Andy Burns

🚨 Another email subject line 🚨 You’ve seen it with generative AI the quick fix for mass blast emails or social media posts; emojis dropped in to make content look exciting. Red alarms, sparkles, flame icons. It’s meant to cut through the noise, but more often it just feels like noise itself. The problem isn’t […]

I normally take Flixbus when I travel in Europe. It’s inexpensive and has wide coverage, so it’s pretty popular too. But for some reason I got myopic while in Germany on using trains and booked a ticket on the ICE train from Berlin down to Nuremberg. Initially I thought I made a mistake, it was

I recently received this question from a client running events every week. They wanted to send an introductory email about the sessions without the typical event confirmation email message template info: I created a smart group for an upcoming study group. Can I use it so new registrants get the introductory email automatically, or is

In my last note, I laid out the problem with hourly billing: it shifts all the risk onto you and has a tenuous connection to outcomes. So what’s the alternative? Fixed-price projects. Here’s why they work better for both sides: Think about it: why would you want to pay more for someone to take longer?

I’m going to say something that might be totally alien to some of you, but paying hourly can have little to do with the outcomes you want. It only feels normal because we’ve been conditioned by an industrial revolution mindset: punch in, punch out, pay by the hour. That may have worked on a factory

Can we be honest? Humans aren’t especially great at thinking long-term. That’s why cheap looks a bit too attractive—it tempting to go with, even if it costs you more in the long run. Take Walmart. It’s busy every weekend because people are drawn to low cost. You grab the plastic widget that does the job

At the start of a CRM project, price often takes up a good deal of the conversation. Boards want to prove they’re being careful with donor dollars. Committees sometimes run rigid RFP processes that boil everything down to a single number. Then that allows them to line consultants up like me and get “apples to

With most commercial CRMs, you don’t have that much control for what you pay. Growth pushes you into higher tiers, adds fees for extra user seats, and features you need can be locked behind pricier plans. CiviCRM doesn’t play that game. You can grow as big as what value you delivering your constituents. And it

Most commercial CRMs hit you with a penalty for success: The feature one also gets tricky, because they always stash the stuff you will need eventually into a higher tier. Just search some CRM’s now and tell me what you find. Here’s the deal: Besides the higher ongoing subscription fees you’re committed to as long

In my last note, I talked about how a potential client went with Wild Apricot as member management tool because it was better than standing still. That’s true. It was not sustainable to do nothing. But it also comes with a catch that most nonprofits don’t see until they’re in it: recurring payments vendor lock-in.