This post is authored by Tobi Nifesi at Keela.

In the not-for-profit sector, accountability matters. With a complete not-for-profit accounting solution like Xero for Not-for-Profits, you can streamline your not-for-profit operations and be more accountable to your donors and board members.

As a not-for-profit professional, you understand the importance of keeping your ducks in a row at all times. Chances are you’ve lost countless, valuable hours designing spreadsheets or storing data in a physical ledger to track your funds and expenses. And after doing all that, it was still challenging to create and share financial reports.

Xero is an all-in-one not-for-profit accounting solution that can save you hours of administrative work so you can spend more time making significant contributions to your community. This easy-to-use software lets you streamline your tasks, increase your productivity, track your not-for-profit’s financial health and be transparent about it.

Leveraging technology for your not-for-profit

Technology is powering the way not-for-profit professionals work. By integrating technology into your not-for-profit management strategy, you can increase your team’s efficiency, stay organised, align your budgets with your expectations and focus on doing more good. That said, it is vital to use technology that meets your organisation’s specific needs.

Your choice of not-for-profit technology should positively impact your organisation’s ability to achieve its goals. It should improve your organisation’s productivity, accountability and campaign outcomes. Your preferred tool should be purpose-built for the sector and help minimise the challenges not-for-profits face daily.

Not-for-Profit accounting remains a challenge for many organisations. It requires a great deal of organisation, fund and expense tracking, as well as comprehensive reporting. There are several ways to go about managing your not-for-profit accounting. Whether you’re hiring a bookkeeper or crunching numbers on an Excel spreadsheet, you need a system that can track transactions, record disbursements, manage your inventory, and capture costs.

Why use Xero for Not-for-Profits?

Xero for Not-for-Profits can help you manage your not-for-profit accounting smoothly and with peace of mind. With Xero, you can pay bills, claim expenses, create accurate accounting reports and organise your payroll. You can also sync your bank accounts with your financial records and share your financial data with board members or your accountant.

Xero allows you to automate your expense tracking, conveniently manage account receivables and account payable and share your financial records with your bookkeeper, or other collaborators. Similar to Keela’s intuitive reporting, Xero lets you create, customise and monitor your accounting reports so you can stay on top of your not-for-profit finances.

Xero’s impact on your not-for-profit accounting can:

• Save you time by streamlining tasks and increasing your capability.
• Allow you to share critical donation and expense information online with donors, board members, volunteers and other collaborators.
• Sync seamlessly with third-party fundraising and donor management tools like Keela.
• Enable you to access your not-for-profit’s financial records from your phone or mobile device using the Xero accounting app.

Xero for Not-for-Profits offers eligible not-for-profit organisations 25% off their Xero subscription. To take advantage of this discount, all you need to do is sign up here for a 30-day free trial, no credit card required.

After signing up, contact the Xero support team at support.xero.com with your proof of charitable status and your discount will be automatically applied at the end of your free trial.

Keela’s Xero integration

Keela’s intelligent all-in-one CRM and donor management solution is built specifically for not-for-profits. With Keela, you can delight donors, mobilise volunteers, and transform your team into a data-driven organisation so you can raise more money for your cause.

From donor management to email marketing, our CRM offers all the essential features you need to run a successful not-for-profit organisation. We have woven our intelligence features into our software to give you insights like who you ought to reach out to, when to connect with them and exactly how much contribution to ask for during your fundraising campaigns.

As part of our commitment to helping not-for-profit organisations excel and do more good, we’ve teamed up with Xero for Not-for-Profits to streamline your not-for-profit operations. Keela’s Xero integration is perfect for not-for-profits looking to optimise their not-for-profit accounting process and minimise data entry errors.

How does Keela integrate with Xero?

Sync transaction records from Keela to Xero

As a Keela user, you can seamlessly transfer your Keela transactions to your Xero income account from within the Keela platform. This makes it easier to include your donations, grants, sponsorships, membership fees, and other sources of revenue in your accounting records.

Sync transaction fees for Stripe and PayPal payments made through Keela

With this integration, you can ensure your payment processing fees are accounted for in your Xero expense category. Xero allows you to create custom expense categories by adding an account to your chart of accounts. This way, you can record and track all kinds of expenses, including your Stripe and Paypal transaction fees.

Segment your transactions based on impact area or campaign

Keela is working to create an enhancement to improve the way you report transactions. This feature will allow you to segment your transactions and sync them to their corresponding tracking categories based on impact area or fundraising campaign. Xero’s tracking categories will add an additional level of reporting to monitor your campaign’s progress or not-for-profit’s performance in specific impact areas.

Track your not-for-profit accounting data with Xero and Keela

If you’re a Keela user, you can still capture your donations and revenues in Keela.

But now, with Keela and Xero talking to each other, your accountant, bookkeeper, or board treasurer can view your up-to-date financial records as your donations, grants and revenues roll in.

You can also create, customise, share and export your accounting reports. Xero’s accounting report feature allows you to prepare a detailed budget, analyse your financial statements and share your progress. This way, you can remain more accountable to your donors, board members, volunteers and collaborators.

With Keela’s Xero integration, you can trade-in your messy spreadsheets for a few easy clicks and keep track of all essential not-for-profit data. You can spend less time on administrative tasks and focus on what truly matters.

Our success team is committed to ensuring you get the most out of this feature. We’ve detailed all the steps you need to sync your data in the Keela platform with your Xero account. Visit our Help Center to get started and learn more about how Xero and Keela can help your non-for-profit business.