Ever since this feature was requested by our old pal Steve Andersen, I’ve been waiting to play around with this.  This feature makes looking at a specific Campaign wayyyy more useful. First thing you should do (if you haven’t already) is add  the CampaignMember Related List to the Campaign Page Layout.   Ta-da!  You can now see which Leads or Contacts are members of your Campaign without running that sucky, uncustomizable Campaign Call Down Report.  But wait!  You can now customize that Campaign Call Down Report too!  Woo-hoo!

Okay, so now you’ve got the report of your Campaign Members.  Wouldn’t you love to indicate payment information on each of those members?  Of course you do!  Sure, you could customize the Campaign Member statuses to indicate RVSP, Paid, etc.  But I’m sure you’d love to capture their payment details.   Well, now you can go ahead and add custom fields to the Campaign Member object, like a Check #, Credit Card #, Amount, etc.  Then, whenever you have events that you want to see if people have paid for, you can use the Campaign Member customization you just did.  There are all sorts of ways to use this, and I’ve only touched on one.  How are you using Campaign Member customization?  Do you like the new Campaign Membership Management?

I’ve been working on a project that involves the use of CMSForce and since that’s a fairly new offering from Force.com Labs, thought I’d share my experiences so far.  The install itself is easy enough, but there are a few post-install instructions that need to be followed for it to work, so be sure to download the documentation available on the AppExchange and read through it.

To use CMSForce, you’ll either need to use one of the Page Templates that comes with the application, or create your own, which involves Visualforce.  The idea behind CMSForce, as with any CMS application, is that those templates can be created by someone more technical, and then anyone can go in and create new pages or adjust existing pages without needing a background in Visualforce, HTML, or style sheets.  CMSForce definitely accomplishes this, and anyone willing to spend half an hour to an hour getting up to speed on it should quickly be able to start making use of the Sites functionality now native in the Enterprise version of Salesforce.

For the graphic design of the Site I did, my client already had a non-Salesforce web portal whose style they wanted to mimic, so all I had to do was create a Zip file of the CSS and image files (maintaining the folder structure on the web server), upload that as a Static Resource and then refer to the style sheets in the Visualforce Template.  And the voila, standard HTML tags like <h1> (heading 1) now display with my client’s branding.

The Page Template is what it sounds like, it provides the styles and the frame for the page, which can include header, footer, menus, etc.  In the Visualforce for the Template, you can insert Content Block components which are the placeholders for the content that users will be able to provide.  From there you create Page records, which become individual pages in the site.  Users then have the ability to update the content in each Content Block within the Page using a GUI editor.  One page can be identified as the Home page and is the default when users go to your Site URL without specifying a specific page.

Once you have a Page Template and one or more Pages with Content Blocks created, you’re ready to set up a Site to go public.  Once again, just read through the CMSForce documentation for all the configuration that needs to be done.

I’ve hit 2 issues that I’m still trying to resolve in this process.  First, the content within the Content Blocks looks great in the preview but isn’t displaying in the public site.  This I’m sure is a permission issue, and fortunately one of the Sites PMs from Salesforce will be helping me resolve that tomorrow.  If this is a shortcoming in the documentation, I’ll be sure to post the resolution here.  The other is that I created Visualforce page to display data from Salesforce and used that as a Page Template, and it isn’t functioning as expected in Sites.  I suspect this has to do with the fact that my page is embedded as a component in another page, so once I figure that out I’ll post what I’ve learned here.
Revision 8/26: both of these issues were, predictably, due to user error- I hadn’t realized that CMSForce wasn’t deployed yet.  Once deployed, everything works as expected!

All in all, another solid application from Force.com Labs.

