With response rates 8x higher than email, text messaging is the fastest way to engage your alumni—whether it’s for events, fundraising, or updates. And now, you can do it all directly from Almabase.
Summary
• Boost engagement for time-sensitive campaigns and events by using integrated text messaging directly within Almabase. This new feature helps you cut through email noise and get quicker responses for registrations, donations, and updates.
• If you’re tired of low email open rates or disconnected third-party text tools, this built-in solution streamlines your communication, driving 5 times more responses for urgent announcements or event reminders. It solves the challenge of fragmented data.
• Easily manage event communications by sending registration reminders, payment confirmations, and last-minute updates directly from your event workflows. You can also send timely post-event thank-you messages and photo links.
• Drive your giving campaigns more effectively by sending personalized donation appeals, gentle nudges for incomplete gifts, and immediate thank-you messages. This approach can significantly improve donor participation.
• Leverage Almabase Data Studio to segment your audience and send personalized messages using merge tags, ensuring your outreach is always relevant. This helps you use your CRM data smarter and connect better with constituents.
• Seamlessly collect and manage consent for text communications during event registration or within alumni profiles, and track delivery rates and replies in real-time. This ensures compliance and helps you see what's working instantly.
Over the past few years, it’s become clear—text messaging isn’t just for friends and family anymore. It's now a powerful communication channel for institutions that want to cut through the noise and connect with their communities in a way that’s timely, personal, and effective.
When every inbox is overflowing and attention spans are shrinking, SMS stands out. Text messaging drives 5 times more responses than emails, making it one of the most effective ways to spark action—whether it’s registering for an event, completing a donation, or simply staying in the loop.
So when our partner institutions told us that emails weren’t always getting the job done, especially for time-sensitive campaigns and updates, we listened.
“We need a faster way to get people to act.”
“Our email open rates are dropping.”
“We’re using a third-party text tool, but it’s disconnected from our data.”
The real problem wasn’t just about sending messages. It was about:
• Reaching the right people at the right time
• Avoiding fragmented tools that don’t talk to each other
• Staying compliant while collecting and managing consent
We set out to build a solution that would be powerful and seamless. A tool that lived inside your existing Almabase workflows, not outside them.
We’re thrilled to share that text messaging is now live on Almabase.
Whether you're organizing an event, running a giving campaign, or sending out general community updates, you can now do it all via SMS, directly from Almabase.
This feature is designed to fit naturally into the way you already work, while giving you the speed and reach of text-based communication.
Whether you're running a campaign, planning an event, or sharing general updates, text messaging on Almabase fits right into the way you already work:
Text messaging is even more powerful for events because it's built right into the event workflows. You don’t need to go to Data Studio—just access it directly from your event or sub-event page. Send registration reminders, confirm payments, or share last-minute updates like venue changes. You can also follow up after the event with thank-you messages or photo links.
Send donation appeals, nudge incomplete donations, or thank donors instantly with personalized texts that feel thoughtful and timely.
Share program updates, alumni news, or important reminders with your community quickly and effectively.
Here’s how Almabase text messaging helps you engage smarter:
Target any segment of your alumni or donor base directly through Data Studio, just like you would for email.
Use merge tags and segmented lists to send messages that feel personal and relevant—whether it’s addressing someone by name, following up after an event, sending a tailored giving appeal, sharing a personalized reunion itinerary or nudging them about an upcoming mentoring session.
Collect consent during event registration, from alumni profiles, or upload it via Excel using the new "Consent" tab under text communication.
Monitor delivery rates, replies, and unsubscribes from a central dashboard so you always know what’s working.
Ensure your messages look familiar and trustworthy by sending them from local phone numbers.
Want to understand how it can work for your unique workflows? Our team is here to walk you through it.
👉 Talk to an expert and see how SMS can elevate your engagement strategy—from giving to events and everything in between.
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Pulling lists and updating constituent data, and updating information in Raiser's Edge is now even more efficient! While admins can pull data from Raiser's Edge independently with minimal effort, they still need to pull lists every time they want to pull constituent data, which requires them to keep moving between Almabase and RE. As we continuously make the database processes more efficient, we want to simplify how you create new records, pull lists, and fix errors seamlessly.
And that’s precisely what we’ve done with our latest auto-pull feature!
Dive in to find out more.
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The auto-pull feature lets you set up and update RE lists and queries through multiple one-time and auto-recurring pulls, simultaneously. If a new profile or record is added to RENXT, the recurring pull will automatically add new information from RENXT to the directory, improving data accuracy. Admins can save time by setting up daily, weekly, or monthly auto-pulls.
