My Ongoing Frustrations with Church Community Builder
UPDATE Sept 7, 2011 – I get lots of hits on this post because there are very few real reviews of ChMS systems on the web. I still use CCB and at this time don’t plan to switch. When I have some time I will post a new review. I have not found another system that is easier or less money. This does what I want. Don’t avoid CCB because of this article. If you have actual questions, drop me a note. I will try my best to answer them. I just don’t want to cost CCB business because this is one of the few real reviews.
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update 8/26/2010: I have since updated my processes. I am now able to generate a csv file that I do a mailmerge through Word to do my mailings. I honestly don’t know how hard it is to incorporate an online document editor so I don’t hold this against the software. Though you would think it could incorporate Word like Quick Books can do.
Now, as far as the pathetic email editor. . . I currently export all email addressed and import it to Vertical Response to do my mailings. Again, not the simplest process but it works.
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August 11, 2010: For those who have followed this blog, you know that I had been looking for a decent church management software solution and in the end went with Church Community Builder. Time and again I feel like that was not the best decision. When I compare it with other solutions, I honestly don’t know if one is better than the other. And for all the reviews that I read online, here are some of the key things I wish I had known before I bought.
- <– see that bullet? You want one on a letter? Too bad. In fact, though Church Community Builder talks about how you can create processes and mail merge a letter to folks, you can’t format that letter beyond the return and space key. So do you use tabs in your letter? Not anymore. Bullets? Leave them at home. Don’t want your correspondence looking like a form letter? Too bad, recipient address goes at the top whether you like it or not. Want to address an envelope? Better do it by hand. The closest you will get is a mailing label. Want any kind of graphic? You would need to draw it in by hand. Hope that letter is going to be printed on stationary because you cant just throw your header image and print on a color printer.
- The email client lacks any tracking. None. Nada. And it is not possible for folks to sign up for your email without completing a form and you adding them to the system after you get the email form. So you have no idea how many folks read, or even received the email. The basic functionality of constant contact or vertical response.
- Speaking of email. You better know html because there is not any email formatting beyond what you see on your keypad. With all the open source rich html editors none are in the system.
- Another key option I was looking for was an ability for people to sign up for a connection group from my website. I thought I specifically asked that question and was told folks could. Nope. You can search for a group. But that’s it.
- I love the financial tracking. But I can’t justify the cost for that one function.
As much as it pains me to say this, I am now going to look and see what it would take to switch to another ChMS. I know there would be a hefty fee but I am not sure if I can justify throwing good money after bad.
If your church wants folks to be able to look at stuff online, CCB might be great. If you want to do anything with that information then it might not be the best solution.
I too share in your sentiment on the email tool. I was looking for solutions, and I cannot follow your idea. Your terms are unknown to me, so can you help me by elaborting what tool you use to compose your email messages through ccb?
I just sent another blob of words and it is very bothersome to show ineptness with this tool to new parents of my 6th grade students.
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September 10th, 2010 at 9:19 pm
As far as emails go, I only use the email functionality for brief to a few individuals. I think it is far better to use a real email service to do a weekly email newsletter, like constant contact, vertical response, or monkey mail. Here is what you do, do an all church report. Instead of choosing to display on screen, export it as an excel file. Then import the list to your desired email service. A decent one will only import the users it does not already have.
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September 10th, 2010 at 9:21 pm
Another choice is to format the email in any html editor. Then take the html code and paste it in CCB. It will display correctly.
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For the record, it is incredibly easy to integrate an HTML editor like CKEditor.
No idea why they don’t do that.
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November 3rd, 2010 at 2:06 pm
Might be because of licensing worries? I don’t think you can take GPL code and plug it into a proprietary-license web site.
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Hey, I’ve been looking at CCB and comparing it to The City by Zondervan. Have you looked at that? Are they able to handle the issues you have with CCB?
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November 19th, 2010 at 3:07 pm
I like the ease of use of CCB when compared to F1. But no, I have not looked at the city by ZV.
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November 28th, 2010 at 9:12 am
I’ve been doing some investigation of City vs. CCB.
For a 200 member church, City ends up over twice the price with the new Giving module.
Really hard to justify.
I like it, it’s just too expensive.
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November 28th, 2010 at 5:54 pm
When compared to the alternatives I am happy with CCB. Compared with Word, or Pro-Tools, or WordPress, it has a long way to go but ChCM is such a niche market I guess you can only expect so much.
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An option that I use to open up a log of possibilities is XINHA HERE! add-on for Firefox which basically allows me to open up any form in a WYSIWYG edits with the buttons that you would come to expect. I can use this to edit HTML mail merges, as well as on regular group emails or emails to individuals. No matter where I am, XINHA is just a right mouse click away.
Just a thought…although, I have seem some updates to the email tools going through BETA right now. It will add some functionality to the editor which will help with basic communications but I use XINHA for the more detailed edits.
Just a thought.
David
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-us/firefox/addon/xinha-here/
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February 21st, 2011 at 2:23 pm
Kind of hard to have email templates that way. I use dreamweaver and mail chimp. While it would be nice to have all this rolled into one service, I don’t think any of the ChMS programs can replace a true email service.
Besides, using an outside service makes the emails public. I don’t think there is a way to publicly archive emails in ccb.
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Hey there, how have you weathered these frustrations? We’re looking at CCB at present and I’d be interested to hear what you’ve found over time.
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April 23rd, 2011 at 7:15 pm
We renewed for another year if that tells you anything. I have just come to the realization that there is no one solution for all needs.
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Another solution you might want to take a look at is Best Attendance (http://bestattendance.com/youth), although it is mostly geared for youth groups.
Much of the software on the market is big, complicated, and expensive. Best Attendance only does a few things, and it does them well. It’s great for taking attendance, sharing event calendars, sending emails, and updating membership records. It’s a web-based service available as a subscription.
I know there are a lot of options out there, but if you’re looking for something easy to use, this one is pretty good.
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I too share similar frustrations but with Connection Power, a different web based ChMS. I think you are right that there is no panacea out there for ChMS… it just doesnt exist. I export database mailing lists, send from Constant Contact or from my own server if its a small enough list. I also want a “paper trail” and none exists with CP either. But the scheduling software is so great, and cheaper than buying this service via EventU or other vendors. We also just renewed. Its gonna have to do.
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June 27th, 2011 at 4:19 pm
I think that once we get realistic expectations about the ChMS we can be happier with our choice
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If anyone cares I have updated this article. I need to post another one and link to it but I just have other things going on.
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[...] spent some time looking online, and a number of blogs were hugely helpful in our early research phase, especially that of Joel Lingenfelter. After a few [...]
Hey Carl, I care! Thanks for all these initial posts about CCB and the other vendors. We have chosen CCB after a long evaluative process, which I just blogged about. I linked to this post, as it helped me in the process. Thanks again!
http://www.jpuddy.net/2011/09/12/choosing-a-chms-vendor/
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September 14th, 2011 at 3:34 pm
Glad I could be some help. Great post you did. Hope it helps others.
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I think it would be advantageous to incorporate a mailchimp plugin or a series of customisable templates within the message options. I am asking too much?
There appears to be some traction for a couple of ChMS options now. including a basic one called http://Elvanto.com as well as http://www.bvcms.com/
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October 25th, 2011 at 1:37 am
CCB has an existing integration with BombBomb, a competitor of MailChimp’s, FYI.
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Just wondering if you ever looked at Elexio?
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December 22nd, 2011 at 6:49 pm
no. I haven’t heard of it.
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