Community Renewal Society chooses Kintera, Alford implements

Kintera, Inc. announced that the Community Renewal Society has completed integration to Kintera’s social CRM system. Nonprofit sector consultants the Alford Group integrated more than 50,000 records and 23,000 historical financial transactions into the Kintera Sphere social CRM system by means of coding accuracy support system address validation. The Community Renewal will now be able to capture subscriber information and billing information in the consolidated Kintera Sphere database. “Community Renewal has a complicated data structure, and integrating and consolidating on the Kintera Sphere database platform enables us to better manage information at our organization," said Community Renewal Society COO Marsha S. Clesceri.

“The Alford Group’s integration has allowed us to synchronize data between Kintera Sphere and our existing data sources and accounting software.” The Chicago-based Community Renewal Society was founded in 1882 with a mission statement to “build a just society in Chicago, free of racism and poverty and in which all of its members live with dignity.” More concretely, the Community Renewal Society network includes advocacy, training, various organizational services and print media. The ages-old organization decided to make the large leap in modernization as adaptation. Said Alford Group senior consultant Brian M. Worrall, “In today’s competitive environment, nonprofits are increasingly required to streamline their operations and increase philanthropic revenue.

The decision Community Renewal made to improve its efficiency and streamline information and knowledge management utilizing Kintera Sphere will position it strongly for the future.” The Alford Group Inc. was founded in 1979 to, as stated in its mission statement, “provide leadership in improving the quality of life by strengthening not-for-profits.” Through providing services such as fundraising and resource development, knowledge management solutions and organizational development has the Alford Group strengthened some 1,500 nonprofit businesses since its inception.

Kintera Inc. is an online solution provider for nonprofit organizations. Kintera’s trademarked innovations such as the Friends Asking Friends program and the software platform Kintera Sphere, and claims over 15,000 accounts. As timely and tangible proof of their results, Kintera representatives announced three weeks ago that the rise in customer growth has continued into the first quarter of 2006 and that new agreements representing a value of approximately $8.8 million had been sealed in the quarter alone.