Category Archive: Digital Strategy

Salesforce for non-profit organizations

Avatar photo November 21st, 2023 by

No one will tell you that moving from your current CRM platform to Salesforce is easy, but we can tell you there is an easier way to do it. When nonprofits are ready to make the shift to Salesforce, having the right team in place and the right mindset for the launch makes all the difference.

Before you start trying to implement Salesforce on your own, browse some of our commonly answered questions when it comes to launching Salesforce. As experts in bridging gaps and supporting missions, we’re a Salesforce Trusted Partner with strategy, implementation, and support experience.

Salesforce for non-profit organizations

Contents

  • What is Salesforce?
  • Can nonprofits use Salesforce?
  • What is the best platform for nonprofit organizations?
  • Why do nonprofits use Salesforce?
  • What kind of nonprofit teams need Salesforce?
  • How much does Salesforce cost nonprofits?
  • How much does a Salesforce consultant cost?
  • How long is it going to take for a consultant to set up Salesforce for my nonprofit?
  • What’s the best way to get started with Salesforce for nonprofits?
  • What are the benefits of working with a Salesforce consultant before setting up our CRM platform?
  • Can a consultant help me if my nonprofit is already using Salesforce?
  • How do nonprofits make Salesforce work long-term?
  • What are the benefits of keeping a Salesforce consultant on to support my nonprofit?
  • What business goals can Salesforce help nonprofits achieve?
  • What do nonprofits need to know before implementing Salesforce?

What is Salesforce?

What is SalesforceSalesforce is a cloud-based customer relationship management (CRM) platform that helps for-profits and nonprofits to manage their customer experience.

The platform allows non-profit organizations to gather data and automate tasks across functions such as fundraising, program management, operations, marketing and member engagement, and more. It aligns teams by giving them a single, shared view of their members, participants, volunteers and supporters. Organizations that use Salesforce can tailor their CRM experience in innumerable ways to help them meet their wider goals.

Can nonprofits use Salesforce?

Yes, nonprofits can use Salesforce for program, grant, donor, case and membership management, as well as for marketing. The Salesforce Nonprofit Cloud is a cloud based CRM created to help nonprofits streamline their processes and workload, and grow their organizations through meaningful data.

What is the best platform for nonprofit organizations?

What is the best platform for nonprofit organizationsSalesforce’s broad capabilities and features make it the best CRM platform for nonprofit organizations.

Your potential to build out the ideal CRM, tailored to your organization, is unlimited. Salesforce also has an extensive AppExchange, which means sometimes getting the customization you want is simply integrating an app on top of the Salesforce platform. This saves you time and money, as you don’t have to create everything from scratch.

Once you’re able to clearly define what you want Salesforce to do, you can automate it. By automating repetitive manual tasks, your team can focus on better ways to deliver value. It’s essential to make the most of the people and resources you have on hand, so anything that can be automated, should be.

Since Salesforce contains so many options and possibilities, the question is rarely, “Can we do this?” Instead, it’s, “Is there a better way to achieve our desired outcome?”

It’s a broad tool, so it won’t just impact one area of your organization. Salesforce can support your organization with:

  • Constituent management
  • Donation and fundraising
  • Case management
  • Grants management
  • Marketing Automation
  • Reporting and analytics
  • Account management
  • Accounting

Considering it can enable all these departments to work together effectively, Salesforce is by far the most comprehensive and customizable tool to help nonprofits enhance their constituent and member experience and support their mission.

Is Salesforce better than HubSpot for nonprofits?

Selecting the right CRM is about finding the right fit for your nonprofits growth and budget. Salesforce isn’t necessarily better than HubSpot, rather they support different kinds of organizations with different budgets.

Salesforce is a better fit for mid to enterprise-level nonprofits, ready to make a bigger impact on their mission. The deployment cost is a bigger investment upfront, however it’s the top tier when it comes to CRM capabilities, so your organization will likely only need CRM management support once the initial investment is made.

If you have a smaller organization and budget, Hubspot may be a good starting point until you’re ready to move to Salesforce.

Why do nonprofits use Salesforce? What are some of the best features for nonprofits?

Nonprofits use Salesforce to help keep track of their data and make meaningful changes, growth and adjustments based on that data – improving their donor and membership experience, and supporting their wider mission.

The Nonprofit Cloud has functionality that is core to the nonprofit industry. Out of the box, nonprofits can track:

From there, a consultant can help you build anything else you might need. Once this tracking is implemented, Salesforce can also automate multiple touch points across the member landscape. For example, Salesforce can automatically alert your members when their renewal date is approaching and notify them when their payment is successful or if it’s declined.

These automations act as revenue drivers by saving your people time, and shifting their energy away from manual tasks and towards big picture progress. From system tracking to phone banking and tabling, Salesforce can collect all your necessary member data and help you to leverage the insights within.

What kind of nonprofit teams need Salesforce?

What kind of nonprofit teams need SalesforceGiven its wide range of capabilities, any nonprofit team can benefit from using Salesforce for automations and data management.

The essential element any team needs to make Salesforce adoption a success is a readiness to embrace technology. There will likely be resistance from some team members who have their preferred ways of running day-to-day tasks, so it also needs decision-makers who are able to lead them through the changes and put the focus on how much more than can do with Salesforce.

How much does Salesforce cost nonprofits?

Nonprofits can get 10 user licenses for free from Salesforce through The Power of Us Program. When you scale beyond 10 users, or need more robust capabilities, you’ll have to invest in the paid version.

How much your organization spends on your Salesforce account depends primarily on how you’ll be using it, and how many users will need access. The Salesforce Nonprofit Cloud Enterprise Edition is $60 per user, per month. While the Ultimate Edition, which includes extra storage, flexibility and support, is $100 per user, per month.

The price won’t be accessible for every organization, but those that can adopt it stand to benefit financially. On average, organizations using Salesforce see an estimated 25% saving on IT costs and a 26% increase in employee productivity. Salesforce also report that non profits see a 130% increase in total online giving.

You can check out the full list of pricing to get a better idea of how much Salesforce could cost for your nonprofit.

How much do Salesforce consultants cost?

Working with a Salesforce consultant can cost $170-250 or more per hour, depending on the consultant’s level of experience and certifications, and your organization’s needs. Keep in mind though, the consultant team will likely be saving your organization money in the long run.

It’s usually worth the investment. Often, nonprofits will task members of their team with setting up their Salesforce platform, only to find after months of trial and error that they need support.

