Overview
When looking for a CRM, many of our clients have considered Blackbaud, as it is one of the main players in the market. Both SwiftFox and Blackbaud are cloud-based SaaS not-for-profit platforms, that can have 10 or 10,000 users and enable you to undertake a range of actions with the data stored in them. As a newer player in the market, SwiftFox comes with a different philosophy to Blackbaud, which is the start of where differences emerge.
This page can help you understand both platforms and help educate your choice.
Comparing Features
Setup & training
With SwiftFox when you get started you won't need a third party ‘Implementation Partner' to get you set up – the SwiftFox team handle everything.
As part of our commitment to ensuring your success with SwiftFox, we recognise the importance of a hands-on onboarding process. We work closely with our clients during the initial stages of onboarding, collaborating with new clients to import data, configure customisations, and establish new user accounts and appropriate permissions.
Once the platform environment has been set-up and configured, our team will work closely with you to provide a comprehensive overview of the system & train your team. Any webinars or training sessions can be recorded and made available to your team for future reference.
Blackbaud set-up can be challenging as many users have found that they need to have some background knowledge about such software to be able to conduct the set-up process. We were unable to uncover information surrounding additional training or support which can be offered through their subscriptions.
Data security
SwiftFox hosts client data in Australian data centres on Microsoft Azure, so your data stays onshore. The SwiftFox team operates under Australia's only industry-legislated privacy code and is a member of the Australian Data and Insights Association.
Blackbaud's Australian and UK product pages make no data residency statement, and we could not confirm an Australian data region from Blackbaud's published material. There is evidence of Microsoft Azure hosting and a region selector spanning Europe, the US, Canada and the Pacific. If residency matters to your organisation, get Blackbaud's answer in writing rather than relying on the region list.
Usability
SwiftFox features a beautifully simple user experience. Uncomplicated design is powerful. You, your boss, your intern, the new hire - everyone in your organisation should know how to use, and love using SwiftFox. And you should be able to work out how to use a feature with a few clicks. SwiftFox was built from the ground up in the social media age and our future focussed design principles make it simple to navigate. As a universal CRM, once you understand how to navigate one feature – you can navigate them all!
Universal CRM
SwiftFox has everything you need in one platform. This is what makes it so powerful. So marvellously simple to use. You can take donations send emails, newsletters, coordinate events, create forms, manage your pipeline, send text messages, have phone calls, tick off your tasks, talk to your team - all from one place, and with one subscription.
Following initial set-up, organisations license SwiftFox on a subscription basis and our central development team take care of ensuring your platform is always updated and at the cutting edge of innovation.
Blackbaud’s features include fundraising tools such as ticketing, marketing and merchant services such as end-to-end payment processing.
AI & data innovation
SwiftFox is built by The Red Fox Group, an Australian data analytics company, so AI and analytics are not a bolt-on here. Our AI is deliberately simple: draft an email and send it when your people actually open things, see who is likely to renew or lapse, spot who will donate or buy before you ask.
It is included. There are no credits to buy, no consumption meter running in the background, and no separate AI licence.
Credit where it is due: Blackbaud has the most substantial AI roadmap of any platform on these pages. Prospect Insights, Chat for Blackbaud AI, Agents for Good and integrations with Anthropic's Claude and Microsoft Copilot. Generative features are off until an administrator opts in, which is a sensible default.
The catch is packaging. Blackbaud has confirmed its premium AI features are not available individually and require a subscription upgrade — and it does not publish what that upgrade costs.
New features roadmap
SwiftFox takes care of everything. As a SaaS platform, our team has a long-term development pipeline where we are continuously rolling out new features accessed by all our users. Clients can always submit suggestions for the product roadmap.
Blackbaud has a roadmap of releases and custom development is possible with Blackbaud, this requires organisations to hire an external development partner as additional cost.
Ongoing support
SwiftFox has the help you would expect — guides, in-platform training, videos, live webinars, the SwiftFox Academy. But we are also local, and we have a phone. Get stuck and you can talk to someone who can jump on a video call and sort it out. Support is included, not a percentage of your licence.
