June release overview

• Smarter lists. Lists now have an option to get updated automatically, which should save everyone some time. You can also view the history of each addition to or removal from the list, so it’s easier to see how a list was created. Finally, if you do want a static list that never changes until you change it, that option is still available.
• Constituent categories. Groups and tags are cool, but many have asked for the ability to track more specific information, so we have added a way for you to create as many different categories as you want or need to segment your constituents appropriately.
• Gift categories. Gift categories cannot have multiple dimensions like constituent categories can, but they provide an additional way to track where a gift came from. By default the values will be Individual Gift, Corporate Gift, Foundation Grant, Public Grant, and Bequest. Values are customizable in the Settings area.
• Member/membership tracking. For membership organizations we have added the ability to track membership levels and dates, and then search/browse by both sets of criteria. If you need this set up or turned on for your subscription, let us know.
• Seasonal addresses. To help increase the accuracy of mailings, you can now set a specific month/day date range for a given address, and LGL will automatically use the correct address based on when you’re exporting your list or the due date for your mailing.

Smarter lists

With LGL’s new list functionality, it’s a whole lot easier to create living lists that can serve as the basis for most of your common queries and reports.  Instead of needing to re-build the list from scratch each time, you have the option to use the list creation history to automatically update the constituents on the list every day (or whenever you edit/update the list).

A fairly simple example might be to create an always-current list of lapsed donors who have given more than $1000 total, which you can build in the following way:

1. Navigate to the constituents tab and click the “Build a list” button

Note the new Auto-update option, which is selected by default.  If you don’t want the list to remain automatically updated, then you can deselect this at any time and the list will freeze.

1. Use the “Gift amount” option in the advanced search to find constituents who have given more than $1000.

1. Then restrict this further by constituents with a “Lapsed Donor” giving status.

1. Lastly, remove any organizations, for good measure, resulting in something that looks like the following.

1. If you are happy with the list, click “Save” and from this point forward you can always use this as the basis for other searches, mailings or exports.
2. You can clear the entire history of the list and all constituents by clicking the “Clear list history” button.

Note If you add or remove individual constituents to/from the list, then these will take precedence over any bulk additions or removals.  Also, lists are updated automatically on a daily basis, or whenever you edit and save them.

Constituent categories

Everyone has four constituent categories by default (groups, tags, capacity, and interest) but it can be handy to add more if you have some specific information you might like to track. Custom categories are nice because they let you split things up in a way that makes them easier to read and you can also browse through your constituent results that way.  For example, here is a setup with custom categories for Status, Program Interest and Volunteer Interest:

You can edit a category independently by clicking on the “Edit” or “Add” links next to each category (visible when you mouse over the category) or you can edit all categories at once by clicking on the Edit all categories button.

Full constituent editing

Previously when adding a new constituent or editing an existing one, you only had the ability to change name and contact information.  Now you can edit everything about a constituent from a single form.  This form is admittedly quite a big one, but you can make it a bit less intimidating by closing any sections that you don’t care to edit at the moment:

Gift categories

Gift categories provide an additional dimension to gift tracking, so you can more easily track where gifts are coming from.  The default categories are Individual Gift, Corporate Gift, Foundation Grant, Public Grant, and Bequest, but these are fully customizable in the Menu Items section of the Settings area.

Member/membership tracking

With member/membership tracking turned on (it is off by default) you can track a constituent’s membership levels and dates, and also easily search for constituents by level and expiration date.  Assuming you have membership turned on, you can:

1. Add/edit membership information from the constituent details page by clicking the “Edit Membership” button, or you can

1. Add/edit membership information from the constituent Edit form

1. Browse constituents by membership level and status

1. Search constituents by membership level and end dates

All of these tools combined make it fairly easy to do things like generate a monthly mailing to members who are up for renewal.

Seasonal addresses

As in the above example, it’s now possible to set dates that relate to a particular address.  By default, all addresses are considered to be “Year ‘round”, but in the case where people spend the year in different locations, different dates can be set.

LGL automatically figures out the best address to use based on the date.  In most cases, the date used is the current date, but in the case of a mailing, the due date is used (if available) to ensure that the correct address information is used.

Miscellaneous changes

Along with these big changes, we changed a number of other small things.

Constituent lookup

In gift, goal, and task forms, and everywhere else that you need to look up and set a constituent, the process has changed a bit to make it easier to see who’s who.

1. Click on the Set Constituent button. Hitting the “Enter” key should also work in most browsers.

1. Search for a constituent or click the “add a new constituent” link if you need to create a new constituent for this record

1. Click the “Select” button to set the constituent and close the window

Constituent details page updates

The location of contact information on the constituent details page has shifted over to the right, to make way for categories in the middle, and also to allow for more vertical space to display all contact information on the main page

Update all categories on a list

The ability to update groups and tags for a whole list of constituents has been replaced by the ability to update all categories on a list.  You can do this by clicking on the “Update categories” button from any list details page.

You can add/remove any category to or from all constituents on a particular list.

Edit all menu items

The menu items page now allows you to edit every kind of customizable type or menu, including all of the categories, task types, note types, and more.

1. To get there, click on the “Setting link” in the upper right hand corner of any page

1. Click on the “Menu items” link in the sub-navigation

1. Add, update, delete, or reorder the values for any menu