How to customize a CRM to become a more organized and efficient grant writer

As a grant writer, you want to spend the majority of your time writing great grant applications, not worrying about organization and the finer details of your work. A CRM can help you stay organized, keep track of leads and clients, and streamline your workflow so that you can focus on what you do best. To get off to the best possible start with your new CRM, you’ll want to customize it to suit your needs.

There are many CRM features that there’s no need to customize, but to make the most of your CRM, some features will require a bit more set up. To speed up your CRM set up process, read on for customization ideas that will help you get the best value out of your CRM as a grant writer.

Three critical features that you’ll want to customize in your CRM are groups, pipelines, and custom fields. Take a look below for some inspiration for how you can customize these three features as a grant writer and make your CRM work for you.

Imports and exports
Note: If you’re considering CRMs and you want to give our product — Less Annoying CRM — a try, we’ll be happy to apply all these customizations to your account during your free trial so you don’t need to worry about a thing. Just get in touch with our support if you’d like to give it a try.

Groups

Segment and organize your list of contacts and companies in the CRM.

Jump to section >>
Pipelines

Pipelines

Track any workflow or process that you repeat over and over again.

Jump to section >>
Fields

Custom fields

Collect all the information you need that is critical for your work.

Jump to section >>

Custom fields

As a grant writer, it will be especially important to collect information that helps you stay organized as you juggle grant applications.

  • 📝Application requirements (text area to hold any special requirements for a particular grant)
  • ✅Grant Application Deadline (date field to stay on top of grant application deadlines)
  • 💰Grant Funding Amount (currency field to track the monetary value of each grant)
  • 🏆Grant Award Notification Date (date field to track when you’ll be notified about your application)
Thumb snap icon
Custom fields let you take your CRM to the next level. Collect more than just the basic information about the contacts and companies you work with; instead, collect everything that is critical for your work.

Pipelines

Pipelines are composed of statuses—each status is step in the process you are tracking. Pipelines consist of both active and closed status. An active status is something that requires follow up or additional work. A closed status tracks the end points of a process.

As a grant writer, you can use a pipeline to track your entire process. From your preliminary research to hitting submit on your application—store all of that information in your pipeline. Take a look at an example pipeline for grant writers below.

Active statuses

Research
Grant Identification
Proposal Writing
Budget Development
Application Submission
Review and Follow-up

Closed statuses

Grant Awarded
Grant Denied
Thumb snap icon
Pipelines are one of the most useful CRM features; they let you track any workflow or process that you repeat over and over again. It's a great way to make sure nothing slips through the cracks.

Groups

As a grant writer, groups will help you easily keep track of different types of potential funders. Take a look at a couple example groups that are perfect for grant writers below.

  • 🏢Corporations
  • 🌳Foundations
  • 💼Governmental Agencies
Thumb snap icon
Groups are a handy feature that you can use to segment and organize your list of contacts and companies in the CRM. Think of groups as tags that you can attach to anyone to assign a label to them.

Once you’ve created custom fields, pipelines, and groups in your new CRM, you are ready to get started! Dive right in and start making the most of your new CRM.

Less Annoying CRM is a contact management tool designed for small businesses, run by a small business.

At $15/user/month with a 30-day free trial, LACRM has all the features that you need to manage your customers, new prospects, and everyone in between.

Start your 30-day, no obligation free trial