high holidays, and associate seating with certain tiers of membership. Constituents can register and choose their own on your organization s website, and Tessitura can be configured to match the look and feel of the rest of the site. Yahrzeits aren t a built-in feature in Tessitura, but the software s vendor suggested that Yahrzeits could be tracked as Attributes on a constituent record, and felt confident that the system s open API could handle an external plug-in to accommodate the Hebrew calendar. As for broadcast , Tessitura can handle this internally, and integrates with two third-party providers: WordFly and mail2. Reporting and useful statistics like open rate and click-through looked to be strong in the system, and Tessitura lets you maintain dynamic lists to target s to specific demographic groups within your database. We didn t see a lot of Tessitura s bulk mail capabilities, but you can export and personalize acknowledgement letters to Word, or choose to create letters within the database. Tessitura can be accessed via the web using the hosted deployment option from the vendor, or can be hosted within an organization using standard hardware and Microsoft SQL server database. The latter option would require the services of someone knowledgeable enough to maintain it. The Tessitura license varies based on the size of the organization, but the vendors reported a fee range between $4,000 - $15,000 for organizations of comparable size to most synagogues. Family Units and Households Family Unit Summary: Lets you easily see in one place all individuals associated with a particular family unit, including kids and any other household members. Family Unit Details: Lets you track main address, contact information, and membership status for a family unit. Same Name Tracking: Lets you easily track multiple family units with the same family name. Deceased Household Members: Lets you mark and easily print out mailing labels with the deceased member excluded if an individual is marked as deceased, and automatically reconfigures the salutation to exclude the deceased member from the household. Member Status: Lets you mark that a family unit has resigned, has been suspended, has been reinstated, or is no longer active through sophisticated membership-level scheduling, and lets you customize the periods of time that are applicable. Alumni Members: Lets you track an alumni someone who is no longer a member if you create a status to reflect this. Divorce and Alternative Family Scenarios: Lets you associate a child with two family units (i.e. for divorced parents). Lets you easily move an existing constituent with all their history into a new or existing family unit (i.e. child starts their own family, divorce, aged parents moving back in). Lets you account for nontraditional families (i.e. long-term non-married couples, same-sex marriages). PAGE 127 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

128 Multiple Addresses: Lets you track seasonal addresses for a family unit, including start and end dates. Basic Constituent Tracking Activity and Attendance: Lets you see all the recent activity tracked for an individual associated with a family unit, such as event attendance. Lets you auto-calculate a loyalty rating using an algorithm that draws from as activities you identify. Relationship Tracking Outside Households: Lets you track and customize non-family relationships between individuals in the database. Member / Nonmember Tracking: Lets you enter any individual into the database, even if not a member, and easily exclude nonmembers from member datasets. Demographic Tracking: Lets you track and customize basic demographic information of every constituent, such as , phone number, birthday, age, gender. Faith and Observance Tracking: Lets you track what tradition or movement an individual was raised in, how kosher they keep, whether an individual is Jewish (in a mixed-marriage household) and other faith and observance information, by associating these with attributes or campaigns. Occupation Tracking: Lets you track the occupation and job history of adults in the household and link to the organizations associated with them through relationships. Volunteer Matching: Lets you track an individual s interests and skills through customizable attributes to match them with potential volunteer opportunities, but doesn t help you schedule shifts. Full Name Tracking: Lets you track the full name for each constituent in a household to account for spouses or kids with different last names. Constituent Source: Lets you associate the source of a gift with a specific campaign, an event, or a staff member through a system-generated source code. To track the source of a constituent, you could create a user-defined dropdown at the time of the creation of the household or individual record. Social Media: Lets you link to constituents social media pages in their electronic address fields, or through a custom dashboard. Group and Committee Tracking: Let you track who in a household is a member of a group, committee, or auxiliary, and easily see everyone who s in that group, through affiliations. Batch Constituent Entry: Lets you add or import basic information about some features like constituencies, attributes, events, activities, promotions, and solicitations which may be updated in bulk from within the application. Someone with more administrative access could use a data conversion or import tools or direct database access as well. Children: Lets you track a child s age, day school, or college through custom fields. Relationship Tracking Communications Tracking: Lets you see a quick summary of all recent communications and constituent actions in one place, including a manual log of communications with each constituent, such as phone calls or personal meetings, and a record of all system-generated letters and s for each constituent. Duplicate Tracking: Lets you easily merge two duplicate records through a dedicated tool, and aids in the identification of duplicates through wildcard searches Prospecting Workflow for Constituents: Lets you assign a priority, a stage, and a next action to a constituent to manage a prospecting workflow using the Solicitation module. Prospecting Workflow for Organizations: Lets you assign a priority, a stage, and a next action to an organization to manage a prospecting workflow using the Solicitation module. Autoreminders: Lets you create a reminder for yourself or other staff for a particular constituent, task and date and show it prominently at that time through the Assignments feature. Clergy Interactions: Lets you track which constituents have had recent interactions with a clergy member by tracking those interactions as attributes and see who hasn t by reporting who hasn t been associated with those attributes. Pastoral Care: Lets you track when a member is in the hospital or homebound, track who will visit them, and assign visits to staff or constituents through the Customer Service module. Buddy System: It s possible to track, query, and report on a buddy system program, where new members are paired up PAGE 128 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

129 with existing members, by associating the new member and/or their household to the buddy member/household, which would distinguish the mentor/mentee relationship. Membership Tracking Member Payments: Lets you associate payments for events and membership dues with family units for billing purposes. Membership Types: Lets you track the membership type for a family unit (i.e. single, family, senior etc.). Membership Benefits: Lets you associate membership prices with desired seating for the high holidays or other benefits. New Member Signup: Lets you easily enter the information to sign up a new member. Batch Invoicing: Lets you automatically generate invoices for a new cycle of membership dues in batch for all members, and can autorenew. Outstanding Payments: Lets you easily see who has paid outstanding membership dues or event fees and who has not through a dashboard. Member Fee Discounts: Lets you define a discounted membership fee for a particular family member, which is then billed accordingly, but the discounted amount is tracked, and lets you track why a discount on membership is being given, but only on the constituent record. Online Payments: Lets you accept payments online via credit card, gift certificate, and, with additional coding, PayPal. Online New Member Signup: Lets prospective members establish their membership online including information about their household, membership payment information, and payment schedule. Event Management Event Seating (High Holidays): Lets you easily book and bill seat purchases, for specific seats (i.e. C7), and see what seats are still available. Lets you arrange or rearrange the seating plan. Lets you easily view who has sat in what kind/ level or what specific seat for previous events. Lets you automatically assign members to the specific seats they have had in the past, and remove them from the seat inventory. Lets you easily create tickets with seating information in order to send them to the appropriate constituents. Lets you account for non-paid reciprocity seats, for members of other synagogues. Lets you automatically assign members to areas of seating based on their membership level. Online Registration: Lets people RSVP for the events ONLINE for specific seats, with member and nonmember prices. Lets people RSVP for the events ONLINE for general admission, with member and nonmember prices. The system helps you manage overflow and waitlist. Seat Map: Lets staffers see a map of seat offerings with status of seats and who allocated ones are allocated to. Lets members see an online map of seat offerings and select their own. RSVPs: Lets you easily log, view and print who has RSVP d or registered for a particular event. Historical Event Attendance: Lets you easily flag which constituents came to a particular event on their records. Batch Event Importing: Lets you import basic information about a list of event attendees, including ones not currently in the database. Honor Tracking: Lets you track who served as aliyahs or other honors in past, with what specifically they did on what date, through date-driven activities. Lets you easily input honors for a constituent based on a customized list of possible honors. Lets you easily create an ordered listing of aliyahs and honors for a given service, for the program book. Lets you easily identify a group of people and send them a letter asking them to perform a particular honor. Lets you track responses for those invited to perform a particular honor. Lets you track the Hebrew date that an honor took place. Online Event and School Registration Registration and Payment: Lets constituents RSVP online for a free event, which is then captured in the database. Lets constituents register and pay online for an event or class, which is then captured in the database and the accounting information. Multiple Registration: Lets household members easily register other individuals in their household for an event or class, without having to login as someone else. PAGE 129 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

