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About Keela

Keela is a comprehensive nonprofit software that unifies fundraising and donor communications.

Learn more about Keela

Pros:

It is easy to navigate and is very user friendly.

Cons:

Does not work as well on internet explorer as chrome.

Keela ratings

Average score

Ease of Use
4.3
Customer Service
4.5
Features
4.0
Value for Money
4.4

Likelihood to recommend

8.2/10

Keela has an overall rating of 4.3 out 5 stars based on 271 user reviews on Capterra.

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Filter reviews (271)

Leigh
Leigh
Principal in Canada
Verified LinkedIn User
Used the Software for: 1+ year
Reviewer Source

Keela has been highly responsive and quick to evolve to meet the practical needs of its customers.

5.0 7 years ago

Pros:

I like the simplicity of Keela however, it's important to point out that the simplicity doesn't compromise how useful the tool is. They've stripped down the CRM model to make it exactly what fundraisers at small and medium size charity need and got rid of all the extra widgets that just make tracking donor data unnecessarily complicated. We have also greatly appreciated the quick response time of the support team. Multiple features that we have suggested would be useful have shown up in new iterations of the product and the team regularly checks in with us to make sure that we are happy.

Cons:

The dashboard isn't the best. I would appreciate being able to customize it to be able to see the information that is important to you at a glance.

Keela Response

7 years ago

Thanks for your feedback! We are planning to make some improvements to the dashboard and we'd love to hear your ideas. Please get in touch with us here: http://bit.ly/2H0UvvM

Douglas
President in US
Nonprofit Organization Management, 201–500 Employees
Used the Software for: 1-5 months
Reviewer Source

Keela "Thinks" Like We "Think"

5.0 4 years ago

Comments: I'm sorry that, when a person reads the "cons," it probably sounds like I'm "dissing" the software. But the truth is - it's the best we could find. And there's something else: They (the entire team) seem to have such a customer service orientation that they LISTEN! And they aren't afraid to admit that something needs to change. For example, see above when I mentioned the problem with state abbreviations. After I submitted the idea into the idea portal and copied the customer support email, they wrote me back a personal email and admitted that they should have caught this earlier. The fast-tracked the fix and -- I'm serious - they rolled out the fix within like... maybe three weeks max. (As fast as we would have wanted them to make a fix, test it, and releast it.) In fact, they've listened every time - and they've begun implementing changes based on sincere user feedback. Last week (I'm not making this up), they arranged a call with the [SENSITIVE CONTENT HIDDEN] and the [SENSITIVE CONTENT HIDDEN]-- both on a Zoom call with the customer support specialist that they assigned to us. Their main purpose seemed singlefold: To listen. They never became defensive... not once. They basically said, "Make a list of your 'pain points,' and give ALL of them to us." No software vendor had EVER done that for me before (even though I've been equally forthright with ALL of them). The pricing is fair for what we get. Imagine - we sent out 9800 emails. Keela did GREAT. There's so much more I could say. Love it.

Pros:

Keela's pricing structure was straightforward and fair. They didn't charge "by the user," like some vendors do. Yes, there's a sliding scale based on the range of contacts, but for our org, the scale seemed fair. We had tried numerous (I forget how many) products previously. I'm ashamed to admit we rarely stayed with one product longer than a year. DonorPerfect. CiviCRM. Salesforce. Blackbaud. Bloomerang. Salsa CRM/Engage. The list goes on. Not sure why - but when we found Keela (I'm not kidding), it was like finding "the one." For one thing, they didn't make me make an appointment with some sales rep that would do a 30-minute demo, then ask me if I had questions, even though I had already watched everything in her/his demo in dozens of YouTube reviews. (That's a crazy system, if you stop and think about it.) Keela let me open the account, set everything up, do my first imports, and start using the program all without having to wait on ANYONE in ANY time zone. (It's not that I'm anti-social. I just wanted to experiment with it on my OWN.) They advertised some outlandish increase we should expect in fundraising. I remember thinking, "Now how could they know that?" But I'm serious - from the day we first installed until the first email campaign, it was under 90 days. And our first email/printed mail campaign has just topped (you're going to think the company hired me to say this - but they didn't) $100,000 in income. Our typical email campaigns had been $10,000 or $12,000prior

Cons:

I need a bigger box. (haha) I didn't like the way they seemed to want to hide certain fields from me - like, they were afraid it would make the software seem too complex. The reporting module seemed sooooo basic. I just wanted them to give me a "field picker" for every field and let me choose exactly which fields I wanted. Instead, someone in their product development team had apparently decided which fields that he or she thought were important enough to include in a report. What's so hard about giving us a dropdown box with choices -- ALL choices?! States and Canadian provinces were listed in a dropdown - but I had imported thousands of records with state abbreviations -- and, strangely, it wasn't an option to search for those. (?????) Again, it was like they were trying to make the program so friendly that they prevented us from graduating to more of a "power user" posture. The software was fast (I mean - we have 17,000 contacts and it seemingly always finds the desired contact within 1 second - seriously), but some of the clicks and steps between functions are dreadfully filled with twists and turns and dead ends. Too many clicks. They allow the user to manage importing - and they have documented it well - but I can't designate a "key field" that I want to use as the key. They have their own Keela index - but it's hard to assign multiple keys. They DO keep an "external index" and they use it - but sometimes I'm not clear how to mesh the two.

Keela Response

4 years ago

Doug! We've said it before and we'll say it again - thank you from the bottom of our hearts for your enthusiasm, your passion and most of all your willingness to work with us to make the system better. Keela is on a rocket journey to the moon and we're so glad to have you onboard! Thanks always, the Keela Customer Care team (and every single team member t Keela if I'm being honest - we are all BIG fans!)

Rafael
Marketing & Fundraising Manager in Australia
Philanthropy, 51–200 Employees
Used the Software for: 6-12 months
Reviewer Source

Alternatives Considered:

A reasanably good software, with usability downfalls

2.0 4 years ago

Comments: It is positive, but definetely not ideal. The platform was sold to us as basic but powerful, in reality it is basic and need a lot of work, in some instances to get the basics correct (i.e. invoices, integration with payment gateways etc.). Keela lacks a lot of key features we already provided feedback on. We do feel that Keela priority has been in functionalities that are tertiary and not a necessity (i.e. have details of transactions going to stripe description, invoices being more customisable, being able to edit recuring donor accounts without having to recreate them etc ). Those can be very frustrating and we had went backwards in our internal processes, specially with accounts, due to the platform lack of basic business customisation, things we had in our previous software.

Pros:

Keela is happy to listen to customers. They are quick to provide support and the platform offer the basics needed.

Cons:

The basics are not well polished. Usability is a big issue and the navigation is clunky - we find ourselves going back and forwards a lot, some would be easily fixed with a simple "right click to open in new window" but that is not available. We end up using the export feature way more often than we should in order to get the data we need. We have provided a list of cons in the past.

Keela Response

4 years ago

Thank you for your review Rafael, we appreciate the transparent feedback. Over the past year, you and your team have provided our Product Team with really insightful feedback and have suggested really great features to enhance the system. These absolutely do not go unnoticed! Our team is working super hard to make sure we continue to build a system that meets the needs of our users. While some features may take longer than others to build out based on the level of complexity, know that your ideas are being heard and discussed amongst our Product Team. We look forward to you and your team continuing to share innovative ideas with us to support us in building an even better system. Thanks for joining us along the innovation journey :)

Christopher
CDO in US
Sports, 11–50 Employees
Used the Software for: 6-12 months
Reviewer Source

Alternatives Considered:

Great team, great product

5.0 4 years ago

Comments: Overall our experience has been top-notch!

Pros:

Easy integration with multiple other tools related to email, events and accounting. We were very happy with the ability to upload our previously accumulated data through the import tools. Self Help documents are thorough and the Support team are responsive, clear and concise.

Cons:

Soft credits and ability to report on both the initiator and the final delivery vehicle would be super helpful. Minor- but an ability to track any premiums distributed through some form of inventory capture would be great.

Keela Response

4 years ago

Hi Christopher, thanks so much for your feedback! The Support Team is thrilled to hear our Support resources have been useful for you and your team. I'm curious about your recommendations for Soft Credit Reporting and 'Inventory Capture'. Our team would love to hear more about what you have in mind related to this. If you are interested in sharing your ideas with us, please reach out to [email protected]. We are problem solvers, so we may even be able to help you report on some of the things you are hoping for in the system. Otherwise, you can always add your ideas into our Product Portal for our team to review (https://portal.productboard.com/keela/1-product-portal/tabs/1-under-consideration). Thanks again for your review, we look forward to hearing your ideas!

