Non-profits often struggle with day-to-day tasks that take time away from their main goals. Managing members, organizing events, and handling paperwork can be a real challenge. These issues can take time and resources away from their core objectives of serving communities and driving positive change.
In this Customer Story, we look at how the American Legion Arizona, a veterans’ support group, solved these problems. They used WPForms to make their work easier and more effective.
We’ll show you how this small team of six people saved hours of work each week, connected more effectively with their members, and made it simple for them to sign up for events and share news.
Their story shows how non-profits can use online forms to overcome common hurdles. By working smarter, they can focus more on what really matters – helping the people they support.
Customer Profile
The American Legion Arizona is a state branch of the National American Legion organization, dedicated to advocating for veterans, active service members, and their families. They provide a platform for over 120 Posts in Arizona to share information and collaborate, supporting a community with over 100 years of service history.
The Challenge
When the American Legion Arizona started to update their website, they found several problems in how they were working:
- Getting User Feedback: Their old way of asking members for opinions wasn’t working well. Not many people were responding. They needed an easier way to learn what members thought about their services and programs.
- Helping Members: Answering questions and helping members was taking too much time. The team was having trouble responding quickly, causing a poor user experience.
- Setting Up Events: The organization runs many events each year, like meetings and fundraisers. Their old way of signing people up for these events was slow, often had mistakes, and took a lot of staff time to manage.
- New Member Sign-ups: The process for new members to join and pay for membership was time-consuming and difficult for both parties.
- Collecting Information: Getting different kinds of information, like reports from local posts and articles for their newsletter, was messy and slow.
The organization knew they needed to fix these problems to work better and help veterans more. They wanted to find a form-building tool that could:
- Work well with their WordPress website and other tools they use
- Make many different kinds of forms, from simple surveys to complex event sign-ups
- Handle payments for memberships and event fees
- Use smart features like conditional logic to make forms that change based on answers
- Be easy enough for their small team to use without needing to be tech experts
Their main goal was to make their work faster and easier, so the team could spend more time on what’s really important – helping veterans and their families.
How WPForms Provided Solutions
The American Legion Arizona turned to WPForms to address their challenges.
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Create Your Form NowAfter discovering the plugin through a WordPress search for form-building plugins, they were impressed by its capabilities and ease of use, especially with payment collection.
With WPForms, they have created over 50 forms for various purposes, including:
- Membership Sign-Up with Payment: Simplified the process for new members to join and pay online.
- Conference Registration with Payment: Streamlined event registrations and payment collection, saving time for both members and staff.
- Yearly Reporting: Posts can now submit their annual reports online, making collecting and organizing the data much easier.
- Event Submission: Members can now submit details of their events so they can be easily added to the calendar, keeping it up to date without a lot of extra work for staff.
- Newsletter Article Submission: Allows members to submit articles for the newsletter, making it faster and easier to collect and manage content
- Program Registration: Students can sign up for various programs online, helping to streamline and manage signups for different initiatives such as Boys State.
- Officer Reporting: Posts can easily submit officer details and updates online. This automation ensures that leadership information remains accurate and current, aiding effective communication and coordination within the organization.
- Product Order Forms: Members can order and pay for personalized branded merchandise such as polo shirts to show their affiliation and support for the program.
By using WPForms for all these tasks, the American Legion Arizona was able to solve many of their original problems. They could now collect feedback, manage registrations, and gather information much more efficiently.
WPForms was flexible enough to handle this wide range of different tasks and forms were easy for their small team to create, even with limited technical experience.
Members found the forms easy to use, which increased participation, and WPForms integrated well with their existing site, meaning there was no need to move to a new platform or learn new systems.
Favorite WPForms Features and Addons
The American Legion Arizona found several WPForms features particularly helpful. Here’s a closer look at their favorites:
Calculations: This feature allowed them to automatically total up costs for events or memberships. For example, if someone registered for multiple events or added extra items to their registration, the form would calculate the total cost automatically.
Stripe Integration: This made it easy to collect payments securely online. Members could pay for dues or event registrations right on the form, without being sent to another website.
Digital Signatures: For forms that needed a signature, like waivers for events, this feature allowed users to sign digitally right on the form. This saved time and paper compared to printing and scanning signed documents.