130 Back end Event Setup: Lets you easily create an online registration or RSVP form for a new event or class. Lets you set various event registration fees for a single event (i.e. adult/child or member/nonmember). Confirmation and Reminder s: Lets constituents automatically receive a confirmation with customizable text when they register online. Lets you send reminders of events participants have registered for. Custom Fields: Lets you include substantial custom fields (meal preferences, interests, seating requests) on an online registration form that are then easily viewable as a summary of event attendee information. Mobile Registration: Lets constituents sign up and pay for events from a smartphone or tablet if the temple chooses to implement a mobile-optimized design. Wait List/Full Event: Lets you define the maximum number of people that can attend an event, and the online system will stop taking registrations and create a wait list when the max is reached. Autofill: Lets you auto-populate online registration forms with constituent information (demographics, family members). Calendaring: Lets you automatically update an internal website calendar when scheduling events through the system. Observances and Gift Exchanges Anniversaries and Birthdays: Lets you easily create a list of all people with anniversaries or birthdays in a particular month (for Leagrams) if you track that information in a custom field. Gift Messages: Lets you track personal message from a donor for Leagrams and Purim baskets. Batch Entry: Lets you easily data enter a substantial number of tribute gifts in support of specific physical gifts for Purim Baskets and issue soft credit to those who received them. Gift Acknowledgement and Delivery: Lets you easily print a letter that provides all the names and messages of those who supported an individual Leagram or Purim basket. Yahrzeits Hebrew Calendar Functionality: Lets you track dates on a Hebrew calendar through an external plugin. Hebrew Language Functionality: It s not possible to track words or names in Hebrew, with Hebrew letters, in the base application. Yahrzeit Constituent Tracking: It s not currently possible to track Yahrzeit information, but with customization at the time of implementation, the system should be able to let you track the individual constituents who should be notified (i.e. surviving family members) of each particular Yahrzeit, view all the Yahrzeits that a particular constituent should be notified about, and track the individual constituents who should be notified (i.e. surviving family members) of each particular Yahrzeit if you track that information in a custom field. Lets you view all the Yahrzeits that a particular constituent should be notified about if you track that information in a custom field. Yahrzeit Notification: Lets you easily generate letters notifying family members about an upcoming Yahrzeit if you track that information in a custom field. Gregorian or Hebrew Tracking: It s not currently possible to track whether a particular person s Yahrzeit should be observed based on the Gregorian or Hebrew calendar. Yahrzeit Listing: Lets you easily create a list of all Yahrzeits that will be observed in a particular timeframe (based on the desired observance timeframe/ calendar) if the system were customized to accommodate the Hebrew calendar and a Yahrzeit field was configured. Specific Yahrzeit Info: Lets you track AND CUSTOMIZE specific information about a Yahrzeit: Is there a plaque? Hebrew name? How do you pronounce the name? Did they die during the day or evening? Online Yahrzeit Info: Lets those with a login enter information online about Yahrzeits they d like to be observed. Yahrzeit Plaques: With configuration to an external facilities management system, lets you automatically turn on the physical lights for the appropriate plaques for the week s Yahrzeits. Donation Tracking Individual vs. Family vs. Organization: Lets you track whether a gift was given by a whole family unit or an individual within it, primarily for thankyou letters. Lets you associate gifts with an organization as opposed to individuals. PAGE 130 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

131 Quick Entry: Lets you enter a number of gifts at one time through an import process or through a streamlined, keystrokebased quick entry process. Tributes: Lets you easily enter tribute gifts, with both the donor and the person honored. Multiple Campaigns: Lets you assign gifts to a particular source, campaign or fund, or split the gift across multiple of these. LYBUNT, SYBUNT: Lets you easily see who gave to a particular campaign last year or at another time, in order to target them again this year. Pledges: Lets you enter pledges for future gifts, including the amount and scheduled date. This is then handled as an invoice and consolidated into statements. Last Donation: Lets you easily see the date and amount of a constituent s last donation. Recurring Donation: Lets a staffer set up a recurring donation (i.e. $10 per month to the Rabbi s discretionary fund) /// Lets a member set up a recurring donation (i.e. $10 per month to the Rabbi s discretionary fund.) Checkoff Contributions: It s not possible to track checkoff contributions without manual adjustment to the gift. Grant Management: It s possible track and manage grants being sought through a reasonable customization. Overall Online Interactions Payment Codes: Lets you automatically pass online payment data to the system, and eventually to accounting, coded as to what the payment was for. Online Profile: Lets constituents view their own profiles online and update their contact information. Lets you receive a notification when a constituent updates their profile. Lets constituents update their own online profile of interests, skills, and occupation. Lets constituents unsubscribe from lists in the online profile. It s not possible to let constituents update information online about their children (names, birthdates, schools). Online Surveys: It s possible to conduct online surveys, in which data is collected though an online profile and passed through to the database, through customization. Mobile: There s the option to optimize the system for a smartphone or a tablet from the back and front ends. CMS: The system can integrate with your synagogue website s content in a highly sophisticated way, but is not a Content Management System itself. Facility and Staff Scheduling Calendaring for Space Rentals: It s not possible to view what spaces are booked and which are available in a calendar format, or who has booked which space. Calendaring for Rabbi and Cantor: It s not possible to see and manage a Rabbi s or Cantor s calendar. Billing for Space Rentals: It s not easy to bill for the booking of space. Contract and Deposit Tracking for Space Rentals: It s not clear how to track whether a contract or deposit has been received for a rental. Access and Security Remote Access: The system is not web-based but you can connect to the back end remotely via a terminal server. Data Access: Lets you create and enforce access to different types of data for different staff users. Constituent Access: There s no granularity in terms of access to different types of constituents for different staff users. Personalized View: Lets multiple staff people each see a personalized view of the tasks and data that apply to them. Lets staffers customize their own dashboards. Sending Broadcast s: Lets you send broadcast s to specific groups identified in the database and to ad-hoc PAGE 131 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

132 segments of constituents. Opt-Out: Lets you easily generate a list of members for whom there s no address (i.e. to target them by mail instead). Unsubscribe: Lets you easily subscribe and unsubscribe constituents from all or particular lists. Graphic Templates: Lets you use graphic templates to send broadcast s. Statistics: Lets you track information about click-throughs, open, hard bounce, soft bounce, deleted, unsubscribe, and transaction processed by constituent when you use one of Tessitura s partners. Forwarding: Lets you track the statistics on the original system-generated , even if it is fowarded to a friend. Discussion Lists: It s not possible to create discussion lists for particular subsets of constituents. Statements: Lets you send out invoices and statements via rather than mail. Direct Mail Labels: It is possible to generate an ad hoc list by adding the constituents in the contents screen of the list manager, which then allows you to print labels. Templates: Lets you create flexible templates to receive mail-merged data. Lets you easily mail-merge information for a selected group of constituents into a defined template. Response Tracking: Lets you track the response to a particular or direct mail campaign. Acknowledgements: Lets you easily create a one-off thankyou letter and label for a donation from a constituent record screen. Lets you easily create one-off tribute gift letters, which prints a letter and label for both the donor and the person honored--but defaults to . Lets you queue thankyou letters in order to print out a batch of letters and labels at one time. Lets you queue one-off tribute gift letters, to print a whole series of letters for both the donors and the people honored. Tax Letters: Lets you easily create yearend tax letters which summarize all tax-deductible donations, for each constituent, by associating a goods/services level with each gift or dues renewal. Publication Management: You can t use the system to manage the mailing lists of physical publications, but not layout or design of the publications. Accounting Integration Accounting Overview: Integrates with standard accounting systems through an API. Billed Revenue: Billed revenue data is automatically passed to standard accounting systems at a Chart of Accounts account code level. Received Revenue: Received revenue data is automatically passed to standard accounting systems at a Chart of Accounts account code level. Batches: Lets you set up the types of transactions that should be batched into each account code for the accounting system. Lets you create and track accounting batches in order to ease the reconciliation process with an accounting system. Customization Concealing Functionality: Lets a temple opt to hide pieces of functionality that don t apply to them. Dropdowns: Lets you customize dropdown values for fields such as campaigns, type of relationships and others. Custom Fields: Lets you add an unlimited number of custom fields, which can be placed on most screens in the system. Renaming/Deleting Fields: Lets you rename or delete existing fields. Customization Process: The system is customizable by the vendor themselves or extensively customizable by any qualified person. API: Lets you access the source code or access an extensive API in order to update or add functionality. PAGE 132 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

