Greater Giving vs. Kindsight iWave

Greater Giving is well suited for an organization that is looking to save money on their event software and need a full service solution. It is not as sophisticated as others on the market, but it will allow you to get everything you need done for a reasonable price. This is meant to be used by nonprofit event professionals.

Incentivized

iWave is a great resource for getting a big picture understanding of a donor and their potential alignment to your organization. There may be times if you are wanting to dive deeper into a particular facet of the donor profile that you would need to continue researching through other sources. Overall iWave has a user-friendly interface and is a must-have program for any prospect researcher.

Incentivized

• Greater Giving is very user-friendly for both staff and volunteers
• Greater Giving sales and receipt generating features are well received by the guest at our event
• Greater Giving provides excellent customer support - in particular, their "night of" event support

Incentivized

• iWave is very user friendly. It did not take long at all to figure out the most efficient way to use their website. There are many Training Webinars and a support center. Customer Support is very helpful.
• The credits you purchase are only used if you use a batch screening. Individual screening is unlimited.
• We have found that the information discovered in iWave about our donors is up-to-date and accurate.
• The Foundations/Charities search function is particularly helpful. You are able to see the financials, 990s, grants awarded, and the people connected to the organizations all in one place without having to search the internet.

Incentivized

• Love to see more places to log expenses, so you can run a total report of net income.
• It's often a bit wide for my screen, which I can work around.

Incentivized

• The biggest piece of missing functionality has been data integration with Raiser's Edge, but iWave is working feverishly with Importacular to make that an option for users as well. I expect that process to be more user-friendly in the next year or so.
• I love that iWave is always adding new data sources to their 360 Search with Database USA being the newest piece. I hope the "COMING SOON" section of that data source will be populated soon.

Incentivized

Greater Giving is very intuitive. It’s easy to set up in the backend and change as needed. Anytime we couldn’t figure something out on our own, our customer service representative was always available and super helpful!

Incentivized

I think it's very usable, but think the variety of different search functions, search by features can get confusing and overwhelm the user. I would prefer a "master" search function instead of having the user need to figure out to search by company name, employee's name, employee's title, etc. The website is a great resource and my team utilizes its uses often.

Incentivized

Online support was one of the worst customer service experiences I've ever had (I would give them a 1). Phone support and implementation support were very nice and knowledgeable.

iWave customer support is more responsive than most software platforms I currently use. My requests are always handled promptly, and support is incredibly responsive, friendly, and patient. Plus, I can always get someone on the phone immediately if I need a problem resolved right then and there. In addition to the live and personal support, the iWave knowledge base is frequently update with new content, including video webinars that help you become a more powerful user of the software.

Incentivized

We currently use Eventbrite for our pre-event ticket and sponsorship sales as they have a much more streamlined webpage that is customizable, they allow us to pass on the fees to our purchasers, AND they do not charge an annual fee on top of the processing fees. However, they do not have the ability to let you swipe a credit card in advance - you need a membership to Bidding for Good to do so. We tried using Eventbrite and Bidding for Good for only 1 event before we switched back to Greater Giving. Neither platform allowed you to send out tax receipts and the on-site event management was subpar compared to the ease of Greater Giving.

Incentivized

W e originally selected iWave because w e believed the return on our ROI would happen faster than it would with Donor search. Looking back, I wish we had realized that is kind of how it goes with major giving in general. We also didn't have a system the linked to DonorSearch at the time and iWaves reports pulling seemed simpler for our database type.

Incentivized

• Having one system that can manage online donations, ticket purchases, online auction, donor tax letters, etc. has created efficiency for my org.
• Reports are flawed and lack of data integration with other systems causes me to do a lot of unnecessary manual work.

• Every year following our annual gala we run a list of all event attendees to learn more about their interests and giving history. This has led us to new board and/or major donor candidates.
• iWave helps us understand details and less-known interests of our current donors, which helps us with donor stewardship. In today's digital age, these personal details help craft relevant stewardship and communications plans with our existing supporters. With so many competing charities, these small differences can account for a supporter to choose your organization over others who aren't making that personal connecting to the donor.

Incentivized