Repeatable Fields: This feature allows users to register multiple people in one form submission. For example, if someone wanted to register a group for a conference, they could add as many attendees as needed without filling out separate forms for each person, saving time for both the registrants and the staff processing the registrations.
Conditional Logic: This feature makes forms smarter and more user-friendly. Forms can dynamically change based on what the user entered. For example, if a user indicates they need special accommodations for an event, the form would then show questions about what kind of accommodations they need. This makes forms shorter and less confusing for users, as they only see questions relevant to them. It also helps collect more detailed information when needed, without cluttering the form for everyone.
The Results
Implementing WPForms brought significant improvements to the American Legion Arizona:
Time Savings
Automating previously manual processes, such as membership sign-ups, event registrations, and report submissions, saved the team countless hours each week.
Staff members who once spent significant portions of their day on administrative tasks now have the freedom to dedicate more energy to core initiatives like veteran outreach and community support programs.
Increased Efficiency
The transition to online forms streamlined operations across the board. The elimination of paper forms drastically reduced the need for printing, shipping, and manual data entry.
Enhanced User Experience
Members now enjoy a seamless and user-friendly experience when interacting with the organization.
Intuitive forms make it easy to register for events, submit articles for the newsletter, make payments, and provide valuable feedback.
This improved experience has fostered greater engagement and participation from the veteran community, strengthening the organization’s connection with its members.
A Moment of Success
A standout success was with the Boys State program, an American Legion initiative that started in the 1930s.
In the past, managing registrations and collecting necessary information for this program was a cumbersome process involving paper forms and manual data entry.
However, with the implementation of WPForms, the entire process was transformed. Last year alone, over 150 participants seamlessly signed up online, submitting not only their basic registration details but also crucial medical disclosures and payment information – all without a single error.
The efficiency gains didn’t stop there. WPForms also enabled the program to introduce new forms for waitlist participants and high school guidance counselors seeking further information.
These forms, seamlessly integrated with the organization’s email systems, ensured prompt communication and a streamlined experience for everyone involved.
The success of the Boys State program exemplifies how WPForms can empower organizations to modernize even their most established initiatives, improving efficiency, enhancing the user experience, and ultimately allowing them to focus on what truly matters.
Tips for WPForms Users
“Take full advantage of the WPForms knowledge base. It’s packed with information that can help you solve most issues without needing to contact support. And don’t hesitate to explore the various addons available – they can significantly expand the functionality of your forms.”
Looking Ahead
The American Legion Arizona discovered that creating and managing forms can be incredibly simple and efficient with WPForms. The ease of use and powerful features like conditional logic, payment collection, and extensive integrations have been invaluable.
The team can now create numerous forms quickly, ensuring their user data is secure and their processes are streamlined.
WPForms has significantly improved their operations, and they are exploring additional addons and integrations to streamline processes and support growth.
The impact of their success extends beyond Arizona. The National Headquarters has taken note of their achievements, recognizing the potential for online forms to streamline operations across the entire organization. The team is not only focused on their own growth but also on sharing their knowledge and experience to empower other state branches to embrace similar digital solutions.
Key Takeaways
The American Legion Arizona’s success with WPForms offers valuable lessons for non-profit organizations and businesses alike:
- Automate and Streamline: Identify manual, time-consuming tasks that can be automated with well-designed online forms. This frees up valuable staff time to focus on core mission objectives.
- Enhance User Experience: Implement user-friendly forms to simplify processes like event registrations, feedback collection, and information submissions. This improves engagement and satisfaction among members and supporters.
- Optimize Data Collection and Management: Utilize online forms to efficiently collect and organize data, eliminating the need for paper forms and manual data entry. This saves time and reduces errors.
- Leverage Integrations: Choose a form-building solution that seamlessly integrates with your existing tools and systems, such as email marketing platforms and payment gateways, to streamline workflows and maximize efficiency.
By implementing these strategies, organizations can optimize their operations, improve their user experience, and achieve greater success in fulfilling their mission.
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Next, Learn More About How NonProfits Can Use WPForms
If you work for a nonprofit and you’re feeling inspired about how WPForms transformed the operations of the American Legion Arizona, we have a lot more resources that you may be interested in.
Start by checking out our guide to how nonprofits can use WPForms to grow their website. You might also be interested in how you can promote your cause during Giving Tuesday.
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