Nonprofit CRM Replacement: Migration Readiness

The decision framework

Five things a replacement has to improve, not just migrate.

Renewal pressure makes any new system look like progress. These five dimensions are how you tell a real improvement from the same work in a new database. Each one has evidence you can hold in your hand, and a warning sign that says you do not have it yet.

Dimension 1

Data readiness

Completeness, duplicate risk, the fields you trust, gift history, attachments, household and organization relationships, record count, and who owns the export.

Good evidence: A recent full export you own, a duplicate count, and a list of the fields the team trusts.
Warning sign: Nobody can say how many duplicates exist, or the export depends on the vendor agreeing to run it.

Dimension 2

Workflow fit

Whether your critical workflows are documented with an owner, the exceptions, the approval steps, and the finished output.

Good evidence: A one-page runbook for each critical workflow: owner, steps, exceptions, approvals, and the finished output.
Warning sign: The answer to “how does a restricted gift reach the ledger” is a person’s name.

Dimension 3

Integration burden

Every connection classified as keep, replace, retire, or investigate, with its volume, its owner, and what breaks when it fails.

Good evidence: An inventory: each connection, its owner, its monthly volume, and what breaks when it fails.
Warning sign: A sync someone re-runs by hand every month, or a connection nobody remembers setting up.

Dimension 4

Governance and controls

Permissions, approvals, restrictions, audit trail, data use, and security requirements, written down and agreed.

Good evidence: A written permissions model, approval rules for gifts and outreach, and the audit questions your auditors ask.
Warning sign: Security and data-use requirements are “whatever the vendor does by default.”

Dimension 5

Capacity gained

Whether the evaluation names the staff work that must disappear or materially improve after the move.

Good evidence: A short list of recurring tasks with hours attached, and a named person who will confirm they went away.
Warning sign: The evaluation is a feature checklist with no recurring work attached to it.

The scorecard adds a sixth

Change readiness

Whether the decision team, implementation owner, adoption plan, timing, and the hours your team can give the move are realistic.

The five dimensions decide whether a move is worth making. This one decides whether your team can make it this year. A 3 or 4 here is a reason to wait, not to hurry.

Score all six

Four replacement paths

Which route are you actually on?

Most replacement decisions fall into one of four paths. Each has a shape, its own migration questions, and a case where the Ignite Active Intelligence Platform is not the right answer. The scorecard names the path your answers point to.

Entry-level CRM replacement

Who it fits: Organizations raising $3M or more whose donor CRM was chosen for a smaller team. The gifts, events, and reporting now spill into spreadsheets and side tools.
When Ignite is not the right route: If you raise under $3M and one donor CRM still fits the work, a lighter tool is usually the better buy. We will say so.

Point-tool consolidation

Who it fits: Teams running a CRM, email, events, payments, and finance as separate tools, with staff carrying the information between them.
When Ignite is not the right route: If each tool is the right one for you and the handoffs are automated and trusted, consolidation buys little. Map the handoffs first.

Legacy database move

Who it fits: Organizations on a long-tenured database with years of history, custom fields, and reports only a few people can run.
When Ignite is not the right route: If finance must stay where it is and the database is only a donor list, a cleanup and a few integrations may beat a move. Renewal pressure alone is not a reason.

Enterprise crossover

Who it fits: Organizations above $30M in revenue or past the constituent-record threshold. Several legal entities point the same way; the scorecard does not ask, so say so in the session. Complexity, not ambition, is the test.
When Ignite is not the right route: Ignite is built for nonprofits raising $3M to $30M. Above that line the conversation moves to our enterprise team, which may point to StratusLIVE 365 CRM, our enterprise CRM on Microsoft Dynamics 365, rather than Ignite.

Migration Readiness Scorecard

Score your migration readiness.

Score what can be exported, what must be cleaned, which workflows cannot break, and which integrations are carrying hidden operating risk. Four short steps. The result appears on this page.

Every question here is about your systems and your team. Nothing asks about the people in your data, and nothing is stored on our servers unless you ask for an email copy.

The printable worksheet version

The interactive scorecard needs JavaScript, which is off in your browser. The same six dimensions work on paper: rate each one from 0 to 4 with your team, then add them up. 0 to 5 is ready to move; 6 to 11 is nearly ready; 12 to 17 has gaps to close first; 18 or more is not yet. Any 4 is a blocker on its own.

