SmartSimple at the Grants Managers Network (GMN) 10th Annual Conference
March is a busy month for conferences,
and while our team is currently in New York attending the 2015 Summit on
Employee Engagement in Corporate Citizenship, hosted
by Charities @ Work, we wanted to share our experiences from last week’s
GMN Annual Conference.
“I thought it was a great experience,”
says Eric Lauer, Director, Client Care and Marketing, “There was a major focus
this year on measurement, and how to achieve valuable, actionable feedback that
can be used to encourage more donations.”
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| Eric Lauer and Gary Modlin at the SmartSimple booth. |
As a first time attendee of the GMN,
Eric was excited to share his experiences. “Attending this event gave me an
opportunity to get feedback from both current and prospective clients,” he says.
“I brought home new ideas and insights for improving our system and for future
upgrade features. Face to face meetings at conferences are extremely valuable
for interacting with clients who may not think to email or call us.”
“Our team is very open to discuss issues
and concerns with the community. We are receptive to questions because we care
and want to know where we need to grow and develop to accommodate the unique
requirements of the philanthropic community,” continues Eric.
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| Kelly Jackson presenting at our vendor-sponsored session. |
As well as having a presence as a
vendor, SmartSimple also hosted a learning session. Entitled Lessons Learned – The Vendor, The Client and
The Grants Management System, this was an opportunity to walk people
through key steps used to streamline the change management process. Eric, Gary
Modlin, Director, Business Development, and Todd Lapin, Director of Strategic
Accounts, were joined by two SmartSimple clients. Shavon Doyle-Holton from the Grand Rapids Community Foundation, Kelly Jackson from Feeding America,
presented their own personal insight into working through a grants management
system implementation, sharing their experiences and tips with others looking
to introduce a software system into their process.
“Having our clients host the session
with us was a real bonus. I think being able to hear about the ins and outs of bringing
software into an organization from the client’s side is much more valuable in a
setting like GMN. Grants managers want to hear from other grants managers on a
topic like this rather than just from the vendor’s perspective.”
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| Shavon Doyle-Holton speaks to attendees at our session. |
In addition to the session, SmartSimple
hosted an evening event. “This was just an opportunity for us to spend some
relaxed social time with the community and just enjoy everyone’s company.”
Coming up is our own SmartSimple 4th
Annual Community Conference on Wednesday, April 15th here in
Toronto, Canada, and we’d love to have you attend! Space is limited, so be sure
to sign-up on our conference
registration page.
Check out our
website for upcoming
webinars, to sign up for our monthly newsletter, or request a demo of our
system.
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