At that point, it’s almost always easier for a consultant to start the implementation again rather than unpick the issues in what’s been done already. By bringing a consultant on early, your systems and processes will be working for you faster, and your team will be able to focus on their jobs, and what they do best.

If you’re ready to get a quote for the cost of your project, fill out our contact form.

How long is it going to take for a consultant to set up Salesforce?

Normally it takes four to nine months for a consultant to set up Salesforce on behalf of a nonprofit. However, this isn’t a hard and fast rule and a true estimate depends on your needs.

During a demo or intro call a consultant will ask you questions like:

  • What’s the size of your organization?
  • What capabilities are essential for your organization to keep running?
  • Is your organization looking to use Nonprofit Cloud?
  • Are you hoping to implement technology roadmapping and use of apps from the AppExchange?

Once questions like these are answered, the consultant will be able to give you a better idea of how long it will take to get your organization up and running.

What’s the best way to get started with Salesforce as a nonprofit?

The best way to get started with Salesforce as a nonprofit is to first recognize the capabilities of your team and look for help where you fall short.

If you don’t have a team member with Salesforce experience, then it’s time to bring in help from outside to maximize your investment and make your business more efficient.

Finding a certified consultant like fusionSpan can make all the difference in expediting your onboarding to the CRM platform, and keeping your organization moving forward regardless of new releases and capabilities.

Nonprofits who try to implement Salesforce on their own often end up at a consultant agency after months of frustration and failed rollouts. In the long run, it’s often more time consuming and expensive to have someone come in and reimplement, as fixing isn’t always an option.

Start with getting an expert on board from the beginning.

What are the benefits of working with a Salesforce consultant before setting up your CRM platform?

A Salesforce consultant can help with buy-in, adoption, support, and long-term management of your CRM platform.

1. Buy-in

Often, our clients come to us after they have already purchased Salesforce. But if you haven’t already purchased Salesforce, we can help you plan for change and adoption. We start by evaluating the staff capacity and capabilities. We identify gaps and help the folks in the current system expedite their tasks while minimizing resistance to change.

2. Change management

To maximize the impact of adopting salesforce, you need a strategy and structured process behind the transition. For instance, there’s a good chance your entire association may need to be trained on how to use your new CRM, and they may need to adapt their current approach to their role, or collaborate with other departments in ways they haven’t before.

3. Live support

We pride ourselves on flawless launches, but sometimes the unexpected does happen. When it does, we’re available for support so that your IT team doesn’t have to add Salesforce troubleshooting to their already long list of responsibilities.

4. Post-implementation support and management services

With a CRM as complex as Salesforce, you can expect updates, new capabilities, and system maintenance. You’ll want a consulting team that knows your system inside and out to keep your programs running smoothly.

Can a consultant help me if my nonprofit is already using Salesforce?

Yes, a consultant can help you if your nonprofit is already using Salesforce.

Often we find nonprofits who have set up their Salesforce on their own aren’t always aware of the wide range of capabilities and best practices like we are. Over a quick call, we can have a conversation about how you’re using Salesforce now, your desired business outcomes, provide a demo, and help you visualize how Salesforce can make a bigger impact for your nonprofit, and mission.

How do nonprofits make Salesforce work long-term?

When it comes to your organization using Salesforce for the long haul, here are some things to strive for:

1. You need a subject matter expert for your Salesforce instance.

This can be an external consulting organization, or an internal hire. Ideally, there’s a subject matter expert and an administrator for your organization’s CRM. These roles ensure data quality and evaluate upgrades. Even a fractional administrator is better than none.

2. Each employee in your organization should have ownership

If the adoption isn’t there, Salesforce won’t get used. When your team doesn’t use the CRM, or doesn’t use the CRM the right way, then valuable chunks of data go missing. Or their jobs simply don’t get done. Widespread adoption helps your nonprofit get the most value out of your investment.

3. Evaluate your Salesforce system with every new release.

Using Salesforce isn’t a one-and-done situation, especially for major nonprofits.

Salesforce has three regular releases each year in Spring, Summer and Winter, and these can include new features, quality-of-life updates and security upgrades.

With each release, you’ll want to evaluate how you’re using Salesforce, so you can adapt to any changes and enhance how you’re working. It’s smart to work with your consulting team to plan for these strategic upgrades.

What are the benefits of keeping a Salesforce consultant on to support my nonprofit?

A Salesforce consultant can help you with best practices, roadmapping, rollouts, updates, integrations and more.

You need to know how to operate your system. Unless you have a full time Salesforce person in-house, you’ll want a partner to guide you and maintain your new system while circumnavigating any hiccups or issues along the way. This also enables your team to focus on your mission while the consultants focus on your CRM.

What goals can Salesforce help nonprofits achieve?

What goals can Salesforce help nonprofits achieve1. Better understand and improve your engagement.

Often organizations have outgrown their current systems and can’t track all their data, especially engagement tracking. Salesforce allows you to identify engaged constituents and get a better, bigger picture of your overall engagement, so you can make more informed decisions. Nonprofits who use Salesforce for Fundraising on average report a 54% increase in donor engagement.

2. Create a seamless revenue generation experience.

Nothing can hamper a nonprofit’s efforts more than a poor experience with your CRM. If there are too many steps to make a donation or purchase, prospects can be quick to drift away. Salesforce makes transactions quick and easy.

3. Amplify your e-commerce efforts.

From books to donations to memberships and beyond, great e-commerce data helps you sell more. The more you sell, the greater impact you can have on your organization’s mission.

What do nonprofits need to know before implementing Salesforce?

1. You need to prioritize buy-in.

Change is scary, even for people working in organizations that want to change the world. Getting everyone’s buy-in and managing the adoption of new processes is one of the biggest tasks when moving to Salesforce. Don’t leave your team behind when making this decision – you’ll need them for this move to be successful!

2. Consultants can save you time and money.

It’s never too late to get a consultant involved, even if you’ve already tried implementing Salesforce. The best way to save your organization time and money if you don’t have a Salesforce implementation expert on your team is to contact a certified partner, like a Salesforce Impact Partner, to get your implementation moving in the right direction.

3. It’s an ongoing investment.

Adopting Salesforce is the first step in a big adventure towards accomplishing your mission. If you want your organization to make the most of your Salesforce investment, roadmapping where you are and where you want to go are essential for a successful roll-out.

