Blackbaud Raiser's Edge NXT

Pros

I love the user interface and the ability to "drag and drop" objects within constituent records to customize how I want to see information. The dashboard design is lovely and, after a bit of a learning curve, can be used to display some really helpful information for fundraisers.

Cons

This is not yet a completed product and shouldn't be used without the RE 7 database view. RE NXT has all the basic functionality needed for fundraisers to use exclusively, but not database admin staff. A lot of gift processing functionality, and even reporting fields, have not been moved over from RE 7. For any detailed reporting using OR or NOT, custom attributes, or gift amounts requires one to go back into database view to use queries/exports/canned reports.

Pros

What I like most about the software is the ease of use.

Cons

What I like least about the software is that it can be slow to update when I enter changes or gifts.

Pros

A lot of functionality for large nonprofits, yet with little to no customer support.

Cons

Very aggressive sales endeavors and dare I say devious re-subscription processes. They tried to re-subscribe us at a very high price quoting a timeline when we could decide to not re-subscribe. We tried to unsubscribe, but they said we were bound by a contract. We had been using RE for more than a decade, with no consideration. They insisted we missed the timeline to unsubscribe and demanded a very expensive fee for the following period. Ultimately, we reported them to the Better Business Bureau and they could not produce a signed contract from our agency, or even a template from them. We had a back-and-forth with RE via the BBB, at which time they stopped contacting us realizing they had no basis for their demands.

Pros

RE NXT is a quick, web based way to look up the basics of a constituent.

Cons

In addition to making the details of a gift easier to access quickly, I would like to see more customization of the displays in NXT. For example - what each user needs to see in the search results or top display bar varies by position and function.

Pros

ease of use on the road. organized into easy to see tiles. ability to upload things by dragging. ability to get lists easily

Cons

inability to create most custom lists. would like lists to be provided by fund. would like all contact information to be able to be shown for donors in one line with name, ID, phone, email and exclusions. need to make very complex queries to accomplish and extract data from the database view. not user friendly for regular office employee. expensive program that our office does not even know how to fully use. would like more individualized training and support to learn all the aspects of what we pay for. however we have a database manager that does this but acts as a gatekeeper.

Pros

Being able to document donations and send out tax forms at the end of the year

Cons

Reports were very hard for me to figure out how to use.

Pros

Useful for tracking donors for fundraising purposes and managing gifts. Can integrate with enrollment system to track alumni and parents of alumni.

Cons

Clunky and not intuitive to use. Design is outdated.

Pros

The ease of use of the webview for frontline fundraisers is one of the best things for our team.

Cons

Response to customer service requests can be spotty, at best.

Alternatives Considered

Pros

Ease of access is great, very user friendly and visually appealing/easy to use

Cons

Some reporting and query functions are difficult to navigate

Pros

I like how it displayed and gave a good overview of donations. Very easy to navigate and access that information.

Cons

Unless you enter a name specifically as it is entered, it is hard to find. In fact, often it took me much longer to find a client then it should have.

Pros

It's an easy to use product that is definitely easy on the eyes. It provides good data.

Cons

It could be that it's user error for our database services, but the outputs are not as advanced as I thought they would be for a product that's supposed to be what "everyone" uses. Spouses need to be linked - you should have that option in Actions as well to "update" to the partner as well if you enter in a contact report.I want to get training through Blackbaud University but you have to pay to learn anything. BOO. :(

Pros

We have been using some version of Raiser's Edge for more than 20 years. The NXT version is far superior to earlier versions. It does what we need from an Advancement Fund Raising standpoint. It also integrates with our other Blackbaud products.

Cons

Customer support is no longer what it once was.

Pros

Raiser's Edge NXT is much more intuitive and user-friendly than its predecessors. It has many neat features built it such as the map/location function and some automatic reporting. Its mobile friendly meaning its easy to review notes or update on-the-go and the email tools built in are very useful, even if not the most robust email system.