Richard
President in US
Nonprofit Organization Management, 11–50 Employees
Used the Software for: 6-12 months
Reviewer Source

A Modern and Innovative Tool that Helps Us Manage Our Donors and Sponsorships

4.0 4 years ago

Comments: Keela has helped our organization have a centralized data management center that multiple volunteers can access to perform tasks that keep us in compliance with our local and national government. In simple terms, it's made everyone's job a little bit easier!

Pros:

It was fairly easy to switch from our previous CRM database that we were unhappy with. This software has given us the ability to communicate effectively with our donors, keep track of sponsorship pledges, and track our yearly fundraising goals. All of this has been easy to customize to our organization and add the custom fields that pertain to us.

Cons:

To be fair, it's hard to be a "one size fits all" for any product, so of course there could be things that could be enhanced or added. For us, I would like to see when a pledge payment is past due and be able to create a segment or report that could show who is behind and by how much. Also, I would like the ability to create custom reports that would allow custom queries. The nice thing though about the Keela team, is they REALLY listen when you have a particular need like I just mentioned and they provide an Ideas Portal for just that!

Keela Response

4 years ago

Thanks so much for your detailed review Richard, this is great feedback for our team. I am happy to hear that Keela has supported you with data management, donor relationships, and fundraising reporting - that's exactly what we built the system for! If we are not saving you time, we aren't doing our job I noticed there are a few things in the system you are still on the lookout for. Specifically when it comes to viewing and reporting on Pledges. You can actually view the 'Status' of all of your Pledges by going to the 'Fundraising' tool and clicking on the 'Pledges' tab. Here you will be able to view and 'Filter' by Pledge 'Status'. As for the ability to have a visual report of who is behind and by how much, this would be an excellent idea for our Product Portal for our team to review (https://portal.productboard.com/keela/1-product-portal/tabs/1-under-consideration). As for custom reporting, I reccomend reaching out to our Support team at [email protected]. We have become

Melanie
Deputy Director in US
Nonprofit Organization Management, 2–10 Employees
Used the Software for: 6-12 months
Reviewer Source

Alternatives Considered:

Keela to supports my nonprofit needs!

5.0 5 years ago

Pros:

I am so happy to have found Keela to supports my nonprofit needs! At first, I was impressed with the sales team and the product presented to me. The team took the time necessary to help me understand the product. They were not pushy and answered all my questions. They are more affordable than competitors with similar functionality. The software is super easy to use. It looks great. The functionality is excellent and is getting better each day. I really love the software. The best thing about Keela is their ongoing customer support. They are prompt when I request help. They answer the questions I ask specifically. They are really lovely! I am on a first-name basis with one of them. Ha. I recommend this software. It has been excellent for our nonprofit. We are a public policy nonprofit.

Cons:

I do not use the dashboard so much and it's not that customizable.

Keela Response

5 years ago

Hi Melanie, thanks so much for your fabulous review! We all love working with you, so glad you've enjoyed working with us too :) Regarding the dashboards, some great improvements are coming in our new platform that you'll have the chance to migrate to this summer. We look forward to sharing that new enhancement as well as many others with you very soon!

Elisabeth
Executive Director in Canada
Education Management, Self Employed
Used the Software for: 6-12 months
Reviewer Source

Alternatives Considered:

Review for small charity with staff of one looking to grow our capacity

5.0 5 years ago

Comments: Overall Keela is excellent and I love using it. More than that, I love the Keela brand and what the company stands for. There's a warmth and personal approach that helps me feel confident that the Keela team are in my corner. Since I'm the only staff member for my charity, I can't overstate the importance of feeling like Keela are an extended part of my charity team - you help me feel supported and less alone. Thank you!
(Also love the annual capacity conference - please keep it coming!!)

Pros:

The price point is REALLY amazing for very small, young charities. For the functionality, Keela offers huge bang for our buck. My charity Board love that Keela are specifically aiming to help small charities like our grow our capacity. Switching to Keela has allowed me (the ED and sole staff member) to streamline our work flows and automate a bunch of things (like tax receipts and donor thank yous!) that were taking up a lot of my time.

Cons:

One thing that bugs me a lot is when someone uses the contact form that is embedded into our website I seem to need to click through several layers in Keela to actually get to their message (notifications > contact > interactions > contact form > message). It'd be amazing if somehow those messages were easier to access - it took me a few goes to figure out that I need to look up "interactions" for a contact, and not "emails".

Keela Response

5 years ago

Hi Elisabeth, thanks so much for taking the time to write such a detailed review for Keela! We are so warmed that you consider us part of your team. We definitely love helping out our customers and consider them part of the Keela family as well :) I've passed on your feedback to our team regarding the form responses and interactions vs emails. We are currently working on some improvements, so hopefully, these items will be included in a release soon!