It might be time to find out if Salesforce can save your team time, while amplifying your mission. Fill out a contact form to get started.

Not ready to get in touch with us just yet? Get our CRM/AMS Implementations Guide to learn more about implementing Salesforce.

Using Salesforce for Fundraising & Donor Management

Dumebi Okeleke October 16th, 2023 by

Using Salesforce for Donor Management

Using Salesforce for Donor ManagementSalesforce donor management provides a fundraising solution that helps nonprofit organizations continue to grow and track data about their donors. Within your donor management system (DMS), contact information, activity tracking, financial capacity, history, and engagement can be recorded, allowing your organization to monitor success and engage with donors in a more segmented and personalized manner.

Donor management can be executed using Nonprofit Cloud, which is Salesforce’s own Nonprofit industry cloud native within the Salesforce CRM. Combined with Marketing Cloud and Experience Cloud, and streamlined by fusionSpan, Salesforce will enable you to manage and build relationships with donors through nurturing and personalized follow-ups.

Is Salesforce used for fundraising?

Correctly configured by fusionSpan’s expert team, Salesforce’s donor management system will maximize your fundraising efforts. Within Salesforce, we’ll streamline your experience and provide a centralized 360 view of your data, allowing you to utilize campaigns, dashboards, and donor scores, organize donations, and personalize your donor content.

fusionSpan will also manage your Nonprofit Cloud install, helping you tackle accounting for income, manage installments, report on your efforts, and acknowledge your donors with email and print communications.

Give donors scores with fundraising intelligence

Prioritize prospective donors, segment your records, and improve your communication with donors using biographic, philanthropic, and firmographic data for a complete understanding of their profile.

Understand top-performing campaigns

Use Salesforce data to smash your fundraising goals. We’ll help you segment and personalize your messaging so you can create custom campaigns, track progress, and even leverage automation tools, turning volunteers into donors.

Accept one-time and recurring donations

fusionSpan will ensure your DMS is set up correctly to track the money that enters your system as one-time payments, recurring donations, or multiple installments. Plus, use Salesforce’s mobile-friendly donation form to accept one-time, monthly donations, and more.

Use Salesforce dashboards to manage payment data

We’ll ensure that your income is logged correctly to track revenue and meet donor requirements, guaranteeing that you have the accurate data you need to inform future decisions.

Donor attribution

Gain a comprehensive overview of donations by tracking the origin of matching gifts from employers, contributions from donor-advised funds, and gifts generated through peer-to-peer fundraising efforts.

Customize acknowledgments and automated receipts for donors

Engage with donors and acknowledge their generosity with emails and letters. With the expertise of fusionSpan, you’ll get recommendations on the AppExchange software you need to generate branded and personalized thank-you documents and custom receipts.

What is Donor Management?

What is Donor ManagementDonor management centers around the process of organizing donor information, tracking and monitoring interactions, and cultivating long-term relationships with donors. As donors form the fundamental pillar of nonprofit work, fostering these meaningful connections is essential.

Using a donor management system provides capabilities such as data analysis, using this to send personalized communications, and implementing automations to manage these based on donor behavior. Salesforce’s Nonprofit Cloud offers this for both potential and present donors.

Is Salesforce a Donor Management System?

Nonprofit Cloud is a core Salesforce industry cloud offering a robust and intuitive solution for nonprofit organizations.

Your Salesforce DMS technology can be customized to suit your organizational needs by adding additional apps and integrations. This can help to:

  • Better understand donors – made easier by building donor profiles, which will help highlight the most influential and generous donors working with your organization
  • Strengthen strategies – targeting and content strategies can be improved through personalized messaging and content that inspires action from donors
  • Identify impactful initiatives – use reporting functionalities to measure the growth and success of delivered programs and services – plus communicate success stories and metrics back to donors to empower future support

Can you use Salesforce for Nonprofits?

Salesforce for nonprofits provides apps, tools, features, services, and technology to connect with donors, track volunteers, and manage campaigns, helping to empower mission-based organizations transform engagements into relationships.

Working with fusionSpan, your nonprofit will leverage innovations, AI, analytics, and app integrations to create a unique environment that suits your organization, helping to manage donor relationships and fundraising efforts. Some core ways that we can configure Salesforce to support your nonprofit include:

Salesforce’s Nonprofit Success Pack (NPSP)

NPSP provides a series of managed packages which we’ll install to make managing relationships with donors simpler. fusionSpan will assist you in installing NPSP by either signing up for your trial run in Salesforce or installing NPSP on top of your Salesforce Enterprise platform.

The Power of Us Program

The Power of Us Program provides nonprofits with discounted pricing, and 10 free Salesforce licenses. Following a simple application, fusionSpan will support your nonprofit with our Quick Start Implementation process and tailored recommendations on how your organization can make the most of the program, meaning you’ll hit the ground running when leveraging your Salesforce software.

Salesforce Nonprofit Cloud

With the support of fusionSpan, implement Nonprofit Cloud as your flexible solution to fundraising, marketing, data management, program operations, and more, to manage donors, volunteers, and grantees in one central system. We’ll hand-select any add on applications from over 5000 apps compatible with nonprofit cloud, build your solution, and train you on the functionalities and management tools of reporting, customer/self-service, marketing, and events.

Join communities in Salesforce

Salesforce customers, partners, and staff adjoin to support one another and help answer questions through the sharing of experiences and expertise, helping nonprofits connect with similar organizations and local community groups.

Salesforce learning paths

Learning paths provide a collection of resources that help nonprofits successfully leverage Salesforce. Paths include fundraising, program management, constituent engagement, and analytics.

fusionSpan will build an intuitive system that provides a single source of truth with your data, empowering your employees to inspire action among their donors and supporting communities, and be able to clearly report on and accelerate the efforts and outcomes of donor correspondence. Engaging donors, managing programs, understanding income streams, and reporting on growth is made easier by working with fusionSpan to leverage Salesforce for your nonprofit.

How Nonprofits can engage Donors using Salesforce

When it comes to engaging donors, when implemented correctly, Salesforce offers a number of solutions for nonprofits that help maximize the impact of your campaigns:

1. Fundraising online

Track donations, funds, and campaigns in one system, build and measure cash flow streams, and understand where donations were allocated and what triggered them. Plus, build strong relationships with your supporters and report on their engagements with your organization, using reliable data to inform future fundraising decisions.

