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Blackbaud Enterprise Fundraising CRM vs. Slate for Admissions

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    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    Blackbaud Enterprise Fundraising CRM

    Score7.6 out of 10
    N/ADesigned for large, complex organizations as well as federated and international nonprofits.N/A

    Slate for Admissions

    Score6.7 out of 10
    N/ASlate is a platform for admissions and enrollment management, student success, and alumni/advancement, from Technolutions in New Haven. Designed and developed exclusively for higher education, Slate by Technolutions supports the student and donor lifecycle, and provides a unified interface to CRM, outreach and communications, travel management, online applications, online reading, student success and retention, and alumni and donor engagement.N/A
    Pricing
    Blackbaud Enterprise Fundraising CRMSlate for Admissions
    Editions & Modules
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    Blackbaud Enterprise Fundraising CRMSlate for Admissions
    Free Trial
    NoNo
    Free/Freemium Version
    NoNo
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    NoNo
    Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
    Additional Details——
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    Blackbaud Enterprise Fundraising CRMSlate for Admissions
    Considered Both Products
    Blackbaud
    Chose Blackbaud Enterprise Fundraising CRM
    Blackbaud was the industry leader in higher education CRMs at the time.
    Incentivized
    Technolutions
    No answer on this topic
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    No answers on this topic
    100%
    Would buy again
    6 Answers
    Delivers good value for the price
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Happy with the feature set
    No answers on this topic
    100%
    Happy with the feature set
    6 Answers
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Implementation went as expected
    No answers on this topic
    80%
    Implementation went as expected
    4 Answers
    Best Alternatives
    Blackbaud Enterprise Fundraising CRMSlate for Admissions
    Small Businesses
    Salesforce Nonprofit Cloud
    Score9 out of 10
    No answers on this topic
    Medium-sized Companies
    DonorPerfect
    Score7.4 out of 10
    No answers on this topic
    Enterprises
    Ellucian CRM Advance
    Score7.6 out of 10
    No answers on this topic
    All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
    User Ratings
    Blackbaud Enterprise Fundraising CRMSlate for Admissions
    Likelihood to Recommend
    8.9
    (36 ratings)
    10.0
    (9 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    9.1
    (8 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Usability
    -
    (0 ratings)
    7.2
    (2 ratings)
    Availability
    9.0
    (1 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Support Rating
    6.9
    (7 ratings)
    9.0
    (1 ratings)
    Implementation Rating
    7.8
    (3 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    Blackbaud Enterprise Fundraising CRMSlate for Admissions
    Likelihood to Recommend
    Blackbaud
    It works well enough for fundraising purposes and donor tracking. I think it would be less appropriate for instances or industries where you don't need so many data points on someone. You are able to attach a lot of information to a record so if you don't need that info (simply need contact info for example) you might want a simpler system
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Technolutions
    I would recommend Slate, by Technolutions for any higher education institution, big or small. Though there is a higher cost associated with Slate than most other options, it's well worth the price. The level of detail that you're able to gather, maintain, and query on within your student data is far beyond anything I've experienced with other systems. These insights help you pinpoint areas for action and improvement so that you can pivot when necessary, helping you reach your enrollment goals quicker and more efficiently.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pros
    Blackbaud
    • Accessing in-depth data for a single constituent is easily done and customizable by user working with "tiles" on the home screen
    • Generating lists of possible prospects with specific similarities can be done with a few clicks and then stored for more research later
    • well designed relationship options allow for a a look at specific constituents and how they might relate to other constituents in the system leading to more effective prospecting
    • Screens can be easily customized by user or user group eliminating irrelevant data and presenting only truly relevant information
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Technolutions
    • Managing contacts.
    • Smart communications (drip email campaigns).
    • Real-time data management.
    • End-to-end control of product (or instance of).
    • Allows for easy to implement segmentation via smart rules and queries (data sets).
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cons
    Blackbaud
    • Certain aspects of Blackbaud are oddly non-customizable.
    • Blackbaud updates/support is slow and often ineffective - our organization switched to Microsoft 365, which is apparently incompatible with Blackbaud. Help/support recommended clunky workarounds that don't actually work, rather than proactively enhancing compatibility
    • There should be a flag in constituent search to show which people in the results list are deceased.
    • Query isn't very user friendly. It should be simple to locate the information that you want to pull, and add parameters to that information. Instead you have to write multiple queries to set parameters, then write a query that looks at those other queries. It's time-consuming and easy to make mistakes, and the knowledge/proficiency is difficult to explain or transfer to new staff.
    • Blackbaud generally just feels like its technology is outdated. It wasn't built for the needs of a modern organization, and its developers have failed to make the necessary improvements over time to stay competitive.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Technolutions
    • Being able to have students register at an event without needing a wifi network
    • Easier way to update records for individuals who move to a different organization
    • Being able to start an application first without needing to immediately set up a user name and password.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Likelihood to Renew
    Blackbaud
    We've covered a lot, but mostly because we are happy with the system overall. There are a few kinks, and sometimes it takes a minute to figure out the right wording to pull a report or the best way to code a new category that we want to track. But Blackbaud is always there to help us, and once things are figured out - they are super simple to replicate. It wouldn't be worth it to switch to a new system and lose of all our information and time put in to mastering the system
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Technolutions
    No answers on this topic
    Usability
    Blackbaud
    No answers on this topic
    Technolutions
    It's incredibly usable and easy to figure out. It's modern and does exactly what we need for it to do
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Support Rating
    Blackbaud
    I have not personally had to reach out to Blackbaud CRM Support, because we have a central office that manages the Blackbaud CRM relationship. However, any time I've reached out to our support team, there is nothing they can't figure out by utilizing the support they receive from Blackbaud CRM. I've not had any issues that have gone unresolved, and they can always get things done in a timely fashion.
    Incentivized
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    Technolutions
    While I do wish they had actual representatives that we able to come to you for trainings for implementation and new users, I understand that a big draw is the money that is saved by instead investing in knowledgebase, which is it's online tutorials for different functions of Slate.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Implementation Rating
    Blackbaud
    Most of our issues were self-inflicted and related to BB's work. We did not "staff up" correctly, our data to be converted was not in great shape and we set some unreasonable goals. With BBs help we were able to clean our data and prep it for conversion and we adjusted the goals to be more achievable with the timeline we were given. We found the BB staff to be responsive and focused, especially when working on-site with us.
    Incentivized
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    Technolutions
    No answers on this topic
    Alternatives Considered
    Blackbaud
    Blackbaud CRM is more robust and has better functionality. It is necessary for a bigger fundraising shop. Blackbaud Raiser's Edge and NXT worked well in smaller organizations with fewer users and fewer donors/prospects. RE was more affordable than CRM was for the smaller organization.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Technolutions
    We had been on Recruitment Plus- it has been sunsetted, so we were forced to move. I also looked at Fire Engine Red. Slate seemed far and away the most robust CRM/Admissions solution.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Return on Investment
    Blackbaud
    • Change is always expensive and painful, but CRM is worth the time and effort. One immediate benefit is improved transparency internally, especially for internal accounting, controls, and compliance departments.
    • Cloud hosting helps cut cost and demand on organization staff. Improves access and meets compliance on every level.
    • Ability to make global changes to recording donor phone communication makes it a one-stop resource for a well-run development team.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Technolutions
    • We aren't really a business, per se, but a nonprofit university. However, Slate[, by Technolutions] does allow us to easily sort applications into categories for different departments to review. And it provides a clear trail of who is looking at various documents when--and how long it takes to process them.
    Read full review
    ScreenShots