133 Invoicing and Payments Payment Plan: Lets you define a payment plan by entering a start date, end date, and number of payments, and the payments themselves will be automatically calculated. One-Offs: Lets you create a one-off invoice for a single payment Viewing Invoices and Payment History: Lets you view a list of all invoices for a constituent. Lets you easily see the payment history for a constituent. What s Been Invoiced For: Lets you view which payments have been invoiced for when and which have not. Aging Report: There s no built-in aging report, but you could create one without too much difficulty. Other Invoicing: Lets you collect standard payment info: date, amount, payment types that are configurable, check number, etc. Lets you define how much of an applied payment is tax-deductible vs. non-deductible. Lets you write off an invoice as unreceivable. Payment without Invoicing: Lets you apply a payment for any specific event/ service to a constituent record without first creating an invoice in the system. Group Invoicing: Lets you create a payment for a specific event/ service for everyone that meets a particular set of criteria (i.e. all members). Tax/Nontaxable: Lets you apply taxable and non-taxable amounts to a single invoice. Constituents Paying For Others: Lets you apply payment from one constituent to pay another s invoice. All Open Invoices: Lets you see all open invoices and filter by key information (member/ nonmember, amount, event). Usability, Support, and Documentation Ease of Use Overview: The system is designed to be free of clutter, but requires training in order to navigate the interface. IT Skills: You ll need someone with skills maintaining relational databases to support the database. However, there is a a hosted option which allows the database management to be outsourced to the Tessitura Network for an additional fee. Help: Lets you access online help, written manuals and recorded trainings to help staff understand how to use the system. Training: Vendor provides useful options for training staff members via the internet. and phone support are also useful. Workflows: Lets experts use the system to quickly do common tasks, tailored to their own workflow. Process Documentation: The vendor offers documentation in Word format upon request, which users may use as a basis for their process documentation. Religious School Tracking Child Info: Lets you track emergency contact information, doctor, insurance information for each enrolled child through custom screens. Lets you track allergies, diet (kosher?), and special needs for each enrolled child through custom screens. Class Info: There s no built-in way to manage classes, but a synagogue could build courses as performances and mark registration and attendance in this way. This would let you print out a class list with key student information for teachers, assign children to particular classrooms or teachers, and track the current grade level of a child, both in day school and religious school. Class Promotion: You must manually promote all children to next grade level at the end of the year in order to hold some back Attendance: Lets you track and easily input children s attendance through quick entry forms if you treat courses as performances. Grading: No grading functionality. Cemetery Management Billing and Invoicing: Lets you track the person who should be billed for a cemetery plot, bill for the upfront fees PAGE 133 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

134 (reservation, perpetual care) for a cemetery plot, and create invoices based on monthly, quarterly, or semi-annual payment schedules for upfront payment of cemetery plots, if you treat a plot reservation as a seat subscription. Lets you easily create yearly invoices for ongoing annual fees related to cemetery plots. Plot Management: Lets you view which plots are sold and which are unsold and who in the database has reserved a plot and who has not, in order to market plots, through the seat map function. Lets you track who is buried in each plot number in a cemetery, through the seat map function. Lets you track who has reserved each plot number in a cemetery and lets you view what section and/or plot a particular constituent has reserved through the seat map. Yahrzeits and Cemeteries: It s not curretnly possible to associate an individual Yahrzeit with a cemetery plot or track the date of death. Constituents and Cemeteries: Lets you track the names and relationship of surviving relatives for an individual buried in the cemetery and lets you associate the deceased person buried in the cemetery, and their plot, with their family unit, if you track the plot as a seat reservation. Digital Map: Lets you view a digital map to see allocated and unallocated plots, with names of those buried, if you use the seat map function to track seat reservations. Plaque Management: Lets you track if there s a memorial plaque associated with a plot, and if so, where it is. Reporting and Querying Standard Reports: Lets you create a set of standard reports that account for typical synagogue needs (for instance, parents with kids in preschool, parents of kids in 6th grade, LYBUNT and SYBUNT reports, constituents with a particular set of skills or interests, who came to event X but not Y). Ad Hoc Reports: Lets you easily create ad hoc reports that allow staff to define what rows, columns, formulas and formats are used. Querying: Lets you query for a set of constituents who meet criteria for a standard set of fields. Lets you create a flexibility query for a set of constituents based on almost any field in the database. Reporting For Data Issues: Lets you identify possible data issues (i.e. duplicates, inconsistent data entry) from two data management reports which can pull by list and/or operator to review data entry. There is also an audit which is displayed by constituent which can be rendered in report format. Dashboards: Lets you easily view and customize a dashboard that helps you track overall metrics about programs and finances. Excel: Lets you export a report or query to a friendly Excel file. Searching: Lets you quickly search the database for an existing person from anywhere in the interface. PAGE 134 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

135 Appendices

136 Appendix A: Methodology Idealware s research was broken into three distinct parts, as outlined below. Requirements Gathering To learn about what is needed from a synagogue s database, we conducted interviews with 10 staff members at synagogues ranging from executive directors to staffers on the ground about their current uses for their synagogue management systems. We also asked them what they wished their systems could help them with in terms of fundraising, event management, relationship management, and more. These participants were nominated by the consortium of organizations mentioned earlier in this report. We also conducted focus groups with experts in the space, including consultants and representatives from the movements, to glean their thoughts on what synagogues should expect from their systems in order to gain a strategic perspective to complement the tactical orientation of the staffers. We coded these raw notes to define and prioritize an exhaustive requirements document for an ideal synagogue management system one that would serve the current needs of synagogues as well as address the more aspirational future of data management. Idealware found significant overlap between the needs of the synagogue representatives and those articulated by experts in the space. The full requirements document is included in Appendix C. Phase I The requirements document provided the basis for our selection of 22 systems (narrowed from 60 initially included for discussion) from the Synagogue Management, Donor Management, Membership and Association Management, Constituent Relationship Management, and Church Management System sectors for inclusion in the report. Idealware drew from its own knowledge of the sectors based on years of quantitative research, and also relied on the advice of expert consultants and queries to the vendors themselves to create this list for Phase I. All told, we considered 60 different software systems for inclusion in this report. To narrow them down, we used the following strategies: Synagogue Management During the requirements gathering phase, Idealware noted synagogue management systems being used by participants in our interviews and focus groups for investigation, and took suggestions from the advisory committee for other systems to include. Out of the 13 systems in play for inclusion, Idealware chose the five systems included in the report based on a combination of the following factors: Market Share: How many synagogues currently use the system? We wanted to make sure that synagogues could read about systems they ve already heard of and might even be using already, so included two of the most popular synagogue management systems that have been around for decades: Chaverware and MM2000. Out-of-the-box Features: How closely were these systems already aligned to the requirements of synagogues? Did they have support for fundraising, s, event management, relationship management, and member dues built in already? Was there some kind of online portal where members could log in and see or edit their information? Could they pay online? Innovation: We looked for systems that were incorporating new trends in the nonprofit database sector, such as being a cloud-based system or one based on a CRM platform, to investigate how the sector was changing this led to the inclusion of smaller ShulCloud, ShulSuite, and Cloud for Synagogues, newer web-based programs that don t have the market share of Chaverware or MM2000, but are still interesting options. PAGE 136 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

137 Donor Management Idealware has considerable expertise in this arena, and has published a report on low-cost donor management systems for more than five years. We dug into our research to find systems we believed would fit the requirements of synagogues based on previous demos. We then sent the following queries to vendors of 11 systems we were confident would be particularly useful in this context: Imagine that there is a member of an organization who is married to a person who may or may not be a member, and that they have children who are involved in an organization s programs. How does the software represent this family as a household as well as individual constituents? Let s say that an organization s financial year is coming to a close, and all members will need to renew their membership by paying dues. Some of your members want to pay quarterly, others monthly, and still others in a lump sum. How would the software handle this? If an organization holds an event, can the software reflect how much (not just whether) an event registrant has paid (or if s/he is a guest or presenter), as well as whether the registrant actually attended the event? Can you let us know how many users your software currently has? The questions were selected to test the software s ability to handle scenarios common to synagogues and to assess features that would be difficult to build in without completely changing the infrastructure of the system in question. Based on how the vendors responded and how well they aligned with the requirements of synagogues, we narrowed the list down to the four systems included in this phase of the report. Membership Management Again, Idealware relied on our expertise in the notfor-profit technology sector, drawing particularly from an article we researched and wrote on member and association management tools. Because synagogues operate on a membership basis, we were particularly interested in investigating this sector for systems that could be useful for the purposes of this report. We then sent the same queries sent to the donor management system vendors to 18 systems we knew would be particularly useful in this context. Based on how the vendors responded and how well they aligned with the requirements of synagogues, we narrowed the list down to the four systems included in this phase of the report. Church Management To find systems of particular use in the church management sector, Idealware enlisted the help of several consultants working in the church software sector to get their advice on which systems would be of particular use to synagogues. We then sent the same queries as those sent to the donor management and member management system vendors to all 14 of the systems suggested. The questions were selected to test the software s ability to handle scenarios common to synagogues that would be difficult to build in without completely changing the infrastructure of the system in question. CRMs Idealware defines CRMs strictly, and considers there to be only four true systems on the market: CiviCRM Salesforce SugarCRM Microsoft Dynamics Because this market is so small and these systems so flexible, we included all four in this phase of the project. We wrote up a standardized demo script that focused on aspects of the requirements that would demonstrate each system s fit on a structural level. Idealware then conducted hour-long demos with each of the vendors and wrote up one-to-two-page narrative summaries of the systems describing their fit with the requirements of synagogues, pros and cons, and pricing. All summaries were reviewed by the vendor or a consultant specializing in that system for accuracy. PAGE 137 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

