Discussions - Recent Threads

Assistance with Tribute (memorials/honorariums) and listings, please!

Jonathan Wysong — Fri, 05 Apr 2024 18:17:40 GMT

Hi all,

We have been recording tribute gifts using an appeal called LO FYXX Tribute, with each source being a separate "in memory/honor of...."

Next week, I'm going to need to list our tributes out in a way that looks like the following:

In honor of Teddy Abrams
Mr. William Abrams and Ms. Karen O’Leary

Assuming that the "in honor of Teddy Abrams" portion is the source description, how can I export the data that links each gift to that source?

I am used to doing a list where the criteria is a specific source code in order to produce contact information for families (notificants) of the tribute so that they can thank the donors for their gifts, but that list often needs to be further edited because it pulls gifts in not related to the source itself (basically if a constituent makes a gift with that source, it gives me all the gifts on record for that constituent and not just the one related to the source). I'd prefer not to have to do that for this project, so I'm curious if I am doing something wrong in my output sets or if there is a better way to get what I want.

Reminder: Two TLCC Opportunities!

Colleen Miller — Wed, 03 Apr 2024 16:48:02 GMT

As a reminder there are two TLCC-based opportunities with deadlines closing in!

CALL FOR TLCC PRESENTERS

All are welcome to submit presentation proposals, no matter your experience with Tessitura. Presenters will receive a 25% discount on the conference registration fee, and support will be available to help you prepare your presentation. Session proposals are due by Wednesday, 10 April. Learn more and submit your ideas.

APPLY FOR A TLCC SCHOLARSHIP

Tessitura is offering 10 scholarships for TLCC 2024 in Washington, DC, including seven Diversity Scholarships and three Emerging Leaders Scholarships.

Scholars will be awarded complimentary conference registration. This includes:

All sessions
All networking events
All conference meals and refreshment breaks (except Tuesday evening, which is a build-your-own networking night)
Access to conference materials and presentations

Scholars will be responsible for their own travel expenses and lodging.

All applications and letters of recommendation must be received by April 17, 2024. The Scholarship Committee will notify all candidates about its decision by May 10, 2024.

If you or someone you know is interested in applying for a scholarship you can find more information here.

GENERAL TLCC REMINDERS

Here is some helpful, general information about TLCC Washington, D.C.:

Dates and location:

TLCC Washington, D.C. will take place Sunday, 11 August through Wednesday, 14 August at the Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center.

Registration information:

Registration opens Tuesday, 30 April.
Early bird registration $1,595 through 31 May
Regular registration $1,745 through 12 July
Last call registration $1,995 through 6 August

Virtual Viewing Pass option:

A Virtual Viewing Pass will include live access to all general sessions and 48 concurrent breakout sessions, as well as recordings of those sessions.
Registration for the Virtual Viewing Pass is $575 through last call on 6 August.
On demand access to conference content after the conference is $625.

Helpful TLCC Washington, D.C. web pages:

TLCC Washington, D.C.: TLCC Washington, D.C.
Registration info: Registration
Hotel info: TLCC Washington, D.C. Hotel & travel
Call for presenters info: Call for Presenters

Fundraising Expenses

Colleen Miller — Wed, 27 Mar 2024 19:38:19 GMT

Hey all! I'm working on a presentation for our board to give them a sense of our fundraising expenses vs. what we raise within a fiscal year (like I'm sure some of you have experienced, they don't seem to understand how far we stretch a dollar to make sure contributed income can elevate the art above all else 🙃). I'd love to also be able to talk through the standard at other arts and humanities organizations for perspective. Is anyone willing to share what percent of their organizations contributed income goes toward expenses? I'm specifically interested in looking at non-Gala special events (opening nights, stewardship receptions, etc.) I appreciate your insights!

Opportunity - TLCC 2024 Scholarship!

Colleen Miller — Tue, 19 Mar 2024 15:41:09 GMT

Tessitura is offering 10 scholarships for TLCC 2024 in Washington, DC, including seven Diversity Scholarships and three Emerging Leaders Scholarships.

Scholars will be awarded complimentary conference registration. This includes:

All sessions
All networking events
All conference meals and refreshment breaks (except Tuesday evening, which is a build-your-own networking night)
Access to conference materials and presentations

Scholars will be responsible for their own travel expenses and lodging.

All applications and letters of recommendation must be received by April 17, 2024. The Scholarship Committee will notify all candidates about its decision by May 10, 2024.

If you or someone you know is interested in applying for a scholarship you can find more information here.

