I am getting paid $30 for this post*. Before you curse me out and unsubscribe from my blog, at least hear me out first.
I received an email today from one of those sponsored posts companies. I signed up for it when it first came out to check it out and decided that it wasn’t for me. Still, I never get emails from them so I decided to at least see what they wanted me to peddle. It turns out they were wanting me to review a database product for non-profits to manage their membership. The interesting thing is that I actually get asked about this kind of software several times a year. I used to be “the tech guy” for some non-profit organizations and I was a member of this really cool Circuit Riders community. Of course, that was a long time ago so my current knowledge of the field is limited.
The software that they want me to review is the Member Database Software by Wild Apricot. I have never used it, but I have used some similar software. Hopefully they won’t get mad at me (i.e. they will still give me my $30) if I link to some of the software I know more about. I have worked with two open source membership database products before. eBase is based on FileMaker (still?!?! What ever happened to the soon-to-be-released web-based version?). It is a quality piece of software, but I just can’t imagine wanting to run a database that wasn’t web-based (or at least web-accessable). I know people still do it, but I think they are nuts (usually). OCDB is a similar piece of software to eBase, but was less mature back when i used it (this was like 2001 or 2002 when it was released). Both eBase and OCDB are free and open source solutions. Both of them will help you manage a membership database. Both of them run on local computers and require 3rd party consultants for support. Other than that they don’t do much.
The other software I am familiar with is Raisers Edge. This is like the behemoth of the non-profit membership/donor management databases. It is huge, complicated, incredibly feature rich, and very expensive. Hey, you know it is expensive when they don’t list the price on the website 
Raisers Edge can be extended by what seems like and endless supply of modules. It can handle any scenario you throw at it. Coincidentally, this is the software that my mother would like to replace when she contacts me about once a year during what I assume is budget time.
So, then there is this new product that I have just seen for the first time thanks to the offer for me to whore out my blog publish a “sponsored post” on my blog. To be honest, it actually looks like it serves a needed market. The pricing is a little steep for the bigger customers, but then again, these are probably people who are already paying a fiscal shitton for their member database product. The cool thing is that this software seems to be web-based. It also ties in some nice extras like events. I know it is nice to be able to invite your members to an event and have the RSVP / fee collection process integrated right in. Since they are able to accept credit cards with the same service, I assume that people can buy tickets to events right there. That is a nice integration of services that I am sure would be very valuable to the small to medium sized non-profits.
Like I said earlier, I can’t exactly vouch for the quality of the product since I don’t have any experience with it. I don’t see any problem recommending people to check into it a little further. I like what they are trying to do and I know lots of non-profits that have looked for something like this before. If their product didn’t interest me I wouldn’t have taken the time to write this.
* As I said, I am getting paid to post this ($30 to be exact). Here are the guidelines I was given for this post:
1: You must disclose that the post is a paid post in some way. Here are some ideas: “Sponsored Post:”, “The following is a paid review:” “Advertisement:”.
2: Reviews must be at least 200 words. Use whatever length you feel is appropriate aside from the minimum of 200 words.
3. Reviews may not contain affiliate links. Any review with affliate links will be rejected.