(With apologies to Stanley Kubrick)  We’re about to begin a Salesforce rollout to a new team of users and I thought I’d share the steps I’m taking to prepare everyone for the big change that’s about to happen:

• Communicate early and often! We let people know months ago that this was coming, and kept reminding them every few weeks.  Not in a nagging way, but just to keep it from going completely off their radar.
• Enlist the “difficult” users first! You know who these people are, they’re the ones who won’t want to touch Salesforce with a 10 foot pole.   You’ll get their buy in by making them feel invested in the outcome, and letting them know that you’re really listening to their concerns (by  making changes to your training documents or Salesforce to make their lives easier).   Once the “difficult ones” see the light, they’ll be your biggest evangelists.
• Beta test with a user or set of users first.  That way they can give you feedback on what’s working and what’s not, and you can make changes accordingly.  Don’t forget to REWARD your beta testers too – candy or booze always works well for me.  And thank them publicly too.
• Use help text! Since Help Text on Standard Fields is now coming in Winter 10 (at last!), don’t be stingy with using these everywhere you possibly can.  It’s always easier to mouseover a little help bubble than to open a manual/wiki/screencast/sticky note/etc.
• Create documentation! This could be a Word or Google doc, a Wiki, a Screencast (I love Jing for these), whatever – just make sure this is something easily accessible to everyone who needs it.  I like to create a custom web tab (Called “TRAINING MANUALS” or something descriptive) that embeds links to everything on one page.  And make sure that someone knows how to update it when you’ve hit the lottery and moved to Kauai!
• Have a plan! Make sure that you’ve got all these steps written out, and a timeline to implement!  Salesforce rollouts are not an overnight process, and you should plan on things taking a while.

Stay tuned for a future post about monitoring user adoption.  For more on the topic of managing technology change in your org, I refer you to one of the best sessions at this year’s  Nonprofit Technology Conference, “Technology Ch-Ch-Change: Managing Technological Change in Your Organization” and to Dahna Goldstein’s chapter in the NTEN book.  Enjoy!

This is my first post after a long hiatus involving a move to a new city (Boston), and to a new job as Technology Manager at Root Cause, a nonprofit in Cambridge, MA.  One of my first and biggest challenges here has been getting our Salesforce database under control.  After 4 years, every user was a System Administrator, and nobody knew what most of the custom fields and objects were being used for!  It was a disaster.

big mess o' computers

Here are some of the things I did to get our database back under control:

• I talked to the currently active users, and got their buy in to make changes as long as they weren’t catastrophic to the way they were currently doing things.
• I formed a “data cleanup” team to start wrangling some of the thorny data issues.  One of the best things we did (thanks, interns!) was use DemandTools to create an Access database backup of our entire Salesforce database, then look at every single field in every single object and report on how much data was there!  We got some very surprising answers for fields we thought everyone was supposed to be using (they weren’t, or the data was inconsistent).
• I formed a “SF Training Team” to create a Salesforce manual and make some screencasts using Jing.
• I started getting definitions for all custom fields, and adding it to the Help Text balloons, so people were no longer mystified as to what went in a certain field.  (By the way, PLEASE give us help text for standard fields, Salesforce!)

Hope this helps any of you out there who are inheriting a database “of a certain age.”  Good luck, and any comments are welcome!

One of the great promises of using CRM for nonprofit program management is the ability to manage by metrics. In theory, if we could track all efforts and all outcomes in a system, then we could uncover those predictive indicators that lead to desired outcomes. We could then make adjustments to the program operations itself to reach those desired outcomes. To a great extent, this is possible, however, it is much more complex than it sounds. One of the root causes of the complexity is the fact that we often are not looking at all of the variables and are only looking at a subset. Making decisions on a subset of variables can sometimes lead to incorrect conclusions. Since I have seen this logic trail unfold a few times, I thought I would share an abstracted example of such a situation.