Elevated Events Reporting

Sue Llende — Mon, 04 Mar 2024 14:57:23 GMT

Hello All! We've started using Elevated Events to capture high level data on non-ticketed events. We've created an event for each instance and are recording the event date, number of attendees and revenue. I'm struggling to find a report that shows these basic pieces of data for our events and don't see that this data is available in Analytics. Does anyone use this functionality and if so, can you share how you output this data? Thanks in advance!

Constituency Codes

Jessica Zakula — Thu, 29 Feb 2024 15:35:13 GMT

I was wondering if anyone could shed some light around constituency codes.

For some, these codes are manually added to a constituent, but for others, there are a set of rules in place for the code to automatically be added/updated if the constituent meets the criteria in the set rules. For us, the code in question is in our associated membership level. My question is, if we manually add this code that is tied to our membership levels, will the membership rules engage and update accordingly, or is it an independent code that will just stay on the constituent until we remove it?

Thank you in advance!

TLCC DC - Call for Presenters is Open!

Colleen Miller — Tue, 27 Feb 2024 16:02:58 GMT

Hi all! The call for for TLCC Washington, DC is officially open! Here are the details:

All are welcome to submit presentation proposals, no matter your experience with Tessitura. Presenters will receive a 25% discount on the conference registration fee, and support will be available to help you prepare your presentation. Session proposals are due by Wednesday, 10 April. Learn more and submit your ideas.

Here is some helpful, general information about TLCC Washington, D.C.:

Dates and location:

TLCC Washington, D.C. will take place Sunday, 11 August through Wednesday, 14 August at the Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center.

Registration information:

Registration opens Tuesday, 30 April.
Early bird registration $1,595 through 31 May
Regular registration $1,745 through 12 July
Last call registration $1,995 through 6 August

Virtual Viewing Pass option:

A Virtual Viewing Pass will include live access to all general sessions and 48 concurrent breakout sessions, as well as recordings of those sessions.
Registration for the Virtual Viewing Pass is $575 through last call on 6 August.
On demand access to conference content after the conference is $625.

Helpful TLCC Washington, D.C. web pages:

TLCC Washington, D.C.: TLCC Washington, D.C.
Registration info: Registration
Hotel info: TLCC Washington, D.C. Hotel & travel
Call for presenters info: Call for Presenters

Feedback on Using Tap Pay Devices to Fundraise (Tiptap vs. Dipjar)

OTC Marketing and Development — Tue, 20 Feb 2024 17:25:45 GMT

Hello,

We are considering using tap and pay devices to add to our theatre's fundraising efforts. Does anyone have any experience fundraising with either TIPTAP or DIPJAR? What are the positive or negative experiences you have had while using these services? Any and all feedback is greatly appreciated. Thanks!

February Lean Coffee Discussion Notes

Colleen Miller — Mon, 12 Feb 2024 21:58:45 GMT

Thank you to those of you who were able to join us today for our Lean Coffee discussion! We had some great topics covered. Here are the notes for anyone unable to join us: communitytest.tessitura.com/.../sessionsummary_2D00_12Feb2024_2D00_19_2D00_05_2D00_00_2D00_PM.pdf

LYBUNT/SYBUNT

Megan Quinn — Wed, 07 Feb 2024 14:43:43 GMT

How do you set up your LYBUNT/SYBUNT reports? Thanks!

Switching memberships from fixed to rolling

T.C. Brown — Fri, 02 Feb 2024 19:06:26 GMT

Hi,

In our consortium, one of our organizations is currently using a fixed membership to track annual donations. They are interested in changing their membership structure to a rolling membership to better manage their donors and when solicitations for annual gifts should be sent.

I’m curious if anyone has changed their membership structure from fixed to rolling? If so, what steps did you take? Were there any hurdles you encountered? Is there something you wish you would have done differently?

Thanks for any advice anyone can offer.

Best,

T.C. Brown

Pittsburgh Cultural Trust Consortium

Cross posted in Memberships; and Fundraising.

Importing MSA data

Lindsay Rogillio — Fri, 02 Feb 2024 14:03:03 GMT

Has anyone successfully imported MSA data? We'd like to use this data in segmentation in order to pull prospect lists based on an MSA region.

We were told we could import the data into the Geographic Areas (TR_GEO_AREA) table, and that there's a process that runs on the backend to tie the constituent's address to the MSA region.

What we've found it that the process has each key programmed line by line to update each address based on the zip code. So it appears to us we would have to update the table, then rewrite the whole process. Has anyone already done this and would be willing to walk us through how you did it? Or if you've found a more efficient way to write the process instead of programming line by line?