Cons

With NXT, it seems like Blackbaud released things before they were ready. Many of the necessary features can't be done though the NXT online view and still require the database view, which is the same as RE 7. They are adding new features all the time and perfecting the ones they already have, but many times it seems like they should have perfected it before it was released. Often when they debut a new feature, I'm left with more unanswered questions. I do belive NXT view will get better over time, and it is necessary to switch over as soon RE 7 will not be available, but NXT is expensive and does often feel like it is still in development.

Pros

I use Raiser's Edge as our donor database and the data entry, reporting features are really updated. However, when they came out with NXT, it was a game changer. NXT is amazing! It has a very attractive interface and super user friendly. As soon as you search for a record, consecutive years and all information on the donor is clear to see and it lets you know which donors you should be reaching out to. You could assign donors to others to initiate contact. You could easily access information on your mobile device. It takes the Raiser's Edge data entry interface and completely gives it a makeover. You are easily able to review giving history and all donor information on one page and very clearly.

Cons

The only thing I don't like about NXT is that the consecutive years aren't always the same as in the donor records in the database version.

Pros

The interface is a lot friendlier to the average user than the database view, making it easier to use for our employees that don't like working in databases as much. It also introduced certain features that were missing from the main database, which added some new tools to manage data and keep our information clean. The analytics is my favorite addition; while some dashboard tools exist in Raiser's Edge, in NXT they are fully thought out and allow for excellent reporting and visual depictions of our progress.

Cons

It's still an in-development product, so while this could be great for some organizations it's not at the point where it's great for all organizations. Despite the fact that it's user-friendly and many of our staff members prefer to use it, the lack of certain features from the main database make it hard for them to convert completely, and they feel that switching between the two views of the same system is a hassle. While it's understandable that the extra add-ons would take a back seat to the development of the main features, with our membership module missing it does make it hard for our organization to shift most of our staff over to it from the main database view. There are also some things that don't synchronize properly between the two systems yet, which sometimes makes database maintenance feel like we're checking in two different databases for information.

Pros

Blackbaud's Raisers Edge is great software for donations management, including special events and memberships. It's very easy to use, and very easy to get information from, whether through any of the many canned reports, or through queries and exports. Support is extra, but well worth the cost, at least in the initial years after set-up.

Cons

The cost - upwards for just the donations management - is considerable. And things like the Special Events module and Membership and Tributes and Memorials modules are not included in the base package. Like most other software, a lot of thought needs to happen when setting Raisers Edge up. But seriously for every con that I could list, the customer support that comes extra with the annual maintenance, if purchases, offsets the con with quick answers and fixes, so that even the most complicated thing in RE is easily addressed with a quick phone call to support.

Pros

Queries are what we use to create lists of constituents with particular behaviors or similarities that we can use for creating mailings, invitations or actions. An amazing tool with endless possibilities.
Raisers Edge is a beast of a program. It can do just about anything you could want for a donor database and Blackbaud offers several supplemental solutions that seamlessly integrate.
Donor stewardship, from first contact, to donation, to acknowledgement letter, is a process that is handled particularly well with Raisers Edge

Cons

The program is quite complicated and if data is not entered correctly than the program just won't work well. "bad in, bad out'. But that is not unique to this program.
That some of the features that I like to use like global changes for adding appeals is pretty buried and the way of finding it convoluted.
Attributes could be more flexible: like I would prefer to have all events under one table (which it can do now) but then there is no step further where I can then say whether they RSVP and then also whether they attended and their name for easy export for nametags.

Pros

The ease of use which makes training co-workers much quicker and more easily understandable. The various modules make database management more effective (specifically EVENTS).

Cons

My biggest complaint with Blackbaud is customer service. Prior to the new procedures, I was able to call and speak to a human being and explain my issue. Currently, I can only get a CSR via CHAT, and that is only if someone is available at that time. Even during times where someone is supposed to be available, I frequently receive a message to try again later. When I CAN get a chat session, I find the CSRs are not as knowledgeable as they should be. I also find the CSRs have a hard time comprehending exactly what I'm asking and usually give up and find another way to get the information. In addition, while the standard reports typically give me the information I need, there are some that are sorely lacking and we are presently not in a position to create new ones (time and resources limitations) so we will piece together numerous reports.

