Cross-posted with permission from Promet Source
If you're looking to create great NGO and association sites using Drupal, below are six ways your NGO can increase membership and donations.
1) Develop a Community!
Drupal has a lot of exciting ways (including the Organic Groups module) for you to give members a social hub. Engage users with live social walls, user profiles, communication tools, user search functionality, event calendars, and more...Drupal lets you create your own social media site (if you will). A good Drupal development firm will be able to customize a user portal that fits with your mission.
Keep your member base engaged on your site so you can continually expose them to your mission, messaging and brand. If they convene elsewhere (e.g. Facebook) to socialize, you’re missing valuable promotion time.
2) Integrate with your CRM or AMS!
Member retention starts with tracking your members’ trends and activities. Whether it’s Blackbaud, iMIS, CiviCRM, SugarCRM, Salesforce, Oracle or something else, make sure it’s integrated with your site. Integration lets you say “Goodbye” to manually finding and entering contact data. When you are selecting your CRM or AMS, make sure it is easily integrated with your site. Ask about the API and ask your web development team if they have experience integrating with your CRM/ AMS.
Why integrate?
- Track your leads
- Track and manage your donation campaigns
- Gain insight into your members’ behavior
- Improve member communication and retention
- Analyze your donation flow
Pro Tip: Set up recurring payments/donations by integrating with Recurly. You'll save a lot of time and money!
3) Responsive Sites!
If you want to reach your member base everywhere, make sure your site is responsive. That is, your site can adjust between desktop, tablet and mobile.
According to a study by Pew Research, 55% of cell phone users say they use their mobile devices to browse the internet, exchange emails, or download apps. Make sure you are able to reach your member base 24/7, on any device. Non-responsive sites contribute to high bounce rates - if your leads and members leave, you risk missing member retention, donations and promotion opportunities.