2. Personalize outreach and engagement

Turbocharge your nonprofit’s efforts by building multi-channel connections with your prospects and donors. Capture touch points across the donor journey, and track information about the donors that engage with your organization; then provide personalized outreach showcasing your understanding of your community on both an individual and at-scale basis.

3. Visualize engagement with analytics

Identify trends and patterns in your donor data, and understand who your donors are and how they engage with you, using analytics. Not only does this help your organization know where to focus its efforts, but analytics can be shared with donors to reiterate the impact and importance of their support and generosity.

4. Program and event management

Deliver programs and events that inspire your communities, managed and organized on a unified and fully integrated platform, curated by fusionSpan. Use custom software and automation to empower staff, understand the needs of your program participants, and provide the best service. Plan events based on donor locations, and use apps that make registration, ticketing, record updates, schedules, and follow-up surveys more efficient.

5. Grantmaking

Drive stronger outcomes for your funding programs, nurture strong stakeholder relationships, connect teams, and generate positive experiences for grantees. Using Salesforce Nonprofit Cloud, uncomplicate the grants process, create and publish funding opportunities, proposals, and awards, and manage budgets.

6. Operations

Connect external systems with the help of fusionSpan and get streamlined, trusted data. Create accounts for your donors, businesses, grantees, and volunteers using Nonprofit Cloud and build datasets that inform your nurturing and outreach processes, generate trusting relationships, and help you make informed decisions that raise more funds.

7. Stewardship

Standardize engagement with donors to maintain long term relationships. Using Salesforce paths and email templates, streamline internal processes and ensure consistent communication with donors. By syncing communications in one system, employees can observe activity history to understand what donors have received, and how they responded.

8. Use experience cloud to create donor communities

Allow donors and members to login and use self-service features, joining a community of similar people through message boards and forums. Within the self-service portal, publicize events, share relevant updates, and empower donors with their own data.

Examples of Donor Management

We supported a recent client through a project to streamline their data and transform user experience. They had separate platforms and unintegrated systems, resulting in disorganization and lots of duplication.

By implementing Nonprofit Success Pack (NPSP), fusionSpan determined a data management system that improved functionality and user experience and provided a more effective ecommerce and events platform.

With this CRM implementation successfully executed, our client was also able to foster dedicated and engaged members, accurately track donations, and analyze repeat donations and where funding was coming from.

Learn how our clients are leveraging Nonprofit Cloud

How fusionSpan can support with using Salesforce for Donor Management

fusionSpan exclusively focuses on associations, nonprofits, the local public sector, and purpose-driven organizations.

As experts in Salesforce and Nonprofit Cloud, our knowledge and dedication to excellent solutions mean we can help your organization overcome the problems that are restricting your growth and creating obstacles in managing and engaging your donors.

We’ll work together to close the gaps and find innovative solutions that ensure you get the most out of your software investment, and drive results that help you fulfill your mission.

Streamline your software and build lasting relationships with your donors.

Contact fusionSpan to start the process.

Being Digital-First

Avatar photo September 15th, 2022 by

Most modern business leaders are still underutilizing the power of technology in today’s digital world. But, in reality, being digitally first does not imply having all of the software tools available; rather, it entails having the proper ones.

Technology is essential, but it’s only a piece of the puzzle. A digital-first strategy must be customer-centric to be successful. Keep your customers top of mind, and you’ll be on your way to success.

Consider how a shift to digital thinking and a focus on a larger digital strategy might benefit your company in the long run rather than focusing on a specific technology or tool designed to implement a digital process. For example, businesses can use a digital-first mindset to improve service delivery, customer support, workforce planning, and recruitment.

How does Being Digital- Frist helps Businesses?

There is no doubt that businesses need to be digital to stay ahead of the curve. However, many business owners are unsure how being digital can help their business.

  • The first way that being digital can help businesses is by increasing efficiency. When businesses can digitize their processes, they can streamline inefficiencies and save time. In addition, digitizing processes can also help businesses automate tasks, freeing employees’ time to focus on more critical tasks.
  • Another way that being digital can help businesses is by improving customer service. Businesses that are able to understand the ideal customer experience and translate it seamlessly into a digital one are poised to demonstrate value, capitalize on personalization, and enhance connection with their customers. In addition, being digital can also help businesses build trust with their customers as they can show that they are up-to-date with the latest trends and technologies.
  • Finally, being digital can help businesses save money. When businesses digitize their processes, they can reduce their overhead costs. In addition, digitizing can also help businesses take advantage of new technologies, resulting in process improvements and cost savings. For example, cloud-based solutions are often more affordable than traditional on-premise solutions.

Ways to approach Digital Transformation

There is no tried-and-true gold standard for approaching digital transformation because it is new. However, it helps to keep a few things in mind when looking for ways to better your business by turning digital:

  • Enabling consistency across different channels: Customers and staff alike expect the same process and outcome on the web and mobile devices. While the content displayed can and should be tailored to the device, the process for ordering a product, scheduling a service, or contacting customer care should be the same whether the user is on any device. Likewise, employees should be able to access files, submit reports, and pass projects along just as effortlessly, either on the move or at home.
  • Experience is the new attention: As more organizations and services vie for our attention, it’s becoming increasingly crucial for forward-thinking enterprises to provide integrated experiences into our daily lives. Designing thoughtfully integrated experiences across your delivery channels creates regular positive touchpoints with your customers. We are more likely to develop a habit of a digital experience if it is simple, familiar, and smooth.
  • Being Digital means being agile: Companies that embrace cutting-edge technologies and agile practices can better keep up with changing times and adapt quickly to changing market conditions. This agility is a crucial advantage in today’s fast-paced business landscape, where competition can come from anywhere, and businesses need to respond rapidly and effectively to stay relevant. Adopting lean processes streamlines operations by eliminating waste and redundancy throughout the organization. In addition, by optimizing the flow of information, resources, ideas, and tasks within a company, these lean processes enable teams to respond more quickly and effectively to changing business needs and technologies.

Overall, by staying on top of the latest technological advancements and adopting best practices for being digital, businesses are better able to keep up with changing times and thrive in today’s competitive landscape. So whether you’re an executive or a CIO, it’s essential to take a strategic approach to build your company’s digital future to stay ahead of the curve and stay relevant in the years to come.

At fusionSpan, we specialize in helping companies develop future-facing digital strategies across all digital channels and create agile cultures that embrace new technologies. If you’re interested in learning more or need help getting started, please don’t hesitate to contact us. We would be happy to discuss your needs and see how we can help.