Pros

The most impactful web view pieces are those that the fundraisers use most often: viewing their portfolio and opportunities, actions that need follow up, and reports that have been built to help look at work completed. Lists are helpful to them for travel planning and calling. The Reports that are already built are great for a starting point.

Cons

Many of us use the database side (RE 7) more than the web view side still because there are so many areas that are not yet complete in web view. Roll out has been fast, though, so I'm excited to see what continues to grow. The areas we still use the most in the database side are query and export, adding constituents, adding gifts, and all work within funds. Those pieces still have some work needed on the web side to get to the sophistication we're accustomed to in database view.

Pros

Constituent records
Outlook plugin (quickly add emails to a constituent record)
JustGiving integration is an exciting prospect
Lists
Reporting features - including the option to send out an automatically generated custom report to yourself or a colleague, for example every month or week
Webinars and video demos of new features

Cons

Doesn't have all the functions of Raisers Edge 7 so we still needed to use RE7 in parallel
New features take a long time to arrive
Terminology doesn't always match Raider's Edge (for example "canvassers" in RE7 are fundraisers in NXT, "Attributes" vs. "Custom tags")
Emails sent out via NXT should be automatically added to constituent's record
Difficult setting up new users on the system

Pros

RENXT is a wonderful leap forward for those that are currently using RE7. First off, it is online, so you can login anywhere and on any device, which for me makes it far more useful to fundraisers. Ultimately, I am a big fan and I think it makes your fundraisers spend more time reaching out to key donors, rather than working on back end tracking and database work. Also, what I appreciate the most is that I do not have to hire people who have RE experience anymore, because it is so easy for them to immediately start working out of NXT. It opens up the candidate pool!

Cons

This is a general blackbaud critique, but their customer service is not always the best. They can be difficult to get in touch with and you sometimes have to wait for a while to get a question answered or problem fixed. I will say, we have not had any issues with NXT in particular, where we needed to call them though.

Pros

My biggest likes for the Raiser's Edge are the various modules: Events, Membership and Online Express. I can organize the information and pull it back out in queries so easily. The canned reporting is not bad either. They pretty much have every kind of basic report you could need. You can pull some pretty decent reports that track actions, solicitors, giving and profiles. The key is making sure your data is clean and organized.

Speaking of which, Raiser's Edge has done a great job of improving it's data clean up functions. They have improved duplicate removals. They have added e-mail and phone clean ups. And they are always on top of making sure their clients are heard (even if it takes them a little while to deliver).

Cons

The reports have aged out at this point in the desktop version (non-cloud). Development departments are looking for different ways to report their money and we are now depending on Crystal Reports to constantly fill that void. I wished the reports were more malleable and you could really build out the layouts to accommodate what staff wants to see. The biggest thing I hear in terms of complaints from my staff are the number of clicks to get a process done, whether entering an event on a record to recording a membership. Sure we can set up default settings for many of the procedures, but there is still that need sometimes to have to go through and enter manually.

Pros

I enjoyed the upgrades from the old school dinasaur program that was available until NXT. The features were comparable to other software on the market.

Cons

THE PRICE!! They were very proud of their product and ultimately did not try to keep our business. They offered their product to us for $30,000 a year for a database with less than 10,000 constituents. I believe they have since lowered their price, but their security breach has had a huge impact on many of our fellow nonprofits. Their customer service is some of the worst I have ever endured and you will have 5+ people contact about the same issue. You're lucky if you get a respose, so I mostly didn't even ask a question.

Pros

Nothing comes to mind. I inherited this software when I began working here.

Cons

The interface was unfriendly, the search engine awkward, and getting reports was very difficult.

Pros

It's easy to learn and intuitive, and has decent reporting functionality

Cons

Unfortunately it doesn't do the trick for larger nonprofits- it's limited in it's functioning capabilities, and the API's aren't up to industry standard.

Pros

Although I do not use NXT often due to my job requirements, I find much easier to use rather than the original Raiser's Edge platform. It is more modern looking and has easy to use WYSIWYG is simple and comprehensive. After not using the site for a while, I am able to pick up without much issue.

Cons

you cannot do all functionalities on NXT that you can do on Raiser's Edge. it can be somewhat limiting.

