SYNC-Results Nonprofit Consulting Group - Dallas

Transcription

1 - Dallas

2 The Raiser s Edge Guide: Events Customized for Clients by Page 2 of 31

3 Table of Contents Introduction... 4 Navigating the Event Record... 6 Creating & Managing an Event... 7 Creating a New Event Record... 7 Setting Up and Entering the Event Information... 8 Common Tabs Managing Participant Information Participant Types Adding a Registrant Recording a Sponsor or Event Guest About Seating Setting up Sections, Rows, Tables and Seats Review your Seating Plan Seating Participants Configuration Mail Place Cards & Name Tags Financial and Goal Summaries Financial Summary Navigation the Financial Summary Goal Summaries User Options Page 3 of 31

4 Introduction For years, you ve spent more time managing your events in spreadsheets rather than securing new sponsors and inviting guests. The Raiser s Edge provides a total solution to help you eliminate the use of external spreadsheets. Whatever you are looking to track for your event, RE gives you the ability to manage your event instead of the event managing you. Take control today.. Page 4 of 31

5 Events & The Raiser s Edge Event records are the central clearing house for all event-related data. Participants and sponsors can be linked to their constituent record. Registration fees, donations, and sponsorships can be tied to new or existing gift records. Through linking to the appropriate records, you are able to provide more detailed reports on the effectiveness of your events. Page 5 of 31

6 Navigating the Event Record Each event record contains information on a series of tabs located just under the menu bar. These tabs are described below. General: Overall information regarding the event including event type, time, location and seating capacity. Prices: A listing of units available for purchase and their associated benefits. This includes lists of the sponsorship and ticket opportunities. Expenses: Track both anticipated and actual expenses for the event. Participants: Lists all constituents associated with the event and their participation information. This includes both organizations and individuals. Actions: Enter your to-do list with reminders or record previous actions such as meetings, phone calls and invitations. Attribute: Attributes can be customized to further define details about the event. Media: Attach brochures, invitations and other electronic media to the event. Notes: Attach additional information about the event. Page 6 of 31

7 Creating & Managing an Event You ve confirmed you re having an event. Now, let s get into The Raiser s Edge and have the system manage it. There are a series of simple, but important steps to create an event in Raiser s Edge. Remember the golden rule: if it s not in Raiser s Edge, it doesn t exist. Therefore, enter as much information as possible to provide better tracking and future reporting. Creating a New Event Record Open The Raiser s Edge. Click on Records in the left navigation and select New Event. Opening an event Open The Raiser s Edge Click on Records in the left navigation Click Open an Event or type the name of the event in Quick Find. Hint: To search for an event, you may use an asterisk (*) at the start of the event name as a contains search function. Page 7 of 31

8 Setting Up and Entering the Event Information Event Categories When creating a new event in Raiser s Edge, an event category must be chosen. This list is not custom to each organization and is established by Blackbaud. The different categories reveal different aspects to participant records. General Tab On the General tab, you ll begin with entering the Event name and ID. It is suggested to begin the Event Name and ID with the year (i.e. 2009). This allows for easier searching. A B C A. Select the larger group in which the event falls (i.e. Gala, golf tournament, Board meeting, Volunteer meeting, etc.). The group field is used when generating reports, queries and exports; and is an option when viewing the event calendar. B. You can simply record the event location in name only or provide more detailed location information when you click on Location. C. Seating is covered in a separate section in this guide. Page 8 of 31

9 Prices Tab The Prices tab is used to outline the event registration and sponsorship fees for the specific event. You can also add benefits to the prices as desired. These are the only prices available from which to choose on event participant records. Simply, choose the unit (i.e. ticket/sponsor level) from the drop-down menu and enter the associated gift and receipt amounts. Note: See Configuration for more information on how to change this table. If the unit has any associated benefits, click on Benefits and enter the appropriate data. The benefits list can also be edited in Configuration. Page 9 of 31

10 Expenses Tab Plan and track your event s budget on the expenses tab. You can return at any time to enter the vendor and actual expense amounts. Keeping detailed expense records allows you to generate financial and goal summary reports for each event. Note: Vendors are considered participants in the event and can be linked to their participant record. Page 10 of 31

