Product Blogs

• The User’s Edge — The official blog of The Raiser’s Edge
• The Ledger — The official blog of The Financial Edge
• The Spotlight — The official blog of The Patron Edge
• The Book Bag — Blackbaud’s school software blog

Personal Blogs

• Connections — Steve MacLaughlin, Director of Internet Solutions
• Navigating the Fundraising Universe — Jim Bush, Enterprise Bus. Architect
• Webby Things — Chad Norman, Manager of Internet Marketing

Corporate Blogs

• From the Doc Side — The Product Documentation Team Blog
• Blackbaud News — Up-to-date Blackbaud News

Industry Blogs

• NetWits — Internet marketing, communication, tools, and technology

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The User’s Edge: The Official Blog of the Raiser’s Edge
The Ledger: The Official Blog of The Financial Edge
The Spotlight: The Official Blog of The Patron Edge

There are also a couple of personal blogs: Steve MacLaughlin’s Connections and my own Webby Things. The infamous Jim Bush is next, along with a few more brave souls we’re coaxing out of the ‘baud. Stay tuned for more, or just subscribe to Blackbaud Blogs (rss) and let us come to you.

One of the coolest parts about building software is designing for extensibility. When you are building a system that must support extensibility you apply much more rigor around what programming interfaces are exposed, being sure they are resilient from release to release, and a whole host of other technical goo that I won’t bore you with. Extensibility is something we paid strict attention to in Blackbaud NetCommunity’s (BBNC) platform architecture.

The “cool” part comes when you look out at the BBNC developer community and see how many compelling solutions our customers and 3rd parties are building using the BBNC API. I’m not going to sugar coat it, this stuff takes solid programming skills and a good grasp of Web technologies, but if you posses those skills, this is a pretty rich canvas.

Frankly, the technical nature of the API has probably led us to be a bit too reticent in regards to discussing it. In the past, if a customer inquired, we’d happily respond with a link to the SDK and send them on their way. We’re working hard to get better in this area. This API layer has shipped “in the box” with BBNC since day one, and we’ve reached the point where people are blogging about it and discussing it in peer support forums etc. The API ecosystem has arrived so, expect to see continued momentum on this front from Blackbaud. I’ll include some links to some great resources for aspiring BBNC developers below. While we don’t have programming phone support around the API, there is a LOT of information out there now, and plenty of folks using it on their live Web Sites.

The BBNC Component Model

First, a little background. The NetCommunity component model is based around the concept of “parts.” Parts typically are designed around very specific scenarios (Take an online donation, self-service profile updates, targeting content based on member demographics etc.). Pages are typically composed of a number of parts which ultimately is served up as a Web Site’s content. Now, an important goal of the team was that these parts have a configuration user interface that a non-uber-Web-guru could be productive with. With each release of BBNC we refine existing parts, and roll out new ones. This has worked very well.

Enter the Developer - The BBNC API

So, given a well defined component model and set of core design idioms, the logical next step was making this architecture “pluggable.” The goal here was to provide the APIs, SDKs, samples and tools that a reasonably skilled developer could leverage to build their very own “custom” part that would surface in the system to the folks building the site as if they were intrinsic parts. Here were the high level scenarios we wanted to support in the API:

• Support for adding custom parts into the system, treated as fist class parts by all designer interfaces of BBNC.
• Support for fetching key data from The Raiser’s Edge via a custom Web Services based API extension mechanism.
• Support for riding on BBNC’s secure transaction pipleine for cases where data obtained by a custom part needs to be downloaded securely and processed in RE.

In the end, the resulting API supports all the key scenarios outlined above, and it really is gratifying to see what enterprising developers out there have built with minimal guidance from Blackbaud! Like I said, we’re getting better in this area.

Resources for Aspiring BBNC Coders

The NetCommunity API Wiki - Comprehensive set of documentation and samples in open Wiki format. Please contribute information!

Blackbaud Labs - At Blackbaud Labs we periodically release cool samples and screen casts covering the entire Blackbaud technology portfolio. We have featured BBNC’s API a lot recently so we encourage you to have a look.

There’s more to come, so sit tight. And thanks to all the developers out there building on the platform. The next release of BBNC has a good chunk of new stuff targeted directly at improving the API based on your feedback to date.

The book covers a variety of important topics related to how nonprofit organizations can leverage Web 2.0 and other social networking technologies.

The contributors to People to People Fundraising bring with them a lot of experience and this is an excellent way to either start or enhance your understanding of this important trend.

My task during the writing process was to put together the introductory chapter for the book. So the challenge was to paint a broad, but still vivid and engaging, picture of what people to people fundraising means in order to setup the rest of the book. Amazon.com has the “search inside” feature setup and the chapter appears as the excerpt. Click here to take a look at some of what made it into print, including this paragraph of prose:

“A fundamental reality of fundraising is that people give to people with causes, not to organizations. Buildings and brochures may in some ways influence people, but they cannot hold a conversation. People need to feel a personal connection to the causes and initiatives they choose to donate to. The power of personal content, communication, and collaboration all combine to create a sense of community.”

So where do we go from here? Lots of places, hopefully. Over the next year I will be spending a lot of time writing and talking about applying the notion of people to people fundraising in a variety of different ways. As always, this needs to be a two-way conversation so you feedback and ideas are very important. With that in mind there will be some upcoming ways to get engaged in the dialogue. Stay tuned…

Head over to Blackbaud Labs and watch the short screen cast. I’m excited at the thought of what you guys will do with the platform!