Designing a Website For The Best Customer Experience

Adam April 8th, 2021 by

The design of an organization’s website is a key factor in retaining existing customers and attracting new ones. From visual design to overall usability, every element of your website plays a part in engaging customers and providing them with the value you have to offer. This week we’ll take a look at how web design affects customer experience, explore the impact of specific design elements, and discuss how you can improve your web design to maximize the value you provide your customers.

Determine Why Your Customers Are Coming To Your Website

There are two big questions to ask yourself before diving right in and making updates to your web design – why do people come to your website and how can you get them what they need as quickly as possible? Understanding your customers’ intention when they visit your website will help inform decisions around content priority. For example, if customers are frequently asking where to register for events on your current site, that is an indicator that events are valuable to your customers, but your existing design struggles to deliver that value. In that case, it might be worth adding a list of upcoming events on your homepage with a “Register” button (this is also known as a call to action). Determining content priority based on what customers find valuable about your site will streamline the process of getting your customers what they need as quickly as possible.

Build Your Sitemap With A Specific Focus On Content Priority

The navigation menu on your website serves as a map that customers can always use as a guide to get where they need on your website. A study performed by Nielsen Norman Group determined that people tend to scan website content in an F-shaped pattern. This means that people scan website content in two horizontal stripes (starting with the navigation menu, left to right) followed by a vertical stripe on the left side of the screen. Based on this study, a User Experience best practice technique is to display your most valuable content on the left side of your navigation menu and less valuable content toward the right side of the menu. Once content priority has been established for your site, it is important to develop your navigation menu with this in mind to improve your customers’ experience.

Mobile Responsive Design

In this day and age, a website that can be used effectively across a variety of different devices is a must. A mobile responsive website includes design elements such as:

    • Legible text without the need to zoom
    • Adequate space for tappable targets (buttons, links, etc)
    • No horizontal scrolling required
    • Stacking content as needed for smaller screens

Each of these elements contribute to the overall usability of your website. A mobile responsive design casts a wider net to existing and potential customers who try to visit your site on a mobile device. In addition to the usability of the site itself, Google announced in 2015 that they updated their search engine algorithms to reward mobile responsive websites by placing them higher in search result rankings. Therefore, by ensuring that your site is responsive on mobile devices, you are improving your customers’ experience before they even reach your site and increasing the likelihood of reaching new potential customers.

Web Accessibility

It is important to ensure that everyone who visits your site has equal access to content. In order to do so, all measures should be taken to make your site as accessible as possible for all users. There are various levels of ADA Compliance and it is important as a company to decide what level of compliance to shoot for (A, AA, or AAA). That decision should be made even before deciding on a brand direction, as color contrast can be quite the hurdle when it comes to web accessibility compliance.

In addition to just being able to say that your website is ADA compliant, there are several other incentives that should inform your decision to make web accessibility a priority, namely:

    • The more accessible your website is, the more your Search engine optimization (SEO) will improve. Your website will rank higher in search engine results if it follows accessibility best practices. As a result, this can help increase your site traffic.
    • Adhering to web accessibility guidelines overlaps into other areas of “best practices” such as mobile web design, overall usability/UX, and (as mentioned above) improved SEO.
    • It is the right thing to do. The internet has become an integral part of everyday life, and when anyone takes ownership of a public digital experience – such as a website – there is a certain level of responsibility to provide equal access and equal opportunity to all visitors. This includes, but is not limited to, people living with disabilities.

Make A Good First Impression With Your Homepage

According to Tony Haile (CEO of Chartbeat), you have about 15 seconds to capture a person’s attention before they lose interest and leave your website. In order to do that, it is important to efficiently demonstrate what value you provide to your customers, without providing too much content and potentially overwhelming visitors. In order to strike that balance effectively, it is best practice to provide a small amount of information (a sentence or two) in each value proposition with a call to action prompting the user to learn more. For example, this call to action might be in the form of a “Learn More” or “Register” button. This quickly demonstrates how to access valuable information promptly, without users having to sift through a large volume of content first. Providing too much information up front can not only be overwhelming, it also provides no incentive for people to explore the rest of your site.

Reach Out To fusionSpan For All Your Web Needs!

Optimizing customer experience through web design is an ongoing process and is not limited to the recommendations listed above. It takes time, attention to detail, and creativity to engage your customers and leave them with a high level of satisfaction with your services. fusionSpan is passionate about designing and developing websites to do exactly that for every team we have the pleasure to work with. Reach out to us today!

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Leverage Pardot Forms as Lead Generation Tools

Komal Chauhan fusionSpan Team December 17th, 2020 by

Forms are very common features on association websites to collect information from visitors, regardless of if they are members or not. The information gathered on forms can help turn anonymous visitors into identified prospects. For example, when a visitor provides an email address in the form while signing up for a free newsletter, you will be able to capture the name and contact information of that user. Therefore, forms serve as ideal lead generation tools.

Forms can further be used to gather more information about the contact. Based on the demographic or preference information, more personalized emails can be sent in the future. Different associations value different information, so the fields can easily be customized to get the most important information required into the marketing database.

Associations use a wide variety of marketing tools (MailChimp, Campaign Monitor, Pardot, HubSpot, Marketing Cloud, etc.), many of which have form functionality. On of the most common platforms associations tend to use is Pardot. Pardot is a B2B Tool built on top of Salesforce, and makes it easy for users to create customized and user-friendly forms based your organization’s needs. While these forms appear advanced, they are easy to handle and maintain over time.

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There are two different form types available in Pardot: Forms and Form Handlers.

Pardot Forms

Pardot forms are designed and managed completely in Pardot. They are easy to use and collect information about people visiting your website or landing page, and can be set up quickly by using the Form Wizard tool. Benefits of using Pardot forms include:

  • Prevents data duplication by merging form submission with any existing prospect with the same email address
  • Includes progressive profiling
  • Invisible bot protection
  • Tracks form views and logs error data
  • Can be embedded in a Pardot landing page
  • Can set up automation rules based on form views
  • Displays customized “thank you” content after form submission

Form Handlers

Form Handlers connect Pardot to external forms, which allows you to funnel prospect information into Pardot. With Pardot’s form handlers, you can keep all your existing, styled web forms and still collect the data in Pardot. fusionSpan recommends form handlers if you have an extensive form infrastructure already in place, need total control of your form’s design, or just want to pass data back to Pardot from specific fields in pre-existing forms. Some features include:

  • Integrates with third-party forms
  • Integrates with Salesforce Web-to-Lead forms
  • Maintains existing web forms that are already styled to your association’s brand
  • Captures information from a form that may be writing information to multiple other databases

Progressive Profiling

Forms do not have to be static. Instead, associations can use progressive profiling to set up iterative forms that enable you to define which fields appear in order to gather even more information about the prospect. Every time a prospect fills out a form, you are progressively collecting valuable new information about them while keeping your form as short and easy to complete as possible. Pardot forms can dynamically change and hide questions based on what you already know about the prospects.

