Why I'm Optimistic About Blackbaud's Acquisition of Convio

By Jeff Shuck

So the first reason this news is big is that these are the two leading players in nonprofit technology, by a large margin.

The second and more important reason is that because of the different competencies of the two companies, most clients use a mix of both systems. It is very common to find a Convio front end feeding a Blackbaud back end. It is also very common to find frustrated IT managers and fundraisers in the middle, trying to get the two systems to play well together. This acquisition not only brings with it the promise of more seamless integration, it also could vastly reduce administrative headaches throughout an organization — reducing multiple invoices, sales visits, service calls and so forth to one point of contact.