Simplicity is sophistication

You can build really complex workflows, reports, segmentation, and tracking in your open-source CRM.

The tools are there. It's awesome. It's a ton of fun.

But are you going to use them? Once you’ve built them, will you be able to recall in your own mind at any given moment how they work and what they mean?

If you're not really going to make use of them, where’s the value in building them at all?

Here’s the thing:

A simple system that you know well, understand fully, and use frequently will generally have more business value than a complex system that you rarely (or never) use.

Keep it simple, if you can.

And when you decide to go for something more complex, make sure you know why.

All the best,
A.

P.S. The aphorism “Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication” is often attributed to Leonardo da Vinci, but that’s probably not quite right.

Ice bucket challenge

Long-term vision, perseverance, and dedication to a mission — those count for a lot.

Remember the ALS ice bucket challenge?

Even if you do, you probably haven’t thought about it in a long time.

But the ALS Association has been thinking about it.

Just recently the FDA approved the first ALS treatment funded by the ice bucket challenge. Over 8 years since the grass-roots viral awareness campaign netted it millions of dollars in donations.

Here's the thing:

You may not be lucky enough to have a global viral sensation sending millions of dollars your way.

But you do have a mission, and you have people who believe in it.

Perseverance and smart long-term planning can help you get there together.

All the best,
A.

Are duplicates limiting your growth?

A few duplicate contacts here and there probably won't hurt you, and it can be counterproductive to obsess over squeezing out every single duplicate.

But if 10 or 20 percent of your contacts are duplicates, each with their own records of event participation, membership, and payments, you're going to run into real problems as you try to manage and report on their engagement with your mission.

And good segmentation — in order to get them to the next level of engagement — won't be very easy either.

Deduping is not always fun. But it's an important part of good data hygiene, and it's essential for making your CRM effective in furthering your mission.

All the best,
A.

Flossing your data

Most people don't get very excited about flossing daily. But we do it because we know the value adds up over time. And the cost of skipping that simple routine is not pleasant.

Cleaning out duplicate contacts is something like that.

It's not always fun, but it's important, and it gets easier when you make it a routine practice.

All the best,
A.

When free software isn’t free

Yes, CiviCRM is free, as are Drupal and WordPress. Free to use, and free to modify as you need.

But as with everything, it's worth taking a moment to count the total cost of ownership, compare that to the actual value you're getting, and make sure it's worth it. And then, to prepare for healthy system maintenance by budgeting appropriately.

Ownership costs of for open-source software could include:

• Security maintenance

• Hosting fees

• Bug fixes

• Staff training

• Member support

And that's just to work with it out-of-the-box. If you want to customize it, or use it in creative ways that are unique to your organization, you'll naturally have some custom development cost as well.

Here’s the thing:

Most organizations who rely on open-source software are very happy with it. I love it and my clients love it.

If you’re making sure to count the cost of ownership, budgeting for good maintenance, and making smart value comparisons, then you’re in a good spot. If not, slow down a moment and consider what you’re trying to achieve.

All the best,
A.

Building trust

When you’re starting off with a new service provider – or looking to select one – how do you know if you can really trust them to deliver the goods?

Fortunately, there’s something pretty simple that you can start measuring from your first interactions:

Do they actually do what they say they will do?

• If they said they would get back to you by Tuesday, then did they?

• Are they on time for meetings?

• Did they send that additional information that they promised?

Watch for such things from the beginning, and then let that inform the trust you’re willing to place in them.

There’s no good reason to bet the farm on someone who may not have the integrity to handle the job. As with everything, consider what you’re hoping to achieve, and start looking for early indicators as soon as possible in the process.

One more thing:

If they do well early on, but the relationship is still too new for you to trust them with a massive project, it’s okay to ask if they’ll start out on something small. How small? As small as necessary to fit within your trust and comfort level, however you measure that for yourself.

All the best,
A.

One question

The shift to value-driven thinking from the old feature-driven thinking can be a hard one. It can take some time.

But one thing you can start now is simply to ask yourself a question anytime you get a new idea for a feature:

What's the actual business value that I will get from this improvement?

The answer should have a number and a unit. It could be hours of staff time saved, or a percentage of membership sign-ups increased, or even a percentage of how much easier your life would be.

You don't have to change everything at once, but just asking yourself to put a number on things can give a whole new perspective to your work.

All the best,
A.

Did you figure it out yet?

Hey, you know that thing you were wondering about? Did you look it up in the docs —any luck? You have somebody you can ask about it?

