Naylor Association Solutions

No thrills database for an association. Reliablity is good and customer service friendly and helpful. Not much flexiblity within the system.  Membership invoicing is challenging and rigid. Email renewal notices do not allow for much design - basically resemble a text only email.  Limited ability to modify design of actual renewal notices/invoices.  The report builder function is challenging to work with. Its next to impossible to modify/change a custom report as there is no copy option - the user typically will need to rebuild a report from scratch to modify it. So if you don't select all the tables you want at the beginning - there is no way to add them later.   

Over the 6 years that we have been a client of Naylor/Timberlake, we have experienced good and bad things within our database. 

Good:

• Customer Service - they are usually very responsive and can answer the questions that we have had. If they do not know the answer, they take a few hours to days to respond with the help that we need.
• Events Module - It is one of the best features on the system. In the past 6 years, they have made improvements to it.
• Website Creation - It is really easy to create pages for the website. Especially if you do not have experience with coding. However, it is somewhat cumbersome to work in when you have to edit pages. There are times when we have to continue to save and check and edit and then save and check again with the webpage because the editor system didn't like what we did or how we entered.
• Reporting - The reporting from Naylor is a lot better than our last AMS. You have the option to build your own reports which is great. 

Bad:

• Chaptering - Naylor considers chapters a "committee" which is super frustrating for associations like us. We have 50 chapters that are under our association, but are run by volunteers of that chapter. When a new member joins, the system says "Committees" and not chapters. Before we signed on with Naylor, we asked them if they had chapter options and understood how chapters worked. They said yes. That is NOT the case at all. This is one of the most frustrating things within this platform.
• Duplicates - you cannot delete or merge duplicate records AT ALL within Naylor. We have asked them to add this as a new feature for years and they do not consider this a priority. All associations unfortunately deal with duplicate entries at some time or another. This should absolutely be a feature within every AMS.
• Integrations - 
  Informz: We were one of the beta testers for the syncing feature between Naylor and Informz. It does not work at all. There is no activity sync at this time so we are basically paying for Informz and not able to use it to its full capacity. We were informed by Naylor that the activity sync works, but Informz said they are waiting on Naylor. It is a lot of back and forth and no responsibility has been taken.
  QuickBooks:  The system does not integrate correctly with QuickBooks unfortunately.
• Financials - Inability to have more than one GL code per transaction.
• Blogs - The part of the system is okay, but when a person comments on a blog post, it does not send the original author an email of the comment so I have to manually go in and check each blog post every week to see if there were comments and then email the author to visit their article to comment. It's a lot of work on my end that I do not have time to do.
• Advertising - The only trackable ads are on the homepage per our theme. But they provide options to add advertisements throughout your website...they just aren't trackable. It seems like the advertising module was simply an afterthought.
• Organizational membership feature - This is not easy to use. We are a membership association for individuals, however some organizations like to pay for their employee's memberships so we created an org membership dues category. Unfortunately, you cannot merge people in and out of this membership, so if Sally Smith leaves ABC organization for XYZ organization, and has been a member for 20 years, she has to create a brand new account and since we cannot merge her information to her new account, she loses everything in her record.
• Donations - It is completely disconnected from everything else. You cannot do a membership payment and a donation on the same transaction.
• Certifications - very basic feature that you cannot post details within. We have an actual credential and there is no way to track any information within Naylor.
• Store features - There is no shopping cart feature where you can visit your cart at any time. The store features are very lacking. A non-member/potential member cannot find the store within our theme easily at all. They basically either have to receive a link to purchase from there or create a new account to purchase. If they do not purchase a membership with their purchase, we do not see any of their contact information to be able to reach out to them to promote membership or events.
• Forum - Naylor's forum is lacking. It speaks volumes that they don't even use their own forum for their clients to communicate...they use Higher Logic. We moved away from their forum and went with Higher Logic for our membership community forum. It was a very wise choice on our part!

Thanks!

