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About Blackbaud eTapestry
All-in-one, web-based donor management and fundraising solution purpose-built to help nonprofits raise more money in less time.
The layout is very user intuitive and easy to understand. You can truly dive in and really get a huge bang for you budget almost immediately.
Moreover, at the time, it did not integrate well with other systems we were purchasing.
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Filter reviews (219)

Good management software
Comments: We use this as our primary data storage system. It talks to our database view very well.
Pros:
I like that all of our data is stored in this software and that it is easy to quickly access for my whole team.
Cons:
Sometimes the software gets bogged down with users and runs very slow. The updates do take some getting used to as well.
Pro for Donor Management, Con for Event Management
Comments: While eTapestry has helped us make sense of a lot of data and history, it is very difficult to learn how to use and train new employees on.
Pros:
I like the data it stores about our donors and the various ways we are able to report on the information,
Cons:
I find the donor facing event platforms very dated and confusing.
Hard to use but has all the bells and whistles
Comments: We liked the software for a while but the more our business grew, the more eTapestry because a pain as the interface was very old and hard to use for people that aren't technology savvy.
Pros:
The software had a lot going for it because it had all the bells and whistles that you want, including ability to find out someones net worth, donations at other places, etc. The plus side about it was that you could easily put someone into the system and instantly send them a thank you email without more than a few clicks.
Cons:
It was very difficult to run reports as there were so many moving parts to get them to come together.

eTapestry for Donor Management
Pros:
eTapestry has a lot of great cloud based functionality for keeping track of your donor database, sending communications, running reports on interactions with donors, etc.
Cons:
It's pretty pricey for smaller not for profits.
eTapestry Customer Support
Comments: I was hired at Neighborhood Healthcare 3 weeks before its largest fundraiser of the year. I needed to learn eTapestry quickly to accurately update the database with event purchases and I needed my data entry to be fast. Customer support was my go-to, they answered questions over their chat module, emailed me white papers on best practices, and shared detailed instructions on how to be most efficient with our database.
Pros:
Customer service was fast, knowledgeable, and respectful. I never felt like I was asking a dumb question and they always had an answer.
Too Many Limitations
Comments: If you are only dealing with donations, this may be a good option for you, but I work for a membership organization, and not long after I was hired, I convinced the organization to scrap eTapestry for something better suited to our needs.
Pros:
This database is easy to use. If you've ever used another donor management system, you'll find it pretty intuitive. You can build decent queries and create tons of data points you want to track.
Cons:
Everything has to be done manually, and it can take some time. I wouldn't recommend this to a membership organization because of the time involved logging renewals. There is also a really not so awesome template you have to use create all of the products you want to offer, including donations. It's a hassle for the organization and the donor.
eTapestry Non Profit Review
Comments: Very cumbersome and took a long time to learn all the aspects of the software. I still do not feel like we were able to utilize the system to its fullest potential.
Pros:
Accessibility and ease of data entry. I also liked the templates that were available for newsletters, emails and etc.
Cons:
Creating reports was not user friendly.

Expensive, Buggy, and Complicated
Comments: I find this platform user-unfriendly, and it regularly is buggy and slow. Considering we pay them literally thousands of dollars every year to use it, I expect a better product. Running reports is a nightmare and requires significant staff training for the simplest of reports. The only reason we are still using it is because it is so difficult to switch years of donor records to another platform. They also recently opted us into a more expensive package without giving me a chance to opt out – despite it being a feature we don't use.
Pros:
Not much. There aren't many pros that I have seen compared to other softwares.
Cons:
The biggest problem with eTap is reports. Running the most basic of donor reports is incredibly unintuitive and convoluted.
eTapestry Makes Organization Easy for Nonprofits
Comments: I have used the software in my work for a nonprofit 501 c 3 organization. eTapestry has a clear, intuitive structure that is also easy to personalize. I feel like information that before was spread out over our intranet, email marketing software, and donor database system is now together in one place for streamlined communication.
Pros:
Easy to use, offers personalization, organizes complex information simply
Cons:
The "Help" section can be confusing. You can easily end up looking up with answers that pertain to other Blackbaud products and tracing your way back to eTapestry specifically can be confusing.
eTapestry Blackbaud Software
Comments: We use eTapestry as a software relationship building and donation tracking device. We are quite pleased with the software and are sharing our successes with you because eTapestry is an easy and affordable database for our organization.
Pros:
Ease of use, versatility, and access are pro's to the eTapestry software system.
Cons:
Sometime because this is a cloud based system, there are timing issues.
eTapestry - A medium weight solution for Donor Management and Receipting.
Comments: I have been impressed with the solid support team eTapestry has. The online chat has been very helpful to me, and the specialists I have chatted with have always been knowledgeable.
