January Challenge: What's your favorite product tip/trick?

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  • Miki Martin
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    @Christine Robertson YES! I added so many fields to my Favorites in Query. I learned the hard way that I had to add them for the different types of queries, though. So helpful since I used to build a lot of queries.

  • Miki Martin
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    @Crystal Bruce one that comes to mind is Aliases. At my prior organization, many times we would get tributes “in memory of Sr. such-and-such.” That proved tricky since many sisters changed their names and we have their given names in RE. So I added aliases for any alternate names so people could look up Sr. Marlene and see that it was actually Sr. Rachel now and find the actual record - instead of creating a duplicate. Some sisters had two or three because of name variations.

  • @Miki Martin - Yes - thank you for the added bit about different Query types. That's so important when you are working with more than just Constituent data!!

  • @Anuradha Parihar Welcome!! This community is a great place to learn.

  • Alex Wong
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    @Lindy Kingins
    the copy and paste one-of is a great tip.

    I do want to add that you don't need to scroll to the bottom. Once you clicked on the first row (for the typing cursor to show up), you can just click on the scroll bar down once, and you can Ctrl-V to paste)

  • @Dariel Dixon Thanks for the tip!

  • @Alex Wong I tried what you suggested but it didn't work for me. Maybe because it's RE7.

  • Alex Wong
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    @Lindy Kingins
    we are on RE NXT, azure hosted, RE database view version is v7.96.6404.33 not sure if this has to do with if the trick works.

  • @Lindy Kingins Hi, Warren from SmartTHING here - SmartPASTE definitely works with RENXT Database View too. Hope you manage to get it sorted. Any issues just contact our support guys support at smartthing.org. Cheers. Warren

  • @Amy Barker another variation is when you're adding info with a date in the current month, just type the DD and once you enter it'll autocomplete the MM and YY.

  • @Stephanie Veatch this is my favorite time saver and I wish I had learned about it far earlier than I did!

  • @Crystal Bruce for those with the Event module in database view one thing I discovered last year was for non constituents that you set up a participant record for you can add biographical information and when you export it will include that (for emails it is especially helpful). Previous to discovering this I set up a participant attribute for email to store that information but so much easier and cleaner to put it on the bio screen. This is the screen you get to by clicking on the three dots next to the participants name within their individual participant record.

  • @Crystal Bruce
    Using shortcuts like F2 and F3 have made creating constituents and updating information so much easier! Before I knew that the shortcuts existed, I would spend so much of my time adding every line of data in Addressee/Salutations in RE database view or updating the date fields on various tabs. Now, it is just a click of a button and I can move on!

  • @Whitney Shelton, lots of great tips (and reminders)!

  • @Don Burrhus, that's a great idea!

  • @Crystal Bruce, we have found that AddressFinder includes commas (usually for an apartment number), which causes some issues with our mail vendor. So, I created a query to check on any new addresses that contain commas, thus making it easy to correct those records as needed.

  • @Crystal Bruce a recent simple, but effective one I implemented is a workflow based on a newly added recurring gifts. When someone signs up for a recurring gift, an action is assigned to our Annual Giving Officer so they can followup and thank them in a timely manner.

  • @Spring Velazquez
    This is by far my favorite and biggest time saver!

  • @Erica Guernsey Along this same idea…. I was fumbling around yesterday and found the spot to configure the types of gifts that Web View will pull in reports for the “Committed revenue,” “Received revenue,” and “Recognition” filters.
    Control panel → Settings → Giving Analysis

  • @Whitney Shelton Woah, that's awesome! I didn't know you could customize those!

  • Sara Niemiec
    Sara Niemiec Community All-Star
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    @Crystal Bruce, I know it may seem small, but I recently took a Blackbaud University Virtual Training session and learned that entering the day (the number, like 26) in any calendar text box and then tabbing out of it auto-populates the current month and year (so, 26 would change into January 26, 2024). I use it all the time now, and I think it's great.

  • @Jordyn Kieft
    How do you move a block/tab?

  • @Pat Phillips you just have to click and drag the tab that you want to move!

  • @Jordyn Kieft Didn't work. I mainly work in DB view, so I am not familiar with NXT. Will try another day.

  • @Sara Niemiec @Crystal Bruce That is a cool trick which works for me in db view but is not working for my colleagues. Any ideas why the date would autofill for some but not others?

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