Are you using the RENXT Online Giving donation form for membership?

Juliana Lawson

Some of you are using the donation form in RENXT webview to collect memberships. You might be using them in conjunction with the membership module or not. You might be using monthly recurring donations or one-time gifts as a membership. Regardless of how you are using the form to promote a membership “program”, I would like to hear from you!

I've found a few great examples on my own, but I'd like to see what everyone is doing. Just paste the URL to your form(s) here or a link to your website.

Thank you!

To clarify, I'm referring to the donation form found in RENXT WEBVIEW.

Karen Diener

@Juliana Lawson is there anything specific you are hoping to learn?

Juliana Lawson

@Karen Diener thank you for responding!

I'm looking for examples of how the form is being used in this way currently. Beyond that there are a few other things:

• Are you using it with recurring gifts?
• Are you using it with the membership module in database view?
• Are there any small improvements that could be made to make it easier to use this form for membership.

Obviously using this donation form for membership is not a long term solution, but I am curious what types of organizations are using it for this successfully today. There may be some Customer Discovery opportunities in the future.

Karen Diener

@Juliana Lawson:

@Karen Diener thank you for responding!

I'm looking for examples of how the form is being used in this way currently. Beyond that there are a few other things:

• Are you using it with recurring gifts?
• Are you using it with the membership module in database view?
• Are there any small improvements that could be made to make it easier to use this form for membership.

Obviously using this donation form for membership is not a long term solution, but I am curious what types of organizations are using it for this successfully today. There may be some Customer Discovery opportunities in the future.

That is helpful! I can only speak to some past clients / past experiences, but here are a few thoughts:

I have not seen anyone use a donation form for membership. If they have a true membership program, they have that module and use the Membership Form in OLX.

One client was interested in the ability to allow recurring gifts and/or pledge payments, but the whole concept of the membership module itself was too overwhelming for them and they abandoned it.

Improvements to the membership form are different than improvements to the membership module itself.

• The form seems to be the least of the worries, though it could definitely benefit from the ability to customize - to add help text, or add other content not directly tied to a field. A few of these things have been included in webview donation forms which is an improvement.
• The module is overly complicated and designed for an older membership structure. Categories and Programs, Upgrades and Downgrades, Memberships plus their related transactions. I understand it because I've studied it a lot and used it for four membership programs at a large hospital foundation. That was all for internal purposes though - it was not donor-facing.

I hope that is helpful. I have less feedback about the form than the module itself.

Karen

Emily Savino

@Juliana Lawson we do not use RENXT online form for our memberships, but we do use the membership module sign up form through OLX. Not sure if you want to see it or not, but here's the link to our form:

Elaine Tucker

@Juliana Lawson we have different memberships - 3 giving circles, 1 giving society and 2 “council” memberships. We are using donation forms for them, and then in database view we are linking gifts to the memberships that we have. It's a bit cumbersome, but workable.

https://www.txwf.co/xix-society/2021-landing-page
https://www.txwf.co/village-membership-page
https://www.txwf.co/ELC-P
https://www.txwf.co/WLC-Pcc

Brandon Stein

@Juliana Lawson We are using the membership module and I have been asked to try to get in on discovery for NXT membership. Would love to help work out the next iteration of membership.

We also would love the ability to tie an appeal to membership gifts. We currently have to segment different pages we direct donors with different forms just to be able to ensure we tie the proper appeal to which renewal form a donor is receiving.

Here is our membership join page:

Juliana Lawson

@Brandon Stein Thank you for responding.

I added a screen shot to my post for clarity. I'm looking for specific feedback on the RENXT - webview - donation form, not the OLX form. I will be sure to pass your post onto the Online Express product team.

Your feedback has still been helpful as I research how customer are using the webview donation form for their membership needs. I will say these types of customers are either not using the membership module in database view or do not have a large or complicated membership program.

Karen Diener

@Juliana Lawson:

@Brandon Stein Thank you for responding.

