Our Search For a Donor Management Platform

TLDR: Rise didn't have a donor database, so this summer a student in our micro-placement program went looking for one. They asked other Calgary nonprofits what they use, compared three platforms plus a free fundraising tool, and wrote up the findings. Biggest lessons: keep donor data on Canadian servers, make sure tax receipts are CRA-compliant, and start by asking your peers. Want the full research? Email Shane at shane.yu@risecalgary.ca.

Like a lot of nonprofits, Rise Calgary has leaned heavily on grants. Grants are important, but most only last a year or two, and they rarely arrive when you need them. We wanted to build a steadier base of support, which meant paying more attention to donors: who they are, when they give, and how we stay in touch. We had the basics in place. We could issue tax receipts and kept a simple spreadsheet of donors, but there was no real system for managing those relationships. Donor information was limited and difficult to use beyond keeping track of who had given.

So this summer, through our student micro-placement program, we set out to fix that. The goal was simple. Find a donor management platform that could pull the work of several separate tools into one place, and figure out which one actually fits a small organization like ours.

We started by asking around

Before looking at any sales pages, our student reached out to other Calgary nonprofits to ask a basic question: what do you use, and would you use it again? That turned out to be the most useful part of the whole project.

A few things stood out. The same handful of platforms came up again and again. Several established organizations use Raiser's Edge. Others don't rely on one system at all, and instead stitch together a few different tools to cover donations, receipts, and contacts. And almost everyone cared about the same two things we did: keeping donor data on Canadian servers, and being able to issue CRA-compliant tax receipts without extra hassle.

From there we narrowed the field to three platforms, booked demos with each, and compared them on cost, features, and how they treat donor data. We also looked at a free fundraising tool called Zeffy that can sit alongside a donor system. We pulled all of it into a short research deck.

The community part

The best surprise was how generous people were. Fund development and database staff at other organizations gave us their time over email and video calls, walked us through the tools they live in every day, and were honest about the trade-offs. Several even asked if we would share what we found. That kind of openness is a big part of what makes Calgary's nonprofit sector work.

We want to thank the teams at:

• Momentum
• Ronald McDonald House Charities Alberta
• Calgary Immigrant Women's Association (CIWA)
• Sagesse
• MUHSEN Canada
• The Alex
• Carya
• The Calgary Bridge Foundation for Youth
• CUPS Calgary

Thank you for making time for us. We’re stronger when we work together to support the next generation of changemakers.

A note on the how

This research was done by a post-secondary student through the University of Calgary’s micro placement program. They ran the outreach, sat in on the demos, and put the findings together. It’s a small example of what we try to create at Rise: space for students to take on real work, try things out, make mistakes, and leave knowing a little more than when they started. The student got hands-on experience, and we came away with an objective look at our options.

Want the research?

We put together a short, shareable summary of what we found, including platform overviews, pricing, and pros and cons. If it would help your organization, we're glad to pass it along. Reach out to Shane at shane.yu@risecalgary.ca.