Partners in Education Toledo

We are a nonprofit organization which develops and fosters partnerships between area schools and northwest Ohio businesses, government agencies, organizations, and churches. Funded by contributions from businesses, individuals, and the community, we leverage our most important investment — the education of our children.

Challenge

Partners in Education was looking for an easy-to-use donor management system that could help them organize, access, and keep track of all their donor data. “We were looking for something easy to use, easy to pull data out of, and something that tracked everything we needed,” said Michelle Klinger, Executive Director at Partners in Education Toledo.

Solution

After hearing more about Bloomerang from Jay Love and Steven Shattuck, Michelle was initially drawn to its attractive interface, functionality, and intuitiveness. “I heard a presentation by Jay Love and then, Steve Shattuck visited us in Toledo for a presentation when I was the director of The Center for Nonprofit Resources here in Toledo.” The team at Partners in Education was excited to see improvements with their donor retention and gift development processes by being able to manage and keep better track of their constituent data. “We are a small company but we want to double our programming in the next four years. Our organization had been struggling to find ways to manage data for a number of years. Bloomerang provided a mechanism that our staff could learn and use easily. To be truthful, we are not yet scratching the surface regarding what Bloomerang can do. We have used it religiously to inform our board about who is giving and where we need to go with respect to donor development.” Michelle is happy to tout Bloomerang’s ease of use, data management functionality, and built-in constituent communication abilities as reasons to recommend it as a top donor management system for public benefit organizations like theirs. “I have recommended Bloomerang to every nonprofit we work with. Our organization runs an initiative called the Afterschool Alliance with over 435 members and we recommend Bloomerang to everyone because of the ease of use, the data it provides us, and how it keeps us on track to thank donors and stay in touch.”

Results

Since implementing Bloomerang, Partners in Education has gained power over their data and has benefited from making informed decisions. “Really, for this organization it was about consistent data collection and Bloomerang’s attractive interface. Also the fact that the software is accessible anywhere our staff needs it to be, has helped us a great deal.” And since increasing their efficiency and gaining better access to their data, Michelle and her team have been able to benefit from increased donations and online giving, along with improved fundraising and development efforts. “I can tell you that our fundraising has improved every year since we began using Bloomerang. Our annual fund donations have doubled in the past three years. And our online giving has increased by 100%.” In addition to high number growth, the team at Partners in Education has also seen improvements in the quality and frequency of their reporting and constituent communications. “Having Bloomerang does allow us to create reports at the drop of a hat, which is great. We hope to use it to improve our constituent communication in the near future. And we now have a much better idea of who is giving and what programming areas they are most passionate about.” All in all, it’s amazing what a simple and innovative donor database can do for the growth of an organization such as Partners in Education Toledo.