Yes, you can take it with you

Ever tried migrating away from a Software-as-a-Service (“SaaS”) platform? Some of them make it pretty hard to do.

Sure, you can just cancel your subscription — that’s easy. But can you:

• Export all of your historical data in a usable format?

• Find someone to help you turn that export into something that’s usable elsewhere?

If you can’t, then you’re pretty well locked in. Moving away from that vendor can be all but impossible, no matter how certain you are that it’s time to move on.

Here’s the thing:

Wouldn’t it be nice to know what your “end of relationship” options are … before you begin the relationship?

With open-source tools like CiviCRM, you’ve got options.

• CiviCRM partners, to whom you might be looking to host your systems, are used to this kind of question, and should be able to give you a straight answer in the early stages of discussion — in writing, if you wish.

• The answer, in all but the narrowest of cases, is (or should be, IMO): “Sure thing! If you ever decide to take your CRM systems elsewhere, we’ll package it up and deliver it to you, so that any competent CiviCRM provider will have what they need to keep you moving forward.”

• On top of that, in most cases, it’s not only “when you decide to go elsewhere.” It’s “any time you want a full data dump or export of your entire system, we’ll deliver it to you.”

• Sometimes there’s a fee for such services; sometimes there’s not. It’s worth asking about.

Sure, once you get that package delivered, you’ll probably need help — professional, competent, paid help — unpacking it and assembling it so it’s useful. But that help is available from any number of well regarded other CiviCRM partners (or your own in-house team, or even your selected non-CiviCRM vendor, if you’re leaning that way).

And the critical point here is:

You can take it with you, and (almost always) you can practice taking it with you, at any time.

All the best,
A.