I added a screen shot to my post for clarity. I'm looking for specific feedback on the RENXT - webview - donation form, not the OLX form. I will be sure to pass your post onto the Online Express product team.

Your feedback has still been helpful as I research how customer are using the webview donation form for their membership needs. I will say these types of customers are either not using the membership module in database view or do not have a large or complicated membership program.

This is an interesting response. People aren't using a Membership form in webview because it doesn't exist. So they are forced into using the donation form if they want to use NXT form because it is much more friendly than OLX. However, many are not using NXT forms because there are issues with constituent matching and the gift processing is very different than it is in database view.

Maybe discovery has already been done on membership in general for organizations. If not, I feel like the online form is not where the focus should be. “Membership” means different things to each organization, but most of the time they do not need the Membership module. If organizations are only using it to track annual or lifetime giving societies, I would probably not recommend it. It is not worth the expense.

Karen

Juliana Lawson

@Karen Diener thank you for your response. We do have some customers using the donation form in RENXT webview to collect memberships. Some are using it with the membership module in the database, some are not. It is not a recommended solution, but it is working for some customers.

As for the constituent review available with the donation form, I hear you. We know some customers want more control when it comes to matching so in 2022, we enhanced our matching algorithm by adding an address check and visibility to the match status in gift batch combined with a closer workflow into the merge tool also directly from the gift batch. We saw some improvements, with some organizations matching more than 80% of incoming donations to existing donors, but we want to do more.

We previewed a feature in the Online Giving Product Update Briefing that will give users an optional donor review tool. When switched on, unmatched transactions will pause so users can review them, search for and select a match, or choose to create a new constituent record before dropping into gift batch.

Thank you again for responding. It is greatly appreciated.

Karen Diener

Thanks @Juliana Lawson -

I'm fully aware of the enhancements that Blackbaud has been working on. Again, my question was whether there has been Discovery about the Membership module in the database. I just want to make sure that customers have an opportunity to add their input there as well.

Karen

Juliana Lawson

@Karen Diener Missed that question in your thread, apologies. I'm not aware of any discovery in that area.

Karen Diener

@Juliana Lawson - thanks for your response!

Brandon Stein

@Juliana Lawson Thank you for your response. We are in the process of creating a donation form in NXT for a membership drive in the next few months. We are working on embedding this form into our website but here is a link to the donation page in NXT:

I hope I can help out in any way I can!

Jade Hammond

@Juliana Lawson

Hi Juliana,

We currently use RENXT webview donation form for our one time donations and memberships in the same form. We have the memberships coming through as recurring gifts, however because we're using the same form, people who are coming through as a one-time donor sometimes appear as the same cons.code as a member, which makes things confusing.

We're launching a few membership programmes in the next month and we are wanting to use the membership module for this, as it will add their memberships to their records and will streamline renewals etc. However, it only gives us the options to make the membership form in database view which really limits the customisation and just looks ‘clunky’, especially if we embed it in our website. Are you still working on adding the membership form to RENXT webview? Any updates on this would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks, Jade

Juliana Lawson

@Jade Hammond Thank you for responding. I would recommend attending the RENXT Product Update Briefings (PUB) for the most up to date information on plans. As you mentioned in your post membership support is needed across features to work well and the PUB will be more comprehensive as to what is happening in each area.

Juliana Lawson

Hello @Brandon Stein, How did the membership drive go?

Brandon Stein

@Juliana Lawson
It's going really well. We have received 267 memberships to date and are about 60% to our goal.

Juliana Lawson

@Brandon Stein that is great news! I'm going to pass this on to the Online Giving product manager. She is responsible for the donation for you are using and likes to see what customers are doing with them.

Emily Bastow

@Juliana Lawson We are using the NXT Donation forms as a work around for disccounted memberships, or to pay the difference to upgrade memberships. It processes the gift and then we manage the membership in database view. We don't embed on our website, but send links to donors.

Juliana Lawson

@Emily Bastow thank you for passing this on!