Salesforce for AdvancementData Storage Recommendations from a Salesforce Architect

By: Tom LeddyDirector of Education Services, Salesforce.org

Data Strategy

Reporting Strategy

Storing Data in Salesforce

Choosing Data and Reporting Strategies

Conclusion

Table of Contents

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What’s a data strategy?

Data is the lifeblood of any educational institution and its importance

continues to grow at a rapid pace. An advancement organization, in

particular, requires as much data as possible to use when creating

strategies around how to approach individual alumni and their

associated organizations for future fundraising efforts. Depending

on the size and age of your university, your organization may have

decades or even centuries of historical data about current and

previous donors, along with the interactions they’ve had with

the University. A modern Advancement system, such as the one

that’s built into Education Cloud, can be utilized for a multitude of

purposes, yet constituent data remains its most valuable asset and

forms the foundation of a variety of business processes. So it’s not

surprising that questions like “where should I store all of my data?”

and “how can I easily access the data my my team needs?” would be

top of mind.

The good news is that Salesforce offers multiple ways to manage your

data storage needs; our platform is flexible enough to allow you to

not only choose the approach that’s the best fit for your organization

today, but also to make adjustments as your data requirements

continue to evolve. The decisions you make around where to store

what type of data and how your various storage options will evolve

over time can be referred to as your organization’s data strategy.

Data Strategy

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What’s a reporting strategy?Your organization can store as much data as you’d like but none of

that data will have any value if you’re not able to access, review, and

gain insights from it. The types of insights that you’ll want to gain from

your data will affect your organization’s reporting strategy, which will,

in turn, drive your data strategy. So before we get into the pros and

cons of all of the different data storage options, the first thing we’re

going to want to do is think about the types of reports you’d like to

run and what your team will do with the insights that you gain from

them. So if we take a step back even further, we can see that there’s a

cyclical relationship between your organization’s donor engagement

strategy and your reporting strategy and and another one between

your reporting and data strategies.

Reporting Strategy

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When you think about your reporting strategy, keep in mind that reports typically fall into two categories:

• Operational Reports are day-to-day reports that are needed to run your organization. An example of an operational

report would be one that calculates how the donations that your team collected this month are matching up against

your monthly fundraising targets. These reports can usually be run directly from your Advancement system using the

data that’s stored directly in that system, such as new donations that have come in during the current month, the

campaigns that you’re currently running and a list of donors who you’ve reached out to.

• Analytical Reports are more historical in nature. They’re used to track your donations over time and identify trends

that might help you make adjustments to future programs or identify new donors or organizations to reach out to

going forward. An example of a report like this might be one that determines whether a marketing campaign run by a

different department in another part of the University to communicate the overall value of higher education to your local

community resulted in any type of lift in your donations. While these types of reports can sometimes be run directly from

your operational system, you may find that it’s beneficial to export your historical data to an

external data warehouse where it can be combined with data from other systems.

Or you may find that you’re hitting limits with the reporting tools that are

available in your operational system and want to create advanced

data visualizations or include some AI driven predictive

analytics in your reports.

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6An important thing to keep in mind as you think through your reporting strategy is that since Analytical reports typically involve building advanced data visualizations or combining data from multiple systems into a single report, the underlying data that they use doesn’t necessarily have to be stored in Salesforce. A good overall approach involves three steps:

1. Keep the records that you need for your operational reports in Salesforce.

2. Set up a periodic job to copy all of your records into a data warehouse via a middleware tool or other type of API call so

that it can be used in your analytical reports (this is usually done via a nightly or weekly batch process).

3. Determine a set of criteria that will define records are no longer needed for your operational reports (i.e. donations that

have been closed for more than two years) and set up a periodic job to purge them from Salesforce but leave them in

your data warehouse so that they can still be used in your analytic reports.

This approach will result in “cleaner” operational reports that only contain the data they need to give you a clear picture of the current state of your department along with rich analytical reports that you can use to track trends that go as far back as you’d like. It will also make it easier for your users to search for relevant data in Salesforce and help keep your org’s data volumes lower to reduce the likelihood of performance issues popping up over time.

Data Storage in Salesforce

How much data can I store in Salesforce? Now that we understand the different strategies related to data storage and their relationships to each other, let’s talk about data storage itself, since this will drive your decisions around how long to keep your records in Salesforce. Storage is primarily divided into a two categories in the Salesforce platform:

• File Storage includes files in attachments, Salesforce CRM Content,

Chatter files (including user photos), the Documents tab, the custom

File field on Knowledge articles, and Community Cloud assets.

