How to Use Roles

Your organization connects with a lot of different people and entities — donors, volunteers, vendors, board members, and more. Roles are how MonkeyPod helps you keep track of who's who.

At their core, roles are labels you assign to relationship records to describe how that person or organization relates to your work. A donor gets the Donor role. A contractor gets the Vendor role. Someone who wears multiple hats can have several roles at once. And a relationship with no defined role yet? That's fine too.

Roles do more than just organize your contact list, though. They're the foundation for segmenting email campaigns, customizing the information that appears on a relationship's record, and filtering search results. Getting your roles set up thoughtfully early on will save you a lot of time down the road.

What are relationship roles in my MonkeyPod?

Roles are labels you assign to relationship records to describe how that person or organization connects to your work. Common examples include Donor, Vendor, Volunteer, and Board Member. A relationship can have one role, several roles, or none at all.

Once roles are assigned, they appear at the top of the relationship record, where you can add or remove them at any time.

How do roles work in my MonkeyPod?

Roles are one of the most foundational features in your MonkeyPod, so it's worth taking a little time to think them through before diving in. Here are some of the ways they're used throughout the system:

• Relationship pages: The roles selected for a relationship determine what information is displayed on a relationship page, including what actions are available in the actions menu.
• Email campaigns: Roles make it easy to target the right audience when sending outreach. For example, you could send a volunteer appreciation email to everyone with the Volunteer role.
• Searching: Filter your relationship list (Relationships > Browse Relationships), or run searches based on role to quickly find the people and organizations you're looking for.
• Relationship cards and action menu: The information displayed on a relationship page is determined by the relationship's roles. A Vendor record might show invoicing and spending details, while a Donor record highlights contribution history. Similarly, the action menu on the relationship page will show actions relevant only to the roles of that relationship.
• Volunteer HQ: Assigning the Volunteer role is what makes a relationship available to add to Volunteer HQ.

How do I add roles to my MonkeyPod?

MonkeyPod comes with four default roles to get you started:

• Customer
• Donor
• Employee
• Vendor

You can add as many roles as your organization needs, but we recommend keeping it to somewhere between 5 and 7. A shorter, well-defined list is easier to apply consistently and keeps your data cleaner over time.

To add a role go to Relationships in the main menu then under Track and Organize, select Manage Roles.

Then, on the Relationship Roles page, select "Add a new role".

Type a name for your new role and click the checkmark to save it.

What are "relationship cards"?

Relationship cards are the information panels that appear on a relationship's record. Each card surfaces relevant details for a particular aspect of that relationship, such as contact info, contribution history, invoices, or documents.

A relationship that plays multiple roles in your organization will display cards for each of those roles, so their record shows everything relevant to how they connect with you.

To view or modify which relationship cards appear for each role, choose Relationships from the main menu, then under Track & Organize select Manage Roles.

Here you'll see a list of the roles you have in the system along with their relationship cards. 

To customize which cards are shown for a specific role, select Edit role settings.

From there you can see which relationship cards will be displayed for anyone with that role. Add or remove cards by selecting/unselecting the checkbox.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I assign or remove a role for a group of relationships?

Sure! You'll see the option to add/remove roles to a batch of relationships in a number of places in your MonkeyPod. For example, you can use the Advanced Relationship Search to find a certain subset of your relationships, then use the Assign/Remove A Role button that appears there above the search results to make the desired changes. You'll see that same button in various reports like Top Donors, Top Customers, and donor retention reports.

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