138 Phase II Once the first phase of the project was over and Idealware had conducted 21 hour-long demos of software selections across the different sectors [one vendor, ACS, declined to participate after initially agreeing to do so], we analyzed the data we had gathered for each system and evaluated the strength of every system as compared to the requirements critical to the synagogue management sector. We placed special weight on structural aspects that aren t easily customized, such as dues cycles, household management, the ability to collect payments and see what is due, ability to customize the system to accommodate the Hebrew calendar, the possibility of tailoring dues cycles in batch, and the user-friendliness and learning curve for a new user. We also considered two additional and critical aspects: the willingness of the vendor to partner with the sector and adapt the system to its needs, and cost. After asking for price specifications in the first phase of the demo, we selected for inclusion only vendors willing and able to consider models that allow a small synagogue to use the system for no more than $5,000, given upfront investment. This is comparable to what most small and mid-sized synagogues currently pay for a data management system. Based on our conclusions and assessments of the needs of this community, we selected 12 systems for inclusion in Phase II of the project, which involved an additional demo of two-to-three hours. In these demos, Idealware asked scenario-based questions directly corresponding to the requirements document. Two vendors, Donor Perfect and Talisma, performed highly in the first phase of the demos and were invited to participate in this second phase, but declined. We demoed a third system, Affiniscape s Members360, for inclusion. However, the company merged with another vendor shortly before we went to press on this report and declined to have the more-detailed review published at this time. PAGE 138 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

139 Appendix B : How We Rated the Systems Fair Solid Excellent Family Units and Households Lets you track main address, contact information, and membership status for a family unit Lets you easily track multiple family units with the same family name Lets you mark that a family unit has resigned, has been suspended, or is no longer active No way to distinguish family units/ individuals Children are not a real constituent record; have to take away a lot of meaningful things Lets you mark an individual as deceased Lets you track seasonal addresses for a family unit including start and end dates Lets you easily see in one place all individuals associated with a particular family unit, including kids and any other household members Lets you track an alumni someone who is no longer a member but was possibly through a custom field Lets you associate a child with two family units (i.e. for divorced parents) Lets you account for nontraditional families (i.e. long term nonmarried couples, same sex marriages) Basic Constituent and Relationship Tracking Lets you see all the recent activity for a specific individual Can easily exclude nonmembers from member record You can customize what basic demographic information is tracked, such as , phone number, birthday, age, gender, of every constituent You can track the occupation of an individual Lets you track an individual s interests and skills through customizable fields to match them with potential volunteer opportunities Lets you track the full name for each constituent in a household to account for spouses or kids with different last names Lets you track and customize nonfamily relationships between individuals in the database Lets you distinguish between different tiers of members and nonmembers in the database, if you add the tiers Lets you link to constituents social media pages within their records, at least via a custom field Let you track and see who in a household is a member of a group, committee, or auxiliary, and easily see everyone who s in that group Lets you easily add or import basic information about a number of constituents at once Lets you flexibly record information about a child, such as age, day school, college Lets you track what tradition or movement an individual was raised in, how kosher they keep, if they ve been to Israel, whether an individual is Jewish (in a mixed-marriage household), and other faith and observance information through custom fields Easy to see a meaningful summary of all family unit activity Family unit and other kinds of relationships are distinguished clearly Can designate which individual gave EITHER: Lets you track alumni someone who is no longer a member but was through a relationship that s not a custom field or status OR Automatically excludes individuals marked as deceased from labels or mailings, at least by setting up a trigger or workflow Lets you easily move an existing constituent with all their history into a new or existing family unit (i.e. child starts their own family, divorce, aged parents moving back in) Lets you easily see all the recent activity tracked for an individual associated with a family unit, such as event attendance You can track the current employer of an individual and associate that employer with a company record PROVIDES ONE OF THESE: Provides sophisticated functionality to match individuals interests and skills with potential volunteer opportunities Pulls data from constituents social media pages into the system itself Lets you associate the source of a constituent with a specific campaign, an event, or a staff member Lets you define rating on how engaged a person is based on what they ve participated in PAGE 139 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

140 Fair Solid Excellent Member Management and Dues Renewal Lets you associate payments for events and membership dues with family units for billing purposes Lets you track the membership type for a family unit (i.e. single, single parent, family with children, etc.) Lets you easily enter the information to sign up a new member Lets you easily charge a building fund fee to a new member, with flexible payment terms as described in the billing section Lets you automatically generate invoices for a new cycle of membership dues in batch for all members Lets you easily see who has paid outstanding membership dues and who has not Lets you define a discounted membership fee for a particular family member, which is then billed accordingly, but the discounted amount is tracked Lets you track why a discount on membership is being given Lets you accept payments on outstanding invoices online via credit cards Event, Honor, and High Holy Day Management Lets you easily book and bill holiday seat purchases for general admission to specific areas, with member and nonmember prices Lets you easily view who has sat in what kind/ level of seat for previous high holidays Lets you easily log, view and print who has RSVP d or registered for a particular event Lets you easily flag which constituents came to a particular event Lets you track who served as aliyahs or other honors in past, with what specifically they did on what date Lets you easily create tickets with seating information in order to send them to the appropriate constituents Lets people purchase seats for the holidays ONLINE for general admission to specific areas, with member and nonmember price Lets you account for non-paid reciprocity seats for members of other synagogues Lets you easily input honors for a constituent based on a customized list of possible honors Lets you easily create an ordered listing of aliyahs and honors for a given service for the program book Lets you easily identify a group of people and send them a letter asking them to perform a particular honor Lets you track the Hebrew date that an honor took place Lets you define membership prices based on the desired seating for the high holidays Lets a prospective member fill out their membership form online, and pass data into the database Lets you easily book and bill holiday seat purchases for specific seats (i.e. C7) Lets you arrange or rearrange the seating plan Lets you easily view who has sat in what specific seat (i.e. C7) for previous high holidays Lets you track what specific high holiday seats (i.e. C7-14) are still available Lets you automatically assign members to the specific seats they have had in the past, and remove them from the seat inventory Lets people purchase seats for the holidays ONLINE for specific seats (i.e. C7), with member and nonmember prices Lets you see an online map of seat offerings with status of seats and who allocated ones are allocated to Lets you easily add or import basic information about a list of event attendees, including ones not currently in the database Lets you track responses for those invited to perform a particular honor PAGE 140 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