We have been using Naylor/Timberlake for over a year. The system, while easy to use, is very clunky. The event module is dated and poorly executed. Customization of the event modeule is very limited. The registration pages do not look modern and need a complete refresh. The member management module does not allow for importing new members via spreadsheet. If you have 400 new members to add during one month of the year, importing is an absolute necessasry. The process for loading documents for committee members to view is convoluted and time-consuming, The CMS and website has been great. It is easy to use and allows our association to make changes without hiring a tech person. However, it is impossible to access documents or images without being in the process of uploading something to the website. 

My biggest complaint is the lack of any in-person training. They basically turn the system over to you and expect the online resources to suffice for more in-depth training. The online videos are dated and frequently do not match what I am seeing as a user. There is not enough online documentation to answer many questions. I find customer support team unfriendly. They seem annoyed when you call to ask a questions.

They sell you what sound like a great system, full of bells and whistles. This is not the case. We will be moving on.

My organization uses Naylor's Timberlake. It's strength is that it is very easy to use. I recommend it for very small organizations are are using an Excel spreadsheet for membership and are ready to move onto an AMS. We have completely outgrown it and are ready to move on to a more sophisticated product.

Manual movement of data between old database, QuickBooks and ConstantContact is what sent us on the search for a new AMS. Timberlake (now Naylor) assured us the system would be able to meet all our needs and make the manual data transfer unnecessary. In reality, NONE of what we were promised has been possible. These are just some of the problems: 
1. Can not mark members as having attended events. Zero check-in type functionality. Also no option for issuing credits for events not attended. 
2. Renewal process is a nightmare - anything other than simply dues (e.g. section membership or additional options) requires the member to renew or staff to manually renew individual members. 
3. Zero integration with QuickBooks. Payments must be entered manually. 
4. Simple reports (e.g. How many members have paid their dues and how many have outstanding invoices?) don't exist. Everything requires exporting data to Excel and then sorting, running counts, etc. 
5. Blast email capability is cumbersome at best (e.g. can not change subject line for membership renewal email or sending invoices) 
6. Credit card payments for invoices require manual movement of data as it is not identified what the member purchased or paid for. 
7. Recurring problems with members not receiving password reset emails. 
8. If you have members who are part of a firm or larger organization, it is NOT possible for them to show up on their own in the directory AND bill the firm/org for all dues and invoices

We have used Timberlake for a number of years for event registration, membership and content management on our website. We have not used the product, job board, forums or financial functions. 

Naylor/Timberlake customer support is responsive and helpful. 

While we have found work arounds to make things work, it is clunky and the modules we use (particularly events and membership) do not "talk" or relate to one another very well. Both registration and membership are not the easy to use online interface that most members and customers would expect. 

We are making due with the system for now, but exploring new options. 

The ease of use is the greatest selling point for TImberlake. My biggest issue is with their reporting functionality. you can pull simple lists but if you really want to start digging into your data and looking at trends, etc.. you will need to do that manually. 

The store functionality is very basic. Promo codes can not be applied to one specific item. And the membership application feature is just long and there isn't an option to create an account with basis information first and then build your profile later.

Lastly, customer service is ok. You do get an immediate response but for work to be done is where you are waiting for weeks and have to constantly follow up with them. 

I will say we have been with them for years and there has been significant improvements in the last 2 years.

Pros - Naylor AMS is a very good AMS for small to medium sized organizations. It's ability to be your website as well as your MMS and Event Management Tool helps organizations save money. It integrates with the Naylor Career Center (Boxwood) easily.  

Cons - It is limited in its customizability. There are areas in which you can control and others that you cannot. It's reporting system requires a course to get used to. There is no manipulation of the data in the system. You have download the data into another program to do any data manipulation.

Staff - The Naylor AMS team is very friendly and easy to work with. They are open to suggestions on how they can improve their system. They have an "ideas" forum where users can share product enhancement ideas. They have even implemented a few of my suggestions to enhance their system.

We looked for an AMS solution for more than a year. We are extremely happy we chose Naylor. This product exceeded our need for cost, functionality, implementation time frame, and professional website interface. NASS now has a professional AMS which we are all very proud to present to our membership.