Pros:
eTapestry has lots of power to get things done. It is cloud-based, so there is no need for the user to worry about upgrading the software or backing up the data. Queries are very easy to produce, and exporting the results in reports, PDFs or excel is a snap. You can design your own forms so that your website can talk to eTapestry easily. eTapestry works equally well on desktop computers, tablets and cellphones. This is very helpful for fundraisers who are on the road.
Cons:
If you are downsizing from a more robust package such as Raiser's Edge, be prepared for a loss of flexibility - for example, queries in eTapestry lack some of the power that Raiser's Edge has. When comparing what you get "out of the box" with some other solutions, you will find that in order to keep costs down for the average user, eTapestry is very basic. To add in eCommerce, donor logins, advanced email, etc these are available, but as an add-on pricing. This can make it more expensive than other products that have all these features to start with, so you should be aware of what your real needs are before committing to eTapestry.
eTapestry: simply the best product out there
Pros:
The eTapestry system is by far the best we've ever used. There are many things to like including: the dashboard with its sophisticated look that integrates all of the important information in on place, which makes it simple to focus on important things like delivering programs. Our old system didn't work well, especially when we needed to pull information from it. Reporting in eTapestry is quick and it looks really professional. So far, everyone we've had to provide information to, such as accountants, counselors, and so forth, are really impressed with how the information is presented to them. Last but not least, the diy forms are a godsend. They've raised us to a whole new level in regards to our tax receipting, registration forms, and mail outs! Perhaps the greatest thing we've enjoyed using eTapestry is the caliber of service we've received from every member of the team.
Cons:
So far there's nothing we don't like, but I do have some suggestions. First of all, for the diy forms, we are using one for program registrations that have a fee - the donation form seemed to be the best fit. It would be ideal for us if we could either change the wording from "donation amount" and "donation frequency" to "payment amount" and "payment frequency", or provide us with the options for wording because we don't want those who are registering to be confused about the fee because it's not a donation. Secondly, in the diy forms, where we have multiple options for users to check off, it would be ideal if we could create columns so that the form isn't too long. Finally, because we are using some of the diy forms for program registrations and we deliver programs to families, it would be ideal for us if we could have a form where participants could put in the names of their family members and those names would generate separate constituents in the database. For instance, a mother signs up for a program with her two kids. All have the same contact information, but the health information is different for all three. Currently, people have to do the form several times - once for each family member.
Been with eTapestry for over three years.
Pros:
Very recently, I had my first positive experience with phone support. Hopefully, that is an indicator that eTapestry is beefing up their customer service. We will know more as the holiday rush happens.
Cons:
Since the beginning, customer support has been abysmal. Just recently, it has improved, but it took three years. Last year, during the holidays, I waited no less than an hour on hold each time and ended up hanging up because I did not have that kind of time to wait on the phone. One time, I waited an hour and a half, and when the closing time came, instead of taking my call, eTapestry simply disconnected me, and I pay extra for phone support! I gave up and was never able to reach support last year during the holiday season. This year's holiday season is just starting, so I have to see if anything has improved. Also, when we set up our account there was zero project management. They did not establish our needs, and as a result, set up the database as they saw fit. We had problems with defined fields (ones they established and ones they did not), and any changes would have cost a fortune. So we were stuck with what they did, which requires a lot of additional data input after the fact. There was also zero personal training. They provided videos to watch. That was not an effective way to train because they use their own terminology, and when you had questions to ask, you couldn't ask because you were watching a video. Hands-on training is a must! We started with a customer support person who was not in tune with our needs and was later switched to a group and lost one-on-one support.
Expensive platform with increasing costs and long contract periods!
Comments: Unfortunately, eTapestry is just not easy to work with as they were in the beginning when we started working with them in 2011.
Pros:
At first I loved eTapestry for its great support and a la carte options. It is definitely a robust system. Not so much anymore since they are now part of Blackbaud. They now bundle options and railroad agencies into long contracts to get single features that used to be available a la carte.
Cons:
All of the above, plus their communications tool is not the best. It would be better if they integrated with a marketing tool like Constant Contact and included that in their packages. The maneuvering through the system is clunky and not at all intuitive.
Frustrating with a long learning curve
Pros:
Integration with online giving is seamless. Manual entry of gifts is easy and straightforward. It's easy to export data.
Cons:
No one in our small organization uses this software regularly enough to feel proficient, and it isn't intuitive. I waste a lot of time trying to get data out of the software. Reports have to be rebuilt every time you run them, and there is no built-in year against year to date report, which seems like an essential to me. When I was given instructions on how to accomplish this, I couldn't believe the number of steps it involved. I find myself spending a lot of time running queries, then exporting them to Excel to manipulate the data to prepare something I can share with the ED and Board. I know there are users who love this software, but it isn't working well for us.