Note: Recurring pulls allow admins to add only new constituent information without updating existing records, as the sync system handles updates. For bulk updates, administrators should create a separate one-time pull session with the recurring pull option disabled.
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The new auto-pull feature streamlines email list management on Almabase. With the auto-pull update, admins can pull constituent data for email lists. For example, if you establish a daily pull for a list with 100 records on RENXT, any changes—such as adding or removing records—will be automatically reflected in your Almabase list. This means new records will be created for constituents not already on Almabase, and existing records will be updated accordingly.
Note: Almabase will periodically pull data from the RE list or RE query, and depending upon the type of configuration, it will add/remove constituents from the email group or list of records on Almabase.
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The new sync data dashboard lets you set up and manage: set upone-time or recurring and view historical pulls, all in a single dashboard. If there are any errors in constituent records or email lists, you can fix them directly within the same dashboard by clicking on the "Fix errors" button, eliminating the need to switch different tabs on Almabase or RENXT.
If you’re an Almabase customer, simply log into the platform's database settings to create your first auto-pull session.
If you’re not an Almabase customer, click here to learn more about our industry-leading integration with Raiser’s Edge NXT.
Keep email lists and user-directory updated on their own with auto-pull sessions
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In today’s digital-first world, having a well-designed, functional website is crucial for educational institutions. Often, institutions using outdated tools lack the flexibility, aesthetics, brand consistency, and functionality required to meet the expectations of today’s digital-savvy users.
Almabase now offers a powerful integration with WordPress, the world’s most popular content management system (CMS). This integration allows institutions to enhance their online presence with a highly customizable website while ensuring top-notch security and seamless support. This level of customization is crucial for standing out in a crowded digital landscape and ensuring that your website truly reflects your institution’s identity.
In this blog, we’ll explore what this integration entails, the benefits it offers, and the design services available to help you create a website that truly reflects your institution’s identity across all your webpages.
By default, Almabase comes with a default homepage with essential customization options like color schemes and logos to align with your school’s branding.
WordPress integration is a game changer for institutions that want advanced customization and flexibility. It unlocks advanced customization options, allowing you to either modify the default theme or create a unique theme tailored to your institution’s specific needs. This means you can fully leverage WordPress’s vast ecosystem of themes, plugins, and design tools to build a website that stands out.
Here are a few examples of our customers' WordPress pages:
1. Washburn University Alumni Association and Foundation
2. Illinois Institute of Technology
3. Punahou School
Furthermore, all the features unlocked by the integration are available to every user at no additional charge. Whether you choose to customize the theme yourself or build a new one from scratch, you have the freedom to create a website that perfectly aligns with your institution’s branding guidelines.
For institutions that prioritize branding but may lack the time or staff to handle website design, Almabase offers professional design services to help bring your vision to life.
• Homepage Development: Whether you want to redesign your homepage or replicate another reference site, we offer tailored services to meet your needs.
• Internal Page Design: Help you create custom pages that resonate with your audience.
• Page Template Design: Help you build reusable templates that simplify content updates.
Whether you're familiar with WordPress or new to the platform, Almabase’s integration has you covered.
1. Start with the default WordPress theme offered by Almabase.
2. Customize the branding, update the design of the header and footer, and modify the content of the homepage to highlight key programs.
3. Take advantage of features like:
• Access to Elementor Pro, a popular WordPress page builder
• WordPress front page customization
• Header and footer customization
• Access to paid plugins, like social media feeds
• Using WordPress for internal pages and posts
If you prefer, you can also purchase additional design services to replicate styling from another website or to assist with content migration.
1. Start with the default WordPress theme offered by Almabase.
2. Easily add, remove, or modify content to reflect the key programs you want to highlight.
3. If needed, purchase additional design services to assist with styling replication and content migration, ensuring your website meets your expectations.
Regardless of your experience level, Almabase’s WordPress integration offers the customization flexibility you need to create a website that reflects your institution’s identity.
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• Isolation: WordPress is installed in a separate, isolated virtual network, completely disconnected from Almabase’s production environment.
• Network Security: All workloads in the WordPress cluster use network security groups and appropriate firewall rules. Internet traffic is managed through gateway servers, allowing only HTTP(s) traffic.
• Encryption at Rest: Data and OS disks are encrypted at rest using Azure Disk Storage Server-Side Encryption.
