When Chris Pipkins walks the exhibitor space at advancement conferences, he sees a wide array of products, many offered by new and unfamiliar companies. As the associate vice president for advancement information services at James Madison University in Virginia, Pipkins says he fields more calls and emails from potential vendors than he once did.

"The choices are almost overwhelming," he says, "and it seems more challenging than ever to select the right vendor and the right product."

Today, advancement services professionals are inundated with requests to consider products or accept meetings from companies ranging from startups to familiar names that have expanded their product lines. There are at least 20 different companies offering giving day, mobile giving, and annual fund services; dozens of email platform vendors; and several database companies.

Advancement professionals say they're seeing more donor stewardship products to help them capitalize on engagement; more back-office solutions to synchronize or standardize data and sources, manage projects, or marry multiple platforms; and more cloud-based services that make advancement systems available anytime on any device.

Why are so many companies focusing on advancement?

"Many companies seem to think advancement is an easy add-on to what they already have," says Terry Callaghan, associate vice president of IT and advancement services at the Rutgers University Foundation. "I'm not sure that the vendors all understand our requirements."

For instance, customer relationship management vendors who work in the corporate sector are tapping into the advancement field. However, Callaghan says, the CRM systems that advancement requires are "much more complicated, especially when deferred gifts, annuities, capital pledges, and proposals are involved."

In other cases, companies are offering solutions to challenges such as capturing metadata associated with social media campaigns to see how many shares or click-thrus an institution's content receives and whether an institution's social media activity is driving volunteerism, donations, or other interactions.

Though the innovation is appreciated, Robert Weiner, a strategic technology consultant to educational institutions, notes that "an overwhelming number of vendors do the same things. Dozens of companies provide email marketing, and there are about 150 choices for donor relationship software. Too many choices can be paralyzing."

To weed out the champs from the chumps (or the companies that aren't the best fit for your institution), follow these eight steps.

1. Determine your needs. New technology can be seductive. Innovative tools may be tempting, but ask yourself: What problem are you trying to solve? 
Michael Greenberg, founder of the crowdfunding platform ScaleFunder, puts it another way: "Does this proposition solve a hair-on-fire problem? Is this something I don't want to wait another budget cycle to think about? It's the difference between a ‘nice to have' and a ‘need to have.' "

At Rutgers, Callaghan adopts new products or technologies only after a detailed request for proposals process, which starts with a needs assessment. A business analyst at the foundation interviews the advancement staff about the problem they're trying to solve, asking how they operate and what the goals are for the new system.

The advancement team then uses that information to write user stories to include in the RFP, Callaghan says. Here's a sample user story for an event management program, which describes how Rutgers envisions using the solution it will eventually purchase:

The day before the "Yeasts and How to Use Them" lecture, a huge snowstorm grounds all flights out of St. Paul, Minnesota, preventing the speaker from getting to the Rutgers campus. Event planner Laura immediately logs in to the administrative interface and cancels the activity. An automatically generated email then alerts all registered guests that the event is canceled and that their registration fee will be refunded.

With such precise user cases detailed in the RFP, "the vendor can explain how its product can meet those specific needs," Callaghan says. That approach is more effective, she finds, than asking a list of "does your product do this" type of questions.

2. Consider a vendor's background. Callaghan is often more interested in a product if a developer has experience working in advancement. Rutgers took a chance on Raising Insight, a new vendor, for business intelligence. "Their staff have been able to use their extensive background in advancement to provide expertise into the development of gift forecasting using proposals and giving trends," Callaghan says. "This would not be easily understood by a corporate business intelligence vendor."

3. Understand the product. Before gambling on a product, advancement professionals need to know what it can and can't do. "Never assume—always look at the details and ask questions until you are fully comfortable," says Vicky Medlock, associate vice president for advancement at Augusta University in Georgia.

Be sure to include staff members who will actually use the product in the pitch meeting. "It doesn't encourage a good working relationship if the advancement services team is not involved in the sales process to understand how the product will fit in with the entire information management platform," says Thomas Chaves, associate vice president for advancement operations at Saint Joseph's University in Pennsylvania.

4. Talk with at least three references. And make sure those references are similarly sized institutions with similar audiences or common components, such as a medical school or an institution that frequently handles complex gifts, Callaghan says.

5. Consider all the costs. The cost of obtaining a new application or software goes beyond its price—consider the staff time that may be involved in learning to implement the product into current business processes. Medlock creates a three- to five-year funding model summary of the costs to start up a product and obtain ongoing maintenance, to get the full picture of the investment.