Laura
Executive Director in Canada
Music, 2–10 Employees
Used the Software for: 6-12 months
Reviewer Source

Keela review to date

4.0 2 years ago

Comments: We have only just started using the software, so do not feel we have had enough time with it yet to review it. We have noticed a couple of glitches with the software which are unique to our two organizations, as mentioned earlier in this survey.

Pros:

We are very new to the software, so our focus so far has been on data entry and setting everything up and developing convention for entry to ensure consistency.

Cons:

We would love to see the ticketing software that integrates with Keela. We have been using TicketPeak and it is not a simply process to ensure we are accurately capturing contact info. One system for our CRM, fundraising and box office would be ideal. We would also like there to be a way in which we can issue tax receipts for each of our two charitable organizations without having to pay for two separate databases. They are essentially the same contact list, but donations are made to either or both organizations. It would be great to find a solution to this within just the one database.

Sam
Executive Director in US
Motion Pictures & Film, 2–10 Employees
Used the Software for: 6-12 months
Reviewer Source

Love it so far and excited to continue integrating it into our regular workflows.

4.0 4 years ago

Pros:

The customer service has been good, the platform offers a robust feature set with good customization. We are still learning and implementing the tool and it feels like it has a lot of more to offer as we continue to integrate it into our daily operation. Some of the other platforms didn't offer as much flexible control. The pricing feels fair and transparent. As we were looking for a tool the more established systems were too expensive and were hard to get a good sense of and the cheaper systems lacked a lot of features that we were looking for. Keela feels like the right balance, and we have already seen updates and new features that make it a better solution.

Cons:

The user interface is good but there are areas where it feels old and clunky and a little confusing. The report creation and segmentation tools in particular feel like they could be streamlined. The tools work but they feel like they are lagging behind some of the other user experiences in other parts of the Keela platform. That's a small complaint so far very happy and excited to continue to learn the platform.

Keela Response

3 years ago

Hello Sam. Thank you for sharing your feedback with us! We really appreciate this - especially your comments on our Reporting tool. I'm happy to report that our Product Team are currently designing a bunch of enhancements to improve it, based on feedback from our users just like this! It's always a great feeling to know that our Product Roadmap aligns exactly with what our customers are asking for. That's the sweet spot! If ya'll keep providing us with such thoughtful and challenging (in a good way!) feedback, we'll keep working to make Keela the best that it can be. Thanks so much! The Customer Care team.

R. Brad
R. Brad
Vice-President/Senior Compliance Officer in US
Verified LinkedIn User
Financial Services, 2–10 Employees
Used the Software for: 1-5 months
Reviewer Source

A Quick, Low-ish Cost Solution for a Non-profit that lacked structure

4.0 6 years ago

Comments: Overall this software has (or will be) a lifesaver. Our staff have had difficulties adjusting to the new system, mainly because there is structure and specific data points where before it was a mish mash of data in notebooks, Excel files, and Post-It notes. I would like to see some additional development devoted specifically to customization of the system. Keela is very much a rigid cloud solution with little to no customization options. Having the ability to control the look and feel of the system, donor-facing data, and being able to control what inputs are allowed from users would be a huge help. At the end of the day, though, Keela is a great solution for a small nonprofit who is looking for a quick solution at low cost.

Pros:

-Easy to onboard donors and volunteers (the difficult part was organizing the data to make it upload properly which has more to do with the administration of the organization that the software. -Immediate, flexible training for the staff. -Relatively simple interface. I say relatively because sometimes its almost "too" easy and some members of the staff overlook the simple solution.

Cons:

-I am not fond of the analytics tool. Again, maybe this has more to do with the fact that its too simple, but as an analyst I find it difficult to get the information I want easily. -We have had some struggles with the integration with other vendors-specifically MailChimp. After following all the instructions for both companies, we still cannot complete a good link.

Keela Response

6 years ago

Hello Brad! I'm so glad to hear your feedback - especially your sentiments about training which the Customer Success team are particularly proud of :). I'm also pleased that you find the system to be easy - Our goal is a simple system that users can transition to easily so this is very good news! I understand that the Analytics tool can be challenging sometimes - and I'm happy to let you know that we're making improvements to it early this year! We'd also love to hear your suggestions for what you'd like to see (you can post them here: (https://keela.ideas.aha.io/ideas/new)) In the meantime, if you would ever like suggestions on how to access your desired information please don't hesitate to reach out to [email protected] - we will do our best to find a quick and easy way to get what you need. Also, please also let us know if you are still experiencing issues with MailChimp - We'll be happy to take a look.