141 Fair Solid Excellent Yahrzeits Lets you track the anniversary of a constituent s death (Yahrzeit) based on the Hebrew calendar Lets you track the individual constituents who should be notified (i.e. surviving family members) of each particular Yahrzeit Lets you view all the Yahrzeits that a particular constituent should be notified about Lets you easily generate letters notifying family members about an upcoming Yahrzeit Lets you store basic information about a deceased individual who has no relationship to the synagogue other than through a member s desire to observe their Yahrzeit Lets you store basic information about an individual who has no relationship to the synagogue other than being kin of a deceased member Donation Tracking Lets you easily enter tribute gifts, with both the donor and honoree Lets you assign gifts to a particular source, campaign or fund, or split the gift across multiple of these Lets you easily see who gave to a particular campaign last year in order to target them again this year Lets you enter pledges for future gifts, including the amount and scheduled date; this is then handled as an invoice and consolidated into statements. Lets you easily see the date and amount of a constituent s last donation Observances and Gift Exchanges Lets you easily create a list of all people with anniversaries or birthdays in a particular month (for Leagrams) Lets you track who has donated for a particular event and in support of what other family unit (Leagrams, Purim baskets) Lets you define when the synagogue wants to observe Yahrzeits (i.e. before the actual date? After?) Lets you autofill a Hebrew date of death based on a Gregorian date Lets you track whether a particular person s Yahrzeit should be observed based on the Gregorian or Hebrew calendar Lets you easily create a list of all Yahrzeits that will be observed in a particular time frame (based on the desired observance timeframe/ calendar) Lets you track whether a gift was given by a whole family unit or an individual within it, primarily for thankyou letters Lets you charge a credit card through the system Lets you set up a recurring donation (i.e. $10 per month to the Rabbi s discretionary fund) Lets you track whether a constituent is opted in or out for a checkoff contribution, such as ARZA Lets you automatically add a line item on invoices for constituents opting in for a checkoff contribution, alongside their membership fees Lets you easily enter a substantial number of (essentially) tribute gifts in support of Leagram or Purim baskets Lets you easily print a letter that provides all the names and messages of those who supported an individual Leagram or Purim basket Lets you track specific information about a Yahrzeit: Is there a plaque? Hebrew name? How do you pronounce the name? Did they die during the day or evening? Lets members enter information online about Yahrzeits they d like to be observed Lets you automatically turn on the physical lights for the appropriate plaques for the week s Yahrzeits Lets you quickly enter a number of gifts at one time through a streamlined quick-entry interface Lets you assign credit in the database for bringing in a gift to as many staff members or other people as you like Lets you associate gifts with an organization as opposed to individuals Lets you track and manage grants Lets you track personal message from a donor for a Leagrams, Purim baskets Lets you create a list of who should receive what size gift basket and at what address (Purim baskets) PAGE 141 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

142 Fair Solid Excellent Overall Online Constituent Interactions Lets constituents RSVP online for a free event, which is then captured in the database Lets constituents register and pay online for an event or class, which is then captured in the database Lets you set various event registration fees for a single event (i.e. adult/child or member/nonmember) Lets you easily create an online registration or RSVP form for a new event or class Lets constituents automatically receive a confirmation with customizable text when they register online Lets constituents donate online with credit cards Lets you track what fund or campaign a constituent is donating to online Lets constituents view outstanding invoices online and pay them by credit card AT LEAST FIVE OF THE FOLLOWING: Lets you send reminders of events participants have registered for Lets parents easily register their child for an event or class, without having to login as the child Lets you include substantial custom fields (meal preferences, interests, seating requests) on an online registration form that are then easily viewable as a summary of event attendee information Lets you define the maximum number of people that can attend an event, and the online system will stop taking registrations when the max is reached Lets you auto-populate online registration forms with constituent information (demographics, family members) Lets you automatically pass online payment data to the system, and eventually to Accounting, coded as to what the payment was for Lets you receive a notification when a constituent updates their profile Lets constituents update their own online profile of Yahrzeit information Lets you help manage synagogue s website Lets constituents view their own profile online and update their contact information Lets constituents update information online about their children (names, birthdates, schools) Lets constituents update their own online profile of interests, skills, and occupation AT LEAST FOUR: Lets constituents easily RSVP or register multiple family members for the same event online Lets constituents sign up for events from a smart phone Lets you automatically update a public website calendar when scheduling events through the system Lets constituents set up a recurring credit card donation online (i.e. $10 per month to the Rabbi s discretionary fund) Lets you conduct constituent surveys, and responses are automatically pulled into the database Lets constituents view and update their own profiles from a smart phone PAGE 142 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

143 Fair Solid Excellent and Direct Mail Lets you send broadcast s directly from constituent database to defined groups Lets you easily generate a list of members for whom they don t have addresses (i.e. to target them by mail instead) Lets you send out invoices and statements via rather than mail Lets you easily generate labels for an ad-hoc query of constituents Lets you create flexible templates to receive mail-merged data Lets you easily mail-merge information for a selected group of constituents into a defined template Lets you easily create a one-off thankyou letter and label for a donation Lets you easily create one-off tribute gift letters, which prints a letter and label for both the donor and the person honored AT LEAST THREE: Lets you send broadcast s directly from constituent database to ad hoc groups Lets constituents sign up for lists online Lets you use graphic templates to send broadcast s Lets you track information about opens and click-throughs Lets you track the response to a particular or direct mail campaign Lets you queue thankyou letters in order to print out a batch of letters and labels at one time Lets you queue one-off tribute gift letters to print a whole series of letters for both donors and honorees Lets you easily create yearend tax letters which summarize all tax-deductible donations for each constituent Facility Management and Staff Scheduling Lets you see who has booked which space Lets multiple staff people see the same internal room and event calendar Lets you easily bill for the booking of a space Lets you track whether a contract or deposit has been received for a rental Hebrew and Religious School Management Lets you track emergency contact information, doctor, and insurance information for each enrolled child Lets you print out a class list with key student information for teachers TWO OF THE FOLLOWING: Lets you assign children to particular classrooms or teachers Lets you track the current grade level of a child, both in day school and religious school Lets you automatically promote all children to the next grade level at the end of the year, with the option to hold some back Lets you track children s attendance at religious school AT LEAST THREE: Lets constituents unsubscribe from lists via the s themselves Lets you easily subscribe and unsubscribe constituents from all or particular lists Lets constituents easily forward s to a friend Lets existing constituents control their subscriptions to particular lists online Lets you create discussion lists for particular subsets of constituents (i.e. committees, those in a particular class) Lets you associate a tribute gift with the honoree in the system in order to print a single letter to the honoree that includes all the gifts made in their honor Lets you track which physical publications someone has subscribed to, and flag someone to receive a single copy Lets you easily view what spaces are booked and which are available in a calendar format Lets you easily see and manage a Rabbi s or Cantor s calendar TWO OF THE FOLLOWING: Lets you update children s contact, emergency, and other needs information through an online profile Lets you easily input children s attendance through quick entry forms Lets you track children s overall grades for each class they ve enrolled in PAGE 143 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

144 Fair Solid Excellent Cemetery Management Lets you track the person who should be billed for a cemetery plot Lets you track who is buried in each plot number in a cemetery Access and Security The system is tolerably fast for multiple users to use concurrently Lets you create and enforce access to different types of data for different users Accounting Integration Lets you easily pass data to standard accounting systems like QuickBooks and Sage 50 Lets you create and track accounting batches in order to ease the reconciliation process with an accounting system Lets you easily bill for the upfront fees (reservation, perpetual care) for a cemetery plot Lets you view which plots are sold and which are unsold Lets you access constituent data through a remote browser Lets multiple staff people each see a personalized view of the tasks and data that apply to them Lets you batch and transfer payments received online into the accounting system BILLED revenue data is automatically passed to standard accounting systems at a Chart of Accounts account code level RECEIVED revenue data is automatically passed to standard accounting systems at a Chart of Accounts account code level Lets you track who has reserved each plot number in a cemetery Lets you view what section and/or plot a particular constituent has reserved Lets you associate an individual Yahrzeit with a cemetery plot Lets you track the names and relationship of surviving relatives for individuals buried in the cemetery Lets you track the date of death for each individual in a cemetery plot Lets you associate the deceased person buried in the cemetery, and their plot, with their family unit Lets you notify people associated with a cemetery plot of the Yahrzeit associated with the person buried Lets you easily create yearly invoices for ongoing annual fees related to cemetery plots Lets you view a digital map to see allocated and unallocated plots, with names of those buried Lets you track if there s a memorial plaque associated with a plot, and if so, where it is EITHER: Lets you access constituent data through a smart phone Lets you create and enforce access to different types of constituents for different users Lets you link a batch to a deposit slip number to tie it back to the accounting system Lets you set up the types of transactions that should be batched into each account code for the accounting system PAGE 144 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

