st. charles borromeo

SPOTLIGHT
MAY 2013
ST. CHARLES BORROMEO
PARMA, OHIO
Success through Deliberate Transition and Online Giving
St. Charles Borromeo Church takes up a
full block of land between Charles and
Wilbur Avenues in Parma, Ohio. The
parish of more than 4,200 families makes
good use of the space, sharing its sizable
campus with St. Charles School. With
many parishioners, a large campus,
numerous facilities, and a parish school
to manage, it’s no wonder that St.
Charles decided to upgrade the church
software by purchasing ParishSOFT’s
Parish Suite of products and Online
Giving program, among other add-ons in
the fall of 2010.
Since then, Thomas Holzheimer,
business manager at St. Charles
Borromeo, and the rest of the staff have
had great success with Online Giving and
are deliberately working toward a smooth
transition to move the rest of their parish
Success with
Online Giving
electronic system—ACH debiting through
their bank. According to Holzheimer,
parishioners are responding positively to
administration to ParishSOFT.
At St. Charles Borromeo, Online Giving is
quite a step up from their old, in-house
the new Online Giving program. “I can
tell it’s growing more and more when I log
THOMAS HOLZHEIMER serves as
minister of music and business manager
St. Charles Borromeo celebrated its
90th anniversary on April 21, 2013
FR. JOHN T. CARLIN serves as pastor
to more than 10,000 parishioners
“I can tell it’s growing more and more when I log in and see
new parishioners who have signed up and given.” Thomas Holzheimer
in and see new parishioners who have
signed up and given,” he says.
REGULAR REMINDERS
ENCOURAGE SIGNUPS
Holzheimer reminds parishioners to
sign-up by highlighting Online Giving
in the bulletin every few weeks and
featuring a screenshot of the Online
Giving parishioner interface on the
home page of the St. Charles
Borromeo website. Although many still
prefer the tangible envelope,
Holzheimer estimates that they’re
closing in on 10% of parishioners
contributing through Online Giving.
ONE-STOP SHOPPING
It’s really no wonder that Online
Giving is succeeding at St. Charles
because when it comes down to it, the
program provides a convenient and
flexible way to give. Parishioners are
taking full advantage of the of the
adaptable giving schedule options—some
choose to contribute weekly, others
monthly, and some sporadically.
In fact, members want to do more than
tithe online—they’re eager to contribute to
special funds as well. With Online Giving,
this is possible, and Holzheimer plans to
add special funds, like the endowment and
memorial funds, as options in St. Charles
Borromeo’s Online Giving interface.
“People like that they can go out there and
make contributions,” says Holzheimer.
“With the added funds, it will be like onestop-shopping.”
The parish’s custom Online Giving system is easy for members to use — and find!
The image above is prominent on the parish home page at stcharlesonline.org.
Just sign in to make a gift or pay a fee.
Making a smooth
transition
modules, as Holzheimer slowly but surely
weans them off the old software. So far,
one staff member manages ministry
Holzheimer has taken a different approach
when it comes to implementing the Parish
Suite. Because very little was done with
scheduling solely with ParishSOFT’s Time
and Talent.
online transactions, switching to Online
Giving wasn’t too disruptive. But altering
the rest of the parish administration is a
different story.
CONTROLLED PACE
Staff are accustomed to their old systems,
so they have opted for a gradual transition.
Instead of changing all of their processes at
once, parish staff are temporarily using
parts of their old Parish Data System (PDS)
along with pieces of their new ParishSOFT
But a gradual transition does not mean a
hesitant one. Holzheimer understands that
a change involving data conversion and a
learning curve can’t happen overnight, and
he’s excited for the day when St. Charles
Borromeo will operate entirely on
ParishSOFT. “ParishSOFT is user friendly
and has more capabilities than our old
software,” says Holzheimer.“We’re looking
forward to being able to say that we’re
completely off PDS and just using
ParishSOFT.”
“ParishSOFT is user
friendly and has
more capabilities
than our old
software.”
Though Holzheimer has chosen the stepby-step approach to the switch, his “steps”
have been significant and motivating. To
to transfer the old PDS data to their new
ParishSOFT Family Directory database,
but also to be able to update the church’s
records.
Holzheimer says that he specifically
focused on getting accurate email
addresses and cell phone numbers. Email
addresses are always changing, and cell
Borromeo staff to use the other
ParishSOFT tools that make the most of
this new-and-improved database.