Teresa
Director in US
Legal Services, 2–10 Employees
Used the Software for: 1+ year
Reviewer Source
Source: GetApp

Keela rejects credit card payments for fund raising events/donations needed for operations, contacts messy

1.0 5 months ago

Comments: Extremely poor, there is no way to get timely human help. The program is not intuitive, contacts can't be cleaned up easily if there are duplicates (name of contacts are connected with company, company has a separate listing, deceased contacts can't be deleted, etc). By the time someone at Keela responds via messaging, our events are over and we've lost critical donors and contacts are frustrated. Bad for our brand of reliable legal service for the poor Looking again for better program like donor perfect maybe

Pros:

Our [sensitive content hidden] liked the clean look of the interface, but beyond that, as the [sensitive content hidden], I have no pro and keeping the program is no sustainable because it glitches with credit card payments, usually in the clutch of a big fundraiser. I've had it with this program.

Cons:

example: right now we're screwed by Keela. It stopped taking credit card payments in the middle of our fundraiser event. Totally unreliable credit card acceptance, Fundraising events need reliable links for donors, forms need to work without frustrating donors by rejecting all credit card payments. Our own tests of credit cards doesn't work. The form will work for awhile, and then we lose critical time and labor with all the calls that the link won't accept credit card numbers and we have to manually take payments. Its unsustainable.

Taryn
Brand Partnerships in Canada
Nonprofit Organization Management, 2–10 Employees
Used the Software for: 6-12 months
Reviewer Source

Lovely locally program!

5.0 4 years ago

Comments: We think it is pretty great!

Pros:

This is more than a CRM for us! This software created inspiration for building a journey for our donors and sponsors. It provides us with numbers at our finger tips and knowledge is power.

Cons:

There are some functions that are lacking intuitive UX for our team.

Keela Response

4 years ago

What an incredible review Taryn, this is EXACTLY what Keela aims to do. We not only aim to provide a practical and efficient CRM but we also aim to create tools and resources that support organization's creativity and critical thinking so they can thrive and keep sharing their impact with the world. We are so delighted to hear Keela has supported your organization with this. With that said, we would be happy to hear your feedback on our UX design, so we can work on improving this. Keela is designed specifically for our organizations, which is why this feedback is so crucial for us. Feel free to send your recommendations to [email protected] or share them in our Product Portal (https://portal.productboard.com/keela/1-product-portal/tabs/1-under-consideration). Thanks again for your humbling review and we look forward to your continued journey with Keela.

Avi
Executive Director in Mexico
Nonprofit Organization Management, 2–10 Employees
Used the Software for: 1-5 months
Reviewer Source
Source: SoftwareAdvice

Alternatives Considered:

Great solution

4.0 5 years ago

Comments: Tracking contacts and donations and hopefully will expand more for e-blasts.

Pros:

Easy to use and very user friendly. Screens are managed and viewed easily. Easy to enter and log information (like contacts, donations and so on)

Cons:

Support (although very professional) only by email. Would prefer a phone support.

Keela Response

5 years ago

Hello Avi, Thank you for your feedback and we are so glad that you are enjoying the solution! Feel free to reach out when you are ready to try E-Blasts and we would love to send you some resources to get started. Also you will be happy to know we are working on adding phone support sometime in the future. Thanks again for your time!

Mary
CFO in US
Nonprofit Organization Management, 2–10 Employees
Used the Software for: 6-12 months
Reviewer Source

Great software for the price

4.0 3 years ago

Pros:

We love the Communications tools offered and the ease in which we can add forms to our website for registrations and donations.

Cons:

There is an issue with being able to link a business with the person connected to the business and being able to search by the person's name.

Keela Response

3 years ago

Hello Mary! Thank you for taking the time to review us here. We can't tell you how much it means to us. I completely agree with your feedback about connecting businesses and individuals when searching. It's been added to our Product Portal a few times (one of them by me!). Knowing our Product Team, it'll be on our Road Map before we know it. It's feedback like yours that help to make Keela the best. Thanks again! - The Keela Customer Care Team.

