If you have any teachers in your life, or like to support your local schools, you’ve likely heard of DonorsChoose.org. This incredible online charity makes it easy for anyone to help students in need through classroom project requests that range from basic supplies like pencils and paper, to books, robotics kits, or educational experiences designed to inspire. Teachers at over 66,000 public schools in America have created at least one project request on the site since it was launched in 2000; and over two million people have donated more than $400 million to fund well over 700,000 projects.

In addition to working with individual donors like you and me, the charity has also attracted a wide range of corporate and celebrity backers—from Steven Colbert and LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner, to Disney, Chevron, and the NFL. The process of securing these partnership and managing the execution of the grant money they deliver can be an unwieldy task for a lean nonprofit organization.

As DonorsChoose.org grew, they knew they needed a more efficient and automated way to handle these processes that cut across their business development and finance teams. A long-time user of Salesforce for their front-office activities, the nonprofit had been struggling with a back-office system that didn’t offer a connection to Salesforce. Due to this lack of communication between the systems, the partnership team didn't know any of the financial details for their accounts, and the finance team didn't have any visibility into when checks were coming in for new grants.

Solution: Intacct and Salesforce

With transaction volumes spiking, DonorsChoose.org decided to move to a modern financial management solution that could seamlessly integrate with Salesforce and their other business systems. They selected cloud ERP software from Intacct. Intacct offers a seamless integration with Salesforce enabling companies to gain a full view of every customer, streamline their quote-to-cash and revenue management processes, and create more productive communication between the department that makes the numbers… and the department that manages them.

Since moving to Intacct, and by extending the benefits of Salesforce through Intacct’s CRM integration built on the Salesforce1 Platform, DonorsChoose.org has eliminated duplicate data entry and gained complete visibility into its grant lifecycle. This has significantly streamlined their business processes and saved the finance team a full day of manual work each month.

Taylor Chang, vice president of finance at DonorsChoose.org, shared a glimpse into how things work: “Our partnerships team uses Salesforce to post grants received and the finance team can then go in and review the documentation. With the click of a button, we’re able to post the revenue to Intacct and when the payment comes in, those details flow directly back to Salesforce. Both teams are on the same page at all times and have full visibility into the lifecycle of our grants.”

Results: Increasing efficiency

In addition to the benefits of connecting Intacct with Salesforce, DonorsChoose.org has also used Intacct to increase overall finance team efficiency by 20 percent; they are saving over 50 hours of work per month on revenue recognition, reporting, and accounts payable processes; and they have shortened the monthly close process by 50 percent.

“It is important to invest the time and resources into integrating your systems. This will ensure that everyone is working with the same information when making decisions,” added Chang. 

To learn more about Intacct, visit them on the Salesforce AppExchange.

Kathy Lord is SVP of Sales and Customer Success at Intacct.