IconCMO Blog

It is Here – The First Android Church Software

By Jay Leave a Comment

Icon Systems has released the first, completely functioning church software that includes membership, contributions, fund accounting, payroll, small groups, attendance, and gifts on the Android Operating System for the tablet market. We felt it important to release the full system for the tablet market and not just a “lite” or “slimmed” down version that only shows only demographic information. Why did we decide to do this for our clients? The iPad with 15 million sold in 11 months is the fastest selling technology hardware device in history – EVER. We believe tablets (Androids, iPads, etc.) will eventually replace the laptop for majority of the population. Secondly, the mobile devices adheres to our motto of Anytime, Anywhere access.

Laptops only were able to get people partially the way to being completely mobile. The tablets will take the user the rest of the way. After we released the iPad version of IconCMO on Aug. 3rd, we received a call on Aug. 17th from Steve Hewitt of CCMag about doing a cover story on mobile computing.

At the time of this writing the Android version of the IconCMO is in Beta testing and getting ready to be put out to our clients! Many people will ask why did we decide to quickly turn and do this for the Android market? There are two reasons. First, Steve mentioned a survey where majority of church leaders and staff prefer the Android tablet over the iPad for its Flash capabilities instead of the iPad. This market trend is different than the rest of the population that uses the iPad. Secondly, companies say they are the leaders in church management software with innovations but most come up short because of the technology they use is outdated for the current technology era.

When technology that is used allows you to release a full Church Management Software (ChMS) solution on an Android tablet in weeks not months or years – this shows innovation, the right technology in the right era, speed of development, agility of management, and the true leaders of the church software industry – Icon Systems. Please read the full article about mobile computing that was published in CCMag. Tell us what you think.

Mobile Technology for the Church – How will this Help the Church?

By Jay Leave a Comment

Mobile Technology – How Will It Help The Church?

Is mobile technology a passing fad or here to stay? Will only tech-savvy people embrace the advancements, or will it be common to see Grandma using her iPhone to keep in touch with the grandchildren? A recent blog post by MicrosoftTag supports the idea that mobile devices will become commonplace. The post also reported that mobile devices are expected to account for more Internet usage than desktop computers by the year 2014. How are users spending their time? Currently, the most popular uses are: games, weather, maps/search, and social networking. People enjoy using their mobile devices and are looking for new ways to exploit them other than playing Angry Birds.  New technology brings more opportunities that churches should use to help grow their faith. One of these new technologies that churches are starting to use is mobile tags.

What are mobile tags and how are churches benefiting from them?

Mobile tag for Church Software
Try it out  – Visit Our Website

Mobile tags are two-dimensional barcodes that can be scanned using the camera from any bar-code or mobile tag enabled device. Mobile tags are able to store more information than traditional barcodes and typically act as a gateway to a website. In addition, these mobile tags point to any information that you want and can be changed over time.

Mobile concepts already used by churches:

  1. A fund raising event where churches and local merchants partner together on a specific day and the local merchant gives back a percentage of the proceeds.
  2. Have contact information encoded within the tag for the church staff so people can scan it, upload the contact information, and not touch one key on their phone.
  3. Have a tag point to this week’s sermon so users can view on their mobile device quickly for reference.
  4. Giving and voting on important issues via mobile tagging.

Why is this important to churches?

Since technology moves at record breaking speeds, your ChMS needs to move just as fast. The church should embrace mobile technology and utilize the resource to raise community awareness, increase donations, and bring ease of use to members and staff while keeping everyone as mobile as possible. Engaging members through instant communication is essential for churches; people are busier than ever before and staying productive while on the go is a must. Icon Systems, Inc. is dedicated to connecting churches with the latest technology – watch for a new mobile IconCMO product in the near future!

Using mobile technologies (such as the new mobile product for IconCMO church software) will help make the most of your time as well as the church’s. Icon Systems, Inc. will be on the forefront of this technology – bringing it to churches to ensure they can reach members, communicate vision, allow members to interact with each other, coordinate the church staff easily, and much more!

Thanks,

The Development Team!

How to Choose a Church Management Solution!