Meghan
Charity Administrator in Canada
Individual & Family Services, 2–10 Employees
Used the Software for: 1-5 months
Reviewer Source

Alternatives Considered:

Fantastic product for NPO's

5.0 4 years ago

Comments: We're happy to finally have a cloud-based database where many of our team members can access important information and we can all work together to perform tasks. Working with Keela has been a positive experience from the beginning and we especially appreciate that they consider feedback and are constantly improving and making updates.

Pros:

Keela has become our one-stop-shop for donor, member, e-mail management, etc. and has streamlined our processes immensely. The integration and import of all of our current data was seamless and quick and if we ever ran into any issues, customer service was very helpful. Keela is very easy to use and learn, which made training our very busy staff and volunteers very easy.

Cons:

Our organization has some pretty specific needs, and not every feature from our previous donor/member database was able to be customized in Keela. However, we were able to find some work-arounds and the pros of using Keela vastly outweigh the cons.

Keela Response

3 years ago

Hello Meghan! This review made our hearts sing - This is exactly the experience that we are striving for you and your team members. While you said so many wonderful things, it's your comment about us considering feedback and making constant improvements that I'm most pleased about. Our Product Team works so very hard to collate and action each piece of feedback that we receive and it's brilliant to see that their hard work shows. I'll be sure to pass this through to them! Of course, your compliments for our customer service was the cherry on top. Thank you again! Keep sharing your feedback and we'll keep building together.

Bryant
Executive Director in US
Nonprofit Organization Management, 2–10 Employees
Used the Software for: 6-12 months
Reviewer Source

Keela

4.0 6 years ago

Comments: About the only benefit I have seen so far is that it is an online portal that is easy to put in information and to download contact lists. All of the other functionality that is available is there--we just don't know how to use it. We are still not even accepting payments via PayPal, even though we synched the accounts. Our marketing director needs some hands-on assistance with merging the forms to our website.

Pros:

The set up was not as complicated as I thought it would be, and the navigation is well laid out and easy to follow.

Cons:

I don't think we received enough human training with on-boarding, and it would have been nice to have more one access to a human as the "prompted" help answers are often inaccurate and not helpful. Our sales agent was fantastic and very knowledgeable, but once we purchased I felt as we were kind of left to our own devices. Now I am not even sure that we set it up the best way. 1. We hae to enter memberships as donations and as memberships 2. The "tags" remain even if a membership expires. 3. We still aren't sure that when we are pulling reports that the information is being put in correctly to access what we need as as information. 4. We were not aware that in order to sync membership payments automatically, we have to use Skype. 5. We should be much much further along in using the different amenities of the site, but so far we are just kind of stuck. We need assistance.

Keela Response

6 years ago

Hi Bryant, thanks for bringing these issues to our attention. I'm sorry to hear that you have a challenging experience with Keela so far. Our Head of Customer Experience will be reaching out to you shortly to schedule a call to discuss your concerns, and offer assistance and additional training for your team so that you can feel confident to keep growing with Keela in the future.

Ash
Executive Director in Canada
Nonprofit Organization Management, 2–10 Employees
Used the Software for: 1+ year
Reviewer Source

Game changer for our non profit

5.0 last year

Comments: We now have way better data management. We had a really clunky membership program before Keela, and now people can easily become members and set up an auto-renewal for their membership, which is a game changer for us. We are finding over 70% of members are opting for auto renewal, which is saving us a stack of time sending follow up emails that are being lost.

Pros:

We are a small non profit and we were managing all our relationships and donors on spreadsheets. We knew we needed to take the leap to a CRM, but we were hesitant to invest the money. Over 6 months we trialled all the main non profit CRMs, and Keela came out head and shoulders above the rest. Although it is an additional expense, we easily earn that back in increased donations and recurring donations set up through Keela. There are many features of Keela we don't use, but if you had a sophisticated fundraising team they would be great.

Cons:

Some features are not as customizable as I would like, for example, you can't have a pay what you want/custom membership amount, which was a core component of our membership program.

Keith
Membership Services Coordinator in Canada
Nonprofit Organization Management, 2–10 Employees
Used the Software for: 1-5 months
Reviewer Source

Not a CRM software package

4.0 5 years ago

Comments: We had thought to replace our CRM software with Keela, but trying to 'translate' the processes in place with Software ABC into Keela has not been totally successful. It may be that I am too used to the 'old ways' that I can't change. We originally bought Keela because of the receipt function and the hopes that we could replace our other CRM software. Changeover has been slow and we are really only using the receipt function in Keela right now.