Go Red Sox!

Before I get to the meat of what I want to talk about today, a very quick intro. Unlike some of the others on the blog, I’m a bit less techy. I’m a word person. As such, I want to talk about the power of words…

What first drew you to your own organization? What was it about the mission, the people, the results that made you want to dedicate your time? What gets you out of bed in the morning?

Whatever the answers to those questions, those are probably the same things that are going to motivate donors and volunteers. As you all know, it’s much harder to say no during a face-to-face solicitation then it is over the phone or through the mail. If your communications with prospective donors and volunteers personifies your mission, it’s going to be equally hard to say no.

Use the voice of the people on the ground—blogs from community organizers or field agents, videos of the direct benefits of your work, recordings of the beautiful music you create, and donor stories that tell why a person had to give are all ways to get your message out there.

This is what your freshman composition teacher was talking about when he or she said “Show; don’t tell.”

It’s one thing to say my organization provides medical help to third-world countries. It’s another to show you the before and after pictures that show what a difference removing a five-pound tumor from someone’s face makes (if you’re brave—some of the images are on the graphic side: http://www.mercyships.org/site/c.agLOI4OFKrF/b.1078001/k.AC82/Success_Stories.htm). Creating that human connection is what makes people open their hearts (and subsequently, their pocketbooks).

You’re probably saying, “We already do that. We have a whole section on our Web site for success stories.” But that generally requires digging. It means that someone has to care enough about your organization to go looking for the story. You want to catch the casual surfer and keep that person’s attention. Keep your success stories. Having that library shows the range of your successes. But also feature a Reader’s Digest version of your most compelling success on your Home page. Link it to the full version and the rest of your successes. Keep the stories human and include whatever detail pulled at your heart. Combine it with easy access to a donate button and who knows what might happen.

I’m going to try and share of bit of that obsession with you and see how it can be applied to help nonprofits communicate in ever more effective and creative ways. Hopefully you’ll join in the conversation and we’ll get some real communication going!

Prior to Blackbaud I was getting my master’s degree at Texas A&M in Science and Technology Journalism. Before that I was fully immersed in the science side of things studying Physics at Ithaca College. You know you better watch out when you find someone who likes math AND commas.

http://www.ymca.net/
http://www.salvationarmyusa.org/
http://www.redcross.org/
http://www.catholiccharitiesusa.org/
http://www.goodwill.org/
http://www.ujc.org/
http://www.mskcc.org/
http://www.bgca.org/
http://www.americares.org/
http://www.habitat.org/
http://www.cancer.org/
http://www.nature.org/
http://www.worldvision.org/
http://www.plannedparenthood.org/
http://www.giftsinkind.org/
http://www.feedthechildren.org/
http://www.voa.org/
http://www.scouting.org/
http://www.easterseals.com
http://www.foodforthepoor.org
http://www.girlscouts.org/
http://www.crs.org/
http://www.shrinershq.org/
http://www.care.org/
http://www.americanheart.org/
http://www.dana-farber.org/
http://www.secondharvest.org/
http://www.ywca.org
http://www.si.edu/
http://www.pbs.org/
http://www.stjude.org/
http://www.cityofhope.org/
http://www.unicefusa.org/
http://www.childrenshospitalla.org/
http://www.ccci.org/
http://www.ucp.org/
http://www.savethechildren.org/
http://www.map.org/
http://www.moma.org/
www.samaritanspurse.org/
http://www.metmuseum.org/
http://www.fhcrc.org/
http://www.aed.org/
http://www.brothersbrother.org/
http://www.mfah.org/
http://www.bbbs.org/
http://www.ob.org/
http://www.nwmedicalteams.org
http://www.cbn.com/
http://www.metoperafamily.org
http://www.jdc.org/
http://www.marchofdimes.com/
http://www.directrelief.org/
http://www.compassion.com/
http://www.nmha.org/
http://www.cmalliance.org/
http://www.leukemia-lymphoma.org
http://www.diabetes.org
http://www.nmss.org/
http://www.theirc.org/
http://www.cff.org/
http://www.specialolympics.org
http://www.alz.org/
http://www.cmmb.org/
http://www.ducks.org/
http://www.wcs.org/
http://www.christianchildrensfund.org/
http://www.uncf.org/
http://www.girlsandboystown.org/
http://www.younglife.org/
http://www.iie.org/
http://www.artic.edu/
http://www.tbn.org/
http://www.mda.org/
http://www.amnh.org/
http://www.mercycorps.org/
http://www.girlsinc.org/
http://www.jdrf.org/
http://www.wish.org/
http://www.history.org/
http://www.komen.org/
http://www.crista.org/
http://www.nga.gov/
http://www.cartercenter.org/
http://www.wgbh.org/
http://www.lungusa.org/
http://www.npr.org/
http://www.mfa.org/
http://www.hadassah.org
http://www.tpl.org/
http://www.kennedy-center.org/
http://www.thirteen.org/
http://www.ja.org/
http://www.rotary.org/
http://www.dav.org/
http://www.projecthope.org/
http://www.family.org/
http://www.arthritis.org/