Technology Key in Sustaining Growth of Arts and Cultural Sector
April 24, 2012
Blackbaud showcases latest trends and technology at American Association of Museums Annual Meeting + Museumexpo
CHARLESTON, SC – April 24, 2012 – Blackbaud, Inc. (Nasdaq: BLKB) announced that it will participate in and sponsor American Associations of Museums (AAM) Annual Meeting + Museumexpo™, April 28 to May 2 in Minneapolis. In addition to featuring a new infographic that shows how technology is impacting the arts and cultural space, Blackbaud will also demonstrate Altru™ for museum management and its new online user community, and The Patron Edge® for ticketing and patron management.
New Infographic for Tech Savvy Museums
With 2 million paid staff and 1.9 million volunteers, arts andcultural organizations are serving over 850 million visitors andgenerating $166.2 billion dollars in business every year. Using datafrom AAM and Americans for the Arts, Blackbaud has created a newinfographic that features visually appealing statistics about the impactof technology on arts and cultural organizations.
“In order to sustain this type of impact, tech savvy art museums,zoos, historical sites, botanical gardens and many other types of artsand cultural nonprofits must understand that technology is key tosustaining their growth,” said Jay Odell, Blackbaud’s vice president andgeneral manager, Altru.
Learn how technology is helping arts and cultural organizations and view the infographic at http://bit.ly/TechSavvyMuseums
Blackbaud at the AAM Annual Meeting + Museumexpo
As a member of the AAM Affinity Partner Program, Blackbaud offers AAM Institutional Members a discount on their first year Altru subscription. Altru was designed to help museums manage their organization with unified functionality for memberships, fundraising, ticketing, marketing, merchandising, and more. Blackbaud will feature Altru in the Museumexpo along with The Patron Edge, its comprehensive ticketing management solution.
“We are proud to not only be a member of AAM’s affinity program, but to also once again partner with this leading organization on its annual event which is focused on building community among museums,” said Odell. “In turn, we are excited to announce the launch of the Altru Community, designed to provide users a place to network, learn and access vital support resources.”
Odell will participate in the session Benchmarking: From Data to Intelligence to Applications at the Meeting on Sunday, April 29, from 4:15 to 5:30 p.m., which will provide an overview of available benchmarking resources for museums, an introduction to benchmarking as business process, and case studies from three museums that use benchmarking data to improve planning and operations.
In addition, Blackbaud is sponsoring the following events:
- The Leadership Reception: April 28, 6:30 to 8 p.m., Weisman Art Museum
- First Timers Reception: April 29, 11:45 a.m. to 12:30 p.m., Convention Center
- CEO/Director Reception: April 29, 6 to 7:30 p.m., Minnesota History Society
- Board Alumni Reception: April 30, 5 to 6:30 p.m., Hilton Minneapolis
The Altru Community
Blackbaud recently launched the Altru Community to provide an online hub where users can interact with each other, the Altru team, and gain access to a variety of support resources, news, and updates.
“The Community has been a huge help, not only through the quick and helpful responses of the Blackbaud team, but also by providing us a forum to connect with other users and discover how different organizations utilize the program and handle internal business processes,” said Audrey McAbee, an Altru user from The Mariner’s Museum. “I love feeling like I actively contribute to improving Altru’s features, as well as helping other organizations in the museum community.”
To learn more about Altru, visit www.blackbaud.com/altruaam.
About Blackbaud
Serving the nonprofit and education sectors for 30 years, Blackbaud (NASDAQ: BLKB) combines technology and expertise to help organizations achieve their missions. Blackbaud works with more than 26,000 customers in more than 60 countries that support higher education, healthcare, human services, arts and culture, faith, the environment, independent education, animal welfare, and other charitable causes. The company offers a full spectrum of cloud-based and on-premise software solutions, and related services for organizations of all sizes including: fundraising, eMarketing, social media, advocacy, constituent relationship management (CRM), analytics, financial management, and vertical-specific solutions. Using Blackbaud technology, these organizations raise more than $100 billion each year. Recognized as a top company by Forbes, InformationWeek, and Software Magazine and honored by Best Places to Work, Blackbaud is headquartered in Charleston, South Carolina and has employees throughout the US, and in Australia, Canada, Hong Kong, Mexico, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom.