Pros:

Keela integrates very easily with most other apps I am using . Paypal and Stripe are easy to set up; connects to Eventbrite too. Adding contacts is super easy, plain language categories and descriptions. Easy to connect contacts into groups (they call them 'families'). The software is geared towards use by a single point NFP agency. Can generate receipts for all monies that come in, assign them to a campaign or purpose, email the receipts and store them for retrieval, if necessary. Keela has always been on top of customer service questions. I have received prompt replies to every question I have made and the answers were always easy to understand and implement. Keela also regularly hosts online training sessions, and strives to improve their product to meet the needs of their users. Recent upgrades included a way to create a report of revenues received/receipted. that was a BIG help.

Cons:

As a software package created for single point NFP, it does not like that I work for an agency that provides services to other NFP organizations for an annual fee. I can't group the contacts into one organization and then make the organization the one that pays the annual fee (it needs to be attributed to a contact).

Keela Response

5 years ago

Hello Keith - thank you for taking the time to leave this feedback. We really appreciate it! I'm glad to hear that you've found the receipting tool to be helpful! My favourite part is your comment on Keela's commitment to improvement - We really do aim for this! The Revenues tool upgrade has been a big boon for us and we couldn't have done it without you - thank you! If you have any particular processes that you'd like to transition from Software ABC to Keela please don't hesitate to reach out to us at [email protected] - We'll do our best to create a new way for you to do the same magic in Keela :) Thanks again!

Kat
Outreach and Development Specialist in Canada
Museums & Institutions, 2–10 Employees
Used the Software for: 6-12 months
Reviewer Source

We love Keela!

5.0 4 years ago

Comments: Keela has fundamentally changed how I manage my organization's donors and how I communicate with our community. The interface is so easy to use and affordable for a small community museum like ours.

Pros:

I love that Keela is Canadian based and offers a complete cloud-based CMS and donor management system. It's a great value for the money and their onboarding and customer service are fantastic. I know the name of the person who helps me when I run into problems.

Cons:

Some features are still in development. I'd like to be able to customize receipts and automatic replies a little more than currently offered. However, Keela's development portal makes it easy to submit recommendations and see what's next for product roll out.

Keela Response

4 years ago

Thanks so much for your feedback, Kat! I think I can speak for Elsie and say you have been great to work with. You are both a patient and avid learner, making our jobs easier than ever! As for customizing receipts, we have options for customizing receipts for certain campaigns and impact areas coming - estimated for our 2.7.2 release. Keep an eye out for this! Addintally, custom automated emails are also on their way. We call these 'email drips' which have been added to the planned tab in our Portal. Feel free to jump in a vote (https://portal.productboard.com/keela/1-product-portal/c/24-email-drip-marketing-campaigns). There is lots more to come, all based on user feedback, so keep sharing those brilliant suggestions of yours. We look forward to continuing to work with you Kat :)

Tara
Office and Event Manager in Canada
Events Services, 2–10 Employees
Used the Software for: 2+ years
Reviewer Source

Customize Keela to suit your needs!

5.0 last year

Comments: Keela has a fantastic team that is very supportive and willing to work with you - right from the initial meeting we had with the sales team, through integration and uploading all our data, to support as glitches were found... the Keela team is there for us!

Pros:

The ability to customize the program to do what we needed it to do. The main purpose is to send emails to our various stakeholders, ensuring the correct people get the correct messages and emails. Keela definitely lets us do this!

Cons:

It is a big expense for us! We continually monitor our numbers to stay within the contact limit allowed by our current level. The jump to the next level is outside of our budget so we need to ensure we don't go over.

Rebecca
Secretary in US
Nonprofit Organization Management, 2–10 Employees
Used the Software for: 6-12 months
Reviewer Source

Alternatives Considered:

Pros and Cons of Keela

4.0 5 years ago

Comments: This program is great. I'm only 6 months into this program. I would reccomend this to others. But it will take time to learn how to run it properly. I am still learning.

Pros:

Its easy to enter the contacts. Once you set up an e-blast, its easy to choose the recipients. Once you learn to create the e-blast letter, it looks great.

Cons:

It can be difficult to log in. It will redirect me from log-in to setting up a new account. It can be challenging to learn how to work the e-blast letters and setting up the campaign. Its difficult to get answers quickly. It takes a while to reach someone, and it usually is only email communication. It can be difficult to create the email body for e-blasts.