Pros

Has a lot of features and bells and whistles.

Cons

Customer service with Blackbaud is extremely frustrating.

Pros

I have been using Raiser's Edge with a variety of non-profits since 2007. It has consistently been a vital tool in tracking donor and constituent relationships.

Cons

Building and pulling reports from RE can be challenging. There should be more advancement in making it more intuitive to do so.

Pros

Blackbaud Raiser's Edge NXT is an efficient and effective way to manage a donor database. It's user friendly for front line fundraisers, and the reports are helpful in retaining current donors and moving new donors through the moves management process.

Cons

While it is user friendly and has some really good aspects, there are still some restrictions on data viewing that could be improved. But Blackbaud is working on these to improve the overall experience.

Pros

I use both database view and NXT. I like the powerful queries and reports.

Cons

Sometimes a query can be difficult to run based on what has been entered in the database.

Pros

Visuals is based on permission and search button on the top of the browser is useful. Tiles are collapsible and dashboard is easy to view. Comparing to the database view, opening a new browser tab is useful when doing some comparisons between screens. Data Health (Deceased/Email/Duplicate Finder) is a great feature in web view. We use it all the time. The availability of ResearchPoint on dashboard is great feature for prospect management team.

Cons

RE NXT is a web view that is not as fully integrated as the database view. List, import and reporting are not adequate as the database view. Although SKI API is available, not all of the data point in database is available.

Pros

It's good Blackbaud realized that it needed to build in the classic version ("database view") of the old Raisers Edge into its NXT cloud version of the product. The old RE remains one of the best donor-, events-, membership-management software packages around. I've been using since 1997, and Raisers Edge integrates perfectly with Financial Edge.

Cons

As I mentioned, the cloud version of the software ("web view," or what you land on as soon as you click into Blackbaud.com and sign on) is weak. Adding to the frustration is that it looks completely different from the old version of the software. The worst thing about the cloud version is that a lot of the functionality in the old version has yet to show up in the web version, although Blackbaud keeps promising that future updates will contain familiar functions. In the middle of all this frustration is that Blackbaud's customer service, once the gold standard for what any customer service should be when paying this much for a product, has changed dramatically to customer service sometimes helping directly as they always did in the past, to customer service sending you Knowledgebase links for you, the customer, to figure out things yourself.

Pros

The Raiser's Edge is a very powerful database that can provide great insight into your organization's fundraising. It has the capability to track and report on anything you would ever need to look at for fundraising. The template reports are customizable, which is very helpful. My favorite feature is the query and export combo - I can pull out any piece of information I need to analyze and Raiser's Edge does a good job of getting rid of duplicate information for me. The dashboard feature is also good - you can create multiple dashboards to compare fiscal years, appeals, funds, recent gifts list, summaries, etc. You can also share your dashboard with other users so that everyone can be looking at the same thing.

Cons

Building custom reports from scratch (not using a template) can be challenging to create through Crystal Reports. However, you can usually find a template that you can customize to create a similar report, if not the exact report you want to write.

Duplicate records can also be challenging in Raiser's Edge. When Constituents are uploaded to the database from a list or entered manually, Raiser's Edge will not identify duplicates if the name or address is not an exact match. This can be frustrating - for example, it won't recognize a duplicate address if the only difference is between "Street" and "St." in the database. Cleaning up the duplicates is even more challenging. I have needed to export lists of constituents, identify duplicates in Excel, and then go back into Raiser's Edge to merge and delete the duplicate constituent records.

Pros

Raiser's Edge 7 gives you the tools (and/or gives you optional add-on tools) to manage your donor relationships and data in just about any way you can think of. It's a great all-purpose fundraising tool for non-profit organizations. Raiser's Edge NXT (RE NXT) is the next generation, and we are most likely moving to that within the next year. The awesome things about RE NXT are 1. User access to your donor data from anywhere on any device, 2. Unintimidating ease of use for non-techie and techie alike, 3. Open API which means lots of more fantastic compatible tools are being built by Blackbaud partners, 4. Unlimited users - which means now our Board members and many other stakeholders will be able to login and get their reports on the dashboard instead of waiting for emailed or, even worse, hard-copy reports to be run and delivered to them by our staff.