Don't let it linger just because you don't know who to ask. If you were wondering about it, there’s probably a good reason to find out.

All the best,
A.

Where’s your blueprint?

It's hard to create something really great without having a good plan first.

When I first moved to my small North Texas town, I looked at a lot of houses to find just the right one.

And I was surprised by the number of homes—several of them—that had started out as simple one-bedroom bungalows, but had eventually sprawled into five-bedroom monstrosities with four bathrooms, three living rooms, five exterior doors, and no hallways.

Oh look, if you walk through this bedroom directly into the other bedroom you can get to the back door.

Yes, a large home with ample accommodation sounds nice. But having a bedroom that doubles as a hallway, not so much.

What these homes had in common was that they were not built on a solid plan—not in their current form., anyway.

And when the many successive additions were made, very little long-term planning had been done to consider how it would all fit together.

Here's the thing:

When you start off with your open-source CRM, it's okay to start small. But it's important to do the right planning from the beginning, and then do it again when you make significant additions, to make sure it all works together nicely.

Keep expanding, it's okay. But do so with a clear plan that aims at clear goals.

All the best,
A.

When your CRM is a community effort

Every few weeks or so, there's a new update released for CiviCRM, WordPress, or Drupal.

These updates are made available at no cost. That's one of the great things about open-source software.

But here's another great thing:

All of the improvements in each new release come almost entirely from the minds and efforts of system owners like yourself.

There's no big corporation somewhere with a campus full of developers thinking up new ideas inside their giant echo chamber.

If you spot an improvement that's needed in one of your open source tools — a bug fix, a new feature, improvements to documentation, whatever — you can contribute that idea to the project and it could very well be there in the next release.

(And if you think it's worth it to you, you could also contribute or sponsor the actual work that's needed to make that improvement happen.)

This is the beauty of open source tools: Other people are improving your software at no cost to you, and now and then you have a chance to step in and make improvements too.

All the best,
A.

Cutting costs vs cutting corners

Yesterday I talked about cutting corners. You don't want to do that.

But what about cutting costs? What's the difference?

Every year when my home and auto insurance comes up for renewal, I ask my agent if he can find me a better deal. That's cutting costs.

Cutting corners would be deciding to go without insurance for a while to save a few bucks.

If I really can't afford the insurance on one of my cars, the only prudent choice is to stop driving it.

Here's the thing:

For any system that you're running, especially open-source software, which you actually own, somebody on your team needs to ensure that system is being taken care of properly, whether that’s a staff member or an outside consultant.

If you do that — even if it means waiting to implement some great new feature — you can be confident that the systems you are running will be reliable for the long haul.

All the best,
A.

Replacement cost

One way to think about value is in terms of replacement cost.

If you lost your CRM today, how would that impact your organization? What would it take to replace it with something else?

Yesterday I heard from an organization who may be facing this question. After years of cutting corners on maintenance, they have a CRM that is broken, unreliable, and un-upgradable without significant repair. And they may not have the budget for repair.

Budget or no, I expect they'll find a way through this. But not without significant expense in human resources and mental stress.

If you've got systems that serve a critical role in your organization's mission, think about the cost/benefit equation of maintaining them properly. It's probably pretty good.

All the best,
A.

Asking for directions

Google maps is pretty good, but sometimes it'll steer you wrong.

This weekend a friend of mine was going to see a play at the local high school, so she pulled out her phone and got directions.

The directions were great. That is, they would have been if she had wanted to go to the old high school, which has been the local middle school for the last two years.

Fortunately she was smart enough to ask a passerby where the new high school really was. She made it there before the curtain opened and enjoyed the show about as much as anybody can enjoy a high school play.

Here's the thing:

The typical authoritative sources — online documentation, tutorials, and the rest — are usually great. But when they're not, it can help a lot to ask directions from someone who knows the territory.

All the best,
A.

Bike sheds

They say that if a committee were tasked with the creation of a nuclear power plant, very few committee members would presume to question the design plans for the reactor itself.

But if the plant designs include a shed where employees can park their bikes, every committee member will have a strong opinions on what color it should be.

... and let the arguments begin.

It's really a good thing in the human character. We want to leave our mark, make our contribution, feel that we’re doing our part. Even over fairly small details.

But, if it delays the project, you've got trouble.

Here's the thing:

Getting bogged down in insignificant detail generates delays, mental stress, and ill will — all of which are unnecessary costs.

If you've got a project in the works, get it done. Focus on the big, important pieces that you know you'll need.