145 Fair Solid Excellent Customization Lets a synagogue opt to hide pieces of functionality that don t apply to them Lets you customize dropdown values for fields such as campaigns, type of relationships and others. Invoicing and Payments Lets you easily define that a payment is required from a constituent for a specific event/service Lets you apply annual, quarterly, or monthly payment plans to a payment Lets you create a one-off invoice for a single payment Lets you create a statement that includes all currently due payments or pledges for a constituent Lets you view a list of all invoices for a constituent Lets you view which payments have been invoiced for and which have not Lets you collect standard payment info including date, amount, and payment types that are configurable, check number, etc. Lets you write off an invoice as unreceivable Reporting and Querying Lets you view a set of standard reports that account for typical synagogue needs (for instance, parents with kids in preschool, parents of kids in sixth grade, LYBUNT and SYBUNT reports, constituents with a particular set of skills or interests, who came to event X but not Y?) Lets you query for a set of constituents who meet criteria for a standard set of fields Lets you export a report or query to a friendly Excel file Lets you add an unlimited number of custom fields, which can be placed on most screens in the system Lets you rename or delete existing fields Lets you view an aging report, which includes a summary of overdue payments with information about how overdue they are Lets you define a payment plan by entering a start date, end date, and number of payments, and the payments themselves will be automatically calculated Lets you apply a payment to any specific invoice or pledge in the system Lets you apply a payment for any specific event/ service without first creating an invoice in the system Lets you easily see the payment history for a constituent Lets you see all open invoices and filter by key information (member/ nonmember, amount, event) Lets you create a flexible query for a set of constituents based on almost any field in the database Lets you identify possible data issues (i.e. duplicates, inconsistent data entry) from reports provided by the system The system is customizable by the vendor or extensively customizable by any qualified person Lets you access the source code or access an extensive API in order to update or add functionality Lets you define how much of an applied payment is tax-deductible vs. non-deductible Lets you create a payment for a specific event/ service for everyone that meets a particular set of criteria (i.e. all members) Lets you apply taxable and non-taxable amounts to a single invoice Lets you apply payment from one constituent to pay another s invoice Lets you create ad hoc reports that allow staff to define what rows, columns, formulas and formats are used Lets you easily view a dashboard that helps you track overall metrics about their programs and finances PAGE 145 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

146 Fair Solid Excellent Usability, Support, and Documentation The system is somewhat free of clutter, but not easy to understand by novice users; there are step-by-step wizards, searches and quick lists for some features The system does not require substantial IT skills to support Vendor provides useful options for and phone support, or there is a substantial community for an open source product Lets you access a useful combination of help text throughout the application, online help, written manuals and recorded trainings to help staff understand how to use the system Vendor provides useful options for training staff members, via the internet or live The system is carefully designed to be free of clutter, and easy to understand by novice users; there are easy step-bystep wizards, searches and quick lists for many features Lets experts use the system to quickly do common tasks, tailored to their own workflow Lets you process documentation to help staff understand how they re supposed to enter data and assure consistency PAGE 146 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

147 Appendix C: Full Requirements Document We ve documented three different priorities for each requirement based on our understanding of synagogue needs from the interviews and focus groups. The first priority, labeled Majority of Synagogues, documents how the majority of synagogues are likely to prioritize it including, for instance, that many of them may not need some of the more advanced functionality at all. There s then a Substantial Minority column and an Only a Specific Niche column representing other needs this allows us to represent, for example, that it s incredibly important to a few specific synagogues but that no one else cares about it. NOTE: This requirements document served to guide our research and analysis and was drawn from the interviews and focus groups we conducted with synagogues and focus groups over the summer of It s a working document, and is meant to demonstrate our methodology. Family Units and Households Majority of synagogues Who is This Important To? Substantial minority Only a specific niche 1. Lets you easily see in one place all individuals associated with a particular family unit, including kids and any other household members Lets you track main address and contact information for a family unit Lets you easily track multiple family units with the same family name Lets you track the membership status of a family unit Lets you easily print out mailing labels with the deceased member excluded, if an individual is marked as deceased Lets you mark that a family unit has resigned or has been suspended Lets you associate a child with two family units (i.e. for divorced parents) Lets you track constituent information, as defined below, for every member of a family unit Lets you easily see all the recent activity tracked for an individual associated with a family unit, such as event attendance Lets you track family members who are not actually living in the household, like a kid who s gone off to college Lets you easily move an existing constituent with all their history into a new or existing family unit (i.e. child starts their own family, divorce, aged parents moving back in). 12. Lets you enter a family unit in which one spouse is a member and another is not (i.e. for a mixed marriage in some conservative temples) Lets you account for nontraditional families (i.e. long term nonmarried couples, same sex marriages) =Unimportant 1= Nice to have 2=Quite useful 3=Very important 4= Synagogues cannot effectively function without this PAGE 147 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

148 14. Lets you track seasonal addresses for a family unit including start and end dates. 15. Lets you track the relationship between two family units (i.e. the two husbands are brothers, one is a grown son of another member). Basic Constituent Tracking Majority of synagogues Who is This Important To? Substantial minority Only a specific niche Lets you enter any individual into the database, even if not a member, and easily exclude nonmembers from member datasets Lets you track basic demographic information, such as , phone number, birthday, age, gender, of every constituent Lets you easily track multiple constituents with the same name Lets you mark that a constituent is deceased Lets you track what tradition or movement an individual was raised in; how kosher they keep; if they ve been to Israel Lets you track the occupation of adult constituents Lets you track an individual s interests and skills, to match them with potential volunteer opportunities Lets you track the full name for each constituent (to account for spouses or kids with different last names) Lets you track whether a particular individual is Jewish (i.e. for a mixed marriage) Let you track the source of a constituent (for measuring outreach efforts) Lets you track social media pages/ handles for constituents Let you track who is a member of each group, committee or auxiliary Lets you easily add or import basic information about a number of constituents at once Lets you track an alumni -- someone who is no longer a member but was Lets you pull in Twitter/ Facebook posts for constituents Lets you track individual birthdays on a Hebrew calendar Lets you track words or names in Hebrew, with Hebrew letters Lets you quickly search the database for an existing person from anywhere in the interface Lets you track (for a child) their age, day school, college Lets you track that a nonmember has made an inquiry about membership or services =Unimportant 1= Nice to have 2=Quite useful 3=Very important 4= Synagogues cannot effectively function without this PAGE 148 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

149 Relationship Tracking Majority of synagogues Who is This Important To? Substantial minority Only a specific niche 1. Lets you keep a manual log of communications with each constituent, such as phone calls or personal meetings Lets you see a quick summary of all recent communications and constituent actions in one place Lets you track non-household relationships between constituents (i.e. boss/ employee) Lets you easily merge two records if it becomes apparent that those records are duplicates Lets you automatically store a record of all system-generated letters and s for each donor Lets you assign a priority and a stage to a constituent to manage a prospecting workflow Lets you assign a donor to a particular campaign, and track their response to the campaign Lets you create a reminder for yourself for a particular constituent, task and date and show it prominently at that time Lets you track who on staff is the owner of a particular constituent relationship (i.e. for a major donor) Lets you track the next desirable action with a constituent Lets you assign a priority and a stage to an organization to manage a prospecting workflow Lets you create a profile for an organization and track the people who work for it (i.e. for sponsorship prospecting) Lets you track who has had recent interactions with a clergy member (to be able to find those who haven t) Lets you know when a member is in the hospital; track who will visit them when Lets you track a buddy system program, where new members are paired up with an existing member Membership Tracking 1. Lets you associate payments for events and membership dues with family units for billing purposes Lets you track the membership type for a family unit (i.e. single, single parent, family with children, etc.) Lets you define membership prices based on the desired seating for the high holidays Lets you easily enter the information to sign up a new member =Unimportant 1= Nice to have 2=Quite useful 3=Very important 4= Synagogues cannot effectively function without this PAGE 149 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

150 Majority of synagogues Who is This Important To? Substantial minority Only a specific niche 5. Lets you easily charge a building fund fee to a new member, with flexible payment terms as described in the billing section Lets you automatically generate invoices for a new cycle of membership dues in batch for all members Lets you easily see who has paid outstanding membership dues and who has not Lets you define a discounted membership fee for a particular family member, which is then billed accordingly, but the discounted amount is tracked. 9. Lets you track why a discount on membership is being given Lets you accept payments on outstanding invoices online via credit cards Lets prospective members fill out their membership form online, and pass data into the database High Holiday Seating 1. Lets you easily book and bill holiday seat purchases, for general admission to specific areas, with member and nonmember price Lets you easily book and bill holiday seat purchases for specific seats (i.e. C7) Lets you easily view who has sat in what kind/ level of seat for previous high holidays Lets you arrange or rearrange the seating plan Lets you easily create tickets with seating information in order to send them to the appropriate constituents Lets you automatically assign members to areas of seating based on their membership level Lets you easily view who has sat in what specific seat (i.e. C7) for previous high holidays Lets you track what specific high holiday seats (i.e. C7-14) are still available Lets you automatically assign members to the specific seats they have had in the past, and remove them from the seat inventory Lets people purchase seats for the holidays ONLINE for general admission to specific areas, with member and nonmember price Lets people purchase seats for the holidays ONLINE for specific seats (i.e. C7), with member and nonmember price Lets you account for non-paid reciprocity seats, for members of other synagogues Lets you see an online map of seat offerings with status of seats and who allocated ones are allocated to =Unimportant 1= Nice to have 2=Quite useful 3=Very important 4= Synagogues cannot effectively function without this PAGE 150 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

