The first encounter
It was in the spring of 2009 that I met Marc Benioff in London. That day made a lot of impact on me, the fact that Salesforce with Salesforce Foundation is serious about making the world a better place: the first keynote was the CEO of a non-profit organisation!
Marc Benioff himself also made a big impression, as a person: authentic, visionary, driven. A very inspiring meeting it was.
A change for life
And then there was Salesforce's technology. As a thought leader at Capgemini, I had developed a fine nose for discerning key trends. That day, that encounter with Salesforce, the insight of what such a cloud platform could mean for organisations, permanently changed the rest of my life (read: career as an ICT consultant)! I saw then that the world would embrace cloud solutions in abundance by 2022!
Inspiring encounters
Nine years ago, we started the business of implementing Salesforce for non-profits. Among the first clients was Compassion, where I met Klaas Jansen as a client. Klaas has been through quite a journey himself; it's cool that he is now committed at Findock to helping organisations that make the world a better place optimise payments, such as fundraising and grant management.
I also met Mark-Jan Bremmer at Mission Aviation Fellowship (MAF) eight years ago. Mark-Jan very quickly understood the power of the Salesforce platform. He turned out to be a gifted marketer, and put us in touch with Jeroen Houwen of Trybes, formerly Gopublic. It is great working with Jeroen and his organisation, they understand marketing automation, and I am very happy that they are embracing and implementing Salesforce Marketing Cloud.
During one of the first meetings with Salesforce, I was introduced to Ewald Verhoog, then working at Raising Results. He asked me a stimulating question: "What is the most interesting thing you learned from a customer recently, Balt?" I had to think about that for a moment, but then replied, "That's the insight Martijn Moens gave me in his approach to customer journeys." Martijn was a marketer at Compassion at the time and I had invited him to share his insights at a customer event in 2014. "That's strong!", said Ewald, adding, "Martijn is one of my best students at Beeckestijn Business School". As it turned out, he even won an award there. It is worth mentioning that Martijn later also joined Raising Results and is now employed by Salesforce Netherlands.
Recently, Ewald Verhoog spoke as keynote speaker at a g-company for non-profits event to share, among other things, lessons from his book: 'Digital Fundraising'. We are making that book available to anyone who shares their challenge that we can help with.
On the same page
The ultimate collaboration is working together on the same page, right across the organisation: marketing, fundraising and project implementation. A great example is Refugee Foundation, which uses both Salesforce CRM (with Findock) and Salesforce's Marketing Automation and Programme Management.
Working together on the same page and thereby also becoming data-driven in a responsible, constructive way, that is our dream for every NGO!
And the story continues!
Over the past nine years, g-company foundation has been privileged to help 90 non-profit organisations grow with Salesforce. In September 2021, g-company joined Xebia Group and this year, g-company foundation will also transform into Xebia Salesforce.
Our mission remains the same: we use our core competence to make the world a better place. We do this by helping non-profits digitise, collaborate on the same page and become responsibly data-driven.
Feel free to let us know what we can help you with in this context. If you share your challenge, we will reward you with the inspiring book 'Digital Fundraising' by Ewald Verhoog!
The first encounter
It was in the spring of 2009 that I joined my first Salesforce event, in London, and met founder and CEO Marc Benioff. That day had a big impact on me, the fact that Salesforce with Salesforce Foundation is deadly serious about making the world a better place: their first keynote was the CEO of a non-profit organisation!
Marc Benioff himself also made a big impression as a person: authentic, visionary, passionate. He had a very inspiring presentation.
Life changing
On that day, I saw the potential of the technology platform of Salesforce. That meeting with Salesforce, the insight of what such a cloud platform can mean for organizations, changed the rest of my life. I envisioned how the world would embrace plenty of cloud solutions in 2022!
Inspiring meetings
In 2013, we started with g-company to implement Salesforce for nonprofits. Compassion was one of the first customers, that's where I met Klaas Jansen. Klaas has also been through quite a journey himself, it is cool that he is now committed to Findock, helping organizations that make the world a better place optimising payments, such as fundraising and grant management.
I met Mark-Jan Bremmer at Mission Aviation Fellowship (MAF) in 2014. Mark-Jan quickly realised the power of the Salesforce platform. He turned out to be a gifted marketer and brought us into contact with Jeroen Houwen from Trybes, formerly Gopublic. It is a pleasure to work with Jeroen and his organisation, they understand what marketing automation is, and I am very happy that they are embracing and implementing Salesforce Marketing Cloud.
During one of the first meetings with Salesforce, I was introduced to Ewald Verhoog, then working at Raising Results. He asked me a provocative question; "What is the most interesting thing you learned recently from a customer ,Balt?". I had to think about that, but then replied: "That is the insight that Martijn Moens gave me in his approach to customer journeys". Martijn was a marketer at Compassion at the time, and I invited him to share his insights at our customer event in 2014. "That is special!" Ewald said, and added: "Martijn is one of my best students at Beeckestijn Business School". He even turned out to have won an award. It is worth mentioning that Martijn later also joined Raising Results and is now employed by Salesforce Netherlands.
We recently invited Ewald Verhoog as a keynote speaker at one of our events, to share some lessons from his book 'Digital Fundraising'. We offer a copy of this book to everyone that shares his/her challenge in which we can contribute.
On the same page
Ultimate collaboration is 'collaboration on the same page', across the entire organisation: marketing, fundraising and project management. A nice example is Stichting Vluchteling (Refugee Foundation), that uses Salesforce solutions Salesforce CRM for fundraising (with Findock), marketing automation (Marketing Cloud) and programme management (Amp Impact).
Working together on the same page and thereby also becoming data-driven in a responsible, constructive way, that is our dream for every NGO!
And the story continues!
In the past nine years, as g-company foundation, we have been able to help ninety non-profit organisations to grow with Salesforce. In September 2021 g-company joined Xebia Group and this year g-company foundation will also transform into Xebia Salesforce.
Our mission remains the same: we use our core competence to make the world a better place, and help nonprofits digitize, collaborate on the same page and become consciously data-driven.
Please let us know how we can help you in this context. If you share your challenge with us, we will reward you with Ewald Verhoog's inspiring book 'Digital Fundraising'.