Blackbaud's support is tiered, and premium support is a paid upgrade. It does not publish what any tier costs. Blackbaud does have a deep partner and consultant ecosystem, which is genuinely useful — it is also another relationship to buy and manage.
SwiftFox: What does it do?
SwiftFox is campaign and membership software for organisations that talk to their people at scale. Store contacts, send emails and texts, make calls, run events, build forms, manage memberships, accreditations and awards, track cases and visits, run projects and pipelines, take payments and reconcile them to Xero, publish a member portal — and see every interaction against the one profile.
SwiftFox AI reads that history and tells you what to do with it: who is likely to renew, who is drifting, who will donate, who will show up. Automations then handle the follow-up so your team doesn't have to.
One subscription. Everyone in your organisation gets an account. No per-user fees.
Blackbaud
: What does it do?
Blackbaud is a cloud-based platform built around fundraising and donor development, and it is the incumbent standard in that space for good reason — forty years of domain depth.
It covers:
- Donor and prospect profiles, with mature major-gift and prospect-research tooling
- Multi-channel campaigns
- Fundraising goals and KPI tracking
- Payment processing through Blackbaud Merchant Services
Blackbaud now has a substantial AI offering, including Prospect Insights, Chat for Blackbaud AI and Agents for Good, with integrations to Anthropic's Claude and Microsoft Copilot. Its premium AI features require a subscription upgrade.
The distinction worth holding onto: Blackbaud's centre of gravity is donors, not members. If your core need is membership lifecycle — subscriptions, renewals, member self-service — you are adapting a fundraising system to do it.
An Overview of SwiftFox Users
SwiftFox is campaign and membership software for organisations that talk to their people at scale. Store contacts, send emails and texts, make calls, run events, build forms, manage memberships, accreditations and awards, track cases and visits, run projects and pipelines, take payments and reconcile them to Xero, publish a member portal — and see every interaction against the one profile.
SwiftFox AI reads that history and tells you what to do with it: who is likely to renew, who is drifting, who will donate, who will show up. Automations then handle the follow-up so your team doesn't have to.
One subscription. Everyone in your organisation gets an account. No per-user fees.
An Overview of
Blackbaud
Users
Blackbaud is a cloud-based platform built around fundraising and donor development, and it is the incumbent standard in that space for good reason — forty years of domain depth.
It covers:
- Donor and prospect profiles, with mature major-gift and prospect-research tooling
- Multi-channel campaigns
- Fundraising goals and KPI tracking
- Payment processing through Blackbaud Merchant Services
Blackbaud now has a substantial AI offering, including Prospect Insights, Chat for Blackbaud AI and Agents for Good, with integrations to Anthropic's Claude and Microsoft Copilot. Its premium AI features require a subscription upgrade.
The distinction worth holding onto: Blackbaud's centre of gravity is donors, not members. If your core need is membership lifecycle — subscriptions, renewals, member self-service — you are adapting a fundraising system to do it.
Pricing
SwiftFox charges one subscription for your whole organisation. Everyone gets an account — the ops manager, the intern, the board member who logs in twice a year.
That is a deliberate choice. When licences are rationed, people work around the CRM instead of in it: spreadsheets appear, lists get emailed around, and the 360-degree view you bought the system for quietly stops being true. Per-user pricing also punishes you for growing.
Blackbaud does not publish pricing. Not in Australia, not in the UK, not in the US — every pricing page is a sales enquiry form.
We are not going to put a made-up number in the table opposite. What we would suggest, if Blackbaud is on your shortlist, is asking for a written quote that separates four things: the subscription, the implementation, the annual uplift, and the tier upgrade required for its premium AI features. Those uplifts compound, and they are the part organisations most often miss at signing.
SwiftFox publishes its pricing. You can read it before you talk to us.
Time to join SwiftFox? Making the jump is easy!
Get in touch and learn how easy it is to switch to SwiftFox, our team is available to help you every step of the way.
We don’t just tell you to export your data from your old system and figure it out yourself, we sit down and plan with you the most efficient migration process with minimal disruption.
And then a dedicated SwiftFox team member will take care of the transition, including help with set up and data importing if required. No third-party implementation provider required, just us!