Keela Response

5 years ago

Hello Rebecca - thank you so much for this amazing feedback. I am so glad you find the system easy to use. This is exactly what we're after so it's very reassuring to hear we're on the right track. At the moment Keela offers unlimited online support and you'll always hear from us within 3 business hours of your email - often sooner! If we're able to introduce phone support in the future we definitely will! Thank you so much again - we look forward to seeing the incredible things that you and your team achieve with Keela.

Briana
Communications and Marketing in US
Nonprofit Organization Management, 2–10 Employees
Used the Software for: 2+ years
Reviewer Source

Best Nonprofit CRM out there!

5.0 last year

Comments: Keela is the best do-it-all CRM for any nonprofit!

Pros:

Keela has everything in one place for nonprofit contact/database/fundraising management. They also have the best customer service in the industry. One of the items that really sets them apart is their monthly webinars to help you learn more! They help you learn about their systems but also provide valuable industry content as well!

Cons:

There are things that I wish Keela did that it currently doesn't. However, Keela is very receptive to new ideas and takes customers' insights into consideration when upgrading things.

Matthew
Executive Director in Canada
Nonprofit Organization Management, 11–50 Employees
Used the Software for: 6-12 months
Reviewer Source

Good value for the money!

4.0 6 years ago

Comments: We made the switch from an overpriced, under-utilized database software to Keela. The switch pretty smooth, not without a few learning moments, but all the data was imported. It meets our needs for receiving and tracking donations, receipting, e-blasts, reporting, and it comes with an affordable price tag! Customer support has been great. Overall, we are very happy with the software after using it for 6+months.

Pros:

The software is straightforward, fairly intuitive and does most of what we need it to do. The setup for donations through the software was simple. The email platform saves us from having to pay for a separate email service. Most of all, I appreciate the helpful customer support. They answer questions in a timely fashion and have made the overall experience really good!

Cons:

The sidebar is limited and should include a quicker link to things like donations, e-blast, etc. In order to use the CRM platform, I have to click through 3 pages to put in a note about a donor. Adding some quicker links for this, including putting an interaction link on the "+" at the top of the page would up my rating of the software.

Keela Response

6 years ago

Hi Matthew, thanks for sharing your review. Glad to hear you are finding Keela to be a good value. :) Regarding your suggestions for improvements to the sidebar, adding donations is something another client suggested recently - you can vote for this idea to subscribe to it here (https://keela.ideas.aha.io/ideas/KEE-I-126). For your other ideas, we'd love to see ideas for those in our portal as well, so that our product team can review and see if these can be added to Keela in the future. Please share them here (https://keela.ideas.aha.io/ideas/new). Thanks!

Kara
Program Coordinator in Canada
Nonprofit Organization Management, 2–10 Employees
Used the Software for: 6-12 months
Reviewer Source

Highly Recommended

5.0 4 years ago

Comments: Excellent donation and contact management tool. Tech support and learning tools are superb.

Pros:

How donation requests can be automatically matched to donors based on their giving history.

Cons:

As a non-profit, I wish there was a way to track grant success and history.

Keela Response

4 years ago

Thanks so much for your review Kara. I's great to hear our intelligence tool shave supported your organization in making strategic donation asks! We have a lot more Keela intelligence ideas up our sleeve, so stay tuned for an even 'smarter' Keela ;) We also are definitely aware that organizations are hoping to use Keela for grant management... it's on our radar! In the meantime, organizations have had a lot of success using our 'Projects' tool for grat management. Check our out Project section in our Knowledge Base (https://support.keela.co/). You can also reach out to [email protected] if you want to brainstorm with us! We are always happy to help. We look forward to having your organization grow alongside us!

Anna
eCommerce Lead in US
Nonprofit Organization Management, 11–50 Employees
Used the Software for: 6-12 months
Reviewer Source

Looks great, doesn't function well

2.0 5 years ago

Comments: It looked nice but a huge disappointment.

Pros:

It looks beautiful and clean. Vibrant colors.

Cons:

Very challenging to create reports. Our organization gets grants and reporting is a huge aspect of our monthly financials. Keela did not have a clean reporting. Very disappointing.

Keela Response

5 years ago

Hello Anna - Thank you so much for providing this feedback. We really appreciate you taking the time! We are on a constant journey of improvement and the opportunity to grow is invaluable to us. Our Customer Success team has reached out to find out a little more details about the reports that you would like to see added to Keela - I look forward to hearing more details for you and getting these updated into the system. If you ever have any questions about how to use the reporting tools or would like to pass through suggestions please don't hesitate to reach out to us at [email protected] - we love feedback and new ideas! Thanks again.