Blackbaud's Community Relations Manager Sally Ehrenfried Featured in Charleston Regional Business Journal

From politics to philanthropy: Sally Ehrenfried
By Holly Fisher
Research Editor 

From the article:

Ehrenfried’s position overseeing community relations allows her to foster that love of public service through Blackbaud’s philanthropic efforts. Ehrenfried manages Blackbaud’s corporate giving portfolio, directs corporate giving and works with the company’s almost 2,000 employees to promote philanthropy and volunteerism.

Blackbaud has long been a strong supporter of community service and is taking that vision to its other offices, across the United States and in London; Glasgow, Scotland; and Sydney, Australia.

One of the company’s core beliefs is that service to others makes the world a better place, Ehrenfried said. She helps the company and its employees live out that value.

Read more.

Blackbaud Interviews Podcast to Feature Marc Chardon and Rich LaBarbera

Marc Chardon and Rich LaBarbera will be the featured guests on the next episode of Blackbaud Interviews. They will provide an update on the Kintera acqusition, and will answer questions from listeners/readers. Submit yours here.

Blackbaud Interviews is a recurring podcast that features leaders from Blackbaud and from throughout the sector and explores critical issues faced by nonprofits. Episode 1 features Chuck Longfield, founder of the Target companies and Blackbaud’s chief scientist; and Jay Love, eTapestry’s founder and CEO and explores these leaders’ views on consolidation within the sector and within the software industry serving it, and the emergence of Software as a Service (SaaS). In addition, Chuck and Jay share their experience with the integration of the Target companies and eTapestry with Blackbaud since the merger.

Download Blackbaud Interviews, Episode 1 (21 MB, 30 minutes)

Press Release: The Field Museum Selects Blackbaud's Arts and Cultural Solution

Charleston, S.C. (August 11, 2008) – Blackbaud, Inc. (Nasdaq: BLKB), announced today that The Field Museum will use The Patron Edge® for ticketing and The Financial Edge™ for financial management.

The Field Museum, located in Chicago, is regarded as one the finest natural history museums in the world and attracts more than 1.3 million visitors annually. When the Museum was faced with a costly and resource-consuming conversion with its legacy system, staff decided to research other solutions. “What we found in Blackbaud was a responsive, dedicated team and are confident that they will be a sustainable partner,” said J.W. Croft, The Field Museum’s executive vice president.

Read more here.

Making Waves with Blackbaud NetCommunity

Blackbaud recently announced the release of Blackbaud NetCommunity 5.5 and one of the major new features that customers are most excited about is the Wave social networking feature:

“With Wave, Blackbaud has introduced a new way to leverage social networking—both within the application and by integrating to social network services like Facebook—which will add to the viral nature of our work,” said Chesapeake Bay Foundation’s Director of Information Technology Michael Sola. “Being able to have an easier way to reach out through social networking channels will help us extend our audience as we move more and more in that direction."  

Here at Blackbaud, we're even more excited to see how NetCommunity users will leverage this new feature as part of their social networking strategy. In a video statement, Vice President of Blackbaud Interactive Shaw Drummond said:

"Thanks to innovations like Wave, NetCommunity's new social networking platform, you can have confidence that Blackbaud is going to work with closely with industry leaders to see around the corner and ensure that you have everything you need in a website solution for years to come."

You can also hear from Steve MacLaughlin, Director of Internet Solutions why Blackbaud chose to "build" a native social networking component over the "partner" or "do nothing" options. He says, "The resounding response from the customers that we interacted with and spoke with was that they wanted Blackbaud to build a social networking component that would be part of Blackbaud NetCommunity, that would be out of the box as a part of the overall solution."

Finally, Blackbaud Interactive Marketing Manager Allison Van Diest discusses the top two questions she hears from nonprofits about social networking:

1) How am I going to control my brand?

2) Is social networking a panacea for everything that is difficult in fundraising today?

Check out the answers to these questions, all three videos and additional feature information that has been posted online.

Press Release: NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital and Weill Cornell Medical College Select Blackbaud Enterprise CRM to Manage Multi-site Development Operations

Read more here.