Frequently Asked Questions
Q. I already have an LGL account, but how/where do I log in?
Your LGL account has a unique URL consisting of a prefix followed by ".littlegreenlight.com". In many cases the prefix is either an abbreviation of your organization's name (ie., wwf.littlegreenlight.com) or it's your website's name (ie., teachforamerica.littlegreenlight.com). You will have received an email from 'noreply@littlegreenlight.com' with the name of your site. If you can't find it, please email 'support@littlegreenlight.com' and we'll happily re-send your URL to you. Please note that neither World Wildlife Fund nor Teach for America are associated in any way with Little Green Light; their names are used here for illustration only!
Q. What is Little Green Light (LGL)?
Little Green Light is a complete web-based donor management system and CRM that makes your work easier and saves you time—and it is extremely affordable.
Q. How will LGL help me do my fundraising and development work better?
LGL is built for fundraising. You can track gifts, grants, asks, pledges, and tasks; plan events and send appeals; create mail merges;
everything you need to make the most of your development efforts. LGL offers complete constituent profiles, giving histories, tasks,
memberships, event attendance, and relationships—all of which can be documented and viewed on a single page. Manage your schedule
and stay on track. Automated reminders and notifications keep everyone up to date and on task, so you can keep moving forward.
Perform interactive, visual searches. On-screen reporting views show the information you need in real time.
Q. What functions does LGL perform?
LGL helps you manage a large set of functions. Below is a list of the highlights. For a complete
walk-through of LGL functionality, download our manual.
Highlights of LGL functionality:
Managing donor information
Managing donor information
- Track unlimited numbers of donors
- Establish relationships between donors (for example, "spouse," "employer")
- Tie constituents to affiliations, such as class year or first membership year
- Keep logs of communications, and communication preferences
- Automatically store copies of system-generated letters
- Maintain seasonal addresses tied to specified dates
- See all recent communications and giving history on one screen
- Manage donors through a workflow
- Track donors’ capacity to give and their interests
- Set a reminder for a particular team member and particular date
- Run a report showing all the asks and current status
- Create mail merge letters using templates you design
- Select constituents who meet your criteria
- Preview and save copies of all letters
- Print envelopes and labels
- Track who has registered for a particular event
- Print nametags for events
- Track payments and separate donations from event payments
- Quickly add gifts for any individual
- Mark gifts as gifts, pledges, in-kind, soft credits, matching, in memory, and in honor of
- Enter a note on a gift
- Apply gifts against existing pledges
- Report on all existing pledges to aid fundraising efforts
- Create and save lists of donors based on wide set of criteria
- Query based on any standard database field
- Use multiple filters to run complex queries
- Generate donor reports for size of donations and by time period
- Filter by campaign, fund, event, appeal, steward, or [dozens] of other fields
- Define multiple user groups with varying permissions
- Customize dropdown values for fields such as campaigns, type of relationship, and groups
- Custom fields automatically appear in filter lists
- Export any and all of your data in .csv format
- Export transactions to sync them up with an accounting system
- Create and track accounting batches by day in order to help with reconciliation
Q. What kind of training and support are available?
With your paid subscription you have access to online and phone support from LGL staff. Our service hours are M-F, 7am-5pm, Pacific Time. Response time to calls is usually immediate, and response to emails is within a few hours. Our minimum service level is a response within one business day.
We pride ourselves on offering great service, but also in making our software easy to use. Most customers are able to get up and running with a small amount of support and don’t need much more support after that—but either way, we’ll make sure you get everything working smoothly.
Q. How much does it cost?
LGL is priced based on the number of constituent records that you track. All subscriptions include
initial data migration, unlimited user accounts, training, and support.
| # Constituent Records | Monthly rate | Yearly rate* |
| Up to 2,500 | $39 | $421 |
| 5,000 | $49 | $529 |
| 10,000 | $59 | $637 |
| 20,000 | $69 | $745 |
| 40,000 | $79 | $853 |
| 60,000 | $89 | $961 |
| 100,000 | $109 | $1,177 |
| 150,000 | $149 | $1,609 |
| 200,000 | $199 | $2,149 |
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* Annual pricing includes a 10% discount.
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Discounts. We offer discounts when you sign up for an extended period:
| Signup period | Discount |
| 3 months | 2.5% |
| 6 months | 5% |
| 12 months | 10% |
Q. What does data migration entail?
We want to ensure that you get the most out of LGL as quickly as possible. To that end, we will help transfer all your
current constituent and giving history data into LGL so you can have a seamless experience. We can handle data in any
format: Excel, Access, Filemaker Pro, Quickbooks, or any donor management system. We’ll work with you to map your current
fields to the fields in LGL, and will identify any data integrity issues that should be addressed.
Q. What security and reliability measures does Little Green Light use?
- All LGL access is handled through SSL-encrypted connections. This is the same level of security used by online banks.
- LGL Servers are hosted with two of the best hosting providers in the country: Rackspace and LiquidWeb.
- LGL servers are tightly firewalled, and communications between servers and data centers are encrypted.
- Access to LGL servers and customer data is strictly controlled.
- RAID storage is used for maximum data protection and integrity.
- Backups occur once a day and are stored on multiple servers for redundancy.
Q. Can I get my data back out of LGL?
Yes, absolutely. The data in your account is yours and you can get it back any time. Through the 'export' options you can
download a copy of your complete constituent database, including giving summary information, with just a few clicks. If you need any information that cannot
be directly exported, we will work with you to provide it.
Q. Little Green Light seems so inexpensive. Can it really be very good for that price?
Yes, it can! While LGL is among the lowest-priced services that provide complete functionality out of the gate (without requiring technical
know-how on the part of the non-profit), it is very powerful and includes many features. This includes the ability to create (and search on) custom fields, track
constituent relationships, assign soft credits, and search by geographic proximity, to name a few. We are priced for the long term;
we expect to have long-lasting relationships with our customers and do not seek to make a profit on a per-account basis in the first year.
Q. Where does the name "Little Green Light" come from?
The name comes from a Taj Mahal song called Candy Man (available on Amazon MP3 and iTunes), and our co-founder Nick loved that song as a child. We think it projects good things: "green light" means "go" and signifies success; and "little" connotes lightweight and easy, all of which match the promise of LGL—it helps you reach your goals and it's easy to use.
But the name is open to your intepretation as well. A common association with "green light" is from The Great Gatsby: "I glanced seaward – and distinguishing nothing except a single green light, minute and faraway, that might have been the end of a dock." (pp. 27-28) The green light in the book is broadly understood to be a symbol for hope.