Cumulative Giving in a Fiscal Year

Renée Cox — Thu, 01 Feb 2024 18:30:52 GMT

Does anyone know I how could get a list of folks who gave over a certain amount in a given fiscal year? This list has to include one-time gifts and cumulative giving. Coming up with a list of folks who gave one gift over my threshold is easily done in List Manager. I just can't seem to figure out how to get folks who gave over my threshold with multiple gifts within the fiscal year.

V16 Upgrade Experience with Memberships

Brooke Holmes — Tue, 23 Jan 2024 21:44:31 GMT

Hi,

We are in the process of testing V16, and are finding a lot of work around memberships that I didn't expect. There are a lot of new terms, etc. that are a bit confusing to navigate as well as making sure we have the correct views when it comes to lists that use Membership Criteria.

Is there someone out there who has gone through the upgrade in Development who uses memberships for donor levels (not any sold memberships) who might be willing to talk to me about your experience to help us navigate this?

I appreciate it! Please feel free to reach out to me directly at brooke.holmes@balletaustin.org.

Thanks in advance!

Brooke

Setting Up and Using Elevated Events for use with Ticketed Performance

Jonathan Wysong — Fri, 05 Jan 2024 16:57:05 GMT

Hi there,

Fairly new to Tess, and I'm trying to figure out how I should set up/use Elevated Events. I have several questions...

1) We have only a few levels - I've already had our consortium license holder set up my levels (we added a few for split options)

- $50,000 Co-Chair - FMV/non-deductible amount is $6,400 ($4,000 is for the performance ticket, balance includes parking, dinner/drinks, and gift) - 20 seats

- $25,000 Sponsor - FMV is $3,200 ($2,000 for performance, rest for everything else) - 10 seats

- $10,000 Table Purchas - FMV is $3,200 (same breakdown as above, but without the non-tangible recognition) - 10 seats

- $500 Single seat - FMV is $320 ($200 for performance, rest for everything else) - 1 seat

QUESTION - How should these purchases be recorded? Should I record them in contribution batches and use the elevated events campaign to assist me? If so, how does ticketing take over the performance amount for their records? If the other way around, how do I make sure the guests get the deductible amount on their contributions record?

2) Already, some donors have opted to split tables, and so I have received several, non-exact checks that add up to the totals I have outlined above (they come from the "same constituent" but are distributed from different sources, presumably to legally account for the tangible benefits these donors receive). Can these be recorded using elevated events, or will I run into issues since they are not exactly lined up with the choices I've set up?

3) How do I best account for donations made for or at the Gala where they are not receiving any benefits - as in sending a donation in the amount of a package listed above, but not planning to come, OR making a donation at the event itself.

TL:DR - can someone who is using elevated events for galas where the purchase includes a ticket to a performance please get in touch with me so I can operationalize this properly.

Tracking Stock Gain/Loss/Broker Fees?

Dawn Plonski — Thu, 04 Jan 2024 16:18:22 GMT

We are currently in the process of migrating from Raiser's Edge to Tessitura with launch in a month. I have searched through the community discussions and do not find any recent threads related to entering stock gain, stock loss, and broker fees to reconcile with Finance. The most recent thread I found was from 5 years ago. I am looking for more recent procedures for entering this information into Tessitura.

Tessitura's v16 Help System for contribution processing shows the custom data tab for fields to enter stock gain/loss value, stock name and # of shares. A co-worker who worked in Tessitura more than 10 years ago, suggested to create a constituent record with the name of "Stock Transactions" that would be used to enter gifts for the stock gain, broker fees, and stock loss with funds specific to those transactions so that they will reflect on GL reports.

Any suggestions or shared procedures would be appreciated.

Thank you,

Dawn

Crescendo Planned Giving Marketing Integration

Lucy Watmore — Thu, 14 Dec 2023 20:13:51 GMT

Hi All,

Can anyone share any experience with working with and utilizing Crescendo? https://www.crescendointeractive.com/

Thank you!

LuxGive Experience

Evan Kudish — Wed, 13 Dec 2023 19:29:45 GMT

Hi all,

This isn't a Tessitura specific query, but we are working on the auction portion of our Gala coming up in May. A board member recommended a travel company called LuxGive which works specifically with no profits. I was wondering if anyone had any experience with this company, negative or positive, that they'd be willing to share with me.

Thanks in advance!

