It’s official: Blackbaud will shut down and cease all support for Luminate CRM (LCRM) on June 30, 2022. While this information might not come as a surprise, there is a clear path forward for your technology strategy as it relates to managing your constituents. For nonprofit organizations currently utilizing the LCRM product, the time is now to plan for what comes next. With a positive mindset and proactive approach, this development just might turn into a silver lining for the future of your organization’s technology. Gather your team and allow Cloud for Good to lead you through this turbulent time.
Readying Your Transition
Changing technology, especially that as important as your constituent relationship manager (CRM), is a decision that should be vetted, following significant deliberation between your leadership, technology, fundraising, programs, and any team impacted by the switch, accompanied by a considered effort to ready your data for migration. Time is of the essence as you assess the state of your data and ensure your team can continue to operate seamlessly through the transition. But don’t worry, you’re not in this alone.
Save valuable time deliberating on what CRM solution will replace LCRM and take it from us: The Salesforce Nonprofit Success Pack (NPSP) is what you’re looking for. Cloud for Good, and the entire Salesforce ecosystem, can help prepare and support you during this transition. As LCRM is already built on the Salesforce platform, your organization will be transitioning to a system that is familiar and flexible with your previous technology investments. The experience you’ve gained building business processes and developing security protocols in a Salesforce-based technology solution will greatly help you get up and running with NPSP.
- Now – Take Initiative
- You’ve decided NPSP is right for you. Now, perform a system check on your current technology and evaluate the business process mapping and data conversions needed to complete your technology transition. Identify the teams that currently use LCRM and start getting them excited for the transition to a system that can support all their needs for the foreseeable future. Prepare your staff for the project to start and begin to establish a rollout strategy that incorporates training and testing.
- Summer 2021 – Begin Discovery and Assess Data Conversion
- With help from Cloud for Good specialists, an analysis of your current LCRM solution and supporting data will be performed and documented. We will work with you to understand your desired business processes, and we will map them into the NPSP functionality. We will then provide templates and best practices to eliminate data redundancies and ensure that the move into NPSP will bring only relevant data.
- Fall 2021 – Build Functionality, Convert and Compare Data
- As we work with your team to build out your requested functionality in NPSP, we will also convert data into the system using our LCRM Migration Accelerator. Converted data and business processes will be tested throughout this step, and your users will begin to gain experience with the NPSP functionality. Using a Salesforce sandbox environment, Cloud for Good will help test and train your team on your new system and compare it to the previous system to ensure it not only replaces but enhances your experience with Salesforce.
- Winter 2021 – Complete End-Of-Year Fundraising
- Use this time to focus on your existing fundraising campaigns within LCRM. We will continue to build and test your new NPSP system throughout this process and resolve any lingering issues before closing out the year.
- Early 2022 – Final Testing and Data Load
- As we finish final testing, the remaining LCRM data will be extracted and then imported into NPSP according to project strategy. Our teams will work together to validate all parts of the new system – the experience, the processes, and the data – and we will work with your team to train your users. Finally, we will prepare for GO LIVE!
Making the Move to NPSP
When you make the switch to Salesforce, you’re not only getting best-in-breed technology solutions, but you’re also benefitting from the power behind the entire Salesforce community. The Power of Us Hub and Trailhead community are both full of past Luminate users that have made the switch to Salesforce, and there will surely be more and more people like you looking for answers as we approach LCRM’s sunset. There are over 40,000 current NPSP customers helping support fellow users with education and quality feedback. Don’t be afraid to lean on this community to inform best practices and assist in your organization’s change management with your new platform.
Salesforce NPSP can do it all for nonprofits, and it is continually strengthened through new solutions in fundraising, marketing and engagement, program management, grants management, and everything in between. According to our 2020 – 2021 State of Salesforce in the Nonprofit Sector Report, 72% of surveyed organizations reported increasing their investments in technology over the last 12 months. Concurrently, Salesforce.org’s most recent Nonprofit Trends Report revealed that 56% of nonprofits have accelerated their move to digital programs.
Learn from Past Salesforce Success
With your next CRM system decided, it’s imperative that your organization moves quickly to set up and follow through with your technology transition. This means forming a transition plan that converts your data, enables your future business processes, and empowers your staff through training and development. Cloud for Good specializes in helping organizations create transformative value through their Salesforce technology and have completed over 2,000 successful Salesforce implementations to date. Our client the Hispanic Scholarship Fund (HSF) is the largest nonprofit organization supporting Hispanic American higher education today and recently transitioned from a highly-customized Luminate CRM solution to the Salesforce NPSP.
This use case is of particular importance to any organization scrambling to find a solution to replace Luminate CRM, as HSF’s migration was completed in just six months. Speaking on the rapid migration to NPSP for better multi-touch engagement of HSF donors, members, and volunteers, Senior Vice President, Project Management Tammy Schlegel said, “Our goal as an organization was to simplify and establish best practices with a cost-saving solution. Cloud for Good was awesome, the team was just fantastic. They really helped us stay focused on what we needed to do and how to transition to NPSP in a very short period of time.”
Don’t let the news of Luminate CRM’s sunset get you down. Cloud for Good is here to help you navigate this sudden transition. With intentional action, an experienced partner, and the power of Salesforce NPSP, you will look back on this moment as a true turning point for your organization. Reach out to us today and let us show you how to truly create transformational value with technology.