"It may take more than a year to see the benefit," she says. "If we elect to test a product, then follow-up steps include a strategic implementation plan with a timeline, goals, budget, staffing, and expectations."

6. Understand the implementation process. Products require implementation and training, even if you obtain them at no cost. "Free software is free like a puppy," Weiner says. "It can wind up sucking tons of time and money, because somebody has to spend time figuring it out."

For instance, a recent client of Weiner's selected a new technology platform. The university qualified for 10 free licenses to use the software, but it is spending $35,000 for another consultant to handle system configuration, data migration, customizations, and training, Weiner says. The university will also spend $15,000 per year on add-in software that works with the platform and provides such functions as email marketing, event registration, online giving, and advocacy. "Over the course of five years, they will spend approximately $110,000 on this ‘free' software, which they knew from the start would not be free," Weiner says.

Before saying yes to a product, understand what is required for implementation—and involve those who will be implementing it in the discussion. "I've seen lots of good tools, ideas, or projects fall apart because people didn't have time to implement them," Chaves says.

7. Determine whether the product will integrate with existing systems. It's important to harness data and provide global analytics for all advancement activities. But a surprising number of products and applications can't communicate with existing systems, leaving data siloed in those applications.

Even if a product connects with existing systems, it may require unnecessary staff time to make that happen. The Oregon State University Foundation considered an email solution that allowed its communications team to more efficiently create email templates but that also required the tech team to manage back-end tasks, such as permitting users to opt out or change preferences, by hand.

"The communications team could create the emails almost with their eyes closed, but it was almost a medieval process to see who subscribed and clicked through," says Mark Koenig, assistant vice president for advancement services at the foundation. "If a product is going to make life easier for one group and much harder for three others, it's not worth it."

8. Understand how you'll measure success. If a product is geared toward solving a specific business problem, "what would a vendor have to show you to prove they can solve that problem?" Weiner asks.

For instance, you might measure success based on a specific number of responses, interactions, or gifts, depending on your goals for the product. When Amherst College used Hustle, an app that loads text messages that can be sent individually to many people, it saw participation rates in an annual giving campaign double among alumni who received a text. Compared with phone calls, which were answered less than half the time, and emails, which had extremely low open rates, personalized text messages yielded much greater responses from alumni. Amherst also saw pledges fulfilled at three times the previous rate, and its total Giving Day dollar amount increased by 40 percent over previous years.

Looking ahead

Advancement offices once used technology mainly to process gifts. After that, gift officers used technology to manage prospects, communicate with them, and plan events. "Now you need to have advancement technology systems on your phone, your tablet, and various channels," says Pipkins of JMU. "We have a platform with thousands of applications we could potentially use, and everyone's trying to figure out the framework that will perform best."

As advancement leaders seek the best ways to use technology, a willingness to try new things and share results will help lead to innovative procedures. While many products and solutions don't communicate with existing systems, technology is slowly bridging those gaps. The sector is seeing more marketing automation and machine-learning solutions to help institutions better understand and target their alumni (see "How Well Do You Know Your Alumni?" in the November 2016 issue of Currents).

Through ongoing experimentation and focused problem-solving, advancement is likely to arrive at a powerful new normal. Pipkins predicts a greater push toward automating the relationship-building process with information technology through programs such as personal texting and college-specific apps that give friends and alumni one place to go for information.

"It's a major period of disruption in higher education technology, the biggest in 20 years," Pipkins says. "Everything is changing."

The Pros and Cons of Working With Startups

Startup companies are developing some cutting-edge solutions for the advancement industry. The advancement "sector needs innovation. You want to give people a chance," says crowdfunding pioneer Michael Greenberg, who leads the machine-learning startup Retina AI. "Being too risk averse as a community means you don't get new products because companies will stay away."

Still, advancement professionals might wonder: Is working with a startup worth the risk? Keep these issues in mind:

Influencing the innovator

Startups might be worth the risk if your institution will have direct input into the product's development, says Terry Callaghan, associate vice president at the Rutgers University Foundation. Rutgers recently worked with Live Alumni, a startup focused on prospect management and research, to create a real-time database of alumni and their current employment information. Her team has also worked with startups Uprising Tech and EverTrue on social media products, all with positive results. "These have worked well," she says, "because they have all had extensive [pre-startup] experience with advancement, so they understand our needs and our language."

