Find the Perfect Grant Tracking Platform For Your Company or Nonprofit

Grant management can be a significant investment for your company or nonprofit. Keeping track of your grants, grant applications, grant awards, and grant reports is a serious task that can keep you and your team busy. Finding ways to streamline grant management for your nonprofit or your company can save you time and money, as well as helping you get the most out of every grant.

Why Nonprofits Need Grant Management Software

For nonprofits, grant management software is a great way to streamline your applications and reporting to make sure every grant is awarded and executed effectively. You can keep your program staff on the same page about grant reporting requirements as well as make sure that everyone understands what will make future grant applications successful. Grant management software can also help your nonprofit keep track of who needs to submit or review your grant application or reports by automating the process and allowing you to assign tasks to different members of your team.

Grant management software is a key part of effectively applying for, executing, and reporting on the grants your nonprofit receives. Make sure you have a system in place to keep your team on the same page and avoid missing any deadlines — which in turn helps preserve your relationship with the company or foundation that made the grant and gives you the best chance at future grant awards for your nonprofit.

Why Companies Need Grant Management Software

The CSR program at your company likely involves grants, and finding a way to manage all the administration and logistical tasks for this part of your corporate giving can be challenging. Grant management software for your company can help you streamline grant applications, including the review process and approval stage, as well as create a simple system to collect grant reports and other important data.

An effective grant management tool like DonationXchange can save your CSR team time and money while also helping you track the success of your grant awards.

Grant Management Basics for Nonprofits

There are several key steps to grant management for nonprofits. An effective grant management software solution can help with every step of your grant process. Grant applications are one of the most important parts of grant management — by investing time to get organized in this stage, you can avoid issues later in the grant management process.

Clear Goals and Reporting Outcomes

The outcomes of your grant should be clear and measurable. The foundation or corporation who gives you the grant will use the outcomes you list in your application for your eventual grant report. Make sure your program staff is aligned on outcomes and how to measure them, and make it very clear in your application just what kind of results the grant will make possible. This streamlines your grant management process — and with the right grant management software, you can keep your team on the same page and get things done quickly.

Tracking Your Grant Results Quantitatively and Qualitatively

Managing a grant after it is awarded requires you to track your results. The best grant result tracking includes both quantitative data, like the number of people impacted or services provided, as well as qualitative data, like stories of people the grant impacted. By showing the ways the grant made a difference, you’ll help the foundation or company who funded the program connect the money they gave to the ways it made a positive impact. This can help with applying for the grant again in the future, as well as improving your relationship with your funders. High quality stories, quotes, interviews, and photos can make a big difference.

Grant Management Basics for Companies

If your company gives out grants to nonprofits in your community, you may find that managing those grants becomes a significant challenge. There are a lot of things to keep track of and it’s easy for things to fall through the cracks, especially if grant management for your company is just part of someone’s job. Successful grant management for your company includes managing grant applications and review, grant awards, grant reporting, and overall CSR reporting.

Grant Applications and?Review

Managing all the grant applications your company gets can be difficult. By finding an effective grant management software solution like DonationXchange, you can track grant applications throughout the process. By setting up an application prequiz, you can screen applicants to make sure they are aligned with your funding priorities. You can also manage grant applications after they are submitted to assign applications for review to different team members and track where the application is in the process. Robust grant management software also offers capabilities like IRS nonprofit status verification and more.

Grant Awards

Tools like DonationXchange can help you award grants even down to transferring money directly to the account of the nonprofit. A bank transfer can securely get your funding to the nonprofit without dealing with mailing a check, which is especially helpful if your team or the nonprofit team is working remotely.

Grant and CSR Program Reporting

An important part of the grant management process is collecting reports from the nonprofits you fund. By using grant management software like DonationXchange to collect grant reports, you can gather all the data in one place and seamlessly pull reports on your overall CSR program with a few clicks. Make sure that you ask for tangible, actionable results from your nonprofit partners, including both qualitative and quantitative impacts. These will make showcasing the impact of your CSR program as a whole even easier.

Features Your Grant Management Software?Needs

Not all grant management software is created equal. The best grant management software has robust capabilities with an easy user interface that your team can quickly learn and understand. It’s generally a good idea to avoid retrofitting another product to also function for grant management, as it will add a lot of extra work for your team. Here are a few other key features your grant management software needs.

Integration with Other?Software

The best grant management software easily integrates with other software your team uses. Whether that’s your donor management system, accounts payable, or other software, the ability to integrate with other software is a key feature of effective grant management software.

Looks

Aesthetics aren’t everything, but looking professional and up-to-date helps your grantseekers trust your organization, feel confident they are in the right place, and feel comfortable submitted detailed and privileged information.

