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Getting started

Getting Started

Six required launch-readiness steps, plus optional setup you can turn on whenever it helps. Optional setup never counts toward readiness.

Find it: Left nav → Getting started · Who can use it: Org Admins and Development Associates work the steps. Board Viewers can follow progress read-only. Committee chairs and members don't see this page.

What you'll see

The Launch readiness bar at the top shows how many required steps are complete, for example "2 of 6 complete". Below it are six numbered step cards. Each card shows:

  • Why it matters: the reason for the step.
  • What we check: the live state ThankFirst looks at, such as donor counts, open duplicate reviews, active staff or tasks due soon.
  • What's left: the next action.
  • Who confirmed it and when, once someone has confirmed or deferred the step.
  • Links to the screens where you do the work.

Each step has a status:

  • To do: not confirmed yet.
  • Complete: someone confirmed it, and the live state still supports that.
  • Deferred: someone chose, on purpose, to come back to it later. Only two steps can be deferred.
  • Needs re-confirmation: something important changed after it was confirmed. For example, a newer import finished, or the settings changed.

Ticking a step is always a deliberate action by a person. A step never completes just because a record exists. When all six steps are complete or deferred, the page shows Ready to launch.

The six required steps

  1. Import and validate donor data: Import your donor file, then spot-check a few imported donors against your source.
    • What we check: donors in ThankFirst, completed imports, imports still in progress or failed, and the import result for tiering. Self-serve imports tier donors automatically, so there's no separate tiering step. Tiers come from gifts recorded in ThankFirst, so an import of historical summaries alone leaves donors without a tier, and the card says so. Org Admins can still recalculate tiers with Auto-tier on the Donors screen.
    • Imported summaries: if your import brought in historical summaries, the card notes that these are source-reported totals, not gifts in ThankFirst. They create no receipts and don't count toward ThankFirst-recorded giving, categories or tiers. See Importing.
    • Who confirms: an Org Admin or a Development Associate. You can't confirm with no donors, or while an import is still running.
    • Needs re-confirmation when: a newer import finishes.
  2. Review data quality: Look over duplicates, communication restrictions, restricted records and incomplete fields before outreach begins.
    • What we check:
      • open duplicate reviews;
      • do-not-contact, do-not-solicit, email opt-out and deceased counts;
      • the number of donors with restricted screening data (shown only to Org Admins and Development Associates);
      • record-hygiene flags, pending changes, imported records flagged for review, and donors with no email or phone.
    • Who confirms: an Org Admin or a Development Associate. You can confirm with items still open, once you've accepted them as known.
    • Needs re-confirmation when:
      • a newer import finishes; or
      • the exact set of open duplicate reviews, hygiene flags and pending changes differs from the one you confirmed. This covers an item being closed, replaced by another or added, even if the total stays the same.
  3. Confirm methodology thresholds and organization settings: Review the major-gift threshold, thank-you ratio window, retention target, wait windows, campaign season and timezone in Settings.
    • Who confirms: Org Admins only.
    • Needs re-confirmation when: any of the following change: the thresholds, wait windows, campaign season, timezone or organization name.
  4. Invite or confirm the core staff team: Invite staff from Team & Roles so their work is attributed to them.
    • Two ways to complete it:
      • Confirm core team, once at least two staff members (Org Admins or Development Associates) are active. Pending invitations are shown but don't block you.
      • Solo team for now, if you're the only staff member. This records a deliberate choice, so a one-person team is never stuck.
    • Who confirms: Org Admins only.
    • Needs re-confirmation when: a confirmed team drops below two active staff members.
  5. Assign ownership for the initial priority portfolio: Give your priority donors a named staff relationship owner. Priority donors are live donors in Tier A or Tier B, or marked as major donors. Deceased donors aren't included. Tiers come from gifts recorded in ThankFirst; imported summaries and DonorSearch ratings don't make a donor a priority. You set the owner on each donor's profile, in the Relationship owner card (see Donors).
    • What we check: how many priority donors have an active staff owner. Owners of other donors are shown for context, but they don't count.
    • To confirm:
      • If you have 10 or more priority donors, at least 10 of them need an owner.
      • If you have fewer than 10, all of them need an owner.
      • An Org Admin or a Development Associate confirms.
    • No priority donors yet? The step can't be confirmed. An Org Admin can defer it with Priority donors not decided yet. ThankFirst never assigns owners or tiers automatically.
    • To defer: an Org Admin can defer the step with a reason: waiting for staff, finishing the data review first, priority donors not decided yet, or other.
    • Needs re-confirmation when: fewer priority donors have an owner than the number you confirmed with, or there are no priority donors left.
  6. Review and approve the first 30-day work plan: The plan is your existing open tasks due from today (in your organization's timezone) through the next 29 days, so 30 days in all. Nothing is created for you. To add work, create tasks yourself or use the Create tasks buttons on the Action Plan.
    • What we check: open tasks in the window and how many have no assignee.
    • What's left out: overdue open tasks are shown as a separate warning and never count toward the plan. Open tasks with no due date aren't in the plan either.
    • Who approves: Org Admins only.
    • To approve: you need at least one open task due in the window, and every task in the window needs an assignee. To take an unassigned task, use Assign to me on the Tasks page.
    • What an approval covers: the exact tasks in the window, including their assignee, due date and status.
    • Needs re-confirmation when:
      • any of those tasks changes, or a task is added to the window;
      • a task in the window loses its assignee;
      • no open tasks remain in the window; or
      • the 30-day window ends.

Reopen step clears a confirmation or deferral. It needs the same authority as setting it. Confirming again records a fresh snapshot of what you reviewed. Every confirm, deferral and reopen is recorded in the audit log.

Optional setup

These modules appear in a separate Optional setup section with their current status. They never count toward the six required steps, and they never block Ready to launch.

  • Payments and online donations: connect Stripe. The setup guide links to Settings → Donations & payments.
  • Committees and volunteers: see Committees.
  • Campaigns: see Campaigns.
  • Fundraising seasons
  • AI features: see AI agents.
  • Scheduled reports
  • API and webhooks: see Public API & webhooks.

If your role can't open a module's page, the row says who manages it instead of linking to a page you can't use.

Good to know

  • Nobody is redirected here. A new organization's creator lands here once, after creating it. Existing organizations simply have the Getting started link in the left nav.
  • Don't see Getting started? Committee chairs and members don't have this page. Ask an Org Admin to change your role under Team & Roles if you need it.
  • Board Viewers see the same progress and checks, without the confirm buttons.
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