The best nonprofit CRM solutions for 2023

You may already know that there are customer relationship management (CRM) solutions for businesses of all sizes. However, you may not realize that this software is also effective for nonprofits. In fact, many nonprofits use CRM solutions for fundraising and donor management.

Nonprofit CRM platforms offer many benefits to organizations, but it might be challenging to choose the best relationship management solutions for your group. This guide will help make the decision a little easier.

What is a CRM platform?

Organizations use CRM platforms to manage relationships with customers or clients. In the case of nonprofits, CRM stands for constituent relationship management. For most nonprofits, constituents include donors and volunteers.

How CRM platforms can benefit nonprofits

Nonprofit organizations can leverage CRM software to help attract and retain donors and volunteers by segmenting and personalizing outreach efforts, including marketing and fundraising campaigns.

A nonprofit CRM platform can also track the efficiency of these efforts by measuring donor retention and engagement levels on an individual basis. Typically, these platforms also integrate with other software solutions for greater functionality, including sales and marketing tools, accounting software, and payment systems.

Selecting the best CRM solution for nonprofits

We selected our list of the top CRM options for nonprofits to consider based on cost, scalability, features, functionality, ease of use, and customization and upgrade potential. Here are some top recommendations for user-friendly nonprofit CRM solutions.

1. HubSpot CRM

HubSpot CRM is one of the best free CRM tools available based on its functionality and ease of use. It has a comprehensive database to store major contact information, including donor data. You can organize donor profiles and communications, such as fundraising campaign messages. In addition, the CRM platform includes an email marketing tool for your fundraising efforts.

2. Jotform

Jotform’s user-friendly form creation tools make it easy to build forms to collect volunteer information and other data for your nonprofit. Several nonprofit CRM sheet templates allow you to track all types of organizational information within one database.

You can use customizable table templates to organize fundraising and schedule volunteers. And you can collect donations with donation forms and use the donations list to keep track of what you raise.

You can upload data from a CSV or Excel file to Jotform Tables or share a custom template with team members, who can then access it from any device.

3. Neon CRM

Neon CRM is a fairly low-cost, cloud-based management platform that helps nonprofits scale as they expand their membership or donor base. Key features include communication and marketing automation, revenue dashboards, and a range of integrations. 

Nonprofit experts design the features, which is a plus — they understand how to deliver tools that help organizations optimize resources like time and money.

4. Kindful

Although Kindful costs more than the other nonprofit CRM solutions on this list, it’s one of the most comprehensive and intuitive tools for fundraising available. The software provides tools that assist with crowdfunding as well as automation to minimize time spent on certain fundraising tasks.

Kindful integrates with other widely used organizational tools for online donation management such as QuickBooks, as well as email marketing tools like Mailchimp.

5. Blackbaud CRM

Blackbaud is a robust CRM solution made for larger nonprofit organizations. It includes fundraising tools that help attract, support, and nurture donors.

A number of multichannel marketing features help your organization develop and maintain strong donor relationships. The CRM system also offers tools for conducting peer-to-peer campaigns and creating content for donation pages.

6. DonorPerfect

DonorPerfect’s centralized fundraising data capabilities help organize donor data and make it accessible across your nonprofit team. Features include a visual dashboard, fast donation processing, event management tools, and a mobile app.

7. Bloomerang

Bloomerang focuses on assisting nonprofit organizations with their donor retention objectives. The donation management solution delivers a full-stack CRM to improve contact record maintenance. It also includes its own online payment processing tool as well as built-in email marketing tools to help you automate communication.

8. Virtuous

Virtuous is a responsive CRM solution designed to improve the donor experience — which can improve donor retention and increase donations. Its marketing automation features optimize the time your organization spends on donor engagement, fundraising campaigns, and follow-up messaging.

9. CiviCRM

CiviCRM is the best and most affordable CRM solution if your organization is looking for customization. This open-source CRM platform allows you to customize all its tools, including those for membership, reporting, advocacy campaigns, contact management, and more.

10. Bonterra (formerly EveryAction, Network for Good)

Bonterra is a unified nonprofit CRM that allows users to manage their fundraising, advocacy, membership, and analytics tools all in one platform. With multiple pricing plans, Bonterra supports workflow automation, omnichannel marketing, donation forms, custom reporting, and more.

11. Keela

Keela is a cloud-based fundraising CRM that gives users the flexibility to manage donors and contacts, receive donations online, and stay on top of donor communications — from anywhere. With a user-friendly interface, Keela lets nonprofits automatically issue receipts and thank-you notes for donations with smart campaign management tools. Plus, users can track team responsibilities and deadlines with robust project management capabilities.

Making a decision

Like business-oriented CRM solutions, platforms built for nonprofits typically offer a trial period. This gives you a way to better assess if the platform meets your nonprofit’s needs and objectives before you commit. In doing so, you can feel more confident that you’ll get the best return on your investment.