The Limitations of Team Raiser

Aaron Rothberg

Hi Everyone-


We're close to purchasing Team Raiser to replace Kintera/Sphere and although I'm excited for the product in general, I've already found a few short comings that make me a little less excited. My observations below were identified through asking the demo folks lots of questions which is difficult when you don't know what to ask. I'm curious what issues Team Raiser Admins have come across they are willing to share that I will need to plan contingencies for.


So far I've learned:

• All Team Raiser constituents come into a Raiser's Edge Event as Event Registrants. They cannot come over as Event Sponsors unless we purchase the Omatic integration for another $10,000 ($17,000 over three years).
• We cannot enter offline gifts into Raiser's Edge and have them sync to Team Raiser unless we buy the Omatic integration.
• We cannot split gifts across Appeals, only Funds. (not a big deal)
• We cannot link Team Raiser Event Registration Participant Types to specific Raiser's Edge Event Price levels.

Are there other Team Raiser gotchas folks would like to share that would be helpful for us to know as we plan our deployment?

Paul St Onge

Hi Aaron, we're a Blackbaud partner and won partner of the year in 2014 & 2105. We specialize in TR. Regarding Omatic I heard that they are starting to offer a cheaper option of their solution if you only need it for TR or LO integration. If you'd like to chat through your other issues and other issues to consider, let me know! paul.stonge@hjcnewmedia.com


Paul.


Aaron Rothberg:

Hi Everyone-


We're close to purchasing Team Raiser to replace Kintera/Sphere and although I'm excited for the product in general, I've already found a few short comings that make me a little less excited. My observations below were identified through asking the demo folks lots of questions which is difficult when you don't know what to ask. I'm curious what issues Team Raiser Admins have come across they are willing to share that I will need to plan contingencies for.


So far I've learned:

• All Team Raiser constituents come into a Raiser's Edge Event as Event Registrants. They cannot come over as Event Sponsors unless we purchase the Omatic integration for another $10,000 ($17,000 over three years).
• We cannot enter offline gifts into Raiser's Edge and have them sync to Team Raiser unless we buy the Omatic integration.
• We cannot split gifts across Appeals, only Funds. (not a big deal)
• We cannot link Team Raiser Event Registration Participant Types to specific Raiser's Edge Event Price levels.

Are there other Team Raiser gotchas folks would like to share that would be helpful for us to know as we plan our deployment?

 

 

Brian Mucha

If you have secondary registration on, sometimes a parent will register the minor first and then themselves. This puts the payment on the minor's record.


A user can only register once per event (not great when using TR for ongoing P2P.)


Also, go and check out the IDEAS forum and browse through the TR related suggestions. That should give you a feeling for what fixes or features people are asking for.


Edit: Link - https://luminateonline.ideas.aha.io/ideas/search?utf8=✓&query=teamraiser

 

Aaron Rothberg

Also, go and check out the IDEAS forum and browse through the TR related suggestions. That should give you a feeling for what fixes or features people are asking for.

Great idea! Thanks Brian. I'll check it out.

Brian Mucha

Another one I hear a lot of around here is lack of payment methods. BB is pretty slow with adopting new stuff, and Paypal isn't impressing anyone these days. I hear Venmo and ApplePay requests all the time. I think both of those are on the roadmap, though really its pretty late.


The community has a lot of fixes, tricks and work arounds for UI stuff - especially if you can handle some html and jquery - but there isn't much you can do about the fundamentals like that.

Erik Rubadeau 3

Hi  Aaron,  


there's certainly differnces between the two programs, and no doubt TR has it's limitations but over all I think Teamraiser is one of the best p2p options in the market. That said we have definitely built our fair share of hacks and workarounds for our clients over the years. 


Not it sure if the BB sales reps shared this with you, but It might also help point out a few of the key differences between sphere and TR. 

https://www.blackbaud.com/files/resources/downloads/2015/Sphere_to_LuminateOnline_OverviewGuide.pdf


You may also want to have a chat with JMG solutions since they have a data connector solution as well that I understand is relatively flexible and reasonably priced. 


Cheers,

Erik




 

Aaron Rothberg:

Hi Everyone-


We're close to purchasing Team Raiser to replace Kintera/Sphere and although I'm excited for the product in general, I've already found a few short comings that make me a little less excited. My observations below were identified through asking the demo folks lots of questions which is difficult when you don't know what to ask. I'm curious what issues Team Raiser Admins have come across they are willing to share that I will need to plan contingencies for.


So far I've learned:

• All Team Raiser constituents come into a Raiser's Edge Event as Event Registrants. They cannot come over as Event Sponsors unless we purchase the Omatic integration for another $10,000 ($17,000 over three years).
• We cannot enter offline gifts into Raiser's Edge and have them sync to Team Raiser unless we buy the Omatic integration.
• We cannot split gifts across Appeals, only Funds. (not a big deal)
• We cannot link Team Raiser Event Registration Participant Types to specific Raiser's Edge Event Price levels.

Are there other Team Raiser gotchas folks would like to share that would be helpful for us to know as we plan our deployment?

 

 

Jennifer Castellanos-Graham

I love Teamraiser - however there are some draw backs, as I too came from Kintera.

 

• 1. a Friends asking Friends event has everything in one portfolio:  (event participants, walker supporters, donors, and sponsors). 
  • TR you have participants and walker supporters, with a notation if the person self donated
  • Sponsors you have to set up on a Donations Management form
    • This report will NOT sync with your TR report for your event
    • Nor will it show up on your Event Manager Portal for reports
      • A sub-admin login is required to access this reports for my volunteers
  • Customization is TR is quite robust
    • beneficial if you know CSS/JAVA and are familiar with Luminate's unique "S-Tag" system.
      • If you're like me ...you're in for some work/research or money for developers needed
  • Added motivational items like Milestone badges
    • Out of the box for $ raised - excellent!
    • Secondary badges for items like social sharing - developers needed
  • Social sharing is huge in what it captures
    • In Kintera it did it naturally
    • In TR you have to set up a Janrain account and program each social module
    • The Login portion is easy, the rest - a developer is needed

I've been a client now of LO/TR for a year and we have really enjoyed the system.  My heartaches are from any changes we want to make after the primary set up has been made.  Each thing requires a developer. 


Hope this helps!


JCG



Aaron Rothberg:

Hi Everyone-


We're close to purchasing Team Raiser to replace Kintera/Sphere and although I'm excited for the product in general, I've already found a few short comings that make me a little less excited. My observations below were identified through asking the demo folks lots of questions which is difficult when you don't know what to ask. I'm curious what issues Team Raiser Admins have come across they are willing to share that I will need to plan contingencies for.


So far I've learned:

• All Team Raiser constituents come into a Raiser's Edge Event as Event Registrants. They cannot come over as Event Sponsors unless we purchase the Omatic integration for another $10,000 ($17,000 over three years).
• We cannot enter offline gifts into Raiser's Edge and have them sync to Team Raiser unless we buy the Omatic integration.
• We cannot split gifts across Appeals, only Funds. (not a big deal)
• We cannot link Team Raiser Event Registration Participant Types to specific Raiser's Edge Event Price levels.

Are there other Team Raiser gotchas folks would like to share that would be helpful for us to know as we plan our deployment?