• Encryption in Transit: Data is encrypted in transit using TLS v1.2 or above, with HTTP requests redirected to HTTPS.
• Regular Backups: Customized WordPress pages are backed up regularly to ensure quick recovery in the event of data loss.
• Routine Checks: We conduct regular security assessments and internal hackathons to identify and address potential vulnerabilities.
• Restricted Access: Only authenticated users can access WordPress sites. Non-internet access from the WordPress cluster to the production cluster is disabled.
Almabase’s integration with WordPress provides institutions with an unmatched opportunity to create a highly customized, secure, and professional website. Whether you’re new to WordPress or an experienced user, Almabase offers the tools and support you need to build a site that enhances your alumni engagement efforts. With our expert support and robust security measures, you can focus on what matters most—building lasting connections with your alumni community.
How Almabase's Advanced Branding and Customization Set You Apart with WordPress Integration
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For advancement teams, managing data isn't just about storing information—it's about harnessing it to drive meaningful alumni engagement and fundraising impact. Cohesive data workflows are crucial for seamless operations; many teams at universities and colleges struggle with fragmented systems, leading to inefficient manual work, inconsistent data, costly errors, and missed growth opportunities.
Unlocking growth starts with building efficient processes that streamline data flow across all platforms. By bringing all engagement and fundraising data into a single, cohesive view within your donor management platform, advancement teams can make data-driven decisions, reduce manual tasks, and make it a single source of truth.
In a bold step towards revolutionizing alumni engagement and fundraising, Almabase has launched TrueSync, a native integration with Blackbaud platforms like Raiser's Edge NXT. This update solves the data disconnect between systems that don't talk to one another, leading to duplicate records and missed opportunities. It's a game-changer that sets a new standard for data integration in the advancement industry.
”To be honest, the word integration has been abused by several software companies. Once you look beyond the marketing, you realize that the integration is exporting excel sheets and importing into your donor management platform. This is the reason we set out to create a truly seamless experience with TrueSync,” said Kalyan Varma, Co-founder and CEO of Almabase.
"Customers want their advancement donor management platform to be a single source of truth and don’t want to go through complex processes to make that happen. This allows them to be data-driven, save time, and grow their fundraising outcomes. TrueSync delivers on this promise.”
While many platforms claim to offer seamless integrations with Raiser's Edge NXT, these integrations often rely on third-party connectors, resulting in a patchwork of data flows that are prone to delays, errors, and duplicate data. These misleading promises can leave advancement teams in a frustrating cycle of constantly cleaning up messy data and manually transferring data across systems.
TrueSync is a direct native integration across Almabase and Raiser's Edge NXT. This approach ensures bi-directional syncing of data without relying on third-party connectors, reducing the risk of errors, duplication, or data silos. Advancement teams can now benefit from a real-time flow of information, enabling more informed decision-making and improved engagement strategies.
Key benefits of TrueSync include:
The launch of TrueSync reflects Almabase's ongoing commitment to innovation in the advancement sector. By providing a more streamlined, cost-effective solution, TrueSync enables teams at universities, colleges, and nonprofits to focus their resources on strategic goals rather than troubleshooting data integration issues.
“TrueSync will significantly improve how institutions manage their data,” added Sudip Datta, Chief Product Officer at Blackbaud . “With this kind of bi-directional native integration between Raiser’s Edge NXT and Almabase, advancement teams can operate with greater efficiency, improve the quality of their data, reduce costs, and ultimately deliver better outcomes for their organizations.”
Illinois Institue of Technology has transformed its alumni data management with TrueSync’s bi-directional sync capability allows the team to quickly push/pull out lists from Blackbaud Raiser’s Edge NXT, improving the team's overall administrative workflow.
The integration allows the university’s database team to configure data collection per their needs, ensuring they can structure information effectively and cleanly enrich the data between systems. This eliminates the need to enter data manually and saves the institution valuable time and resources.
Read their complete success story here.
With the launch of TrueSync, advancement teams can eliminate the roadblocks caused by disjointed systems, empower organizations to build stronger relationships with their alumni and donors, create more effective engagement strategies, and unlock new fundraising potential. TrueSync will expand to support Blackbaud CRM customers, too, helping them streamline how they manage their events and online fundraising campaigns.
To learn more about how TrueSync can transform your institution's data-management workflows, visit TrueSync webpage or connect with our team to see it makes managing programs seamless.
Introducing TrueSync: Industry's only two-way, native sync with Blackbaud Raiser's Edge NXT® to change the way you manage data, saving time and costs
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