Get Started with Online Giving for Blackbaud CRM

Blackbaud Donation Forms available through Online Giving help you increase gift size, eliminate transaction fees, and expand your donor base.

Note: If you are the organization admin, follow these steps to get started using Blackbaud Donation Forms with Blackbaud CRM !

Prerequisites

To use Blackbaud Donation Forms, your organization must:

Configure settings

From Settings in Online Giving, manage preferences for your donation forms and connection to Blackbaud CRM.

CRM connection preferences

Under CRM connection, select Preferences and configure the following:

  • Gift connection — When you receive gifts through Blackbaud Donation Forms, they appear in enhanced revenue batches in Blackbaud CRM. Choose which batch template to use. For more information, see Gift connection.

  • Cards and wallets — Choose how payments received through Blackbaud Donation Forms appear in Blackbaud CRM. For more information, see Cards and wallets.

  • Revenue note type — Comments from donors appear as revenue notes on payments in Blackbaud CRM. Choose which note type to assign.

    Tip: To manage revenue note types in Blackbaud CRM, from Administration, select Code Tables, then filter by the documentation category.

  • Reason codes — Changes to recurring gift statuses are tracked as revenue reason codes in Blackbaud CRM. Choose which reason codes map to recurring gift statuses in Online Giving.

    Tip: To manage reason codes in Blackbaud CRM, from Revenue, select Reason codes, then select the Revenue tab. For more information, see Reason Codes in Blackbaud CRM Help.

Donation form settings

To track end-user behaviors on forms, under Donation form settings, select Google Analytics, then enter the alphanumeric ID from your Google Analytics account. For more information, see Google Analytics.

Contributions settings

To create split gifts when donors cover transaction fees through forms, under Contributions, select Donor cover designation and choose a designation for the fees. Otherwise, fees apply to the gift designation.

For more information, see Donor Cover Designation.

Note: New designations you add in Blackbaud CRM may take up to 15 minutes to appear.

Create donation forms

Optimized Donation Forms

Optimized Donation Forms provide an engaging and streamlined donor experience with continuously refined data and branding cards. Branding cards help build trust with donors using images you choose that represent your organization.

To learn how to create, test, and publish Optimized Donation Forms, see Optimized Donation Forms.

Standard Donation Forms

Standard Donation Forms are customizable forms you create to help raise money for your organization.

To learn how to create, test, and publish Standard Donation Forms, see Standard Donation Forms.

Manage constituents

When donors enter their information through a form, Blackbaud CRM attempts to match the donor with existing constituent records.

  • If a match is found, Blackbaud CRM adds the gift to the existing constituent record and updates contact info as necessary

  • If no match is found, Blackbaud CRM creates a new constituent record and adds the gift

You manage constituent records in Blackbaud CRM.

Note: Blackbaud CRM performs several steps to identify matches. For more information, see Constituent Matching Algorithm in Blackbaud CRM Help.

Manage gifts

Blackbaud Donation Forms operate on a daily batch schedule and use an automated connection to add donors and gifts to Blackbaud CRM.

When a donation form receives its first gift of the day, the connection creates a new batch in Blackbaud CRM. The batch template used depends on your organization's gift connection settings.

As donation forms receive additional gifts, the connection adds them to the batch throughout the day. Gifts received the next day are added to a new batch. If your forms receive no gifts, the connection doesn't create a batch for that day.

Note: Online Giving ignores batch workflow rules in Blackbaud CRM, such as rules that prevent editing or committing a batch while it's in a certain status. The connection adds gifts to the batch until you commit it.

For more information on the batch workflow and how to manage gifts, see Blackbaud CRM Gift Overview.