Shelter Cymru opts for Harlequin

Shelter Cymru opts for Harlequin as part of 2020 Vision

Shelter Cymru has selected Harlequin CRM software to be a central resource in its strategy to achieve financial independence and a 10,000 strong supporter base by 2020.

With an income of £4 million, Shelter Cymru is Wales’s leading people and homes charity. It is delivering a long term strategy that identified the implementation of a new charity CRM system to replace its aging in-house software as an initial priority.

Louise Bennett, Head of Fundraising at Shelter Cymru explains: “With our ‘2020 Vision’ we aim to move from a reliance on public funding to a broader fundraising portfolio and increase the reach of our campaigning. The system will help us to target relevant supporters with the right message using the profiling and communications tools. It will also cut the time taken to consolidate donation information, including Virgin Money and Just Giving income, which will benefit both the finance and fundraising teams. We need to use data in a better way and by 2020 we hope to have 10,000 engaged supporters on our database.”

As well as the core CRM system with individual giving, campaigns, grants and legacy tools, the charity has opted for the events module. Initial donor acquisition activities include street and telephone fundraising, which require data consolidation work. Integration with the charity’s SAGE accounting software will also be delivered.

Louise Bennett adds: “We chose Harlequin as the software is easy-to-use and logical, and offers the breadth of functionality that will help us to evolve. We want more time to focus on our supporters and could see that using some systems would simply eat up that extra time.”

Tom Ellis, Managing Director of Harlequin concludes:  “Shelter Cymru is a perfect fit for Harlequin. As a growing, mid-sized charity our software will be a central component in helping to achieve its strategic goals, offering functionality and new features that can be utilised along the way.”

More about Shelter Cymru

Shelter Cymru is Wales’s people and homes charity. It believes that a decent secure home is a fundamental right and essential to the health and well-being of people and communities.

It provides independent specialist advice, advocacy and legal representation for anyone with housing problems. Last year, its advisers provided face-to-face help for nearly 16,000 people from all over Wales, helping to prevent homelessness in 80 per cent of cases where it was threatened. Meanwhile, over 238,000 people visited its Advice Online pages for help.

Through its campaigning, research and policy work it influences the legislative agenda relating to housing and homelessness in Wales, while its education service aims to prevent homelessness by working with young people and providing detailed teaching and learning resources.

www.sheltercymru.org.uk


Posted on May 5, 2015 by Tom Ellis