Forbes: “Who Is CiviCRM Best For?”

Forbes asks “Who is CiviCRM best for?” and then answers it this way:

CiviCRM is best suited for nonprofit organizations that have the resources available to either build out the CRM in-house or to outsource the initial build to a developer. This is because while it offers very unique features for nonprofits, it is complex to set up and get started with.

Okay, pretty good, Forbes, but not perfect!

First off, “nonprofit organizations” is a little limiting. I like to say CiviCRM is for “community-driven organizations” instead, because the CRM needs of many for-profit orgs (like for-profit professional associations) overlap pretty strongly with those of your typical non-profit.

And, you know, there’s this gem:

… organizations that have the resources available to either build out the CRM in-house or to outsource the initial build to a developer.

This means you must either do it in-house or outsource it. Well … was there ever any other way, for anything?

Here’s what I like to say instead:

CiviCRM is for community-driven organizations with a genuine business case for one of these scenarios:

• Security and privacy concerns that require full control over all constituent data; or

• Heavy customization of features; or

• Reasonable certainty that your CRM needs will match CiviCRM’s out-of-the-box feature set, and a commitment to adapting your needs to fit the CRM (rather than the other way around).

If you’re not in one of those situations, I’d be curious why you chose CiviCRM at all.

All the best,
A.