Extra Month of Membership via Pricing Rule

Sue Llende — Mon, 20 Nov 2023 15:02:48 GMT

Has anyone launched a promotion to give an extra month of membership to selected members via a pricing rule? We're following the Recipe Book, but it is not working properly for us (a message is displayed that the promo code was successful, but the membership end date is not reflecting the extra month.

Thanks in advance!

Membership renewals by divorced household members that haven't told us they are no longer together

Anne M Robichaux — Thu, 16 Nov 2023 15:09:40 GMT

We had a household -- John and Jane Doe -- who had a household membership. They split up, but did not tell us. John renewed the membership, which stayed on the household (where all our memberships live). Jane then purchased a membership, which pushed out to the household. We discovered that they are no longer together and separated the individuals from the household and moved Jane's membership to her account. Because she signed into TNEW with her login, the contribution reflects her as the initiator, but John is still showing as the owner of the contribution, even after moving it over to her account. He has a premium membership and she has a basic one, so the higher value amount is where it needs to be, but I'm wondering what others do when this happens. Ideally, her contribution would show her as the owner for reporting purposes.

Thanks!
Anne Robichaux
The Historic New Orleans Collection

Membership Card Printing On Site

Galen Brown — Fri, 03 Nov 2023 16:02:13 GMT

[Cross-posted from the Memberships forum, at the suggestion of a Community Manager. Original post here.]

At the Met Museum, when a customer buys a membership on site, we print their membership card for them immediately, but we have been having some technical challenges recently and I'm curious about what other organizations are doing.

If you're printing cards on site:

Are you using SSRS, or some dedicated card printing software?
If you're using dedicated card printing software, what are you using and would you recommend it?
Are you using a single hopper printer, or multi-hopper?
If multi, which printer and would you recommend it?

Those are the main questions, but I'll describe what I'm dealing with here in case it's relevant for anybody:

The current process at the Met uses an SSRS report configured as a Constituent Report, and it gets printed to a printer that has multiple hoppers for different card stock for different membership levels. (The printer is a CD800, if you're keeping score at home.) The hopper gets selected using escape codes included in the report. We ran into a problem over the summer when we upgraded our report servers from SSRS 2012 to SSRS 2019 -- the new version required the report to be exported to PDF and printed from there, which added an annoying extra step, and for some reason the escape codes for hopper selection stopped working. So we kept a 2012 server running just for this one report, and that was fine until an automatic Windows update was applied this past Monday night, which removed ActiveX. SSRS 2012 uses ActiveX for printing, and this update removed the print button from the interface. We are currently investigating our options, and finding out what other organizations are doing is part of that investigation.

Thank you for any info that you can provide!

Editing a Payment Plan

Carlos García León — Wed, 18 Oct 2023 16:14:13 GMT

Hola friends,

I am trying to edit a payment plan that has already had some payments processed. This constituent was to stop the payments after a certain month, and will still have an outstanding balance afterwards. Is there a way to stop the payments after the requested month without changing the total amount of the pledge? I've tried editing it through the contributions tab and through a development batch with no avail, but I also could be doing something wrong. Any help would be much appreciated.

Thank you!

Carlos

Tracking Corporate Event Invites in Individual and Company's Accounts

Briar Boyko — Thu, 12 Oct 2023 16:05:35 GMT

Hello! I was wondering if anyone had something setup for the following:

For tracking corporate event invites in Tessitura under the contact’s account that includes an affiliation with their company, is there an easy way to indicate attendance in the company’s account as well? We’re tracking in Engagement under Activities. We need the RSVP to be in the individual’s account for names, RSVP numbers, and pulling information/contact addresses for any follow-ups, but would also like to track corporate engagement overtime in the company’s account.

Any process suggestions that have been working would be very much appreciated!

Consistent Donor List

Julia Clow — Tue, 03 Oct 2023 18:30:10 GMT

Hello everyone!

Has anyone here had success in pulling a list of donors who have given consistently over the past 5-10 years? For some reason I can't get the list parameters correct for something like this to show up. If anyone has any advice regarding this, I'd definitely appreciate it!

Output Criteria - iWave compatibility

Evan Kudish — Mon, 02 Oct 2023 15:39:52 GMT

Hi everyone,

We are about to jump into a huge wealth screening project and I'm working on building an extraction output set that works well with iWave's batch screening template. I think we want to get the RFM score in addition to the iWave score, which means we have to upload info about the constituent's giving to our org. I have it basically all set, but they ask for the total number of gifts and the largest gift amount and date.

Anyone know of the best criteria to get the total number of gifts and the largest gift date and amount? Thanks!