11 Common Tabs The Actions, Attributes, Media and Notes tabs are very similar to the same tabs seen throughout Raiser s Edge. Actions tab Used to manage your to-do list, schedule reminders, and track previous meetings or decisions. A good best practice is to track all of your committee meetings (including any wrap-up or post event meetings) and their minutes in the Actions tab. This tab is highly valuable to track what has been ordered or secured (i.e. flowers for the event) should anyone need to know at any given time. Attributes tab Attributes can be used to further define your events for more detailed tracking and reporting. Page 11 of 31

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13 Media tab Attach electronic files like PDF and jpgs, among other types of electronic files. Notes tab Record other event related information into a text field. Page 13 of 31

14 Managing Participant Information Once you ve completed entering the basic information of the event, save the event and it s now time to tend to our guests, sponsors, volunteers and vendors or what Raiser s Edge calls Participants. Participants can have constituent records in Raiser s Edge, but many may not. If a participant is in Raiser s Edge, it is important to link their event record with their constituent record. Participants can be added individually, or if they were invited based on query, you can globally add them to the event. Participant Types There are three different participant types: 1. Registrants: Any individual or organization that is participating in the event. 2. Guests: Any individual or organization who is attending the event as an invitee or guest of a registrant. 3. Sponsors: Any individual or organization who is sponsoring the event or an individual in the event. Page 14 of 31

15 Adding a Registrant Registrants can be attendees, vendors, coordinators, sponsors, etc. For all attendees, we will create a participant record in the event and track their associated fees, meal preferences, etc. Sponsors and vendors need to be added as participants before linking them elsewhere in the event. All participants in the event may not have a constituent record in Raiser s Edge. We can work on turning them into donors later. However, if a participant IS in Raiser s Edge, it is important to link their participant record with the constituent record. This is done easily through the event. In the participant tab, select New Registrant. Select whether the participant is an individual or an organization. Note: If you click on the New Registrant drop-down menu, you will have the option to create a new registrant, guest or sponsor. Page 15 of 31

16 After selecting the appropriate participant record type, the record will be created accordingly. The first step is to search for the participant in by clicking the binoculars icon next to last name. In the cases when the participant is also in Raiser s Edge, the participant record s contact information will be populated automatically from the constituent record. If the participant is not in RE, complete the contact information. Click Save and Close and the participant record is created and is displayed to be completed. Page 16 of 31

17 Navigating the Participant Record Similar to the main event record, there are multiple tabs in the participant record to accommodate easier navigation. General tab: contains broad information about the participant including invitation, registration and seating information. Travel tab: provides the ability to track and manage all travel related information including confirmation numbers. Registration Fees tab: tracks fees for the event and links to the payments in Raiser s Edge. Participation tab: manages speaker and vendor information Donations tab: tracks donations separate from fees made at/for the event (such as auction purchases) Sponsoring Pledges tab (only including for sporting events): contains a list of those who have made contributions toward a player. Attributes/Notes tab: contains specific characteristics of the participant. One oftenused attribute is meal preference (vegetarian, beef, chicken, etc). General Tab The General tab (pictured above) provides a detailed look at the participant s invitation and registration information, along with their seating details. The bottom on the tab provides links to further information like nametag preferences, awards and any guests associated with that participant. Page 17 of 31

18 The Participation category allows you to designate the participant s participation with the event. This could be volunteer, staff, attendee, etc. Page 18 of 31

19 Travel Tab For those registrants who require the management of travel information, the Travel tab provides an excellent resource to house the travel related information. Hotel and flight information have easily viewable areas to track this important information. Registration fees Tab Managing registration fees in Excel can be a nightmare. Tracking such information in Raiser s Edge is simple. The Registration fees tab houses the information related to fees, payments and associated benefits, but the fees can be linked to gift records. Page 19 of 31

20 Participation Tab The Participation tab houses the information for speakers and vendors for the events. Donations Tab The Donations tab links gift records associated with the event that do not include registration fees. This is often used to track auction purchases and gifts-in-kind to the auction. This provides a better view of the total giving of a participant and the impact they made on the total dollars raised at the event. Page 20 of 31

21 Attributes/Notes Tab The Attributes/Notes tab is a valuable resource to add additional information about the participant. This is most often used to track meal preferences, but can be used to host any sort of information. Remember, the attributes are customizable to your organization s needs. Recording a Sponsor or Event Guest Much of the user interface is the same for recording sponsors and guests as it is for registrants. There are minor adaptations to provide for the tracking of sponsorship information, including linking guests with their sponsor. Guest information links back the sponsorship information. Page 21 of 31