Data readiness. Completeness, duplicate risk, the fields you trust, gift history, attachments, household and organization relationships, record count, and who owns the export.
- 0: Documented and clean. We know what is complete, what is duplicated, which fields we trust, and we own a full export.
- 1: Mostly known. A few fields or history areas are uncertain, but the export is ours.
- 2: Mixed. Some areas are clean; others carry unknown duplicates, dead fields, or missing history.
- 3: Major unknowns. Nobody can say what is complete, and duplicates and attachments are unmeasured.
- 4: Inaccessible or untrusted. We cannot get a full export, or the team does not trust the records.
Workflow fit. Whether your critical workflows are documented with an owner, the exceptions, the approval steps, and the finished output.
- 0: Complete. Every critical workflow has an owner, its exceptions, its approval steps, and a finished output on paper.
- 1: Minor gaps. Documented, with a few exceptions or approvals missing.
- 2: Partial. The main path is written down; exceptions and approvals live in people’s heads.
- 3: Largely undocumented. We know the workflows exist, not how they run.
- 4: Single points of failure. One or two people carry the workflows, and nothing is written down.
Integration burden. Every connection classified as keep, replace, retire, or investigate, with its volume, its owner, and what breaks when it fails.
- 0: Rationalized. Every integration is marked keep, replace, retire, or investigate, with an owner and a failure impact.
- 1: Low burden. A short, known list with few dependencies.
- 2: Mixed. The list exists, but volume, owners, and failure impact are unknown for several.
- 3: Many fragile dependencies. Syncs break, and people patch them by hand.
- 4: Unknown or critical dependencies. We do not know everything that connects, and some of it cannot fail.
Governance and controls. Permissions, approvals, restrictions, audit trail, data use, and security requirements, written down and agreed.
- 0: Approved. Permissions, approvals, restrictions, audit, data use, and security requirements are written and signed off.
- 1: Minor open items. Requirements exist; a few details await approval.
- 2: Several open items. Some requirements are written; others are still debated.
- 3: Major gaps. No agreed permissions model, approval rules, or audit expectations.
- 4: No agreed requirements. Nobody has defined what the new system must control.
Capacity gained. Whether the evaluation names the staff work that must disappear or materially improve after the move.
- 0: Quantified and owned. We have named the work that must disappear, estimated its hours, and assigned who will confirm it.
- 1: Clear. The work is named, not yet measured.
- 2: Directional. We know the general areas, not the specific work.
- 3: Vague. “Save time,” with no named work behind it.
- 4: Feature-only. The evaluation is a feature checklist with no staff work identified.
Change readiness. Whether the decision team, implementation owner, adoption plan, timing, and the hours your team can give the move are realistic.
- 0: Ready. Decision team named, implementation owner assigned, adoption plan drafted, timing and implementation hours agreed.
- 1: Minor gaps. The owner and team are set; the adoption plan or timing needs work.
- 2: Moderate gaps. The owner is unclear, or the timing collides with a campaign or audit.
- 3: Weak ownership. Nobody owns implementation, and adoption is assumed.
- 4: No change capacity. The team cannot absorb a move this year.

Book a working session

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Your migration readiness scorecard

Six dimensions

0 means the evidence is in hand. 4 is a blocker on its own.

Scores are your own ratings against the scorecard’s fixed statements. The result names evidence gaps and next actions; it does not estimate savings, cost, or how long a migration takes.

Close these first

Your likely replacement path

Who it fits
When Ignite is not the right route
What the working session covers

Bring to the session

Bring this scorecard to a working session.

Bring your current stack and this page. We will map the likely path and the migration questions, and say plainly whether Ignite belongs in the evaluation.

Map my replacement path Explore the platform

How this result is calculated

The scorecard is deterministic: the same answers always produce the same result, no AI involved, and nothing inspects your systems. Each of the six dimensions takes your 0 to 4 rating against the five statements shown for it. The total, out of 24, maps to one of four labels: 0 to 5 is ready to move, 6 to 11 is nearly ready, 12 to 17 has gaps to close first, and 18 or more is not yet. Any dimension scored 4 is treated as a blocker, so the label cannot be “ready to move” while one exists.

Gaps to close first are the dimensions you scored 2 or higher, highest first, up to three. The replacement path follows your answers about what you are replacing. Above $30M in revenue or 125,000 constituent records it is always Enterprise crossover, because that conversation is scoped differently.

Scores are your own ratings against the scorecard’s fixed statements. The result names evidence gaps and next actions; it does not estimate savings, cost, or how long a migration takes.

Why the category matters

Replace passive record keeping with active intelligence.

A database waits for a person to interpret and move the work. Ignite prepares sourced next steps on the same record and waits for your team's approval.

Agents research and draft. Writes follow the approval gates your team configures, and actions land in the audit trail. The people stay in charge; the waiting stops.

See why Ignite is different

A passive database

Waits for someone to run the report, read it, and decide what happens next.
Every handoff to email, events, or finance is a person's job, on a person's schedule.
History accumulates. Nothing in it prompts the next step.

Active intelligence

Agents research and draft the next step on the same constituent record, and show their sources.
Your team reviews and approves. Nothing goes out without a person behind it.
Fundraising, finance, marketing, and engagement read one record, so the handoffs stop being staff work.

Questions, answered

Before you score anything

Do I need to enter my email to get my scorecard?

No. The full result appears on screen: six dimension scores, the gaps to close first, your likely replacement path, and the evidence to gather. You can print it, save it as a PDF, or copy a text summary without an account or email. Email is only involved if you ask us to send you a copy.

Does the scorecard estimate savings or how long a migration takes?

No. It scores your own evidence against fixed statements and turns each score into an evidence gap and a next action. Savings, cost, and duration depend on your data and your stack, so we do not invent them here. A working session is where that scoping starts.

What does the Enterprise crossover path mean?

Ignite is built for nonprofits raising $3M to $30M a year. Above $30M in revenue, or past the constituent-record threshold on the form, the conversation goes to our enterprise team, which starts with your structure, entities, and integrations and may point you to StratusLIVE 365 CRM rather than Ignite.

Does the result recommend a vendor?

No. It names your likely path, including the case where Ignite is not the right route, and the questions any vendor should have to answer. If you want a second set of eyes, bring the scorecard to a working session.

Leave the passive databasewithout carrying the old work forward.