Women’s Center and Shelter of Greater Pittsburgh

Women’s Center and Shelter of Greater Pittsburgh Gets All-in-One Solution with NetCommunity Grow

The most haunting issues that cast the darkest clouds over our society seem to be challenged only through the undaunted courage of a few. One of these pertinent problems involves the utterly disturbing case of domestic abuse. Since its founding in 1974, the Women’s Center & Shelter of Greater Pittsburgh(WC&S) has been at the forefront of the domestic abuse struggle. Through strategic and innovative programs, the organization has fervently worked towards curbing domestic violence, while providing services to more than 5,200 victims yearly.

The Challenge:

• The Women’s Shelter was in need of a CRM application to enable mass email communication.
• The organization wanted to better utilize email communications to solicit donations, increase awareness, encourage activism, and share information. 
• Additionally, The Women’s Shelter needed an email solution that would enable it to segment its constituents into a number of groups based on engagement and involvement.

The Solution:

• The Women’s Center selected Blackbaud NetCommunity Grow because it integrates with The Raiser’s Edge, gave the organization a new website with greater functionality, and provided email capabilities with the necessary functionality.
• Additionally, the email capabilities in NetCommunity Grow enables The Women’s Center to effectively segment and electronically communicate with its various audiences.
• The Center is able to decrease the amount and time spent creating and sending direct mail pieces, gift acknowledgement letters, and various other necessary communications.
• With other vendors, The Women’s Center would have had to consistently import and export data.

The Results:

• With Blackbaud NetCommunity Grow, The Women’s Center got a CRM application and a website for the price of one. 
• With its first email campaign, The Center experienced an email open rate of 34 percent and a clickthrough rate of 13 percent - industry average is 14 percent and 2.55 percent respectively.
• The first email campaign yielded a 2.3 percent rate of return.
• Since implementing NetCommunity Grow, the Center has doubled its number of total gifts and total donors.
• Increased total dollars raised 133 percent.