Going Virtual: Online Tools for Data Management

eTapestry tracks donors and prospects while managing gifts, pledges, and payments. The application is built with the goal of significantly reducing the time and effort required for each task while fostering donors. Similar to the other tools reviewed, it is software that runs over the Internet. This is very helpful as improvements to the tool typically happen on a continuous basis and are automatically and immediately available. Data is securely stored, automatically backed up and maintained offsite, and accessible to you 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

The tool is very much “out-of-the-box.” It provides a defined set of features that cover a number of common needs, without the need for technical skills or substantial setup. The application provides a set of functionality that works “as-is," but you may run into limitations as you try to address more atypical needs.

A unique feature that eTapestry provides is a needs assessment survey that is a great first step to identifying your organization's database, communication, website, and ecommerce needs, and therefore helping to determine if eTapestry is a good tool for meeting those needs.

Take the eTapestry Needs Assessment here.

The tool provides robust query and reporting functions that include a wide range of standard reports, as well as a flexible report writer function for creating custom reports and exports to Microsoft Excel or Word. All fields within the tools can be queried, reported on, or exported. As reports are developed, each section can be drilled down to more specific subtotals, and as queries are built they can be reused, combined, or added to and subtracted from. The reports created within these tools can help you stay strategically focused on building relationships and maintaining donor loyalty.

If you decide to use eTapestry, the company provides a checklist to ensure you have imported your current data into the tool successfully. Conversion Evaluation Checklist.

eTapestry has created a form that tracks essential donor information such as relationships with other donors or staff members, how they became donors, contact information, and giving summary. It also allows you to track interactions with the donors by keeping detailed notes about the communications in a journal.

Communications can be integrated into Outlook and recorded in the journal for future reference. Future meetings or communications that you would like to have with your donors can be set up in Outlook and synchronized with the eTapestry calendar. The tool also provides the functionality to send mass emails out to donors. The company does provide an Advanced Email module, at a cost, that expands the capabilities of the standard mass email by including an HTML editor to build graphic emails, scheduled delivery options, reports on deliverability results, views and opens, and blacklist monitoring to ensure maximum delivery. This is ideal for organizations looking to expand their email marketing activities.

eTapestry has a flexible price schedule to accommodate varying budgets and sizes of organizations. Additionally, they give the tool free to nonprofits with one user and with fewer than 500 donor records. For 1,000 to 5,000 records and two users, the cost is $162 a month. You should check pricing carefully as the cost does increase fairly rapidly as more donor records are added. Additional features, such as advanced customer support, also involve additional costs. If you decide to use eTapestry, you can choose quarterly or annual payments to ease cash flow burdens, or add tools and services on an as-needed basis.

As for security, customers' data is securely kept in a safe housing environment maintained by a third party specializing in Internet security that uses an encryption method similar to Internet stock brokerage and Internet banking systems. Data is backed up daily and tested. Any access to your data for support reasons is done only with your approval. Administrative skills require someone who is comfortable using web tools or building websites, whereas the user only needs to be comfortable posting content to sites such as Facebook or MySpace. Overall, eTapestry does a few things very well, including providing the full picture of the donor relationship, email blast capabilities, and online payment processing. It is very easy to set up, but may not meet your needs if you want a system that can be highly customized beyond what is initially provided.

Access the eTapestry website here.