Making donor phone calls via NXT?

Anne Komer

How do your frontline fundraisers make calls to donors?

I'm hoping to find solutions to improve our process for calling donors. I'm looking into Red Arc's Call Box, which is a paid Marketplace add-on to call donors directly from NXT. But they have no reviews and haven't responded to my inquiry. Does anyone have an application they use within NXT/RE to call donors or at least a computer based platform to call donors?

Thanks in advance for any advice!

Alex Wong

@Anne Komer
not sure exactly what you are looking for.

By default RE NXT function, if you go to the constituent page on your phone, click on the phone number, it actually ask if you want to create an action for the phone call, if you do, it will create a phone call action where you can add the content of the call. It will also open the phone app and put the phone number there for you to call right away.

Dariel Dixon

@Anne Komer, if you are looking for a computer based phone system, you can look into soft phone if your organization has a VOIP phone system. These can be set to use the same phone number as a desk phone if configured by your IT department. TBH, @Alex Wong's suggestion about just opening RE NXT on a cell phone is the easiest way to go. It will open the number in the default dialer for your phone.

Anne Komer

@Alex Wong I don't have a work smartphone, just a landline at a very public cubicle, and I'm not comfortable having NXT on my personal phone.

Alex Wong

@Anne Komer
That's an org decision on phone usage.

There's no “having NXT on my personal phone” situation. RE NXT is accessed through a web browser, not an app you have to install. But I can understand you don't want use your phone to make work calls.

Not sure if you are fundraiser or not, but I cannot understand an org not providing work mobile phone to fundraiser as they will be doing a lot of calling to donor and prospect and many of such call are not likely done through a office phone sitting in an office.

Karen Diener

@Anne Komer:

How do your frontline fundraisers make calls to donors?

I'm hoping to find solutions to improve our process for calling donors. I'm looking into Red Arc's Call Box, which is a paid Marketplace add-on to call donors directly from NXT. But they have no reviews and haven't responded to my inquiry. Does anyone have an application they use within NXT/RE to call donors or at least a computer based platform to call donors?

Thanks in advance for any advice!

What exactly is the challenge here, and what are you trying to accomplish? Does staff want to be able to click the phone number and have it dial up for them? My apologies but I'm having a very hard time understand why dialing a phone number too big of an obstacle.

Dariel Dixon

@Anne Komer I think the general consensus is that most fundraisers just look up the number in RE and dial it on the phone. If your organization didn't give you a work phone to use, then I understand not wanting to use your personal phone to do work business. It seems like your employer expects that you'll be fine with just looking up the number on the computer and dialing it on the phone on your desk.

If this is a issue of privacy, then a tool like Call Box won't help you, as your conversations will still be in the same location. As a subscription based service, it might be cheaper for your organization to just supply you with a cell phone. I'm not certain how Call Box works as I don't know of many organizations that have a need for this. It's a personal preference to use your personal device for this, but it shouldn't be expected.

EDIT: Now that I think about it more, I agree with @Alex Wong that it's an unreasonable expectation that fundraisers would not be using an organization supplied or organization contributed device for work business. Do they expect your fundraiser's to only work from the office, or will you be making donor visits? If the latter, then a work device is the only method that makes sense, as you'll be completely mobile and able to work everywhere.

Anne Komer

@Karen Diener The challenge is that our current system is either dialing donors directly from our personal cell phone numbers or dialing into a call-out number, then pressing 91+ the donor's number. This connection when using the call-out number is often very patchy to where I can't hear the donor very well and the system can be finicky, where it will sometimes decide that a phone number is invalid when that is not actually the case.

Cary Webb

@Anne Komer I use Microsoft Teams. It has the option to make outside phone calls. I don't call donors from my personal phone. Another option is to use a google voice number. You might have to pay for the call function but it's an option. When I want to record the interaction I just manually add the action to the donors record after the phone call is over. I work a lot in database view so I add it that way. Hope that all helps.

Jason Weaver

Although it's been a few years, I used to have a second cell phone for all things work related at the previous nonprofit I worked at. I thought this was the perfect model, as I am a huge privacy advocate, too. I had 2 phones (personal+work) for about 10 years. For the last 7 years, I have worked at an org that does not supply work cell phones but offers a reasonable cell phone stipend instead. I thought I would hate this kind of system, but I have actually learned to L-O-V-E it, as I did not realize how big of a pain in the you know what it was to constantly have to lug around and keep track of 2 phones. Today, even though I have a VOIP desk phone and number that I can use when I'm in the office, or anywhere else with a reliable broadband connection, I almost always use my personal cell for inbound and outbound calls, as I forward office phone calls to my cell and use my personal cell for almost all outbound work calls. It is simply so much more convenient...for me at least. And, I'm not worried about sacrificing my privacy either, as I take steps to balance convenience with security and privacy. As far as documenting calls, I just enter my actions one-by-one and don't feel too inefficient about it. I have some semi-automated processes built into my workflow, which work for me. Any questions or request for clarification, just ask!