Microsoft Dynamics CRM

European Foundation Centre uses Microsoft Dynamics CRM

for efficient member and event management

The European Foundation Centre (EFC), established in 1989, is

a member organisation with as aim to support other federations

and organisations with their international development activi-

ties. In order to realise these objectives, an extensive profile of

every member is indispensable. Over the years however, the

member information got spread over dozens of various data-

bases, partly because of turnover of temporary staff, trainees

and volunteers. EFC decided to migrate to Microsoft Dynamics

CRM. The result is one centralised and user-friendly CRM envi-

ronment for member and event administration. Moreover, it

opens the way for all sorts of self-service applications via the

EFC website, like, for instance, automatic registrations for

events linked to an online payment system.

Overview

Country: Belgium

Industry: Members Organisation

Profile European Foundation Centre The European Foundation Centre (EFC) was established in

1989 in order to offer member organisations throughout the

world a suitable legal and fiscal framework for their internatio-

nal activities and stimulate mutual cooperation.

Challenge As a federation, the EFC wanted to keep a profile of its mem-

bers which was as detailed as possible and follow up important

events more efficiently. However, in the past, this information

was spread over dozens of isolated databases and Excel files.

Solution EFC opted for a centralised CRM system for member admini-

stration and event management based on Microsoft Dynamics

CRM. Today, CRM partner Travi@ta is also working on the inte-

gration of the CRM application with the EFC website.

Benefits Secured centralised database with access rights per user

Complete and up-to-date member profiles

Efficiency when organising events

Self-service applications via website, integrated with Micro-

soft Dynamics CRM and online payments

Proactive project follow up and knowledge transfer by CRM

partner Travi@ta

www.traviata.be

+32 (0)2 721 88 80

International organisations and federations encoun-

ter lots of obstacles when they want to operate outsi-

de their own country's borders. The lack of a uniform

international legal and fiscal framework is very often

an impediment.

The European Foundation Centre (EFC) was establis-

hed in 1989 as an internationally active non-profit

organisation whose mission it is to bring together and

support other federations and member organisations

internationally. EFC has about 250 members and

counts 30 to 40 staff. The organisation undertakes

several initiatives in order to stimulate networking

amongst the members. The annual AGA Conference

is attended by roughly 700 participants.

Gonzague Huybrechts, ICT Officer at EFC: "Our main

concern is to get to know our members as well as

possible: that way we'll be able to help them and

bring them into contact with partners and other orga-

nisations. Within our own organisation we have to

take into account a considerable turnover of tempo-

rary staff, volunteers and trainees."

From dozens of datafilesto 1 central CRM system

In the past, every member of staff at EFC worked with

his own files, often in Access or Excel. Throughout the

years, the number of datafiles at EFC kept growing. A

proactive member management was out of the ques-

tion, whilst the quality of the details left much to be

desired.

"A centralised and well-structured member manage-

ment was an absolute requirement. We decided to

migrate to a CRM solution, so that all the knowledge

our staff have about the members could be put into

the system.", Gonzague Huybrechts states.

Luckily, as a non-profit organisation EFC could count

on the financial support from a certain number of

foundations, like the C.S. Mott foundation. Microsoft

Dynamics CRM Gold Partner Travi@ta was able to con-

vince EFC to take the plunge. Gonzague Huybrechts:

“Travi@ta was familiar with the specific issues of

member organisations and had brought many a CRM

implementation in the sector to a good end. The Mi-

crosoft Dynamics CRM platform was very appealing

because of its user-friendliness, important to us as we

work with a lot of temporary staff.”

Detailed contact information

Travi@ta conducted a thorough analysis and asked

after the information EFC wanted to know about every

member. As a result, the standard company profile in

Microsoft Dynamics CRM was adapted by Travi@ta

with a substantial number of extra criteria. At organi-

sational level, it was made possible to register additio-

nal information about the history, the activity domains

and the financial profile of every member.

At the level of the individual contact person the con-

tact information was scrutinized meticulously as well.

For instance, EFC wanted to register information

about political activities and which events were atten-

ded. And because EFC sends out 75 to 100,000 mai-

lings every year to carefully selected target groups,

every contact person should have a detailed list of all

the mailings he has received.

Follow up of payments

Even a non-profit organisation benefits from a good

financial follow up. Today, Microsoft Dynamics CRM is

being deployed actively for the follow up of payment of

the membership fees: on the contact file the staff

member of EFC can see straight away whether or not

the financial contribution was paid.

Event management

Every year, more than 1000 attendants come to an

event organised by EFC, which requires a good follow

up. Travi@ta implemented the necessary adjustments

in Microsoft Dynamics CRM turning the system into a

fully fledged tool for event management. This ranges

from follow up of registrations and the number of par-

ticipants, to filing information about the speakers

which speak at the events. Here too, Travi@ta provi-

ded EFC with a link to the online payment system

Ogone so that also that part of the information ends

up in CRM.

CRM integration via the website

EFC's ambitions are not limited to the implementation

of the CRM itself. The organisation is already looking

forward to the next ambitious project, i.e. the integrati-

on of Microsoft Dynamics CRM with EFC's website.

Gonzague Huybrechts: "The integration of Microsoft

Dynamics CRM with the website offers many a possi-

bility of optimising the service to the members and at

the same time make the internal administration much

more efficient."

In the short term, an extra module from Travi@ta will

be installed which will also manage access rights and

passwords for external members. Every member will

automatically receive a user name and password

which will allow him to gain access to specific details

from the CRM system from the website.

"Every member will be able to view and amend his

own profile information, but will also be able to regis-

ter online for events. The advantage of the web inte-

gration is that all the access rights and the details en-

tered via the website will be registered directly in Mi-

crosoft Dynamics CRM, which will decrease the admi

"A centralised and well-structured member ma-

nagement was an absolute requirement. We

decided to migrate to a CRM solution, so that all

the knowledge our staff have about the mem-

bers could be put into the system."

Gonzague Huybrechts, ICT Officer, EFC

For more information

For more information about the Microsoft products and servi-

ces described, call +32 (0)2 704 30 00 or visit

http://www.microsoft.be/cases, where you will find details

of other companies that use similar types of applications.

For more information about Travi@ta, call +32 (0)2 721 88 80

or visit http://www.traviata.be.

For more information about European Foundation Centre,

visit the website http://www.efc.be, or call +32 (0)2 512 89

38.

www.traviata.be

nistrative burden and the margin of error considerab-

ly", Gonzague Huybrechts states.

Apart from that, Travi@ta is working on the integrati-

on with Microsoft SharePoint and MS Dynamics CRM

in order to offer members of EFC an online collabora-

tion platform allowing them to work together for spe-

cific projects.

Return on investment in the short and long term

Looking back on the successful CRM implementation,

Gonzague Huybrechts really appreciated the professi-

onal cooperation with Travi@ta: "The Travi@ta consul-

tants were able to 'translate' our wishes immediately

into concrete actions and paid a lot of attention to

the knowledge transfer after the implementation.

Other IT companies often speak fine words, but that's

it."

The return on investment of the CRM implementation

is situated on various levels. On the level of the data-

base, the details are, due to the centralisation, much

better protected in case of calamities. The confidenti-

ality of the information is also guaranteed much bet-

ter, due to an efficient management of the access

rights of the users.

With day-to-day activities, like organising events, EFC

is already booking a considerably time profit, while

the CRM offers much more added value as a trusted

source of information for analysis and follow up of

payments and registrations.

In the future the „'Return on Investment' will undoub-

tedly increase thanks to the access to the CRM de-

tails via EFC's website.

©2010 Lemarco

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