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Monday, 23 January 2012 08:42 |
PublishDate: January 2012 Author: Colin Pizarek and Chris Bernard
Neither “snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night” might stay the U.S. Post Office’s couriers from delivering the mail entrusted to them, but it’s a cold fact of the digital world that email has no such steadfast guardians. Some electronic mail will simply never reach... |
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Thursday, 19 January 2012 09:06 |
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Back in my day, one toner cartridge could outlive the printer itself. OK, maybe immortal toner is yet another mirage in my *cough* middle-aged mind. But since 60 is the new 40, I hereby declare myself 21! I digress. Yes, toner. . .We at Idealware relatively recently bought a fast, reliable color laser printer. We love the machine, but after a few months, it stopped printing. “Replace toner,” read the tiny LCD. I’ve pulled a Lazarus on many a “dead” toner cartridge with a just a few... |
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Thursday, 19 January 2012 08:47 |
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So as you've likely heard by now, Blackbaud has plans to aquire Convio. As two of only a handful of big companies in the nonprofit technology space, this is big news. But what does it mean? There's been a lot of concern and speculation.Peter Campbell, an Idealware blogger and board member, said: "It seems to me that if I'm looking for an eCRM or DonorDB for a mid-sized org that can't afford to gamble its fundraising system on some clever startup, I have a range of products to choose... |
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Wednesday, 18 January 2012 17:30 |
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In a show of online solidarity Wednesday, Wikipedia and other famous strands of the Web, along with countless more below the A-list, turned their backs to the world in order to turn our attention to what is arguably the latest four letter word in the Yankee-English lexicon: SOPA. As judged by its full name, the Stop Online Piracy Act sounds fair enough. Despite our cultural love affair with sugar cereal buccaneers, adventure rides and Johnny Depp, actual pirates—at best—profit... |
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Friday, 13 January 2012 09:58 |
The website i09 has an interesting article: Is Facebook Really Doomed to Die?
They ask a number of experts what the think the fate of Facebook will be, with answers ranging from "it will be gone in a matter of years" to a contention that it will "replace regular email and instant messaging as the main way that people communicate with their friends," becoming kind of "the Ma Bell of the 21st Century."
This is all interesting speculation, but what does it mean for nonprofits? I... |
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Wednesday, 11 January 2012 13:34 |
PublishDate: February 2012
You already know the value a good email campaign can bring to your nonprofit, whether it’s an eNewsletter, action email or fundraising appeal, but how can you tell if your electronic communications are actually having the impact you hoped for? Is the work you’re putting in worth the effort? Email metrics can help you determine the effectiveness of your communications and... |
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Wednesday, 11 January 2012 13:33 |
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PublishDate: January 2012 You need an audience for any social media strategy to work. The good news is, because of the “network effect,” attracting a few followers can often increase your potential audience exponentially—the very nature of social media makes it easy for your friends to spread the word to their own networks of friends, and so on. So how do you attract people to “like” your... |
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Wednesday, 11 January 2012 13:27 |
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PublishDate: December 2011 An email list is one of the sharpest arrows in any nonprofit’s quiver. An effective list can maximize your reach, help foster closer relationships with constituents and improve fundraising. But what makes a list effective? For one thing, critical mass—the more people you can reach who are genuinely interested in your organization, the better. But you can’t just buy... |
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Tuesday, 10 January 2012 07:54 |
We get asked all the time, "My organization wants to do this really important/ cool/ necessary technology project -- where can I find a technology funder to give me a grant for it?"
Unfortunately, there's no such beast. I'm not aware of any funder that looks to fund technology projects specifically. (This probably saddens us as much, or more, than it does you, as pretty much every project we're trying to fund is a technology project).
Instead of looking for the mythical technology... |
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Thursday, 05 January 2012 22:45 |
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The end of a year is always an occasion for every magazine, newspaper, TV news show and website to put out lists of their favorite things. We have favorites, too, but thought it might be more interesting to tell you what your favorites were—at least, your favorite Idealware posts. First, a word about the criteria: The measurement was the number of unique views, and we allowed a few resources published in 2010 to sneak onto the list because of their continuing popularity in 2011. So... |
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Wednesday, 04 January 2012 08:37 |
 PublishDate: December 2011
December 2011 Building An Effective Email List
An email list is one of the sharpest arrows in any nonprofit’s quiver. An effective list can maximize your reach, help foster closer relationships with constituents and improve fundraising. But what makes a list effective? For one thing, critical... |
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Wednesday, 04 January 2012 08:37 |
PublishDate: November 2011
November 2011 The Nonprofit Social Media Decision Guide
UPDATED in October 2011. With more than 750 million people signed up for Facebook alone, there's little doubt that social media can be a powerful part of most organizations' communications mix. But what can it be used for--outreach and engagement? Event... |
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Wednesday, 04 January 2012 08:36 |
PublishDate: October 2011
October 2011 A Consumers Guide to Grants Management
Completely updated in 2011, our free, 169-pageConsumers Guide to Grants Management looks at the features and processes used by 20 grants management systems to help private foundations accept and review applications and track grants throughout their life... |
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Wednesday, 04 January 2012 08:34 |
PublishDate: September 2011
September 2011New Social Media Articles! While we are making huge strides as a sector to understand the most effective techniques and approaches to using these tools, we still have a lot to learn about one of the most important areas of social media: measurement. Andrea Berry and Chris Bernard help you through the... |
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Tuesday, 03 January 2012 15:34 |
Event Price: 175.00 EventDate: February 8, 2012 - 2:00pm - March 7, 2012 - 3:30pm Type: Live Training
Email campaigns are a fundraising tool within the reach of even the smallest organizations. An effective way to communicate with donors and raise money without much expense, they're an opportunity to provide... |
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Tuesday, 03 January 2012 15:19 |
Event Price: 200.00 EventDate: January 25, 2012 - 10:00am - February 22, 2012 - 11:30am Type: Live Training
Like most nonprofits, you’re probably aware that the right technology can streamline your processes and help fulfill your mission more effectively. But with tight staffing and budgets, it’s... |
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Tuesday, 03 January 2012 08:31 |
Event Price: 40.00 EventDate: March 8, 2012 - 1:00pm - 2:30pm Type: Live Training
Vendors are lured by visions of long term residual subscription income, while customers dream of IT services and software without significant up-front costs. Sounds like techno Shangri-La, but what of security? Pessimists... |
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Tuesday, 03 January 2012 08:13 |
Event Price: 0.00 EventDate: March 1, 2012 - 1:00pm - 2:00pm Type: Live Training
Nonprofits are under unprecedented pressure to produce more results, with more clients, for less money. To shed light on how organizations are meeting this challenge, MAP for Nonprofits commissioned a study by Idealware to... |
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Monday, 02 January 2012 15:33 |
 It was a dark and stormy night. My face was bathed in the blue glow from the laptop's screen. I sat staring at an email. "We won't have anyone to take on the project manager role for the upcoming major technology project at our organization. Do you think that could be a problem?"
I sat back, cracked my knuckles, and began to craft a reply.
"The challenge of working with nonprofits and technology is the faith that somehow "the technology will save us." I think the... |
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Tuesday, 20 December 2011 10:18 |
My work planning for, evaluating and deploying technology at nonprofits requires that I have a good understanding of fundraising concepts and practices, and I do. It's an area that I'm sufficiently knowledgeable about, but no expert. So my current personal fundraising campaign for Idealware is an amateur effort. It is, happily, a successful one. I did some things right, including, I think, making strategic use of my social networking connections and channels.
I might... |
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Advice on Software
