GiveSmart provided needed solutions in private school setting to help us achieve fundraising goals during an unprecendented time.
June 01, 2021
GiveSmart provided needed solutions in private school setting to help us achieve fundraising goals during an unprecendented time.
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Overall Satisfaction with GiveSmart
We initially purchased the GiveSmart package to conduct a virtual fundraiser for our advancement department. This is the fundraising arm of our school, which needed a quick solution for making a pivot from a traditional spring in-person fundraiser to a virtual only fundraiser. Over the course of the year, we have continued to use the platform for advancement/marketing, but now other departments have also begun to use it. This winter, our athletic department used it to run an online fundraiser where alumni could vote for their favorite coaches of school history. Athletic Department team members liked it so much, they have begun to use it as a way to register families for summer sports camps.
The main business problem it addresses for us is the ability to communicate with and perform transactions for several thousand alumni and families - we needed something easy to use, easy to make online donations and credit card transactions and easy to create several different types of events through.
The main business problem it addresses for us is the ability to communicate with and perform transactions for several thousand alumni and families - we needed something easy to use, easy to make online donations and credit card transactions and easy to create several different types of events through.
- Simple platform for average consumer to understand, register and complete purchases in support of our school.
- Great tech support. I often use their online chat support and when we have a large virtual event coming up, we have meetings with a specified support person. They help us brainstorm and ensure our new event site is working well. In addition, we have used "day of" support for events and they are helpful in working the techie back end of the event for us.
- The designer studio and creation portions of each event are fairly simple and easy to understand.
- It seems like they are often adjusting and implementing changes that improve their flaws. I have noticed several positive changes in just the last year we have had it.
- There are so many pages, screens, options, within an event that it can sometimes be difficult to know where to look for something. For example, if you want to change the text on one of your event pages, it takes some digging around to find where the original page is that you have to edit.
- They have character limits in several areas. This can sometimes be challenging though it does make the event site look cleaner in general. We held a virtual auction and auction items can only have 30 character headings. Our administration team sometimes found this frustrating because they wanted me to have more description in the heading so registrants would click the auction item.
- Some users have complained of issues with checkout and not being prompted to do so. They also have complained of storing their credit card information on a website.
- Switching to a virtual auction instead of an in-person event increased our fundraising efforts. We were able to receive bids on items from people throughout the country - not just those at a physical event.
- Our fundraising revenue increased. Donations increased as people were able to donate with credit card via the event website.
- As more staff members at our school have learned about the GiveSmart event creation, it has helped improve internal efficiency. We are able to work remotely or in the school building on the same projects via the GiveSmart platform.
I have not used or evaluated any other platforms.
We have been able to customize the look and feel of user experience for the most part. We are able to upload our brand logos, seals and we have been able to change event background and text colors to match our color standards.
We have run into a few issues with trying to customize but I believe those are necessary to keep the GiveSmart sites looking clean and easy to use. If they allowed too much customization, it could get muddied up with unnecessary content at times.
One problem we have had is customizing question fields. For example, with some of our events, we would like to ask the users more questions on registration page, but there is a limit.
We have run into a few issues with trying to customize but I believe those are necessary to keep the GiveSmart sites looking clean and easy to use. If they allowed too much customization, it could get muddied up with unnecessary content at times.
One problem we have had is customizing question fields. For example, with some of our events, we would like to ask the users more questions on registration page, but there is a limit.