Recently we've had a few folks ask if we could provide a template that would demonstrate how to format data properly for import. Ask and ye shall receive!

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Have any new staff, volunteers or interns using Salsa? Make sure they sign up to attend our new user orientation (see the events page for upcoming webinars). If they can't attend, teel free to pass along the 8 page New User Orientation Powerpoint (pdf) from the presentation.

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One of the first things you need to do as a new user of Salsa is to setup an email template. We are here to help.

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Do you work for an arts-focused organization? If so you are probably feeling the fundraising crunch. For those of you who may be located in the D.C. metro region, the Kennedy Center has announced a program that will "devote significant time and up to $500,000 in expenses to provide emergency planning for fundraising, budgeting, marketing or other strategies" to nonprofits in need.

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Occasionally you might attempt to import a file and get an error message, or maybe you complete the import but notice that there are error messages associated with the import. This blog post is a brief summary of what these different errors mean.

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It is the time of year where many organizations have end-of-year fundraising appeals on the brain. With that in mind, I thought I'd share some best practices about things to consider when setting up your first donation page in Salsa.

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It took some finagling, but you finally got the money and the buy-in from the big wigs at your organization to switch to Salsa. The ink has hardly dried on your contract and you are already itching to get your data transferred. (We can't blame you, Salsa is pretty cool!)

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Bailouts got you down? What better way to show your organization is paying attention and relevant, than with rapid response tools such as petitions and campaigns.

These tactics on their own won't do much (well, except grow your list!). Consider combining them with a strategy that includes an offline approach, such as printing and delivering your petitions in a creative way, along with calls, in-person visits, etc.

Below is a great example from member group, Campaign for Fresh Air and Clean Politics, who used Salsa to take action on the bailout. Notice how they also used the "letter to the editor" tool and sign-in page.

Tell Congress: Stop the Bailout

Letter to the Editor

Sign in form (keep me updated about the bailout)

If you're thinking, well our group doesn't work on financial issues, think again. This bailout and stock crash will effect everyone's organization, whether it's a massive hit from your funders or a trickle down policy effect. If you don't have a clear target or strategy now, use a petition tool to broadly state that your group is concerned about "x" and how it relates to your issue. This will grow and engage your list and perhaps provide political fodder.

It's probably the only way folks will listen when everyone is thinking about finances. Bring it back to where people are at.

Making change is about endless pressure endlessly applied.

p.s DIA would love to share other examples of how folks are responding the the crisis, especially with issues that aren't immediately connected.

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As we've mentioned before getting email design from the interface to your member's inbox is not as simple as one might hope. Luckily, a well designed email template can not only help you deliver an email that more closely resembles your vision, but can also lead to consistency between emails and speed up the time each blast takes to create.

Use a Template

The over whelming majority of users need to use an email template. We want to use a template to 'protect' some parts of our HTML for both consistency and to ensure critical parts of the HTML are not altered during the creation of a blast.

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CRM, CMS, e-mail, video, databases ... don't know where to start with an approach to the web? Let John Kenyon orient you in this podcast from last summer's Craigslist Nonprofit Boot Camp. By way of the rich a/v trove at Social Innovation Conversations. We didn't only recommend it because he endorsed us. Really.

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