Free Fundraising Software: Is It Worth It? Pros & Cons

When looking at software solutions, it can be tempting to choose the free or cheapest option available. On one hand, this saves your team the time you’d spend researching products and determining which one is a worthy investment, as well as the money you’d spend making that investment.

However, these free solutions can limit your ability to fundraise effectively, costing you even more money than what you’d spend to invest in a fundraising software solution that you’d pay for. 

Let’s explore the pros and cons of opting for a free fundraising software platform. In this article, we’ll review some of the most frequently asked questions about free fundraising and donor database software solutions for nonprofits.

We’ll start by reviewing these topics:

1. Why you might be considering using free fundraising software 
2. Why you might not want to choose free fundraising software
3. Our fundraising software recommendation: Bloomerang

Why you might be considering using a free fundraising software solution

There are many reasons why you might be tempted to choose a free fundraising software solution. 

You want as much revenue as possible to go right back to funding your mission. This requires saving money by lowering overhead expenses.

Second, you might have found it difficult to make the case to your board of directors that it makes more sense to choose a paid option when free options are available. 

There are many reasons why opting for a free fundraising solution could be tempting to your nonprofit:

• You might be curious about the impact that paid donor database solutions can have on your nonprofit. Is it really worth it to spend the money?
• You may not see a significant difference in the features you’ll be using when comparing free and paid options.  
• You may not want to change how you’re currently managing your donors, which means you’d like to invest as little as possible in a different solution or approach to donor management. 

These are all reasonable considerations. However, we’ve seen that when it comes to free fundraising software, you often get what you pay for. That means you likely won’t see the results—increased fundraising revenue, increased donor retention rate, increased average gift size—that you would likely see when using a paid solution.  

Why you might not want to choose free fundraising software

An important thing to keep in mind when looking at free fundraising software solutions is that they often come with additional costs that mean they’re not actually free. 

Let’s take Salesforce, for example. Many of our nonprofit customers have switched from Salesforce to Bloomerang. In almost every single case, they were initially drawn to the fact that the Salesforce nonprofit CRM was free. However, once they started using the software solution, they realized that it was more complicated than they thought. Often, they had to pay a consultant to help them set up their database and teach them how to use it. We’ve even heard some customers say they paid up to $15,000 to do this! Even with the consultant’s help, they often had to endure a lengthy implementation period; it was months before the system was set up.

As you can imagine, they ultimately ended up paying more money and spending more time than they would have if they had just invested in a dedicated donor database like Bloomerang. 

Now let’s look at Excel. A lot of nonprofits start tracking their data in Excel spreadsheets.

Although it may seem like this is an easier way to manage data, this isn’t often a good idea because there are issues to consider like:

• Security: What happens if your computer is stolen and someone gains access to all of that donor data?
• Features: You’ll likely need to invest in other software solutions to send emails, collect online donations, etc., which will make it harder to organize and sync your data.
• Accessibility: It may not be easy to share the sheet with others at your organization. And, the more people you share the spreadsheets with, the more potential security risks there are.
• Support: There’s no one readily available to help answer your questions or fix something if you have an issue with the program. 

Free fundraising software summary

Based on what our customers tell us,  it’s better to seek out a paid solution built specifically for nonprofits.

Our fundraising software recommendation: Bloomerang

Your nonprofit doesn’t have to settle for a limited solution just because it’s free. In fact, you can find an affordable, powerful, and easy-to-use fundraising software solution that will give you the functionality you need.

With Bloomerang, you can access the full functionality of our platform starting at just $99/month. 

With this plan, you’ll get access to essential features like:

• Unlimited users
• Access to Bloomerang Academy, where you’ll find free resources and classes that are designed to help you become a more effective fundraiser
• Unlimited online forms, including online giving and event registration pages
• Email marketing tools
• Comp email and chat support

You’ll also get exclusive features not offered by any other software solutions, like:

• Constituent Engagement Level™
• Constituent Generosity Score™
• Communications Audit Tool
• Research-backed Donor Engagement Surveys measuring donor satisfaction, commitment, trust, and intimacy
• Sustainability Scorecard
• Donor Retention Wheel

With Bloomerang, you can start with the plan that works for you. And because Bloomerang is built to grow with you,  you’ll also have the option to upgrade to other features as you need them.

Want to learn more about what Bloomerang’s user-friendly, robust, and affordable nonprofit donor database has to offer? Check out our free video demo to find out how your nonprofit can leverage Bloomerang’s tools to better manage and retain your donors.

Client Success Story: German American Heritage Center

We’ve seen plenty of examples of organizations that have switched from free fundraising solutions to Bloomerang and experienced a boost to their fundraising and donor management strategies. One of those organizations is the German American Heritage Center (GAHC), a nonprofit dedicated to preserving German heritage and sharing knowledge about the German immigrant experience.

The GAHC had been using Excel to manage campaigns but didn’t have a way to view each donor’s giving history and other crucial donor information. They were looking for a more expansive, easy-to-use system to manage donor data and grow supporter relationships.

Their team found its solution in Bloomerang. They were able to benefit from Bloomerang’s intuitive interface, donor-centricity, and custom field functionality.

Kelly Lao, Executive Director at the German American Heritage Center, said the Bloomerang system allowed the GAHC to turn more lapsed or new donors into sustained givers. The team can now easily view top donors, consistent donors, and lapsed donors who are most likely to give again.

View Bloomerang’s customer results page for more success stories from organizations that have made the switch to Bloomerang.

Now that you’ve reviewed the pros and cons of no-cost fundraising tools, it’s time to decide: Is free fundraising software really worth it?