This sucks. You weren’t planning for a big CRM switch in 2021, time wise or budget wise. But, c’mon now, you KNOW you’ve been talking about leaving Luminate CRM for years now. The time has arrived and we want to help you make lemonade out of these lemons.

Blackbaud recently announced that Luminate CRM would no longer be supported in 2022. That doesn’t feel like a ton of time to make a CRM switch, but for small- or medium-sized organizations, we are confident that this is very doable in this time frame.

First off, this transition might actually be easier than you expect. For many organizations, transitioning from Luminate CRM to Salesforce Nonprofit Success Pack (NPSP) would be a viable and likely option. There are many similarities to how NPSP operates and it could actually be a generally easy transition for your data and your team.

For smaller organizations, this could be a good opportunity to move to a completely new CRM and other digital systems that might better fit your needs. Especially, because we know most small nonprofits aren’t getting the most out of Luminate CRM anyway.

Now you might be wondering with Luminate CRM going away, will Luminate Online still be around? The short answer is yes, at least for now, it will still be around. However, that does not mean it is necessarily the best option for your organization.

If you are using Luminate Online for online fundraising, peer-to-peer, and/or email marketing (which most Luminate CRM clients probably are), you’re going to need to consider your plans with those tools as well. You will have a very different range of compatible systems and modules available to you regardless of what CRM you transition to. And while switching from Luminate Online isn’t as urgent, it is something to keep in mind as you are making the decision which CRM you want to move to. The best part is that those options are generally big improvements over the equivalent Luminate Online tools.

The good news is CRM and online fundraising platform conversions are waaaay easier now, pretty much across the board, than they were 10 years ago or whenever your organization most likely transitioned to Luminate CRM in the first place. This is even easier if your staff is small and motivated to end up with better systems and processes than Luminate CRM provided.

The bottom line is we want to acknowledge that yes, this is urgent and needs to be dealt with ASAP. But we also want you to know it is totally doable without needing to be hasty or panicked. With some willingness to be flexible and endure some likely pain in the short term, you’re going to end up far better off.

Our team at Tackle is extremely well-suited to help you navigate this change. We have helped many clients transition away from Luminate CRM and are confident we can help you smoothly make this transition to a new CRM.

So don’t let this Luminate CRM news sour your day. Let’s work together and get you set up for success with a new CRM that actually fits your needs and budget. Reach out today and let’s get started!