For example, let us say a prospect has already filled out a form with their name, company name, and email. If you want to ask the prospect for additional information, you can use progressive profiling to automatically replace one of the form fields they’ve already answered, like a company, and exchange it for a different field, like a phone number.

The benefits of progressive profiling include:

  • Shorter forms have better conversion rates
  • Progressive Profiling avoids repetition and saves time
  • Users are able to capture more valuable prospect intelligence over time

Completion Actions

Once a user fills out a form, you will want to take next steps with that lead. Pardot has a functionality called completion actions that allow you to immediately perform an action on a prospect record. Below are several examples of completion actions:

  • Automatically add new prospects to a welcome email nurture program/journey
  • Send auto-response after a form is completed
  • Send an email to the prospect asking them to sign up for additional email preferences
  • Assign prospects to a source campaign to later identify their member journey
  • Notify an association staff member that a prospect completed a form

Contact fusionSpan For More Assistance!

As you can see, forms are an easy-to-use yet effective tool. By using forms, you can enhance your customer’s journey and turn unidentified prospects into strong leads.

For more information on Pardot, Forms, or Marketing Automation, don’t hesitate to reach out to our talented Digital Strategy team here at fusionSpan!

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How Google Analytics Can Improve Your Association’s Digital Presence

Adam November 19th, 2020 by

As an association in an increasingly digital world, providing value to members through online-content is essential. However, it can be difficult to determine whether or not that value is truly being delivered without knowing how users are interacting with the content on your website.

By using Google Analytics, associations can measure return on investment, identify which digital strategies are successful, and understand what content is delivering the most value to members and non-members alike. The way that visitors interact with content on your website will either validate or invalidate your idea of what is valuable about your association and the services that you provide.

Let’s take a look at how Google Analytics can help inform your association’s digital strategy:

1. How Are Users Getting to Your Website?

Determining where users are coming from can help inform where your association’s marketing efforts are most successful, as well as areas that can use improvement. For instance, if most visitors land on your website through Facebook, that may be an indicator that your current social media strategy is successful.

However, you may also notice that your site is not getting a lot of traffic through organic search. That could mean that your website’s Search Engine Optimization (SEO) needs improvement. This type of information is extremely valuable and can be used to ensure that marketing budgets are allocated to the best-performing channels.

2. Which Pages of Your Website Are Receiving the Most Traffic?

Using Google Analytics, you can easily view which pages of your website attract the highest number of users. If you notice that some pages are receiving significantly more traffic than others, it may prove useful to incorporate certain design and content elements from successful pages more frequently throughout the site.

High traffic on a particular page may also have to do with how users are getting to that page. Perhaps one news post on your site was viewed significantly more than others, and the source (AKA medium) for that traffic was email. It may be that a link to that particular post was included in an email to members at the time it was posted. This knowledge may help inform a decision to focus more attention on email marketing campaigns.

3. How Long Are Visitors Staying on Your Website?

The length of time users stay on individual pages – or on your website in general – is a simple but crucial metric. Google Analytics breaks these visits into what they call “sessions.” As defined by Google Support, “A session is a group of user interactions with your website that take place within a given time frame.”

With Google Analytics, you can keep track of users’ average session duration that comes to your site. According to Databox, most digital marketers report an average session duration of about 2 to 3 minutes. If users spend less than 2 minutes on your site before leaving, it may be a good idea to review which pages have the lowest session duration and experiment with content updates on those pages.

Contact Our Digital Strategy Team for Additional Resources!

These are just a few examples of the vast array of tools that Google Analytics has to offer. Accurate and reliable data can bolster the success of any association’s digital strategy. Google Analytics provides you with that data and will give your association a clear picture of where to focus your digital efforts. Learning from your data is a big step toward meeting your organization’s goals.

The Digital Strategy team here at fusionSpan specializes in helping associations act on reaching those goals. Reach out today to learn more about how we can help you set up Google Analytics, learn from your data, and act to improve your success in the digital association space!

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Audit Your Marketing Presence Before Implementing a New System

Susan Baumbach September 10th, 2020 by

For many associations, this time spent working remotely has been a great opportunity to examine current processes and tools. A few months ago, I discussed how to evaluate your current marketing tool to determine if it fits your association’s current and future needs. If the result of that conversation was that a new system is needed, the next logical step is to determine which tool should be identified and implemented.

However, before going full steam ahead, I would recommend that your team do a full audit of all of your existing marketing assets and data sources. Going through this exercise will help ensure both a successful implementation, and reduce the number of surprises throughout the process.

My goal during discovery meetings with a new client is to gain a full understanding of everything that touches marketing and communications, but some small items may fall through the cracks because they are not top of mind for the client. Before a discovery meeting, whether internally or with an implementation partner, have your team review the items below to create an inventory of all marketing assets and ensure everything is included in the implementation plan.

Emails

Naturally, in an email marketing system, the first item is going to be emails. In fact, I have seen that Email Marketing is still the “glue” that holds the user experience together for many organizations.

Review the emails that you sent out over the last year and categorize them into buckets. This is helpful in making sure that your email preferences are aligned with what the organization actually sends out. If you don’t have email preferences, then take the opportunity during the implementation of a new system to offer them (and make sure to evaluate your use of transactional emails as well)!

When reviewing the emails, make sure you take a look at the email templates that are used. Do all of the emails use consistent templates, or is there a wide variety depending on the type of communication? Discuss as a group if the organization wants to redesign email templates or migrate the existing design to the new system.

If possible, review what email clients (Gmail versus Outlook, for example), most of your members use to read your emails. Make sure that when creating templates in the new system that they render properly for the most popular email clients your contacts use.

In addition, pictures that are uploaded to your legacy system will likely need to be downloaded and uploaded to the new system. I do not recommend linking to old pictures because once the contract expires on your legacy system, your pictures will mostly likely no longer be available in the future.

