Embracing Age is a small Christian charity with a big mission to mobilise volunteers to befriend care home residents, support informal carers and help churches in their work with older people. They are giving a talk on 13 September 2023 about their journey to integrate CiviCRM.
In September 2022 they decided they needed a new CRM system that would grow with them and give a rounded picture of each contact’s journey with the charity, including donations given and events attended. But there was no budget and no IT department. They were already cloud-based on Google Workspace and had an extensive website using Weebly CMS.
They will share some of their journey of how they have successfully integrated CiviCRM into their daily operations, including:
- Integration with Weebly CMS and Google Workspace
- Recruitment and management of volunteers
- Online donations (including UK Gift Aid)
- Event management (fundraising initiatives, carer and church event management)
- Care home resident referrals
- Volunteer vetting and placement case management
From the outset, Embracing Age prioritized automation to maximize efficiency. Leveraging Google forms, form processors, message templates, CiviRules, and payment processors, they automated various processes while ensuring strict control over user access and information visibility. Access control lists and extensions like Contact Layout Editor and Relationship Block were instrumental in safeguarding data and tailoring user experiences.
This ongoing journey of adopting CiviCRM, and ensuring its sustainability on a limited budget, continues to evolve. Embracing Age will discuss upcoming milestones, including bulk emailing capabilities and automation of volunteer hours and training logging, highlighting their commitment to continuous improvement and enhancing operational efficiency.
Throughout their adoption of CiviCRM, Embracing Age encountered their fair share of challenges, wrong turns, and frustrations. They will candidly share these experiences, providing invaluable insights into the real-world implementation of CiviCRM for a small charity and how they navigated obstacles along the way.
Listen to their story at CiviUsers UK on 13 September 2023:
