Contacts Management Software for Nonprofits
A common need among nonprofits is to maintain various lists of contacts. Generally these are referred to as mailing lists and there are often several, separate mailing lists in any nonprofit.
Contact management software allows the contact information to be centralized. Each contact may be tagged with “logical list membership”. So any contact may be a member of one or more logical lists.
Mass mailings can typically be done, using contacts belonging to specific selected logical lists.
Widely Used Software
Microsoft Outlook has an integrated contact management capability. Microsoft also offers two add ons to Outlook:
http://www.microsoft.com/office/outlook/contactmanager/prodinfo/default.mspx
http://www.microsoft.com/smallbusiness/products/customer-relationship-management/detail.mspx
You can learn about both of these here:
http://www.microsoft.com/office/outlook/contactmanager/prodinfo/comparison.mspx
ACT! Is a widely used, general contact management software
You can download a free trial.
Goldmine is widely used, general contact management software
http://www.frontrange.com/ProductsSolutions/subcategory.aspx?id=80&ccid=15
It also offers a downloadable free trial.
Boutique Software
I recently learned about another software product: Simply Contacts Database
http://www.biztechsoftware.com
There is a free trial download available here:
http://www.biztechsoftware.com.au/other/download.asp
You need only download the basic configuration which has a $139/user price tag
if licensed.
They have several options. One provides a flexible report writer which
might be useful. It would cost an additional $399 one time plus $99 per
user.
One minor add-on costs $19 per user and allows multiple contact lists.
This allows you to associate each entry with one or more list names, so you can
select all contacts who are members of a specific list. Something you
clearly need!
So the ultimate cost would be $158 per typical user and $556 for one
"power user" having report writing capabilities.
Key capabilities:
Record unlimited notes on contact with individuals in the database
Ability to scan MS Outlook and automatically add all incoming and outgoing
email associated with the email address for each individual in the database.
Mail merge for printed, email and fax mass mailings with automatic note placed
in the record for the individual contacted.
Ability to add an unlimited number of customized data fields.
Ability to eliminate data fields not needed.
Ability to load contacts from Outlook and export contacts in
the database to Outlook.
Ability to load contacts from text files or Excel.
Probably means you can import contacts from any other software that can export
the data to a text file or excel spreadsheet.
One final note is that the data is stored in an access database. That means you could use Access' report writer to do customized reports and other capabilities not included in the base product. The program itself is compiled so you could not customize it. But you could add an add-on form, built in Access' forms language that could do specialized things for you. Then you would use the original software or the add-on form - both accessing the same data. I did this for another client in a similar situation and it is working out pretty well.
I should note that the vendor has been extremely responsive to questions I have raised and one bug I found.