Cons

My experience with the Customer Support has been less than stellar. Sometimes it seems like the Customer Support's go-to answer is, "No" or "No, you can't do that." Unless the answer is, "Well, if you buy this other tool we have, then you can do that." But since we have no plans to move off of Blackbaud products, thank heavens they have an amazing Blackbaud Community network where you can ask any question and get tons of advice from folks just like you working in this software daily. Blackbaud Community is now the first place I go when I need support. Many times the question I have has already been asked and answered in the past, and so just searching through the discussions will get me my answer or point me in the right direction, instead of wasting time trying to re-invent the wheel. My fairly high rating in this review on Customer Support is mostly because of Blackbaud Community and our fairly newly assigned account manager.

Pros

Batch entry. That's it. If ALL you do are massive fundraisers where you bring in a thousand donations of 10 bucks apiece in one day, then RE has the batch entry system for you.

Cons

Blackbaud's contracts all have clauses that prevent users from making derogatory statements or posting negative reviews. The contract allows them to lock you out, kick you off, charge for the remainder of the contract, blah blah blah. And they enforce it. Ask yourself why a decent software would need something like that? This is NOT a relational database, and if you understand anything about software file structure, then that explains why RE is so flawed: If someone hits all of those categories, they will appear three times. Ask for their phone or email and they are now listed six times. Process to get rid of dupe listings of the same name loses all of the field access with the exception of addresses - because it's not relational that's the only way they can do it. Raisers Edge NXT has been designed to hide the 'background' so you have less access to work-arounds, but in order to do that they have had to 'assume' what fields are really important to us to be able to export from a specific query. RE is designed to archive a ton of information, it is simply not designed to use it or get it out. Support is dismal, and most support staff have never been users; not customizable; clunky, slow; embedded Word is out-of-date and difficult to update; proprietary e-mail communication tool extremely limited; nothing is intuitive; research analytics and events modules are extremely weak. A waste of money.

Pros

Records in Raiser's Edge are very stiff - as in very difficult to customize. This can be good if you are starting out in it, as you can set a standard of how to keep data, and it doesn't give employees the opportunity to create messy records. Adding information is simple and easy.

Cons

Many features of Raiser's edge can only be accessed in the Data base view, which is way less user friendly, and requires you to open a whole different software. For example, to you want to add a new kind of relationship? Need to go to Database view. Additionally, Records are so not customizable, that if you are moving data from a different system, you're data could easily look like a huge mess if you don't fit them exactly into Raiser's Edges categories.

Pros

Our the years we have used Raiser's Edge it has continued to grow and evolve with broader and impactful criteria that aid in fundraising. NXT is user- friendly much more so than the original Raiser's Edge.

Cons

It would be helpful if there were video tutorials. The knowledgebase is not user-friendly. It is unable to assist in finding quick and clear answers in creating a list specific to our constituency. Again, available video tutorials would be a great addition to the product.

Pros

This is a powerful CRM service/software. We've expanded our utilization over the years, but I still know there are areas we don't even scratch the surface of when it comes to compiling information on donors and potential donors. A few years ago we made the leap to RE:NXT, placing our data in the cloud -- it's wonderful to be able to access data from wherever I am, whether I need a phone number or address, or some data on donation history.

I've been a Raiser's Edge user for 20+ years, and I have to say I can't imagine keeping track of our donors without it. From historical data to personal notations, you can keep so much info here (even uploading photos, documents, etc.).

With RE:NXT we have integration between the CRM and our web site donation forms. They're easy to build and drop in to the coding for the site.

Cons

We've felt that there are a couple of things in the EVENTS module that we wish worked better for us/our organization, but that's a small hiccup when it comes to the functionality and quality of BB fundraising.

Pros

I do feel that once you get comfortable with RE, it's pretty user friendly.

Cons

Sometimes there are limitations to what you can do (for example, creating your giving page), but even with those limitations, the end products looks pretty good.