Having new a database and updated
BIG STEPS: CENSUS AND
CONVERSION
help with the transition, St. Charles
Borromeo took a parish census—the first
since the late ‘90s. The goal was not only
phones are much more prevalent than they
were in the late ‘90s. New and accurate
information will empower St. Charles
information is also pushing Holzheimer to
learn the Family Directory interface.
Though he’s finding ParishSOFT more
user friendly than PDS, it’s still different,
and Holzheimer had to adjust to the new
layout. The good news is that with Family
Directory mastered, adjusting to the other
Parish Suite modules should be easier, and
Holzheimer is well on his way to putting
the functionality of ParishSOFT to work
for ministry.
and Pledges and Religious Education with
Tuition modules, make the transition
worthwhile.
Holzheimer is hoping to add NotifyNow to
the parish’s set of products and is already
anticipating its communication and timesaving benefits.
“I am looking forward to using NotifyNow.
I think we would make good use of it and
save staff time and resources,” Holzheimer
says. Currently, St. Charles Borromeo is
limited in its communication abilities, and
sending out email and mail reminders can
consume staff time and parish resources.
With ParishSOFT, staff will be able to use
their filter and search options to view
exactly the individual or group of
Better software and new features, like
members they need to reach. Right from
the software, they can email families or
create a quick mail merge letter—
NotifyNow’s mass communication tools
and the tuition capabilities in the Offering
formatted just how staff want them—using
the integrated Microsoft® Office® tools.
PLANS FOR NEW FEATURES!
AROUND CAMPUS
St. Charles Borromeo’s school opened in 1924 and offers quality Catholic
education plus a wide range of extracurriculars for students (AKA “Wildcats”!).
Eileen Updegrove serves as principal.
What’s in St. Charles Borromeo’s Toolkit
And if they need to pull a list to use with
an email service provider, it takes just a few
clicks. For urgent communications,
NotifyNow will send recorded messages by
phone, text, and email instantly to all
people in a group selected from a church’s
ParishSOFT database.
PAVING THE WAY FOR
SUCCESS
Holzheimer’s thoughtful and deliberate
transition plans put parish staff at St.
Charles Borromeo in a great position to
experience the same ease as
parishioners with their “one-stop-
NotifyNow can ease the stress involved in
last-minute cancellations, reminders, or
emergencies and get messages out quickly,
shopping” Online Giving experience.
Soon, staff will be able to access and
manage all parish records in one place
replacing the traditional methods of
telephone-tree-style communications with
technology that takes less time and fewer
—ParishSOFT. ■
Offering & Pledges
Time & Talent
Power Add-Ons
Online Giving
Mailroom Solutions
Remote Solutions
Offering and Pledges module and the
Religious Education and Tuition module
have tuition capabilities, so Holzheimer
ANYTIME, ANYWHERE
ACCESS
Anytime, anywhere
access to the
Parish Suite program
s is available
via Remote Solution
s, which
provides cloud acces
s to the
desktop products an
d hosting via
the Web.
just has to decide which system will best fit
his needs.
He’s set the date of July 1, 2013 to make
the transition, and using software that’s
fully integrated with the Family Directory
will be an added convenience for the
parish and school.
The ConnectNow Pa
rish Suite
(which includes My
Own Church)
is a true, browser-ba
sed system for
total church managem
ent that you
can access via any de
vice with a
compatible Web brows
er.
MORE CUSTOMER STORIES
PARISHSOFT
St. Clarence Powers Religious Education with
ParishSOFT (North Olmsted, OH)
825 Victors Way, Suite 200
Ann Arbor, MI 48108
866.930.4774
Visit: http://www.parishsoft.com/stories
Religious Education with
Tuition
ConnectNow My Own
Church
Holzheimer also has plans to start using
ParishSOFT to manage and collect tuition
at St. Charles Borromeo School. Both the
St. Thomas More Doubles Online Giving
(Darien, CT)
Family Directory
Parish IQ
resources.
St. Robert Bellarmine: “Whole New World”
of Ministry Opportunities (Fernley, NV)
Parish Suite:
www.parishsoft.com
SPOTLIGHT ON
ST. CHARLES PARISH
Parma, Ohio
May 2013
www.stcharlesonline.org