Take for example, Acme Org, a human services organization that has implemented a robust CRM solution that tracks almost all aspects of it’s program operations. Below is one of the critical reports reviewed by the Executive Team each month:

The organization is considering the use of these metrics for determining promotions, salary adjustments, and bonuses. After initial review, the Executive team expressed concern about Jon’s performance to Jon’s manager. Jon’s manager on the other hand knew that Jon’s metrics were low because he was always thrown on to the toughest cases. Being on the toughest cases each month meant that Jon would have to spend more time with each client and would be responsible for defining new engagement processes for working through complex cases. Unlike the other client service reps Jon spent a lot of time researching and speaking to industry experts to identify best practices that could be used by Acme to help future clients. In short, Jon was expanding the organizational knowledgebase, capacity, and quality of service delivery. Unfortunately, none of this was being recognized in the monthly report. Jon’s manager decided to add a new metric into the monthly report that would help recognize Jon’s efforts. The revised report is below:

The revised report gave the Executive Team more insight into Jon’s efforts and the demands placed on the Client Services staff.

The point of the example is to proceed with caution when using Metrics for Management level decisions. They can be a very powerful tool when well directed; however, there is usually a story behind every piece of data and it is critical that the entire story is understood before program level decisions are made.

If you haven’t already done so, make sure you get deep into Cross Object Formulas. They have fundamentally changed how we think and work with Salesforce.Com configurations. A Cross Object Formula is a Formula field that can traverse object relationships and pull down data into an object.

Take the following example. Let’s say you are using the Opportunities object to track Inbound Grants. Let’s say that you have a Payments object that has a Master/Detail relationship with Opportunities (Payments is the Detail).

You can setup the following Cross Object Formulas in the Payment object to reference elements from the Opportunity and Account.

Payment Made By (Account) = Opportunities__r.Account.Name
Payment For (Opp) = Opportunities__r.Name

The beauty of the Cross Object formulas is that it lifts many of the constraints we previously faced with Salesforce. We can now:
- Create more complex reports including more objects than we could in the past
- Avoid writing Apex for something as silly as replicating a parent or lookup field
- Ease data entry and report building for the end user by making data more accessible

There are some limitations to be aware of:
- Limit of 5 cross object relationships per object
- You can reference up (from detail to master) or sideways (lookup), however, for references from parent to child, you still need to use Summary Roll Ups.

If you haven’t already used these, you should definitely check them out as they can solve many common problems you may have faced in the past.

If you have any interesting use cases for cross object formulas, please post them in the comments.

A colleague of mine (Lisa Glass) recently began using encrypted fields in Salesforce. It turns out they are fairly simple to use. Encrypted fields need to be requested through the “Feature Activations Team” at Salesforce. You can just open a Support Ticket and put in a request for this. As per the documentation, this feature is available to all Enterprise and Unlimited edition accounts, which means all NPO’s should be able to access this.

How it works:

• It creates a new field type in your instance called “Text (Encrypted)”. This is fairly similar to a regular text field, except that the data is encrypted.
• In order to see data within an encrypted field, the user’s profile must have the “View Encrypted Data” option checked off
• Any user that does not have this permission in their profile will see a value such as “***-**-****” when they view the encrypted field. (Note: You can specify whether you want the Mask to be either a “X” or a “*”. You can also leave a portion of a field unencrypted, such as the last 4 digits of an SSN.

Limitations:

• Max length of 175 characters. (You can’t really use this to encrypt case notes.)
• Field value can not be Unique, External ID, or have a Default Value
• Can not search, filter, roll-up, query, or use the field value in a Formula
• Can not use in workflows and assignments

Overall, this is a very powerful feature and you should consider leveraging it in your instance if your are storing any sensitive data such as Social Security Number, Credit Card Number, Medical Info, etc.

There is a lot more information on best practices and usage examples within Salesforce Help.

At NPower, we have worked on a fair number of CRM projects and we are trying to figure out the question of CRM timing. When is the best time for an organization to implement a CRM solution? I have taken the OLC (Organizational Life Cycle) Model and mapped that against our experiences with CRM success.

Stage 1: Startup Stage – The organization is still figuring out it’s mission and funding streams. Operating procedures are in flux and can quickly change based on grants, board members or funders. Technology is not really a core requirement.
Stage 1 CRM Outlook: Investing in a CRM Solution typically doesn’t yield great results because many of the underlying assumptions will change over the next few years. A very simple fundraising CRM solution can be effective in this environment, however, using CRM for operational purposes may not yield a good ROI.