Data

Your legacy marketing system holds a wealth of information about how your members and prospects have interacted with your organization in the past. At the most basic level you know which contacts are subscribed or unsubscribed from receiving your emails. At a deeper level, you may know who opens up emails related to events versus educational opportunities. This behavioral information can be aggregated and added to the new system so you do not have to start from scratch.

A component of data is also mapping various data sources. For example, some associations have a stand-alone Event Management System that is used to manually create email lists from event registrations. Others may have a smaller database housing contact records – maybe for event sponsors or industry contacts.

List out all of these external data sources and identify what information needs to be pulled into the new marketing system. Think about reducing the amount of manual data transfer among the tools by understanding how they can integrate to achieve a continuous (or nightly) data sync.

Website and Analytics

Many marketing tools offer forms that can be added to the association’s website to generate new leads through a newsletter signup form. With the help of the IT Admin or Webmaster, review the website to find all the places where marketing forms are located. Create an inventory so you know what needs to be updated when the new system is launched. Make sure to note any forms managed by your current Association Management System (AMS), because they could potentially be replaced in your new marketing tool, if applicable.

While reviewing the website, check if there are any tracking codes from the legacy marketing system. In Pardot for example, tracking code can be added to the website to understand what webpages prospects are viewing and link that information to their record. All of this tracking code will need to be updated for a new system. Make sure to review the reports in the legacy system to identify if the locations of tracking code can be refined to get a better understanding of user behavior on your website. Finally, if Google Analytics is connected to your legacy marketing system, make sure that tracking code is updated as well.

Social Media Connections

Integrating email with social media campaigns is a common practice among associations. If your legacy marketing tool was used to manage social media posts for Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn, then make sure the new system is configured to handle those connections as well.

Business Processes

This category is a bit more abstract, but is extremely important to launching a new marketing system and ensuring the implementation runs smoothly. Think through how your organization leverages your current marketing system and identify areas where processes can be improved. For example, one client mentioned that they were missing a key piece of information about their members, so we figured out how to capture that in future initiatives.

Lastly, make sure that you know when your legacy marketing system is up for annual renewal. In some associations, that information lives with the finance team and not necessarily the marketing team. This is a question I have learned to ask up front so that everyone involved feels comfortable with the implementation timeline.

Taking the time to review all of the above items will help save everyone a potential headache during implementation, and ensure that the new marketing tool is optimized for your organization.

Contact fusionSpan For Your Digital Transformation!

Charting the course of digital spaces and larger transformations is daunting. Organizations often struggle to understand the options as well as the implications. At fusionSpan, our digital strategy team understands that a single website or platform is just one stopping point on the entire customer journey.

Contact us today for a consultation to talk about how to plan for your next implementation!

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Best Practices for Your Marketing Tool Spring Cleanup

Susan Baumbach April 2nd, 2020 by

Guess what? Your marketing system is so organized you do not need to do a thing!

April Fools! (belatedly)

In many marketing systems that fusionSpan audits, there are a number of outdated lists, old email drafts, and unorganized email content. Some of this is to be expected with multiple people working in the same system, so it is important to frequently review the tool to make sure it is organized and up-to-date. When doing a cleanup, think about a new staff member coming on board. They should be able to navigate the system without extraneous or irrelevant information around to trip them up.

On The Surface

Remove Test Data
Typically during the implementation of a new marketing tool, a number of test records are created. This may include test contacts, emails, email templates, automated programs, etc. Search through your system for test records and delete unnecessary ones. You still may want to keep some test records that you are actively working on, but just make sure to remove them when you are done.

Cleanup Marketing Lists
Many associations have a large number of lists used for marketing. Some of these are relevant month after month, but one-time lists will just clutter up your system. For example, there is one for collegiate members who are interested in recurring scholarship opportunities and another is for active members in the Western United States for a one-time webinar. To start the cleanup process, copy and paste the names of your lists into Excel or Word and categorize each one based on the frequency of use. Have all members of your marketing team do this exercise separately, and then compare results. Identify specific unused lists that are no longer needed, and either archive or delete them.

Email Templates and Email Drafts
Using email templates is a great way to have a unified marketing approach across all emails sent. Sometimes you use a template to create a draft email, but then it never gets sent for one reason or another. A year later the draft is still sitting there and you have since updated your templates. In order to reduce confusion about which templates are updated, make sure to clean up your old templates and unsent draft emails.

Pictures and Content
Graphics are a key component of good marketing because, as they say, a picture is worth a 1,000 words. Images and other content can easily be dumped into one main folder in your system. If that is the case, then think about a folder structure that makes sense for your association. Should graphic content be organized by year, type, or by specific events? Also, during this cleanup process, make sure you develop a standard naming convention for the files.

The Deep Clean

Once you have gone through and removed clutter from your system, then you can start thinking about several more advanced topics to ensure your overall marketing strategy is updated.

Segment Audiences Based on Previous Engagement
Review reports for each email you sent over the past month or two. If you see a dip in engagement, open or click rates, then segmenting your audience by previous engagement is an important step. It is important to identify which segment of your audience is contributing to that drop. In many tools, you can create a re-engagement campaign by identifying those contacts who have not opened an email in the last 3 months (or whatever timeline makes sense for your organization). If you send emails out frequently, several times a week, then having a shorter timeframe for engagement makes sense, compared to organizations that send an email once or twice a month. Use this new re-engagement list to funnel those contacts into an automated program designed for re-engagement. This may include a reminder about member benefits or discounts for upcoming events. In addition, add the re-engagement list as a suppression list on your regular email sends so that they do not get inundated with both regular emails and re-engagement emails.

Reassessing Your Marketing Goals
By springtime, many people’s New Year’s resolutions begin to wane. Think about what fresh ideas you had about your marketing strategy after coming back from the holiday break. Were you thinking about redesigning your email templates to ensure they render properly on the email clients your members use most? Did you want to develop a new drip campaign for the large conference coming up in the fall? Maybe you wanted to create cross-channel campaigns where members would receive content via email and social media outlets? Whatever your goal was, make sure that you are still working towards it! Ensure that you know how to evaluate if changes in marketing strategy are driving you closer to your goals.

Making sure to be vigilant in keeping your marketing tool free from redundancies or unused strategies will help to keep marketing costs low and free from preventable issues in the future.