22 Setting up Event Seating About Seating The Raiser s Edge offers a valuable resource to help you plan the seating of your guests. To access this feature, open the event to the general tab and click on Seating. The Event Seating Setup Wizard will appear. Page 22 of 31

23 The setup wizard provides a relatively simply way to customize your seating to best fit your event. There are tiers of seating for easier customization: Sections: Used for tiered seating like those closest to the stage or perhaps sponsor seating. Rows: Used for theatre style or classroom style seating. Tables: The number of tables per section. If the sections have different numbers of tables in each section, you can change this later in the wizard. Seats: The number of seats per table. Again, if different tables have different numbers of seating, you can change this later in the wizard. The Raiser s Edge can accommodate seating up to 60,000 seats. Hint: Are you using the same seating from a previous event? You can select an existing event to populate the seating into the seating wizard. Simply click Copy from another Event. Page 23 of 31

24 Setting up Sections, Rows, Tables and Seats Depending upon your selection for the seating sections, the next few pages in the seating wizard allow you to customize the names and numbers of the various sections, tables, rows and seats. Review your Seating Plan After completing the seating wizard, you can review and begin assigning seating for your event. The seating chart provides the ability to create groups of participants. These groups are not based on any relationship in the database. Thus, it provides flexibility to click and drag participants into groups. Page 24 of 31

25 Seating Participants In the participant section, simply drag the unseated participant to the appropriate table or seat. It s really that simple. Page 25 of 31

26 Configuration Raiser s Edge allows for customization of tables (see as drop-down menus in the event records). To view these tables, click on Configuration in the left navigation and select Tables. Select to show Events. To create new attributes, select Attributes. In the next available row, enter the appropriate information and select the table from which the attributes descriptions are pulled from. Page 26 of 31

27 Mail There are multiple options available in Mail to use for your event. These include printing place cards and name tags. Place Cards & Name Tags In the left navigation, click on Mail and select Events. Create a new place card or name tag section. The two are similar to create. They can be saved and used for different events as needed. Step 1: Click Include and select the appropriate event you are creating the place cards or name tags for. Step 2: You can select the size of the card you are going to print on and the appropriate font and size. Step 3: Click on the Field to Include tab, to select the fields from Raiser s Edge to display in the final product (place card or name tag). Step 4: Use the filters tab to select subset of participants for which you want to print the place cards or name tags. Page 27 of 31

28 Step 5: The attributes tab allows you to further filter your group through selecting participant attributes. Step 6: Finally, use the format tab to make design and sorting modifications before you create your document. Step 7: Once you are comfortable with your selections, click Preview. It may take a couple of time to perfect your document, but when finished be sure to save for future use. Page 28 of 31

29 Financial and Goal Summaries There are two features available from the event record that will help you track the success of your event. They are Financial and Goal Summaries. They both are very similar to pull. Thus, Financial Summary is covered in more depth. Financial Summary The Financial Summary provides a brief picture of the budgetary success of the event. The tool measures the budgeted and actual expenses from the event record and adds the revenue sources (i.e. registration fees and donations). The result is a view of the costs, income and the net of the event. To view a financial summary, select Summaries from the event tool bar and then select Financial Summary from the menu. Page 29 of 31

30 Navigation of the Financial Summary The Financial Summary contains four tabs for criteria to help build the most accurate report. General tab: Define whether you want summary data for a specific event or group of events. You can also select the type of participants to use and the specific income sources. Filters tab: provides the ability to consolidate the participants to count. Attributes tab: Similar as throughout Raiser s Edge, the attributes tab allows you to include or exclude previously defined attributes in the participant record. Format tab: Controls how amounts are shown in the results. Goal Summaries The Goal Summary feature allows you to track revenue goals based on the solicitors registered in the event. Page 30 of 31

31 User Options Each user in Raiser s Edge is able to customize portions of their experience in Events. You can access User Options anywhere in Raiser s Edge. In the menu bar, click on Tools and select User Options. Event options are available in the Records tab. The Raiser s Edge is a registered trademark of Blackbaud, Inc. This document is the property of and its clients. All rights reserved. Page 31 of 31