Is CiviCRM what I need?

[Allen]

Greetings! Below is a list of requirements I need of any CRM I am installing.

Background: I am creating a website for the Yarmouth Agricultural Society. We have around 2000+ members that all pay yearly dues. We currently host one major event a year but are looking at adding another.

List of needs:

• Be able to create different types of members with 3 different groups (Groups: Executive, Board of Directors, Members) (Types of membership: Executive Member, Director, Jr Director, Life Time Director, Member)
• I need to be able to email out to each group individually.
• each person can belong to more than one group (eg: Executive Member is part of the membership group, Board of Directors, and Executive.
• Track membership dues by having each member have a unique member ID and if their account is active (if they have paid) or not. With it defaulting to inactive after one year membership.
• When creating an event we often place people 1st, 2nd, and 3rd. I need a way of linking the member who I have assigned to an event to give them a placing.

That is about it

[Coleman Watts]

CiviCRM should have no trouble meeting those requirements.

[Upperholme]

Hi Allen

Thanks for posting your query. I'm not too clear on your final point, but on the whole your requirements look to be pretty straightforward and well suited to CiviCRM's out of the box capabilities.

I would recommend that you set up a local install, or check out the demo at http://demo.civicrm.org and spend a little time. Also the online user and administrator guide (http://book.civicrm.org/user/) is very helpful and includes useful sections on using groups and managing memberships.

[Erik Hommel]

As far as I can see CiviCRM should be fine for your requirements. Like Graham I would recommend you to get started with a local install. Start with a prototype project, where you test your organisations processes against core CiviCRM and note any issue, be it organizational, functional or technical. From that initial start, plan a project that should bring you to live CiviCRM.

Good luck!

[Allen]

My final point: When creating an event we often place people 1st, 2nd, and 3rd. I need a way of linking the member who I have assigned to an event to give them a placing.

This is where an event would be like Horse Jumping for example. For that event I would need to assign members to that event. When that event is over I would need to add their placings, eg 1st, 2nd, 3rd and so on. This way I can have a view that would show placings of the events to people viewing the site.

[Hershel]

It sounds like you could add a custom field to the event registration that only you, as the admin, would edit. That field would hold a person's ranking. After the event you could edit the participants and assign their ranking.

Then if Drupal is your CMS, you could create a View (using the Views module) to display those data, sorted as you want.

With WordPress or Joomla, it's also possible to display this but it may be more complicated.

[Allen]

That is what I thought as well Hershel. Add a field to the people who sign up that only I can see and such. I am very good so far with views as I use that on several of the other sites I manage. It is just I have never done anything with a CRM before.

[Hershel]

If you already have such skills, you will have no trouble with CiviCRM--I would say the next step is to give it a whirl and see how it works for you.