Up Your Marketing Game by Evaluating Your Current Marketing Tool

Susan Baumbach March 5th, 2020 by

If anyone else were to enter your marketing platform, what would they find? Would they be shocked by the vast number of membership lists that are carefully dated so you can identify the most recent list? If they looked hard enough, how many duplicates would they find? You would immediately answer their probing questions by saying, “We have to manually update these marketing lists based on the most current information in the CRM. This is the way we have always done it.” A reasonable follow-up question would be, “Why are they not all connected?”

Whether or not this anecdote is relatable, a critical factor in a member’s experience with your association is the email content that gets delivered on mobile devices or desktop computers. There is a constant desire within associations to keep up with technological advancements to ensure a modernized and uniform membership experience. It is easy to keep the same email templates you have been using for the last several years or to manually update your mailing lists in the marketing tool based on reports in your CRM. By evaluating how you use your current marketing platform, your association can determine if the current product will meet your needs or if a new tool is required.

Whether or not your association is able to purchase a brand new platform right now, there are several key questions that you should discuss internally as the first step:

  • What features do we use and not use in our current tool?
  • Of the features that we use, are there any pain points or ways we can use it better?
  • Of the features that we do not use, do we want to use them in the future? Can we implement the new features internally or is outside assistance needed?
  • Are there any features that are missing from our current tool that we want to leverage in the future?
  • Are the reporting capabilities sufficient to answer key questions on how to improve our marketing strategy?
  • What other products can the platform integrate with? (i.e. Google Analytics, webinar app, etc.)

The table below is an illustration of how to organize the answers to those questions. The features listed are just a few examples available in a wide variety of online marketing platforms today. (Your list will likely be much longer!)

Feature Use Now? Future Use? Plan
A/B Test Emails No Yes Read about best practices and start using for event-related emails only.
Email Client Analysis Yes Yes Confirm the top three email clients our members use to read emails and optimize our existing templates for those clients.
Forms for Lead Generation Yes Yes
  • Pain Point: New leads are created in the marketing tool, but we don’t do anything with them.
  • Plan: Create an automated nurture program to send new leads content on membership benefits.
Create Dynamic Lists No Yes Need a way to sync updates from CRM to the marketing tool. Need outside assistance to integrate the two systems and receive support after the implementation.
Personalized Content Yes Yes Use merge fields, but want to develop dynamic content (text & images) based on contacts previous interactions with the website.

After your team has evaluated your current marketing platform, the next question to address is whether the existing tool will meet your needs, or if a new tool is required. Remember that implementing a new tool is not magically going to solve all of your problems, and there will likely be new issues that surface. For example, your existing tool does not allow you to automate journeys for potential members. Even if you upgrade to a new tool, automation does not mean that you can set it up and let it run indefinitely. Instead, you will want to view and analyze the data to further refine your journeys in the future.

Ultimately, the goal of this evaluation exercise is not to sell you on an upgrade, but rather to assist your association in determining current and future needs. Now go log into your marketing platform and start the conversation!

SEO Best Practice Tips to Increase Your Website Traffic

Adam February 20th, 2020 by

What is SEO?

While online platforms like social media and paid advertising can help drive users to your website, the vast majority of online traffic is generated through organic search (i.e. Google). Therefore, it is important that your website appears when someone uses a search engine to look for content relevant to your site. This begs the question: “How do I increase my ranking in Google’s search results?” The answer is easy in theory, but difficult in practice – improve your Search Engine Optimization (SEO).

SEO is the process of increasing the amount (and quality) of a website’s traffic through organic search engine results. The basis for what defines “good SEO” is a constantly moving target, so there is no be-all-end-all for companies to boost their site to the top of search engine results. With that said, there are a handful of best practices that can be leveraged to help increase your ranking in organic search engines.

How Can I Improve My Website’s SEO?

Crawling in SEO is the process by which search engines crawler/ spiders/bots scan a website and collect details about each page: titles, images, keywords, other linked pages, etc.

  • Mobile-friendly design: According to a report published by Statista, the number of mobile searches worldwide surpassed the number of desktop searches for the first time, in 2018. Google puts a lot of weight on mobile-responsive design when crawling websites to determine how they should rank in their search results.
  • Quality content: Admittedly, Google’s quality guidelines are a bit ambiguous. However, there seems to be a theme around the idea of building websites for users, not for search engines. Although “quality content” is subjective and not clearly defined, keeping your users in mind during every step of developing your content is a crucial factor in driving traffic to your site (in general and through organic search).
  • Accessibility: Developing content with high-level web accessibility should be at the forefront of your SEO priorities. It’s important to consider the wide demographic of users that visit your site, even website viewers with conditions like color blindness or vision loss. Websites that comply with accessibility best practices will rank higher among organic search results. One example of these best practices is including descriptions of content like images or infographics using Alt Attributes. Assistive technologies (i.e. screen readers) rely on these descriptions to convey what is being displayed to users who may have trouble seeing your content.

AIt Attribute: The alt attribute is the HTML attribute used in HTML and XHTML documents to specify alternative text (alt text) that is to be rendered when the element to which it is applied cannot be rendered.

The alt atribute is used by “screen reader” software so that a person who is listening to the content of a webpage (for instance, a person who is blind) can interact with this element

Why is it Important to Follow SEO Best Practices?

The answer to this question may seem obvious – “to improve my website’s ranking on Google!” While this certainly is a desired outcome of using SEO best practices, you’re also providing a better user experience (UX) for your audience. The subsequent boost in the search results is a reward for having a high-quality website that gives your users what they want. Simply put, if you’re making your users happy you are making Google happy, and your site will be rewarded with a higher ranking in organic search results.

The techniques listed above are just a few ways that you can level up your website’s SEO. Google keeps their search algorithm under pretty tight wraps, so none of us know exactly what the recipe is for a perfectly search-optimized site. What we can do is try to provide the best possible experience for our users by considering what we would want (and expect) as users.

Regular WordPress Maintenance – The Unsung Hero

Mary Glavin March 22nd, 2016 by

metro-698661_960_720It was a gorgeous 70 degrees in the District of Columbia on a Wednesday in March, yet offices and business fronts alike reflected attendance and a buzz comparable to a snow day. A vital mode of transportation to many of greater washington DC area commuters, the metro, closed down completely for 29 hours for emergency inspection due to poor planning and inadequate maintenance. Problems happen; but the magnitude of damage is something that can usually be controlled to some extent by forethought and proactive measures.

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