Science and Technology Centers

No matter your size or the complexity of your needs, we’ve got the best-fit solution for your science or technology center.

We understand the unique daily challenges science and technology centers face, like complex access control requirements, managing large, popular exhibits, running multifaceted membership programs, and serving as an educational resource for all ages. You’re challenged to be many different things at one time. And, of course, you have to do all this in the face of funding uncertainty, staff turnover, and decreased participation. Sound familiar?

We help busy science and technology centers meet these challenges by providing best-in-class ticketing solutions, as well as the industry’s best fundraising, CRM, and financial management solutions. Each of these solutions “talks” to the others, which means that we offer the only truly integrated product for managing all of your science and technology center’s needs.

Learn more about Altru, or read on to hear how we help with:

• Online Ticketing
• Ticketing & Admissions
• Fundraising
• Membership
• Internet Solutions
• Group Sales
• Retail Point of Sale
• Financial Management

Learn how our products work together as Blackbaud’s Arts and Cultural Solution (PDF).

"Museums of all types and sizes – from aquariums and historic sites to art museums and zoos – are always searching for more efficient ways to do business, particularly in this economic climate. As AAM continually strives to advocate on behalf of the field and provide outstanding service to our members, we applaud Blackbaud for its Corporate Affinity Partnership and for providing this new solution at a discount to AAM members." — Ford W. Bell, President, American Association of Museums

Regardless of the size of your ticketing office or visitor services operation, The Patron Edge is the only solution your organization will ever need to:

• Manage all ticketing, membership, and subscription sales
• Boost ticket sales and cut expenses
• Build and strengthen relationships with patrons
• Demonstrate increased financial accountability, fostering a positive community image

Read more about The Patron Edge for general admission organizations.





Fundraising

Cultural organizations know that effective fundraising is contingent upon building solid relationships. Contributions begin with good communication and continue only when you maintain a genuine, focused interest in your patrons over time. To cultivate these relationships, you must value the information you collect as your greatest asset. 

The Raiser’s Edge defines and streamlines the process of cultivating relationships by helping you manage and sustain an extensive interaction database, differentiating your organization from dozens (or hundreds) more that are vying for the generosity of your patrons.

Find out how The Raiser’s Edge specifically helps arts and cultural organizations (PDF) or check out how The Raiser’s Edge helps all types of organizations.





Membership

Blackbaud’s Membership Management Solution is specifically designed to help arts and cultural organizations attract, retain, and upgrade members. Easy-to-use reporting tools and website management features allow your organization to focus on building and fostering lifelong relationships with your members.

Learn more about Blackbaud's Membership Management solution (PDF).





Internet Solutions

In today’s busy world, it’s easy to lose touch with your patrons. But your ability to help maintain relationships between your supporters carries immense value. By helping them stay connected, you’re helping to maintain your own enduring connection with them. You create a dynamic, two-way communication vehicle to help you stay in touch as your organization and base of patrons and supporters evolve. Often, patrons wish to stay in touch but find your organization’s communication vehicles — website, email, or direct mail — impersonal, confusing, and frustrating. Without a sense of “belonging” to your organization, patrons quickly become busy and focus on other organizations soliciting their donations, and you lose valuable financial supporters. But when you provide the vehicle to help them stay connected and make critical next-step transitions, you foster a mutual friendship that benefits both your organization and your patrons.

Blackbaud® NetCommunity enables your organization to create an interactive online network for patrons and supporters, fostering a sense of connectivity between them and your organization and significantly reducing the amount of time and money your staff must spend on administrative tasks. Best of all, it seamlessly integrates with The Raiser’s Edge®, our comprehensive fundraising and constituent relationship management solution, so you always have a single source of up-to-date patron information across your entire organization.

With Blackbaud NetCommunity, patrons may visit your website and receive timely, targeted communications at their convenience, wherever they have access to the Internet. When patrons log in, the system creates personalized web pages unique to their interests, with appeals specifically targeted to them. They can communicate with other patrons and search customized directories for other patrons.

Find out more about how Blackbaud NetCommunity can work for you.





Group Sales

In The Patron Edge, Blackbaud’s group sales solution, you can process group sales orders in addition to single ticket sales. For example, if a school group tours your museum as a field trip, you can sell a group of tickets and manage details about the order. With group sales in The Patron Edge, you can take orders for future events without creating the events in advance and change details about the group order, such as dates and number of visitors. You can control capacity and assign guides or resources to events.

Group sales in The Patron Edge offers your patrons the convenience of advanced booking and provides the tools necessary to effectively manage your group sales reservations and collect comprehensive data for group visits and audit order.

With group sales, you can sell admission tickets or general admission event tickets to an entire group at once. You can process the payments at the time of sale, or you can reserve the tickets for the group and accept payment later. Once you make a sale, you can add additional tickets to a group order.

With group sales, you can reserve tickets when a customer selects tickets for a group and postpones paying for them. When the customer is ready to pay, you can easily locate the tickets on the general admission screen and accept and record the payment. If the customer needs to make changes to the order, you can update or delete a reservation. Once you place a reservation for a group order, if the customer needs to add tickets to the group order, you can update the reservation at any time.

Because so many components make a group’s visit with your organization a success, the Group Order Details screen serves as a central location to store all the details about the group order and the group itself. From the Group Order Details screen, you can manage specific details about tickets, contacts, guides, resources, and notes.

Learn more about The Patron Edge and what it can do for you.





Retail Point of Sale

Retail point-of-sale systems are quickly becoming the new benchmark in all walks of retail — from museum shops to thrift stores. Electronic cash registers and outdated retail software pale in comparison to the point-of-sale systems available today.

Blackbaud provides CounterPoint to cultural organizations to help you make and save more money, sell online, retain and find new customers, run a more efficient business, and improve customer relationships. 

Check out the top 10 reasons you should convert to CounterPoint (PDF) to find out what it can do for you .

Want to know how integration between CounterPoint, The Raiser’s Edge, and The Financial Edge (PDF) can revolutionize how you do business and how effective you are at raising money?  You’ve come to the right place.





Fianancial Management

The reality is that today’s economic climate poses tough new challenges for cultural organizations. With increased competition for revenue and funding sources and dwindling numbers of volunteers, members, and patrons, cultural organizations of all sizes find that they must differentiate themselves from other nonprofits competing for their patrons’ dollars and time. As a result, successful cultural organizations have adopted a more aggressive approach toward financial management.

Blackbaud’s The Financial Edge gives you the power and versatility you need to make smart strategic decisions. Capable of standing alone or fully integrating with The Raiser’s Edge, our fundraising solution, and The Patron Edge, our ticketing solution, The Financial Edge is the only financial management solution you can trust to take your accounting data to the next level.

Get the details on what The Financial Edge (PDF) can do for your cultural organization or check out how The Financial Edge helps all types of organizations.