Plone + Salesforce.com

A centralized data collection point, or data hub, is a crucial component for any business or non-profit.  When information about members is managed within one tool, data can be synchronized in real-time without requiring tedious and error-prone manual efforts from staff.

We recommend Salesforce.com for your data hub. This leading CRM is a software-as-a-service solution, which offers advantages to organizations with limited IT budgets. SaaS solutions provide faster time-to-market, the latest features are always available, and they let you focus on your mission instead of on maintaining an IT infrastructure. And thanks to the Salesforce Foundation and the Non-profit Starter Pack, Salesforce.com is very affordable for 501c3 organizations, with 10 licenses donated and deep discounts on additional licenses.

For more information on Salesforce.com for non-profits, see this comparison of donor management software from Techsoup.

Salesforce.com provides another advantage in that it is already integrated with a wide variety of best-of-breed tools. You can manage email campaigns with VerticalResponse, payments with PayPal or Google Checkout, event registrations with Brown Paper Tickets - all without losing centralized control of your data.

The integration of Plone and Salesforce.com is robust and full featured. Capabilities include:

• Submitting form information from a PloneFormGen form into Salesforce.com (web-to-lead form)
• Adding a new lead to a Salesforce.com account using a web-to-lead form whenever a new Paypal payment is made
• Making Events in your Plone site "RSVPable" with data saved directly to Salesforce.com campaigns
• Authenticating against Plone member information (login, password and properties) which is saved in Salesforce.com
• Showing Salesforce.com data as content in Plone