Enterprise and Unlimited Editions orgs are allocated with a base 10

GB of file storage and allocated 2 GB of file storage per user license.

Following the example above, an Unlimited Edition org with 100 users

receives the base of 10 GB of file storage, plus 2 GB per license, (100 x

2 GB) for 202 GB of total file storage. Additional file storage is relatively

inexpensive and you also have the option of storing files in other web-

based storage tools.

• Data Storage includes all other data stored in Salesforce related to

contact bio/demo, gift history, afflictions, etc. All Salesforce orgs are

allocated with a minimum of 10 GB for data storage, plus incrementally

added storage per user license. For example, an Unlimited Edition org

with 100 users receives the base of 10 GB of data storage, plus 120

MB per license, (100 x 120 MB) for 22 GB of total data storage. It’s

important to note that Salesforce data storage is very efficient and just

because you have 10 GB of storage in one system doesn’t mean that

will be the same in Salesforce.

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There are also a few other options for data storage within Salesforce, which are worth considering as part of your overall strategy:

• Big Objects are typically used for data archiving and provide consistent performance for a billion records or more

• Heroku is a platform developers can use to spin up their own databases to migrate data to when users no longer need to

access or modify it directly within Salesforce.

• If you’re using Marketing Cloud, it will store behavioral and communication data in high volumes and you can choose how

much of this content you bring into your CRM system for your end-users to utilize.

• Data can also be moved to an external data warehouse and combined with data from other systems for historical and

advanced reporting.

Choosing Data and Reporting Strategies

How do I decide which strategies to use?So far we’ve covered a lot of ground about creating strategies and talked about storage limits, but we haven’t covered what any of this means for your specific institution and department. The answer is not as straightforward as it may seem. Every university will take a different approach to storage based on their reporting and business process strategies along with a few other factors like data volumes and overall growth.

In the next few sections, you’ll find some example use cases along with some recommendations for when they might be a good fit. These are all hypothetical scenarios and more than likely your institution will fall somewhere in the middle and end up utilizing a combination of the different approaches mentioned below. You can work with an Implementation Partner or one of our EDU Services team members to help identify exactly which ones are the best fit for your organization and then help you implement the tools that are needed to make your vision a reality.

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1 Size: Smallville Community College is a local community college whose students primarily come from within a 100 mile radius of campus. Smallville offers a variety of educational programs but they’re mainly known for their Nursing and Radiation Therapy programs, with graduates usually being recruited by area hospitals and medical centers.

Current Data Volumes: Smallville has hundreds of thousands of donor and donation records that span 30 years.

Data Volume Growth: Smallville receives about 10,000 new donations per year, has roughly 5,000 ongoing recurring donations and adds about 1000 new alumni contacts and 100 new donor organizations to their database per year.

Operational Reporting Requirements: Smallville would like to be able to run reports about donors and their associated donations on a monthly and annual basis to ensure that they’re hitting the targets they need to keep their programs current and put funds towards the purchase of new classroom equipment.

Analytic Reporting Requirements: If any of Smallville’s donors want to see a full history report of all of their donation and associated payment records dating back to their first donation, their advancement team should be able to produce it for them on demand.

IT Landscape: All Advancement related processes are run directly from Salesforce and while Smallville might like to eventually be able to combine their data with data from other University departments, doing so is not considered to be a high priority at this time.

10Scenario 1: Smallville Community College Keeps All Data On Platform

11Solution for Smallville Given their current requirements, Smallville decides to keep all of their data in Education Cloud, run their reports directly from Salesforce and simply purchase additional data storage as needed.

• Benefits: The solution doesn’t require any additional

integrations or architecture and allows all reporting to be

done directly from Salesforce. Smallville can create reports

that show total donations for any given fiscal year filtered

any way they want and can also build reports that show the

entire donation history for any person or organization.

• Considerations: Smallville’s administrators make sure to

limit the number of child records that can be assigned

to a single parent and the number of records that can

be assigned to any one user to less than 10,000 each to

limit the chances of Data Skew. They also instruct their

developers to add the appropriate filters to their SOQL

Queries to limit the number of records that a single

query can return, which also helps to ensure smooth

performance.