Pros: Our members can easily go in and edit their own company and individual information so we don't have to go in and do everything ourselves. It definitely saves time for us as a staff. We also really appreciate how easy it is to manage our website through the AMS. It's nice to have everything in one spot. Cons: You have to be very careful about how you set up your events - especially if it's a multiple day conference with different sessions to register for. The system takes a while to get used to as far as finding where every function is and how to use it. However, that learning curve comes with any new software. The tutorials and customer support are super helpful references.

Overall our experience with Timberlake AMS has been very positive. It is a good fit for our small non-profit association. Data import went smoothly, working with Scott Crockett, project manger, was fabulous, and learning the system has been fairly easy.

My organization had looked in to joining another membership software company because a former employee had let the website go and did not train anyone else in the office on how to use it. We thought it was a lost cause. Timberlake, however, brought us templates for new design and assigned us some really great people to train the current staff on the software capabilities, help us get our membership up to date, help us file the reports we needed from them and to make our website functional and user friendly. We were able to turn our website completely around and they gave us tips for continuing to improve it. We have been so pleased with how quickly they answer our questions via phone or email and how quickly they fix problems along the way. Cara is an absolute gem to work with for website redesign!

we have been with Timberlake, now Naylor for some time and we have started to see a lot of improvement with the site and customer service but we still see issues with Quality Control. If an update is made, something else is usually effected. We usually find out by having members call us. Communications have improved as well but the limitations on what we can do with AMS is really where we get frustrated.

My company gave this AMS a try after our old AMS was purchased and phased out. They sold us an amazing product with amazing support and after a bumpy transition, we went live with a sub-par product expecting updates to the product within 2 weeks. Those 2 two weeks became 2 months, then 6 months. They made updates (other than the ones we were expecting), but everytime they fixed one thing, they broke one or more other things. VERY frustrating. Gave up after a year and transitioned off the platform.

From start to launch, could not be more pleased. Great software supported by great people!

Timberlake works pretty well for our needs. We are a small association; membership is by firm rather than individual. However, we have plenty of firm personnel that are "members" and are in the AMS database. Overall, i think the website, and event registration portals and online directory all work pretty seamlessly together. Nothing is going to be 100% everything, but I think Timberlake does a pretty good job of it.

We have had a hard time with our data in the past and have bounced around between several different platforms before coming back to Timberlake. We have had trouble with their service in the past but the new updated platform is excellent. The process of updating and integrating all our data was smooth, interactive and their representatives could not have been nicer and more accessible, always there to answer the smallest questions. It was a pleasure working so closely with them and I look forward to continuing the partnership going forward.

We just upgraded to the newest Timberlake version and I love it! It is extremely user friendly and has many beneficial features: the event dashboard and one click reports, Multi-channel messaging with the click of a box or two and direct member login from the admin portal. Not only is the platform great, but my project manager, Scott Crockett did an exceptional job of handling the upgrade efficiently and expertly.

I recently had the opportunity to work with Timberlake, more specifically Scott Crockett, and the experience was A+. I was reluctant at first for multiple reasons. The platform we use Timberlike for is as a non-profit, statewide advocacy and information, school counseling site. Because of this, most of the board and resources are volunteer. Somehow, I finally got our emails forwarding correctly and found an email for a Timberlake User Group meeting. It was during this meeting that I noticed all the great features of our software that we were not using, let alone, aware of. As it turns out, because of our internal turnover and lack of any real documentation, we discovered we were several versions behind. This is when we reached out to Ashwin and Scott. From that point forward, the experience was 180 degrees different. Scott took the lead, ran the project as a formal, business/IT focused project, with stage gates, timelines, test plans, etc. As an IT guy, volunteering for the non-profit group, this was a refreshing experience. In my spare time, I am a "raving-fan" for education and educational opportunities for students. In addition to this, I am now a "raving-fan" of Scott and his team! Thank you Scott and team for your commitment to customer service and quality product delivery.

Our organization implemented Timberlake in March of 2013. It has been a nightmare. The customer service is spotty and several of our main issues have never been resolved. It hasn't worked for our members or our association staff. At times, data that has been painstakingly entered has disappeared without explanation---causing our staff to have to re-enter several times. With only 5 people on staff, this is a tremendous inconvenience. We are looking into other AMS options.