151 Overall Event and Honor Tracking Majority of synagogues Who is This Important To? Substantial minority Only a specific niche 1. Lets you easily log, view and print who has RSVP d or registered for a particular event Lets you easily flag which constituents came to a particular event Lets you easily add or import basic information about a list of event attendees, including ones not currently in the database Lets you track who served as aliyahs or other honors in past, with what specifically they did on what date Lets you easily input honors for a constituent based on a customized list of possible honors Lets you easily create an ordered listing of aliyahs and honors for a given service, for the program book Lets you easily identify a group of people and send them a letter asking them to perform a particular honor Lets you track responses for those invited to perform a particular honor Lets you track the Hebrew date that an honor took place Online Event and School Registration 1. Lets constituents RSVP online for a free event, which is then captured in the database Lets constituents register and pay online for an event or class, which is then captured in the database Lets you set various event registration fees for a single event (i.e. adult/child or member/nonmember) Lets you easily create an online registration or RSVP form for a new event or class Lets constituents automatically receive a confirmation with customizable text when they register online Lets you send reminders of events participants have registered for Lets parents easily register their child for an event or class, without having to login as the child Lets you include substantial custom fields (meal preferences, interests, seating requests) on an online registration form that are then easily viewable as a summary of event attendee information. 9. Lets constituents easily RSVP or register multiple family members for the same event online Lets constituents sign up for events from a smart phone =Unimportant 1= Nice to have 2=Quite useful 3=Very important 4= Synagogues cannot effectively function without this PAGE 151 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

152 11. Lets you define the maximum number of people that can attend an event, and the online system will stop taking registrations when the max is reached. 12. Lets you auto populate online registration forms with constituent information (demographics, family members). 13. Lets you automatically update a public website calendar when scheduling events through the system. Observances and Gift Exchanges 1. Lets you easily create a list of all people with anniversaries or birthdays in a particular month (for Leagrams). 2. Lets you track who has donated for a particular event and in support of what other family unit (Leagrams, Purim baskets). 3. Lets you track personal message from a donor for a Leagrams, Purim baskets. 4. Lets you easily data enter a substantial number of (essentially) tribute gifts in support of Leagram or Purim baskets. 5. Lets you easily print a letter that provides all the names and messages of those who supported an individual Leagram or Purim basket. 6. Lets you create a list of who should receive what size gift basket and at what address (Purim baskets). Yahrzeits 1. Lets you track the anniversary of a constituent s death (Yahrzeit) based on the Hebrew calendar. 2. Lets you track the individual constituents who should be notified (i.e. surviving family members) of each particular Yahrzeit. 3. Lets you view all the Yahrzeits that a particular constituent should be notified about. 4. Lets you easily generate letters notifying family members about an upcoming Yahrzeit. 5. Lets you store basic information about a deceased individual who has no relationship to the synagogue other than through a member s desire to observe their Yahrzeit. 6. Lets you store basic information about an individual who has no relationship to the synagogue other than being kin of a deceased member. 7. Lets you track whether a particular person s Yahrzeit should be observed based on the Gregorian or Hebrew calendar. 8. Lets you define when the temple wants to observe Yahrzeits (i.e. before the actual date? After?). Majority of synagogues Who is This Important To? Substantial minority Only a specific niche =Unimportant 1= Nice to have 2=Quite useful 3=Very important 4= Synagogues cannot effectively function without this PAGE 152 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

153 Majority of synagogues Who is This Important To? Substantial minority Only a specific niche 9. Lets you easily create a list of all Yahrzeits that will be observed in a particular time frame (based on the desired observance timeframe/ calendar). 10. Lets you autofill a Hebrew date of death based on a Gregorian date Lets you track specific information about a Yahrzeit: Is there a plaque? Hebrew name? How do you pronounce the name? Did they die during the day or evening? 12. Lets members enter information online about Yahrzeits they d like to be observed Lets you automatically turn on the physical lights for the appropriate plaques for the week s Yahrzeits Donation Tracking 1. Lets you track whether a gift was given by a whole family unit or an individual within it, primarily for thank you letters Lets you quickly enter a number of gifts at one time through a streamlined quick-entry interface Lets you easily enter tribute gifts, with both the donor and the person honored Lets you assign gifts to a particular source, campaign or fund, or split the gift across multiple of these Lets you assign credit in the database for bringing in a gift to as many staff members or other people as you like Lets you easily see who gave to a particular campaign last year, in order to target them again this year Lets you associate gifts with an organization as opposed to individuals Lets you enter pledges for future gifts, including the amount and scheduled date. This is then handled as an invoice and consolidated into statements. 9. Lets you easily see the date and amount of a constituent s last donation Lets you charge a credit card through the system Lets you set up a recurring donation (i.e. $10/month to the Rabbi s discretionary fund) Lets you track whether a constituent is opted in or out for a checkoff contribution, such as ARZA Lets you automatically add a line item on invoices for constituents opting in for a checkoff contribution, alongside their membership fee. 14. Lets you track and manage grants =Unimportant 1= Nice to have 2=Quite useful 3=Very important 4= Synagogues cannot effectively function without this PAGE 153 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

154 Overall Online Interactions Majority of synagogues Who is This Important To? Substantial minority Only a specific niche 1. Lets constituents donate online with a credit card Lets you track what fund or campaign a constituent is donating to online Lets constituents view outstanding invoices online and pay them by credit card Lets you automatically pass online payment data to the system, and eventually to accounting, coded as to what the payment was for Lets constituents setup a recurring credit card donation online (i.e. $10/month to the Rabbi s discretionary fund) Lets constituents view their own profile online and update their contact information Lets you receive a notification when a constituent updates their profile Lets constituents update information online about their children (names, birthdates, schools) Lets constituents update their own online profile of interests, skills, and occupation Lets constituents update their own online profile of Yahrzeit information Lets you conduct constituent surveys, and responses are automatically pulled into the database Lets constituents view and update their own profile from a smart phone Lets you help manage synagogue s website Facility and Staff Scheduling (This sections outlines synagogues needs for facilities tracking in general, but it s unclear to us that this has any substantial overlap with constituent tracking. EMS Light was mentioned by several as a good separate system for this). 1. Lets you easily view what spaces are booked and which are available in a calendar format Lets you see who has booked which space Lets you easily see and manage a Rabbi s or Cantor s calendar Lets multiple staff people see the same internal room and event calendar Lets you easily bill for the booking of a space Lets you track whether a contract or deposit has been received for a rental Access and Security 1. The system is tolerably fast for multiple users to use concurrently =Unimportant 1= Nice to have 2=Quite useful 3=Very important 4= Synagogues cannot effectively function without this PAGE 154 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

155 Majority of synagogues Who is This Important To? Substantial minority Only a specific niche 2. Lets you access constituent data through a remote browser Lets you access constituent data through a smartphone Lets you create and enforce access to different types of DATA for different users. 5. Lets you create and enforce access to different types of CONSTI- UENTS for different users. 6. Lets multiple staff people each see a personalized view of the tasks and data that apply to them Lets you send broadcast s directly from constituent database Lets you send broadcast s to specific groups identified in the database Lets you send broadcast s to ad-hoc segments of constituents Lets constituents unsubscribe from lists from the s themselves Lets you easily generate a list of members for whom they don t have an address (i.e. to target them by mail instead) Lets constituents sign up for lists online Lets you easily subscribe and unsubscribe constituents from all or particular lists Lets you use graphic templates to send broadcast s Lets you track information about opens and click-throughs Lets constituents easily forward s to a friend Lets existing constituents control their subscription to particular lists online Lets you create discussion lists for particular subsets of constituents (i.e. committees, those in a particular class) Lets you send out invoices and statements via rather than mail Direct Mail 1. Lets you easily generate labels for an ad-hoc query of constituents Lets you create flexible templates to receive mail-merged data Lets you easily mail-merge information for a selected group of constituents into a defined template Lets you track the response to a particular or direct mail campaign Lets you easily create a one-off thank you letter and label for a donation =Unimportant 1= Nice to have 2=Quite useful 3=Very important 4= Synagogues cannot effectively function without this PAGE 155 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

