[Discuss] Building a non-profit membership list?

[willrico at gmail.com (Will Rico)]

Sounds like Eric's solution and https://civicrm.org/ (which I believe the
FSF uses) would be good places to start investigating.  Since Eric is
offering assistance, that makes his software even more compelling.

Will


On Mon, Apr 21, 2014 at 10:56 AM, Eric Chadbourne <eric.chadbourne at gmail.com
> wrote:

> On 04/20/2014 05:33 PM, Bill Ricker wrote:
> > Another member of this list, Eric, has open-sourced a CRM he wrote
> > for a non-profit, and recently announced an update here.
> > http://nonprofit-crm.org/2014/03/26/mneme-version-1-0-2-released/ I
> > recently did a code review and it looks good on the inside. Unclear
> > if it has required features for Rich's group.
> >
> > bill
>
> Hi All,
>
> Thanks for the plug Bill.  If the nonprofit wants to use my application
> I would be willing to help set it up for free since they are small.
> Email me anytime off list.
>
> > As I see it, I need something that maintains a complete list of details
> > for each person, and event registration with payment processing
> > capability for memberships and event-signups but in a properly-secured
> way.
>
> Considering list size and the client not being technically sophisticated
> maybe it would be best to keep the solution really simple.  Where to
> keep your lists, how to contact constituents, and collecting funds are
> all interrelated and I would have to know more about your situation but
> here are a few points off the top of my head.
>
> 1.  Where to keep the list?
>
> If you don't need to store interaction info gmail contacts may be
> sufficient.  Services like mail chimp and constant contact can store
> more constituent info.  If you want more versatility free choices like
> the application I'm hacking on and civicrm work.  Nonfree solutions like
> the salesforce nonprofit start pack are compelling.  Hosted service, web
> server, or local application?  Depends on what the like.
>
> 2.  How to contact folks?
>
> A small list could easily use gmail.  They have generous daily sending
> limits.  https://support.google.com/a/answer/166852?hl=en  Larger lists
> should consider a service like mailchimp or constant contact.  Creating
> pretty HTML emails are easy.  The metrics are useful.  Importing and
> exporting lists is easy in most CRMs.
>
> 3.  Register for events and collect funds.
>
> PayPal or similar can easily be embedded into your existing site to
> collect payments.  You can put a limit on the amount of items sold and
> collect buyer info.  This could cover your needs for payment and
> registration.  Eventbrite can be useful but may not be needed in your case.
>
> Any CRM should be able to easily import and export interactions.
>
> Sounds like a fun project.  You have lots of options!
>
> Happy hacking,
>
> Eric
>
>
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