• Difficulty Level: Low - does not require any additional

tools or integrations to external systems and can be self-

implemented.

Why this approach works: Smallville has a very simple

landscape and isn’t looking to combine their Advancement

related data with data from any other systems. Their data

volumes are low enough (tens of thousands of records) that

storing their entire donation history in Salesforce shouldn’t

cause any performance concerns, provided they take the

appropriate precautions.

122 Size: Midway University is a state college who has a 80:20 ratio of in-state and out of state students. Midway offers a more than 50 different majors and their computer science program is ranked among the top 10 in the country for schools their size.

Current Data Volumes: Midway has more than five million donor and donation records that span last 80 years.

Data Volume Growth: Midway receives about 50,000 new donations per year, has roughly 20,000 ongoing recurring donations and adds about 10,000 new alumni contacts and 1000 new donor organizations to their database per year.

Operational Reporting Requirements: Midway would like to be able to run reports about donors and their associated donations on a monthly and annual basis to ensure that they’re hitting the targets they need to keep their programs current and put funds towards towards a variety of initiatives, such as local outreach to minorities who are interested in learning to code.

Analytic Reporting Requirements: Midway would like to be able to send annual reports to donors showing the last five years of donation history and would also like to be able to provide additional donation history by request. Midway’s departments all operate independently and their Advancement team doesn’t need to combine its data with data from any other department.

IT Landscape: All Advancement related processes are run directly from Salesforce. Midway’s Advancement department doesn’t currently have access to an Enterprise Data Warehouse but their Central IT department has indicated that building one that can be utilized by the entire university is on their three year roadmap. They also have Tableau but it isn’t currently connected to any of their existing applications.

Scenario 2: Midway University Archives Data On Platform

13Solution for Midway In order to meet their current requirements, Midway University implements Big Objects and utilizes a combination of Salesforce reports for Operational Reporting and an external reporting tool for analytical reporting.

• Benefits: Midway can archive their old donation data but

still keep it in the Salesforce platform while also being able

to generate the various types of reports they would like to

see.

• Considerations: APEX code is required to copy donation

data from Salesforce into a Big Object. Also, Big Objects

doesn’t have its own reporting tool, so Midway has to

follow a separate process to extract their records and

import into a reporting tool for further analysis.

• Difficulty Level: Medium: Requires an External Reporting

Tool for Analytical Reporting and a combination of APEX

and SOQL get data in and out of big objects.

Why this approach works: Midway can keep relevant

records in Salesforce and archive the rest. Since Midway’s

Advancement team knows that they’ll have access to an

Enterprise Data Warehouse within the foreseeable future,

they can also begin to plan out their future data storage

and reporting strategy and have discussions with other

departments around the university about ways that they

might be able to utilize each other’s data once it’s all stored

in a central location.

143 Size: Mosiac is a 150 year old institution with 5 colleges, each with 20-30 departments. They rank among top universities in the country and graduates hold high ranking positions in many industries and government agencies.

Current Data Volumes: Mosaic’s advancement team has amassed millions of donor records and tens of millions of donation records. Some of their records date back over 100 years and were originally recorded manually on paper. A few years ago, the team completed a project where interns converted all historical donor and donation data into electronic format for easier storage and long term historical trend analysis.

Data Volume Growth: Mosaic receives 500,000+ new donations yearly from donors and associated organizations in the form of single, recurring and lifetime donations. Their database has grown to well over a million records and they add tens of thousands of new records each year. Operational Reporting Requirements: Mosaic would like to run reports about donors and their donations on a monthly, quarterly and annual basis to ensure that they’re hitting the targets. Analytic Reporting Requirements: Mosaic would like to provide donors with reports showing their history for the current year, previous year, last five years and over their lifetimes. They also want to combine their data with data being collected by other initiatives throughout the university to spot trends, identify potential new donors and send effective communications based on interests.

IT Landscape: Mosiac University has a very complex IT landscape that includes multiple CRM and ERP systems, a Marketing Automation System, a Student Information System and several on-premise databases that are used by various colleges and departments. Each of these systems contain records that Mosiac needs to combine with their donor and donation records in order to get a full 360 degree view of their donors.

Scenario 3: Mosiac University Uses a Data Warehouse and External Reporting

Solution for Mosaic To meet their requirements, Mosiac University’s Central IT department stands up an Enterprise Data Warehouse and also invests in a Business Intelligence Tool to build data visualizations and an ETL Tool to assist with data transfers.