156 Majority of synagogues Who is This Important To? Substantial minority Only a specific niche 6. Lets you easily create one-off tribute gift letters, which prints a letter and label for both the donor and the person honored Lets you queue thank you letters in order to print out a batch of letters and labels at one time Lets you queue one-off tribute gift letters, to print a whole series of letters for both the donors and the people honored Lets you associate a tribute gift with the honoree in the system in order to print a single letter to the honoree that includes all the gifts made in their honor. 10. Lets you easily create year end tax letters which summarize all taxdeductible donations, for each constituent Lets you track which physical publications someone has subscribed to Lets you flag someone to receive a single copy of a physical publication Accounting Integration 1. Lets you easily pass data to standard accounting systems like Quick- Books and Peachtree. 2. BILLED revenue data is automatically passed to standard accounting systems at a Chart of Accounts account code level. 3. RECEIVED revenue data is automatically passed to standard accounting systems at a Chart of Accounts account code level. 4. Lets you set up the types of transactions that should be batched into each account code for the accounting system. 5. Lets you create and track accounting batches in order to ease the reconciliation process with an accounting system. 6. Lets you link a batch to a deposit slip number to tie it back to the accounting system. 7. Lets you batch and transfer payments received online into the accounting system. 8. Lets you see revenue data automatically passed to standard accounting systems at an INDVIDUAL CONSTITUENT LEVEL (Idealware strongly recommends against this, but it was desirable to a notable number of congregations). 9. Lets you see transaction data passed to accounting systems in enough detail to use the accounting system for individual invoicing and receivables tracking (again, we strongly recommend against this) =Unimportant 1= Nice to have 2=Quite useful 3=Very important 4= Synagogues cannot effectively function without this PAGE 156 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

157 10. Lets you transfer money from one fund to another in the constituent database (we cannot imagine a situation in which we would recommend this). Customization Majority of synagogues Who is This Important To? Substantial minority Only a specific niche Lets a temple opt to hide pieces of functionality that don t apply to them Lets you customize dropdown values for fields such as campaigns, type of relationships and others Lets you add an unlimited number of custom fields, which can be placed on most screens in the system Lets you rename or delete existing fields The system is customizable by the vendor themselves or extensively customizable by any qualified person Lets you access the source code or access an extensive API in order to update or add functionality Invoicing and Payments 1. Lets you easily define that a payment is required from a constituent for a specific event/service Lets you apply annual, quarterly, or monthly payment plans to a payment Lets you define a payment plan by entering a start date, end date, and number of payments, and the payments themselves will be automatically calculated. 4. Lets you create a one-off invoice for a single payment Lets you create a statement that includes all currently due payments or pledges for a constituent Lets you view a list of all invoices for a constituent Lets you view which payments have been invoiced for and which have not Lets you view an aging report, which includes a summary of overdue payments with information about how overdue they are Lets you apply a payment to any specific invoice or pledge in the system Lets you collect standard payment info: date, amount, payment types that are configurable, check number, etc Lets you define how much of an applied payment is tax-deductible vs. non-deductible Lets you apply a payment for any specific event/ service without first creating an invoice in the system =Unimportant 1= Nice to have 2=Quite useful 3=Very important 4= Synagogues cannot effectively function without this PAGE 157 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

158 Majority of synagogues Who is This Important To? Substantial minority Only a specific niche 13. Lets you write off an invoice as unreceivable Lets you easily see the payment history for a constituent Lets you create a payment for a specific event/ service for everyone that meets a particular set of criteria (i.e. all members) Lets you apply taxable and non-taxable amounts to a single invoice Lets you apply payment from one constituent to pay another s invoice Lets you see all open invoices and filter by key information (member/ nonmember, amount, event) Usability, Support, and Documentation 1. The system is carefully designed to be free of clutter, and easy to understand by novice users. There are easy step-by-step wizards, searches and quick lists for many features. 2. The system does not require substantial IT skills to support Lets you access a useful combination of help text throughout the application, online help, written manuals and recorded trainings to help staff understand how to use the system. 4. Vendor provides useful options for and phone support Lets experts use the system to quickly do common tasks, tailored to their own workflow Vendor provides useful options for training staff members--potentially via the internet or live Lets you process documentation to help staff understand how they re supposed to enter data, aid consistency Religious School Tracking 1. Lets you track emergency contact information, doctor, insurance information for each enrolled child Lets you print out a class list with key student information for teachers Lets you track allergies, diet (kosher?), and special needs for each enrolled child Lets you assign children to particular classrooms or teachers Lets you track the current grade level of a child, both in day school and religious school Lets you automatically promote all children to the next grade level at the end of the year, with the option to hold some back Lets you update children s contact, emergency, needs information through an online profile Lets you track children s attendance at religious school =Unimportant 1= Nice to have 2=Quite useful 3=Very important 4= Synagogues cannot effectively function without this PAGE 158 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

159 Majority of synagogues Who is This Important To? Substantial minority Only a specific niche 9. Lets you easily input children s attendance through quick entry forms Lets you track children s overall grade for each class they ve enrolled in. Cemetery Management Lets you track the person who should be billed for a cemetery plot Lets you easily bill for the up-front fees (reservation, perpetual care) for a cemetery plot Lets you view which plots are sold and which are unsold Lets you easily create invoices based on monthly, quarterly, or semiannual payment schedules for up-front payment of cemetery plots Lets you view who in the database has reserved a plot and who has not, in order to market plots Lets you track who is buried in each plot number in a cemetery Lets you track who has reserved each plot number in a cemetery Lets you view what section and/or plot a particular constituent has reserved Lets you associate an individual Yahrzeit with a cemetery plot Lets you track the names and relationship of surviving relatives for an individual buried in the cemetery Lets you track the date of death for each individual in a cemetery plot Lets you associate the deceased person buried in the cemetery, and their plot, with their family unit Lets you notify people associated with a cemetery plot of the Yahrzeit associated with the person buried Lets you easily create yearly invoices for ongoing annual fees related to cemetery plots Lets you view a digital map to see allocated and unallocated plots, with names of those buried Lets you track if there s a memorial plaque associated with a plot, and if so, where it is Reporting and Querying 1. Lets you view a set of standard reports that account for typical synagogue needs (for instance, parents with kids in preschool, parents of kids in 6th grade, LYBUNT and SYBUNT reports, constituents with a particular set of skills or interests, who came to event X but not Y?). 2. Lets you query for a set of constituents who meet criteria for a standard set of fields =Unimportant 1= Nice to have 2=Quite useful 3=Very important 4= Synagogues cannot effectively function without this PAGE 159 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

160 Majority of synagogues Who is This Important To? Substantial minority Only a specific niche 3. Lets you create a flexibility query for a set of constituents based on almost any field in the database Lets you create ad hoc reports that allow staff to define what rows, columns, formulas and formats are used Lets you identify possible data issues (i.e. duplicates, inconsistent data entry) from reports provided by the system Lets you easily view a dashboard that helps you track overall metrics about their programs and finances Lets you export a report or query to a friendly Excel file =Unimportant 1= Nice to have 2=Quite useful 3=Very important 4= Synagogues cannot effectively function without this PAGE 160 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

161 Appendix D: Other Systems of Interest in the Synagogue Management Sphere During the course of our research for this report, Idealware came across other systems of interest to synagogues that weren t data management systems. For educational purposes, we ve provided brief introductions to each but keep in mind that we didn t demo any of the systems or tools below. GrapeVine GrapeVine is a new platform piloted in January of 2012 in two communities Columbus, Ohio, and Rhode Island. The system s creators say that they want to provide a platform enabling a fundamental shift in the Jewish community from a program-centric to a customer-centric orientation to help retain synagogue members. They report that the system uses data aggregation and predictive analytics to create a personalized approach for each member through weekly s. Learn more at their website: HebCal A basic calendar tool, HebCal offers the ability for developers to include a plugin, API, or website widget to convert the Hebrew to Gregorian calendar. This could be useful when building Yahrzeit modules. Learn more at their website: Hebrew Reminders Another calendaring tool, but this one is a Salesforce App. It s a sidebar application that displays Hebrew dates for Gregorian dates entered throughout the system. They advertise a one-time license fee of $500. Learn more at their website: Leagrams This fundraising service, which purports to help with the process of sending joint greetings for special occasions, was mentioned by a few synagogue staffers in our focus groups and interviews, but their website does not appear to have been updated recently. Learn more at: PAGE 161 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013

162 About Idealware Idealware, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, provides thoroughly researched, impartial, and accessible resources about software to help nonprofits and the philanthropic sector make smart software decisions. By synthesizing vast amounts of original research into credible and approachable information, Idealware helps organizations make the most of their time and financial resources. Visit to learn more or view our hundreds of free articles, resources and reports. PAGE 162 A Guide to Synagogue Management Systems January 2013