Pros

What I love about RE NXT is that it helps to visualize graphs, such as donor patterns and key financial data, automatically. You no longer have to have endless queries and exports and dashboards to access the data you want the most. This helps facilitate staff meeting discussions, and also keeps all team members informed on the fly. Secondly, the prospect profiles for managers. Gone are the days of exporting travel profiles in plain text. Now a PM can login from the road to see all the details they need in a useful manner -- and what's even better? They can change how the data is displayed so that it is personalized to them. It is clean, well constructed, and yet also flexible enough to be able to dig deeper with a couple of clicks. And if they need to find a new person to visit in their area, the map tools are perfect. Highly recommended for offices with lots of traveling teammates.

Cons

As with both versions of RE, you only get out what you put into it. You need to make sure you have the right policies and procedures in place, for example, to make sure that certain fields in actions are required. You'll also need to work with your team to make sure they understand the updated language from the database view to the NXT view. For example, proposals and opportunities are the same thing. This is a bit of a challenge in offices where the NXT vs. database team may not interact that much and will be speaking slightly different languages about this software. It is not a deal-breaker, just a trainable moment.

Pros

Blackbaud Fundraising includes Raiser's Edge, Luminate Online, crowdfunding features. The Fundraising tools integrate very well and it's user friendly and intuitive. We are able to create an attractive and easy to use donation form for our website. It allows you to easily track donor giving, pledges, create donation pledges and integrate with Raiser's Edge and other tools well. NXT is a new feature we purchased which is expensive however it's an attractive interface to view and track donor pledge level and upgrades.

Cons

Blackbaud products tend to be very pricey and offer a ton of features however you only use about half of them on regular basis. It could be quite a challenge to create crowdfunding pages., definitely multiple steps. Sometimes the dashboard giving and queries show different numbers so there's some inconsistency. Their NXT new tool is amazing however it's pricey. It's great for major giving officer.

Pros

I believe Raiser's Edge allows you to track a lot of informaiton in its constituent-relationship database and I like that it has products which it speaks to easily, i.e. a financial product (Financial Edge) and an Internet option (NetCommunity.) I enjoy having the subscription that we have which allows us access to unlimited online and phone questions/issues and also unlimited online training. Very pricey, but worth it, because of the complexity of the system. Blackbaud makes a habit of buying out a lot of their competitors which makes them "the only game in town" in some aspects, but also allows them to take the best of their competitors products and incorporate them into Raiser's Edge, etc. I am most excited about their new product launching July 1, 2015 called RE NXT. This is a cloud based application which will be a great asset to any non-profit focused on major and principal gifts. The only caveat at this point is that non-profit has to have its RE environment hosted by Blackbaud in order to purchase this product.

Cons

The customer service leaves a lot to be desired. They often do not get back to us when we have issues with RE; they seem to focus most of their customer service toward "hosted" clients (and we are not hosted at the present time); we still have cases open with them and unresolved since November 2014 (and this is now April 2015); they do not exude the "customer is always right" attitude and they are a very expensive product. Also be careful with their pricing, different customers pay different costs for the same service/products. There also seems to be a lot of hidden costs when purchasing new products or modules from Blackbaud for the RE so make sure that you delve into that with your customer representative if you are looking to purchase anything from them.

Pros

The Raiser's Edge is consistent and reliable as a CRM. Because it is so widely used, there are tons of good resources online if you have any questions, and you are likely to be able to easily hire staff who have experience with it. You are able to set up your data structure with a good amount of customization. The the query tool is easy to use as long as you understand how you've set up your fields. You don't need to be able to code to administer the database, which I appreciated. Permissions are fairly straightforward.

Cons

As part of the Blackbaud suite of products, The Raiser's Edge is not easy to integrate with other products. If you need easy integration with other software solutions, you'll either have to buy other Blackbaud products, which are expensive and sometimes not the best in their class, or do a lot of data transfers between the systems. For example, when I was administering a Raiser's Edge database, I had to regularly export lists for use with Constant Contact, and import transactions for our online giving page, because we didn't use Blackbaud solutions for email marketing or online giving. It wasn't very difficult to do, but it did slow us down with tasks that should be automated.