For the rest, make a reasonable choice and move on.

You can always repaint that bike shed.

All the best,
A.

The value you give

Besides thinking seriously about the value of your systems to your organization, it's good to think about the value you're providing to your members.

Do your emails enrich their life? How, and how much?

Do your programs advance their career? How do you know?

These things can be measured. Even the intangibles, like a sense of belonging or pride in making the world a better place.

Quantifying and reporting on the value you give will have a measurable impact on your ability to continue serving your people and increasing your effectiveness as an organization.

What steps are you taking to identify this value, to measure it, and to remind people of it?

All the best,
A.

4 areas of in-house expertise

You can (and probably should) outsource things like security updates and other maintenance tasks.

But there are 4 things you should really consider dividing among your existing staff or new hires. I’ll list these in order from most likely to least:

1. Knowledge of the data: Somebody in your organization (or in each department) needs to be the designated person who is most familiar with the CRM data in your system. You're probably already doing this, because that data is the reason you're keeping a CRM in the first place.

2. Features and configuration: Someone in your organization needs to master the features and configuration options of your CRM, and know how your your system is set up. You (or one of your staff) can develop this familiarity by being the one who's responsible for configurations, installing extensions, and deciding which features to use and how.

3. Custom development: Smaller organizations may not be able to justify keeping a developer in-house. But for larger organizations the value can be significant. This person is responsible for any custom code: creating it, maintaining it, and improving it as needed. If you're relying heavily on custom software code, somebody in your organization should at least have a clue of how it works.

4. Visual design: Making your public-facing interfaces look beautiful goes a long way toward increasing your brand value and member experience. Whoever is handling your website design should be able to take this on, whether that's your own staff or an outsourced firm.

Here's the thing:

You probably can't do all this overnight. But dividing the tasks in this way can help you chart a course to get there.

All the best,
A.

Continual improvement

CiviCRM just released a new update: version 5.57.2.

I'm not writing this to say you should upgrade. You probably don't need to.

But it's a good chance to point out two great things:

1. The upgrade is out there, and it may address a problem you already know about. If it does, upgrading is a simple way to fix that problem. (You can see the release notes here if you’d like to see what it covers.)

2. Your open source tools are being supported by a vibrant and active community of contributors who are constantly handing out free fixes for your benefit.

Continual improvement is a wonderful thing. Isn't it nice when you, your organization, and your members can benefit from it?

All the best,
A.

Mowing the lawn

Handling your day-to-day CRM operations in-house is an important step in gaining mastery and ownership of your systems.

But it doesn't mean you have to handle everything in-house.

There are plenty of important but routine maintenance tasks that have little bearing on your mastery of your systems:

• Website hosting,

• Security updates,

• Outbound email routing,

• Uptime monitoring,

• and more.

These are all standard operations that are easily provided at a predictable cost through outside services. And building your own reliable solution for those things is probably going to take more time and effort than it's worth.

Compare it to managing your office space. For systems that are unique to your way of operating, you get a lot of value by managing them in-house.

But it's often smart to hire an outside service for things like housekeeping, window washing, and maintenance of your parking lot and landscaping.

Here's the thing:

Mastery of your systems does require the building of long-term institutional knowledge. But it doesn't mean you have to mow the lawn yourself.

All the best,
A.

“patchwork of tools”

One of the main roadblocks to members better connecting with their association is the patchwork of tools members are asked to use ... Nearly 40 percent of survey respondents cited “too many different tools” and “ease of navigation” as their chief frustrations with their association’s technology.

That's a finding from a recent global survey of nearly 2,000 professional association members. (ASAE: Study: Membership Tech Is Leaving Engagement Gaps)

Frustrations like this might account for the roughly 60% of “early career” association members who said they were not likely to renew their membership.

Are you sending your members to several different websites for things that really could be handled in your primary CRM?

Things like event registration, membership sign up and renewal, content subscriptions?

If you are, think about how this is affecting your members’ experience with your organization, and their willingness to renew their membership next year.

Chances are you can get a significant increase in membership retention by streamlining these experiences for them.

All the best,
A.

Short and sweet?

Is it better to have a long and detailed explanation at the top of your sign up forms?

Or would it be better to assume people know why they're there and keep the forms as short and simple as possible?

If you're not sure, you could just guess and hope.

Or you could test, measure, and find out.

What to do?

Hint: Guessing and hoping is not a plan. If you don't have enough information to make a decision, it's kind of hard to control the outcomes.

All the best,
A.