Stage 2: Growth – At this stage, the organization has proven that their mission is a sound business idea. They have proven that they have the operational know-how to execute on their mission. They have secured a stable base of funders and a good core of board members. Their attention has turned from survival to growth.
Stage 2 CRM Outlook: This is likely the stage at which a CRM solution can have the greatest impact on an organization. Implementing a CRM can provide substantial gains on the fundraising side, while also cataloging a history of all fundraising interactions. On the operations side the CRM can begin to model organizatonal procedures and collect valuable performance data. If the CRM solution is implemented in an intelligent manner, it can scale and flex as the organization grows and evolves.

Stage 3: Maturity – As an organization reaches a certain scale, it’s growth will slow. At this stage, the organization is very good at executing on it’s mission. It has an extensive base of funders and they have very specific expectations of this organization.
Stage 3 CRM Outlook: This is a very tricky stage for CRM deployments and a lot depends on the organizational culture and leadership. If the organization culture is receptive to change, then a CRM solution can serve as a great engine for operational improvements. If the org culture is not receptive to change, then a CRM solution will likely replace some existing systems and only provide marginal efficiency gains.

Stage 4: Decline – The organization begins to lose stable funders and board members. New startups take away fundraising streams and the organization is perceived to be less effective and not as innovative in a modern environment. The organization begins to cut back on programs, staff, and all non-essentials as it seeks to find a way to reach a stability point.
Stage 4 CRM Outlook: Surprisingly, this could be a great time for an organization to move towards a CRM solution. Organizations in this stage are often heading back towards stage 1. This leaves them open to process innovations and funding changes. This willingness to explore new paths can make a nimble CRM solution an effective solution to manage the massive changes that the organization must face. The difference between this type of organization and a stage 1 organization is that they also need to carry forward the massive amount of data and relationships that they have amassed over their years.

The above is not meant to be hard and fast rules about good and bad times to get into CRM. They are just some observations from our years of CRM consulting experience. There will undoubtedly be many organizations that are exceptions to the above rules for a variety of reasons.

It may take years to fully understand the impact of the CRM solution, however, the clear winners so far seem to be those organizations that are in a growth stage.

I’ve been busy writing Apex, so no time to post to the blog. One thing I’m learning is that once you have some useful Apex code, like the lead conversion and payment processing tools we’ve created, it is easy to deploy it to multiple organizations — and that is just what we’re doing. However, in every case there are small tweaks to make, and more test methods to write, and more debugging, so it important not to underestimate the time needed to reuse your solutions.

We currently have two open positions in in our growing CRM consulting practice here at NPower Seattle (and many clients ready for help!). If you have Salesforce expertise or other relevant experience and are looking for a opportunity to work with nonprofits on a great team of developers and implementors, please take a look at these.

NPower Seattle serves over 450 nonprofit clients each year by providing technology consulting, education and training. Our clients include arts and environmental groups, human services agencies, food banks and youth-serving organizations.

Find full job descriptions at http://www.npowerseattle.org/get-involved/jobs. Submit resumes and cover letters to Resumes (at) NPowerSeattle.org.

I was having lunch with a friend the other day and he told me about a recent horror experience he had within his own organization. His organization just completed a fairly large internal CRM project and was rolling out an application. During a training session with a core group of users, one of the users attempted to move from one screen to another without saving and lost some data. Mortified that her action was a bug in the system, she lashed out at the training staff and soon infected the entire classroom with a negative perception of the application. The training staff was eventually able to regain control of the session and finish it out; however, they all now know that an enormous user adoption hurdle lies ahead of them.

I wanted to bring up this story to illustrate a critical point that we often think about in our CRM implementations. Know your influencers!! It’s easy to fall into a trap where you assume management support equals end user support. This may be true in smaller organizations or organizations that have a very hierarchical organizational structure and culture. However, many organizations are operating in more flat and distributed models. This often means that the loud voice of a peer can be just as influential as that of an Executive Director. Getting insight into who the influencers are and getting buy in from them early on in the process can help to avoid situations such as the one above.