By Jay Leave a Comment

How to choose a church management software solution:

  1. Know your requirements and search for a package that meets these expectations.  A bloated system can hinder rather than help. No software can provide everything so find one that meets your needs.
  2. Try before you buy if possible. While this may delay the decision process it will certainly ensure you get what you need. 
  3. Call the support department and have high expectations.  There are many church software companies on the market today that have fantastic support for their products.  Getting a resolution within minutes rather than days should be a requirement.

Each church is unique, but there are four fundamental benefits software should provide:

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Interview with Icon Systems at the Church Accounting Software Guide

By Jay Leave a Comment

Several of us at Icon Systems recently had the chance to be interviewed by the fine folks over at ChurchAccountingSoftwareGuide.com. We think you’ll find it well worth a read! As they wrote:

Why this Interview is a Must Read for Anyone Dealing with Church Management and Accounting

It answers (from a licensed Certified Public Accountant) some of the most common questions I get about church accounting:

  • Are there any special accounting standards our church needs to be following?
  • Can my church lose its tax-exempt status?
  • Are my current accounting reports in compliance with non-profit regulations and standards?
  • Is there a church accounting software program that can help me be in compliance with non-profit standards?
  • My church is small, do I need to worry about the accounting standards?

We also cover the general administrative challenges that churches face, some of the best accounting-related features in IconCMO, and have a detailed overview from our CPA about the federal fund accounting guidelines for churches and other non-profits.

Excel meets IconCMO church software

By Jay 2 Comments

An update for IconCMO and its Reports!

The largest report related release to date for the IconCMO church software solution. The developers have given churches the ability to download reports in an Excel format from the IconCMO church management software (ChMS) solution. The enhancement greatly increases the flexibility of the IconCMO church software. Users can modify the standard reports and add various headings, data, etc. to the downloaded excel file to create their own customized reports. The majority of the reports in IconCMO were modified to offer this feature to our clients.  Additionally, we also changed the screens for reporting. The developers are laying the groundwork for future reporting styles to be added to our flagship church software product.

In addition to this great enhancement we have also included the normal export screens to go directly into Excel.  Now the system will directly send the data into Excel for the user – saving time in retrieving data for the end user!

[Read more…]

Recent Study – Churches Offering Online Donations.

By Jay Leave a Comment

According to a recent study conducted by Lifeway and 1003 protestant churches 55% of churches offer online giving with attendance of 500 or more.  Two-thirds of churches with online giving offered it for 2 years or less. It also found churches in larger cities used it more often. To check out all the statistics please review the study. With this growing trend it is essential to have church software that can handle seamless integration.

Church Member Portal has Read Write Capability

By Jay Leave a Comment

Stop Sending Statements…

Let Your Church Members Print Them.

Icon Systems, Inc. announces the release of the Member Portal for IconCMO. IconCMO is a church management software that is web based. Church members can log into a secure website to verify and update their personal information. Or they can view their giving patterns and print their own contribution statements.

How The Church Member Portal Works

Each household is given a unique 8-digit user name and password. These are similar to what a bank or brokerage firm gives to their clients. Church staff can simply send a reminder to church members, asking them to login and review their personal profiles. This will ensure that contribution information, mailing addresses and contact information is correct. The church members can also check information such as birthdays, communions, confirmation, graduations, baptisms, etc. is complete.

Accurate Data via the Church Member Portal

When church members update their own information, it gives the church more accurate data. Therefore, this gives church leaders a better understanding of their entire church. It also helps to have the most accurate data updated for church groups, VBS, and so on. The church database administrator can view changes made by the church members by simply running a report. The database manager can define who has read only, read write or no access.

Saves The Church Time and Money

Additionally church members can print their own contribution statements at any time. This simple process saves the church time in preparing the mailing and the cost of postage, envelopes, and paper. IconCMO is a online (web-based) church management software. It provides churches with software for accounting, membership, contributions and communications.  And all of these modules can be utilized from any computer with access to the Internet.

President
Bill Gifford
Icon Systems, Inc.

About Icon Systems Software:

For more than 25 years, Icon Systems has been developing high-quality software for religious organizations. Icon Systems developed IconCMO – an Internet based online system. Another product, called Revelations and created in 1992, was the initial product offering. Icon Systems has a deep software engineering heritage that has enabled its products to achieve unprecedented performance, reliability and customer satisfaction. Visit Icon Systems.