Customization

Being able to customize fields and update the branding of the tool is incredibly helpful and goes a long way to making it an effective solution. Options like cascading forms and connecting to external databases like GuideStar can help make sure your grantseekers give you all the details you need.

Simple application process

By making it simple and easy to fill out a grant and to reapply for a new cycle, you save grantseekers’ time so they can do other important work — along with building appreciation and trust with these partners. Make sure that any grant management software allows you to customize the application to capture the information you need.

Pre-Screen Grant Applicants with Custom Surveys

Use a pre-screening quiz to evaluate if a grant or sponsorship applicant is a good fit for the funding focus of your company. You can ask about the nonprofit’s focus area, timeline of the project they are asking you to fund, and other basic information that can help you avoid sorting through applications that don’t fit your CSR program.

The Top 10 Best Grant Management Software Tools for Nonprofits and Companies

Finding the best grant management software can be challenging with a crowded field with different capabilities. Some tools also struggle to help with grant management for companies and are more focused on tracking the grants a nonprofit has applied for — if you’re a company looking for a good grant management software solution, make sure that the tool you are considering is set up for your needs.

Here are a few pros and cons of the best grant management software tools available:

DonationXchange

Pros: DonationXchange allows for multiple user roles to streamline your administration and evaluation of applications, migration of past data into the platform to encapsulate all the information in one place, and direct ACH depositing of grants. On top of this, the platform allows instant 501c3 status verification, supports international grants, embedded application forms, and many other features.With no processing fees and only a small setup fee, it’s a cost effective solution for your grant management.

Cons: As one of the most customizable and versatile solutions on the market, DonationXchange really only has one flaw — you’re not using it yet.

DonationXchange’s Grant Management Tools

Successful grant management programs have many moving parts and overseeing your entire team’s administrative tasks can quickly become overwhelming. There are many responsibilities that come with applying for and awarding grants, such as planning, design, program development and tracking. It is far too easy to let one or more of those responsibilities to fall by the wayside, resulting in an inefficient grant program.

DonationXchange Can Help.

CyberGrants

Pros: One of the best-known grant management solutions, Cybergrants allows you to integrate with your website, instantly verify a nonprofit’s 501c3 status, and create unlimited custom fields.

Cons: Unfortunately, with large name recognition also comes a significant investment — this solution involves both implementation costs and ongoing fees. Some users have also noted this grant management tool can have a steep learning curve and require support for relatively basic updates to application forms and more.

Flux

Pros: Flux allows grant payment scheduling, compliance checks, and an open API system if you have a developer on staff to integrate with other tools.

Cons: Unfortunately, Flux is not the most aesthetically pleasing solution and lacks some other communication and management features.

Submittable

Pros: API ability allows you to integrate with tools like Salesforce and Quickbooks, along with easily customizable forms.

Cons: Some users have noted that Submittable does not allow multiple user types to review grants. This grant management tool also has a high cost with a limited number of users allowed.

WizeHive

Pros: WizeHive is consistently praised as a simple grant management solution with easy-to-build forms and customization options. It’s also more affordable than some other options.

Cons: Each year of applications and grants is separated, which means separate logins and reporting every year a grantseeker submits. Users also note that you can’t duplicate and reuse applications or forms year over year, which can add an extra level of work for your team.

Optimy

Pros: Optimy allows for customization of the software to fit what your company needs for grant management, as well as effectively organization grant and sponsorship requests.

Cons: Setting up forms and other tasks in Optimy have a bit of a learning curve, according to users. There are also some capabilities that have not rolled out yet.

Amplifund

Pros: Amplifund allows user to track data points from their grants in a separate interface and not only in documents, making it easier to track trends and collate data.

Cons: Some users report issues with forms and exporting working correctly. Most users also report a steep learning curve with a fairly complicated grant management interface and difficulty understanding the data tables in the tool.

Smart Simple Grants Management

Pros: Smart Simple allows you to build workflows to automate your communication about reporting or other concerns after awarding a grant. The tool has a robust list of features and automation capabilities.

Cons: Some users have noted a steep learning curve and a need to have a developer on staff to implement most of the automated features.

SurveyMonkey Apply

Pros: SurveyMonkey Apply is very customizable with lots of training available. Users can even assume the role of someone applying to help troubleshoot and understand the process. This grant management tool is very customizable with lots of training available. Users can also assume the role of someone applying to help troubleshoot.

Cons: Users note that SurveyMonkey apply requires quite a bit of lead time to implement effectively. Quite a bit of lead time to implement effectively.

Foundant

Pros: Fondant integrates with GuideStar to allow download of a nonprofit’s public profile into the application. You can set up access codes for some applications and assign specific evaluators, as well as allowing grantseekers to copy answers from past applications.

Cons: Some users have found struggled with Foundant’s learning curve.

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