Relationships matter

"When you work with a startup, you need to keep in mind that it is a partnership," Callaghan says. Often, institutions and the new business work together to help develop a product that will be valuable beyond that one institution. This is a mutually beneficial relationship, she says, in which your institution is helping the startup to develop and test a "product that suits the needs of the broader advancement community."

To determine if you're an early adopter, Greenberg suggests considering these questions: Is your organization in a position to experiment? Do you have the ability and time to manage this product? Are you as excited to help this company grow as it is to help you? Is it truly exciting or is it a commodity?

"It's not just plug and play," he says. "You're managing the relationship."

That's why you need to have regular check-ins—every four to six months.

"With service providers, we buy it and forget it," Greenberg says. "You don't want to do that with startups. You want to know if they're bringing new things to market, and you want to influence them."

Here today ...

"In some startups, one person is developing the product and running the company," says Mark Koenig, assistant vice president for advancement services at the Oregon State University Foundation. "What happens if they get hit by a truck? Or if the company gets bought out? You have to think about the risks involved."

Lehigh University in Pennsylvania had to abandon an alumni app after the tech startup changed ownership. The new owner had other business priorities and didn't want to continue using resources to develop the alumni app, says Thomas Chaves, formerly of Lehigh University and currently the associate vice president for advancement operations at Saint Joseph's University in Pennsylvania.

Be sure to ask the startup if it has received venture funding, Greenberg says. Companies won't say how much money they have, but you want to get a sense of whether the company will last more than 12 months.

Also, find out how many staff members and clients they have, and how many employees are in client support, Weiner says. "Just because a business is new doesn't make it a dealbreaker, but you need to go in with your eyes wide open."

The price might be right

Startups know you're taking a chance, so some will offer "incentives or assurances for taking that risk," Weiner notes.

Incentives might include one-time or ongoing discounts (free in some cases) on software or services including licensing fees, implementation costs, support, and training, Weiner says. The company might also want advancement professionals to speak on panels with them at conferences and offer to pay the cost of sending the project manager to industry events.

"Think fair price but not lowest price," Greenberg warns. "Going for a low cost in the early days means that company may not be around. Think about what you're paying for. Could you work for free for that long? Institutions end up getting hurt when a startup goes out of business."

Buyer beware

If the startup's team is completely inexperienced, you don't want them using you for trial and error. They should have some experience before the startup, Greenberg says. Without it, they may not know expectations of a business-to-business relationship. Also: Are they listening to you or are they telling? Are they getting feedback from you? Or are they saying this is our vision, take it or leave it? 

New Products to Watch

Innovative products are continually introduced into the advancement market. Here are 12 new companies (or companies new to advancement) that a variety of advancement practitioners recommend checking out.

Uprising Technology 
Advancement staff and fundraisers use Uprising to search multiple systems with one login and a Google-like interface. With cloud visualization, everything is accessible from any device.

NewSci 
Universities use a variety of applications, creating siloed data. NewSci brings that disconnected data together into a platform to provide the end-user with insight.

EverTrue 
The EverTrue platform combines donor data with engagement and wealth indicators from social media channels like Facebook and LinkedIn to help institutions understand their alumni base.

Raising Insight 
Raising Insight continues to refine an advancement-specific information reporting and analytics platform, ABI (Advancement Business Intelligence).

Michelangelo Pro 
Developed at the University of Washington, Michelangelo Pro helps institutions navigate their data to discover, among other things, the target audience for fundraising campaigns.

Almabase 
With this alumni relations software, users can create an online community for alumni to network, communicate with graduates, facilitate alumni-student mentoring, manage an alumni jobs board, receive online gifts, and manage event tickets.

Hubbub 
Hubbub offers solutions for giving day, ambassadors tools, crowdfunding, giving pages, influencer reports, and Twitter analytics.

Tassl 
Tassl's engagement technology 
combines a constituent engagement app, volunteer leader tools, and engagement metrics software to help institutions effectively engage alumni networks.

Pledgemine 
Pledgemine offers solutions, software, and a special design team for higher ed fundraising tasks like appeals, pledge fulfillment, stewardship, and emails.

Tableau 
The world's largest organizations can use their data with Tableau's desktop analyst, server, and cloud.

Advizor Solutions 
This fundraising analytical solution offers dashboard design and deployment to help institutions reach a fundraising goal, strategic assessments, and prospective donor screenings and scoring from quantitative experts, training, workshops, and monthly consulting.

MEG 
MEG (formally known as Monthly Engaged Giving) is a specialist in marketing, giver recruiting, and donor stewardship focused on monthly giving.

—Nancy Mann Jackson and Selene San Felice