• Benefits: This allows Mosaic to combine their

Advancement data with data from other parts of the

University to do more advanced reporting that helps them

to get a clearer picture of their students and alumni.

• Considerations: An integration specialist must help

configure the ETL tool to move records between the

various systems and Mosaic’s data warehouse as needed.

A security specialist must help ensure that the user record

and data access is consistent across sytems.

• Difficulty Level: High: due to the complexities around

integrations and data security, it’s best to engage an

implementation partner to assist with this approach. Also,

since this approach requires coordination from multiple

departments, it’s best to also consider standing up a COE

or similar governing body to ensure alignment across all

stakeholders.

Why this approach works: Mosiac’s Enterprise Data

Warehouse, ETL and Data Visualization tools can be utilized

by other departments throughout the university.

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164 Size: GAI is a conglomerate of dozens of art schools around the world with a centralized Advancement organization. GAI’s Advancement team is responsible for handling donations from alumni and associated organizations that vary greatly in size, age and number of donors.

Current Data Volumes: GAI’s advancement team amassed tens of millions of donor records and tens of millions of donation records. Many of their records date back decades and in some cases they go back centuries.

Data Volume Growth: GAI receives 1 million+ new donations per year from donors and organizations that are associated with their network of institutions. The number of records in their database has surpassed 1 billion and they add millions of new records each year. Operational Reporting Requirements: GAI wants to run reports about donors and donations on a monthly, quarterly and annual basis to ensure they’re hitting their targets. Schools in their network also run their own local donor and donation campaigns and report the funds up to GAI’s central Advancement department. Analytic Reporting Requirements: GAI wants to provide donors with reports showing their history for the current year, previous year, last five years and over their lifetimes. They also want to combine their data with data being collected by the other schools in their network to provide analysis of both local and global giving trends and create an overall giving strategy for themselves and their partners. Due to their large data volumes, GAI wants to use an AI based tool to help spot trends and make predictions.

IT Landscape: GAI has a simple landscape themselves, but they need to collect information from all of the schools in their network, which increases their complexity exponentially. They need to integrate with dozens of CRM, ERP, SIS and Marketing Automation Systems across multiple locations and time zones.

Scenario 4: Global Institute of Art Implements a Hot-Warm-Cold Data Strategy

17Solution for GAI To meet requirements, GAI develops a Hot-Warm-Cold data strategy. They keep data they need for current operations in Salefsorce, using an Enterprise Data Warehouse and Business Intelligence Tool for AI-based analytic reporting, and a cold data storage tool for old records that no longer add value to historical reporting.

• Benefits: This allows GAI to create accurate operational

and analytic reports, backed by an AI engine that captures

trends and recommends next steps, and a process to

move old records into a location where they can still be

retrieved on demand if needed, but won’t cause clutter.

• Considerations: A strategy around when data becomes

“cold” needs to be clearly defined. An integration specialist

must help configure the ETL tool to move records between

various systems and Mosaic’s data warehouse and cold

storage system as needed. A security specialist must help

ensure that the user record and data access is consistent

across sytems

• Difficulty Level: Very High - this approach requires

the same steps to implement as the Enterprise Data

Warehouse approach, with the addition of an extra

database for long term storage.

Why this approach works: This strategy takes close

to a year to roll out but given the complexities of GAI’s

architecture landscape and their long term storage

requirements, it’s a best practice approach.

Hopefully as you read through these scenarios, you were able to identify one or more that resonated with you. Keep in mind that there is no universally correct data and reporting strategy and there’s also nothing wrong with combining different pieces of the approaches outlined above to create your own strategy. For example, as long as your data volumes are in the low to medium range, you can continue to store all of your donor and donation data in Salesforce and also use Tableau to build advanced data visualizations.

Talk to an Implementation Partner or EDU Services Team member about doing a review of your current landscape and speaking with your team about your long term plans in order to come to a specific recommendation.

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About the Author - Tom LeddyTom is a Senior Principal Customer Success Architect at Salesforce.org based in the Chicago area. He helps nonprofit and higher education organizations integrate Salesforce into their IT landscapes so they can serve their communities more effectively. He is also an author, public speaker, marathon runner and the president of Pawsitively Famous, Inc. You can connect with Tom on LinkedIn or Twitter.

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