Customization is both a pro and con
Pros:
Basic tools are easy to learn, especially as a first-time user. Saving attachments to records. Tracking soft credits; linking soft credits to hard credits. Ability to process credit cards and post directly in data records.
Cons:
Many past development staff led to variations of historical data inputs--this is where the customization makes tasks difficult. Queries can only do AND and OR, so it can take multiple queries to get to the data needed. Can't delete accounts once a profile has been created. Can't undo merged accounts. Can't pull direct report on numbers of donor visits, donor gifts, etc (donor-focused data). Can't designate a special location for detailed donor visit reports (eTap account "Notes" isn't efficient).
Not recommended for small non-profits
Pros:
eTapestry is probably suited for larger organizations and is much more than we need. There are a ton of reports available and it's easy to keep track of different campaigns. It also has excellent tools for event management, like tracking ticket sales, sending invites, etc.
Cons:
I found the program a bit overwhelming to use as a new fundraiser who also worked by myself. If I had a team, or someone to train me it may have been a bit easier. It is not very intuitive. Also, the training videos are not included, which is a big negative since the program is so expensive to begin with. I did not find this program very simple for receipting donations as they came in with monthly receipts as well as year-end receipts. It was a tedious process. The customer support team was not very helpful. We ended up going in a different direction with our business.
Decent donor software for medium-sized nonprofits
Comments: It's too complicated for small organizations and not robust enough for large organizations. Since bought by Blackbaud, it seems to have been de-prioritized in terms of features, upgrades and design. Customer support is very good - but you'll need them on speed dial. Great people, great company - but this produce needs a little more TLC. Email marketing function is almost un-usable in today's mobile environment. No moves-management function, etc. 'Entirely customizable' means you have to build your own systems within. Great for basic donor info and gift tracking. Took us a couple years to 'right-size' it for us - and even then, when you have more 'work-arounds' than original offerings, you wonder if there's something better.
Pros:
Customer service
Cons:
Old design, clunky, not intuitive.
Miserable and impossible
Comments: I would not wish this donor management system on my worst enemy.
Pros:
It already has all of my data in it. That is literally the only good thing I can say about it. I would never ever purchase this software
Cons:
Its impossible to run reliable reports, even their own support people can't tell me how to get the data I need out of their system. There is no easy way to expunge old records. They make it exceedingly difficult to get away from this company when your contract with them does expire. I have to clean up reports by hand every time I run them.

Great for the price
Comments: The software delivered what we needed it to and was sufficient for our requirements.
Pros:
The ability to have recurring donors processed automatically and securly is very important and Etapestry delivered this. The program is able to track donations to specific projects and fundraising programs. Handles EOFY receipts well.
Cons:
It was difficult sometimes to get the information you required out of the program without specific training.
eTapestry Donor Data Base
Comments: Overall great software
Pros:
eTapestry is an economical donor data base that is provided through Blackbaud systems. It is a great price for all the features and functions it has. It can store and track all data on donors both individual and grants.
Cons:
While the software and database can track grants it is easier and more useful to track individual donors. Matching funds are a bit tricky to input and events are another feature which are a bit tedious and difficult to track.
Painful learning process
Comments: Etapestry needs to be more user friendly. 9 out of 10 times their chat can't even help, and I have to wait for a higher level and sometimes they need to get back to me, which they eventually do, but too much time wasted.
Pros:
Generating letters off of each donation. Being able to run queries. I like the address updates and a lot of the user defined fields.
Cons:
Way too many layers/dynamics. Next to impossible to figure out many of the compound queries without help.
The best part of Etapestry is their customer service; I have been able to quickly get any question or issue resolved with their online assistance.
Pros:
Etapestry is very user friendly, I was able to pick it up quickly without utilizing any of the training videos.
Cons:
I wish there was a way around only being able to open one record at a time. Other web based data bases I've used have had the same issue of only being able to open one window at a time. Are there any web-based data bases that allow you to open more than one window at a time?
Not user friendly
Comments: Bring back the top notch customer support you had . . . eTapestry is hard to learn and unless you are a programmer you need qualified, knowledgeable support who will help.
Pros:
The customer support it used to have when we first started a couple of years ago. Now it seems as if no one knows much on chat.
Cons:
The customer support on chat is terrible. All they do is send you links to read. They don't seem to understand.
eTapestry is a good (not great) system for what we needed
Comments: We are able to track and communicate with our donors through this system. The reporting functionality is amazing for the price, and after a user has invested quite a bit of time into learning how everything works, the system has many capabilities that have been extremely useful for our organization.
Pros:
We like the tiered permissions (security groups) function, which set this system apart from many other offerings in the donor management arena. The customer service has always been great when we've had problems. The reporting capabilities of eTapestry are absolutely incredible.
Cons:
The software is not always intuitive, and it's only easy to use after lots of time has been spent learning its layout and functionalities.