Planning to Hire a Salesforce Nonprofit Consultant? Here’s What you Need to Know

1. Planning to Hire a Salesforce Nonprofit Consultant?Here’sWhat you Need toKnow Whywouldyouneedastrategytohireaconsultant,right? Like go on an XYZ review website and hire the best one? Simple?No? Of course,not. sales@crmjetty.com

2. Hiring a consultant, especially a consultant for Salesforce NPSP can be tricky. Finding is easy, choosing is hard. Well, choosingtherightoneis. So, you definitely need some heads up as to how to hire a salesforce nonprofitconsultant. Inthisarticle,wearegoing totalkabout8thingsthatmight seem obvious but are definitely difficult to execute as well asrememberwhileactuallyconductingtheprocessofhiring a salesforce nonprofitconsultant. Let’sstart. Create abudget Salesforce consultants come at a heavy price. Before hiring youhaveto ask afewquestionstoyourself.Howmuchdoes your company need one and how much of the budget can you spend on it to get optimal ROI. Things that this budget will need to cover: Salesforce NPSP deployment costs, third party software for integration as well as consultation charges. Youcannotgointosuchanexpenselightly.Thinkitthrough and plan itout. sales@crmjetty.com

3. What will your Salesforce consultant do for your organization? Now that we have a clear idea about the budget, let’s talk vision andimpact. You are an NGO and you definitely have your ethics and morals with which you operate. So, you need to be upfront aboutthatwhiletalkingtopotentialconsultants. Tell them about your vision, your operations, and what you are trying to accomplish with your NGO. And more importantly, ask questions. About their operations, ethics, morals, and how they work in general. Try and understand what kind of skillset and people will they be bringing to this deal What can they do for your organization that a random consultantoraconsultancyfirmcan’t? Try and analyze their uniqueness, understand their technology stack, their expertise in the said task, their executionexcellence. ChecktheportfoliosoftheSalesforceconsultants Withanykindofhiringcomesabackgroundcheck.Whether you hire freelancers or a Salesforce consulting company, look into their portfolios. How many companies havethey sales@crmjetty.com

4. worked with? What was the scale of these projects? This is especially important since you are a non profit. If your consultant is used to working only with for-profit companies,theirworkmightnotalignwithyours. So, find a consultant that has experience and expertise working withnonprofits. Create a shortlist with prosand cons By this step, you would have already made a mental list of theconsultantswiththemostimpressiveworkandpeople. So, why notmake it official? sales@crmjetty.com

5. Simply create a Google Sheet and add the names of the consultants or consultancy firms that stood out to you, add their work, their contact details, work experience, pros, cons, skills, recommendations,etc. This will give you an overview of the potential consultants you arerapping. Moreover, you can also create a grading system for the same so as to keep all the stakeholders on the same page whichmakesthefuturecommunicationsmoother. Pro Tip: Add a remarks column to add your views about them from when you’ll get in touch with them. You can also addacolumnmentioningthetimeanddateofmeetingwith a particularconsultant. Fix a consultationtimeline Thethingaboutconsultationisthatit’snotaforeverkindof partnership.Youdon’twantthemtooverstaytheirwelcome and make you an invoice you didn’t plan for. However, this does not mean you won’t need them after the initial level. So, fix a timeline for the project. And plan for contingencies. Once that is done, let them work their magic. Over the years, as you scale, you will need them again, or you might even need regular guidelines. Establish yourpreferences sales@crmjetty.com

6. and plan for the long term with them. This way, neither of you will be caughtoff guard. What process will they follow to on-board your organization? Best of the consultants always have a process in-tact to onboardtheircustomers,nomattertheirsize.Theyarevery particular about the team they have for you, the tools they use to manage their projects, the platforms they use to communicate with clients, and the coding and QA practices theyfollowforthebestoutcome. Their proposal will be a reflection of their onboarding process and how they themselves work internally.You don’t want a cluttered team that’s still trying to figure out how to work theworks. So, keep an eye out for the details they provide about technology stack, platforms, tools, team, skillset, etc. and ask them if they’ll be flexible in terms of collaboration platform. And if not, how are they going to educate you abouttheircurrentsetoftools? This will give you a pretty good idea of the kind of experience you are going to have working with themduring thetimelineyouagreedonforconsultationwork. sales@crmjetty.com

7. Find yourmatch While yes you have to find a consultant that can get the job done, that’s not all. You also need them to play well with yourteam.Onlythenwilltheprocessbefrictionlessandcan betakenforwardeasily.That’sabigchecklisttofollow: ✔Portfolio ✔Non profitexpertise ✔Teamchemistry Ifanyofthesethreearemissing,it willnotworkoutforyou. sales@crmjetty.com

8. Integrate their work into your long term goal and with your in houseteam Your work relationships need to help you get better at your work, sure. But they also need to help you stay there once their job is done. Just like that, your salesforce consultants should also integrate with your team and train them to a certain extent. They should be able to help you strategize foralongerterm,keepinginmindyourbiggergoalsandget yourinhousedevelopmentteamtobeself-reliantregarding updatesandchangesfromSalesforce. All these points will help you find the perfect tech partner youneedasyourSalesforceNonprofitconsultant. Twomorethingsthatyoumightliketoconsider: ✔ See if they are philanthropic themselves. Their contributiontothecommunityandsocietywilltellyoualot aboutthem. ✔ Salesforce Nonprofit Consultant certification. Salesforce isveryparticularthatway.So,makesuretheconsultantyou arechoosinghasthatcertificationandisalsouptothedate with all the updates so as to provide you with the proper consultationyourequiretobringchangeinthecommunity. sales@crmjetty.com

9. Aboutus: CRMJetty is a hub of innovative customer relationship solutions. Our tools ensure that you can render enhanced interactions at each stage of your customer lifecycle. So, if you are searching for the right technology partner to help you deploy your Salesforce NPSP, then you are in the right space.Wehaveservedinthisindustryforadecadeandhave helped many NGOs deploy NPSP along with a good portal solution. Get in touch with us and we’ll help you kick start yourjourneytowardsmakingthisworldabetterplace. Source: https://www.crmjetty.com/blog/hire-a-salesforce-nonprofit-con sultant/ sales@crmjetty.com