Pros

Raiser's Edge is the best donor database I've seen. It has comprehensive fields and capability to track projects, funds, and appeals. When we used RE, we had about 250 different appeals categorized and about 50 different funds. When running reports or queries, you could slice and dice the data pretty much any way you wanted. Query functions were huge for me. You can dig down into anything you want - all donations by xyz appeal during 10-11 timeframe and paid by check at a certain event? That's an option, for example, with the click and choose query.
Huge added bonus if you use RE in conjunction with Financial Edge, Blackbaud's accounting system, as the two systems actually integrate (not export and import but a true integration).

Cons

The biggest obstacle we faced with RE was the pricing. Blackbaud prices you into tiers based on number of constituents, so if you keep old donor records "just in case", you end up accumulating all these records and data that you are paying for annually. If you can afford it, it's great. They are definitely shooting for the quality model not the low-cost model.

Pros

The Raiser's Edge database was very outdated however with the addition of NXT it's now very visually appealing and user-friendly. They took the old database look and revamped it to include charts, recommendations for donor cultivation and alerts daily referencing which donors to reach out to. It's very mobile friendly and great for major giving officers so they could make notes and assign tasks to their team while on the road. You could easily look up donor records and it's all accessible from Blackbaud.com so you don't need to download an app. It's good to have when on meetings and if you have to be an exhibitor for your Foundation and quickly look up donor records.

Cons

NXT shows consecutive donor years at the top of each profile however the years are not always accurate with the years in Raiser's database. Sometimes the years are way off. Also, they should make it easier to view outstanding pledges in NXT. NXT is a bit pricey however worth the cost and your return on investment is improved as it notifies you when you have major giving prospects to reach out to.

Pros

There is so much you can do with Raiser's Edge, it's a robust and powerful tool. It works "out of the box" without need for programming or customization per se (other than settings and configuration etc.) so you don't need to be a coder to set up and use. I particularly love queries to pull together lists of donors who meet certain criteria, which can then be used for mailing lists, reports, exports, etc. The acknowledgement letters are incredibly valuable, allowing variable data and personalized language, e.g. when a gift is designated to a particular program we pull in a paragraph about that program without our gift entry staff having to do any manual or extra work.

Cons

Can be a bit clunky, and not always intuitive (NXT web view is a huge improvement in those areas). The reports aren't pretty (again NXT is astronomically better there) and sometimes there isn't a report that will work for our needs so I have to set up with queries and exports. There is almost always a way to do what I need to do, but I sometimes have to go through some complicated digital acrobatics to get there.

Pros

I've been using Raiser's Edge for 15 years. My current office purchased the NXT web view in 2015. This product helps our office achieve our fundraising goals in many ways. I like that when we purchased the NXT web view we still kept the database view. Now we have the best of both worlds. Most of our office now works exclusively in the web view and with it, they can now get immediate information by themselves that assists them in their work. The new features of the web view have greatly enhanced how we do business.

Cons

I really like this product and I have a hard time coming up with anything negative to say about it.

Pros

The history of the donors is what is most useful. Raiser's Edge has been around for so long and we have such a long history with it that the historical data is priceless.

Cons

Because we have such a long history and so much historical data with RE, we can not really shop around for new products without the risk of losing data or enduring a massive implementation process.

Pros

What I like most about this product is that as a fundraiser, I have many tools that keep me organized and remind me to thank our donors.

Cons

My co-worker who uses this software for only adding donations has a very difficult time with it. She says it takes way too many steps to add donations. It is also frustrating that you have to create a new record for someone who has been memorialized by a gift. It seems odd to add someone into your record base that is deceased and there is a cap on the number of constituents you can have in the database without having to pay more. The reporting pages are confusing and difficult to understand how to set up a goal and see our progress toward it. There are many things like this that we come across that are frustrating to us.

Cons

The pros of their software are outweighed by there incompetent and dishonest staff. This is true all the way from the sales level, customer service, billing and deceitful renewal tactics. This company used to be the best in the business but got too big and stopped caring about their customer and focuses only on their bottom line. Once you commit to a contract it's a miserable process after that. Guarantee.