Donor and volunteer systems

Most organisations lose supporters to silence, not to a competitor.

Someone donates or offers to volunteer, and then hears nothing. The records sit in three spreadsheets and one person's inbox. This is the least glamorous work I do and often the highest returning.

Who it is for

Organisations where donor and volunteer records live in spreadsheets and memory.

Ask about this

Sound familiar?

A donor gives once, never hears from you again, and does not give again.
Volunteer offers go unanswered because the shared inbox belongs to nobody.
Nobody can tell you how many active supporters you have without an afternoon of counting.
Receipts and thank-yous go out late, or by hand, or not at all.

What it looks like

Where an enquiry goes once the plumbing is in place.

Someone asks for help

A form, a WhatsApp message or a call

Routed to the right person

Never sits in a shared inbox

Answered and recorded

Thank-you, receipt, and a record kept

Counted in your report

Ready for the funder, not rebuilt by hand

How an enquiry travels once the plumbing is in place.

What you get

What is actually included

One place for supporter records

A customer relationship management system (CRM) set up around how you actually work, not a product you bend yourself around.

Enquiry routing

Every form, email and message sent to whoever should answer it, with nothing sitting for a week.

Thank-yous and receipts

Sent immediately and automatically, which is both good practice and often a tax requirement.

Appeals and stewardship

Email and WhatsApp sequences that keep supporters close between campaigns.

Lapsed-donor follow-up

Quietly bringing back the people who gave once and drifted.

Admin automation

The copying between your donation platform, spreadsheet, accounting and CRM, done by software.

How it works

Map it

Where supporters currently come from, and everywhere their details end up.

Consolidate

One clean record per person, merged from whatever you have now.

Automate

Routing, thank-yous, receipts and follow-up, running without anyone remembering.

Train

Your team learns to run it, because a system nobody uses is worse than none.

Questions people ask

Do we have to buy expensive software?

Usually not. Several strong options are free or heavily discounted for non-profits, and I will pick on fit and cost, not on commission. I take none.

Is WhatsApp appropriate for this?

In South Africa and much of Africa it is where people actually read messages, so yes, with consent and a clear way to opt out.

What about data protection?

Consent and opt-out are built in, and I keep your data in your own accounts. Your legal obligations under your country's rules stay with you and your board.

Often paired with

Written on this

Impact reporting a funder will actually readMost impact reports are written to survive scrutiny rather than to be read, which is why they are long, cautious and largely ignored. A shorter report built from data you already collect does more, and takes less time to produce.
The look-you-up test, and what a funder sees before they agree to meetBefore a funder answers your email they search your name, and increasingly they ask an AI assistant instead. What comes back decides whether the meeting happens. Here is how to run that test on yourself and read the result honestly.
The Google Ad Grant, and the rule that quietly kills most accountsThe Ad Grant gives an eligible non-profit $10,000 a month in free Google Search ads. Most granted accounts go quiet because of a click-through rate rule that runs in the background and deactivates accounts that fall below it.

All the writing

Tell me about your organisation

A few lines is plenty. I will come back with what I would do first, in writing, at no charge. If I do not think I can help, I will say so.

Prefer to talk? Book thirty minutes.