Opportunities Vs. Portfolio

Question

My organization is planning our annual fundraiser. We're new to using the portfolio feature in NXT and we're exploring different ways we can best track the solicitation of our donors for this event. These donors aren't in any one's portfolio currently, so we're wondering if using opportunities for this event would be more effective for event solicitations. I was also wondering how other organizations are tracking event solicitations at their organizations.

Sunshine Reinken Watson · Answer

Opportunities are great for tracking solicitations, whether the constituent is assigned to a fundraiser or not.

I would limit opportunities to significant planned solicitations before the event like sponsorships, tables, and large donations. However, if you need to track and assign all the asks and be able to report on and review the progress you have some options:

* Use opportunities for all of them, which allows you to track them via opportunity lists, dashboards, etc. Fundraisers can track the status and add linked actions to track their moves management process. You can also add the event participant records and fees when they have committed to track those with the other event data.
* Use event participant records with custom participant options for your needed data points to track them on the event's participant screen. This is not using the system as expected and will limit the type of reports and tracking you can do and historic records (you can't currently query on custom participant options, for example). However, it is an all-in-one place to view the event participant information if those things aren't an issue.

I suggest establishing what type of reporting and tracking you need to do for this event and big-picture, looking at what is possible, and then making a decision accordingly.

Carlene Johnson · Answer

I agree with Joe.  Can you give us some more specifics on what you are trying to accomplish?  When you say "event solicitations" are you talking about large sponsorship asks for a gala for example?

Or are you talking about soliciting everyone who attends the event in general?

Opportunities work best for planned asks for a specific dollar amount withing a defined timeframe.

Joe Moretti · Answer

Could you be more specific, because right now, I am not sure what you are attempting to want. I mean if you are soliciting for events, you can just use appeals and attached the assigned appeals to everyone who has gotten a invite. But it is not real clear what you are attempting.