Best Salesforce Grant Management Alternatives 2026
An honest review of Salesforce Nonprofit Cloud Grants Management. Covers real costs, implementation complexity, AI capabilities, and who should actually consider it.
Salesforce Nonprofit Cloud includes a Grants Management module that extends the platform's CRM capabilities into grant programme administration. For organisations already running their donor relationships, fundraising, and stakeholder data on Salesforce, the proposition is straightforward: keep your grant management in the same system you already use, and benefit from a single source of truth across all your relationships and funding data.
The problem is that Salesforce was not built for grantmaking. Its Grants Management module requires substantial configuration to match the out-of-the-box functionality of dedicated grant management platforms, demands ongoing Salesforce expertise to maintain, and carries implementation costs that can easily run into the tens of thousands of pounds before a single application has been submitted. For organisations not already deeply invested in Salesforce, adopting it specifically for grants management is rarely the right decision.
This review examines Salesforce Nonprofit Cloud Grants Management honestly: what it can do, what it genuinely costs, who it is appropriate for, and where purpose-built alternatives provide better value.
What is Salesforce Nonprofit Cloud Grants Management?
Salesforce Nonprofit Cloud Grants Management is a module within Salesforce's Nonprofit Cloud product suite. It extends the Salesforce platform — originally a sales CRM — to support the management of grant programmes: application intake, award management, grantee relationship tracking, payment scheduling, and reporting.
The module sits on top of the core Salesforce platform, which means it inherits Salesforce's strengths: advanced reporting through Salesforce Reports and Dashboards, automation through Salesforce Flow, a vast AppExchange ecosystem of third-party integrations, and the ability to connect grant data with fundraising, donor, and programme records held elsewhere in Salesforce.
Salesforce launched a dedicated "Nonprofit Cloud for Grantmaking" offering in 2024, which uses OmniStudio — Salesforce's low-code development toolset — to deliver more structured grant workflows. This is a more recent addition to the Salesforce toolkit for funders, and it represents a step toward purpose-built functionality, though it still requires OmniStudio licences and configuration expertise to use effectively.
What are Salesforce Grants Management's key features?
CRM-native grant tracking: Because Salesforce Grants Management sits inside the Salesforce CRM, grant records can be linked directly to contact and organisation records already in your system. A programme officer reviewing a grant application can see the full relationship history — past grants, events attended, donor history, board connections — in the same interface. This is genuinely valuable for organisations where grant relationships overlap with fundraising or stakeholder relationships.
Advanced reporting: Salesforce's native reporting and dashboard capabilities are among the strongest in the enterprise software market. With properly configured data, programme teams can build complex, cross-object reports and real-time dashboards without a separate business intelligence tool.
Flow automation: Salesforce Flow allows organisations to build automated processes — notifications, status transitions, task assignments, approval chains — without writing code. For teams with Salesforce admin expertise, this is a powerful tool for streamlining grant workflows.
AppExchange integrations: Salesforce has a large ecosystem of third-party applications available through AppExchange. Some are relevant to grantmaking: DocuSign for digital agreements, Conga for document generation, and various data enrichment tools. These add capability but also add cost and configuration complexity.
Single source of truth: For organisations using Salesforce across development, programmes, and operations, keeping grants in the same system eliminates the data silos that arise when different departments use different platforms.
Power of Us programme: Salesforce offers 10 free Sales or Service Cloud licences to qualifying nonprofits through its Power of Us programme. This is a meaningful subsidy for smaller organisations, though Nonprofit Cloud licences — required for the Grants Management module — are priced separately and are not included in the 10 free licences.
What are Salesforce Grants Management's limitations?
Not purpose-built for grantmaking: This is the central limitation. Salesforce's data model, interface, and default workflows are designed around managing sales pipelines and customer relationships. Grant management requires a fundamentally different set of processes — application intake, assessment panels, grant agreements, monitoring milestones, disbursement schedules — and mapping these onto a CRM architecture requires substantial configuration. Out of the box, Salesforce Grants Management does not provide the application intake forms, reviewer portals, or monitoring workflows that dedicated platforms include as standard.
High total cost of ownership: Salesforce's headline pricing understates the real cost of deployment. Nonprofit Cloud licences carry significant per-user annual fees. Implementation by a qualified Salesforce implementation partner typically costs between $20,000 and $100,000 or more for a complex grants configuration — and that is before ongoing administration costs. Most organisations cannot manage Salesforce without either a dedicated internal Salesforce administrator or ongoing external support.
Long implementation timelines: A full Salesforce Grants Management implementation typically takes three to six months, and complex configurations can run longer. This is comparable to other enterprise platforms, but significantly longer than purpose-built grant management tools that deploy in weeks.
Salesforce admin dependency: Maintaining a Salesforce environment requires ongoing expertise. Configuration changes, new workflow automation, report modifications, and troubleshooting all require Salesforce admin skills. Organisations without dedicated Salesforce capacity either hire an administrator or rely on an external consultant for routine changes — both of which add to the total cost.
US-centric compliance framework: Salesforce's nonprofit products are designed primarily for the US market. UK-specific compliance requirements — including verification against the Charity Commission register, Companies House checks, and OFSI sanctions screening — are not built into Salesforce Grants Management. UK funders need to source these capabilities separately.
AI features are generic: Salesforce has invested significantly in its Einstein AI platform, but the grant-specific AI capabilities available through Nonprofit Cloud are primarily generic: AI-assisted text summarisation and record suggestions. The purpose-built AI features that dedicated grant management platforms offer — automated due diligence, risk scoring, application assessment against grant criteria — are not available natively in Salesforce Grants Management.
What does Salesforce Grants Management actually cost?
The real cost of Salesforce for grantmaking is substantially higher than any single line item suggests:
Platform licences: Nonprofit Cloud licences are separate from the Sales/Service Cloud licences included in the Power of Us programme. User fees are charged per user per year and are not published as a fixed list price. Expect to request a quote.
OmniStudio: The newer Nonprofit Cloud for Grantmaking functionality requires OmniStudio, which may carry additional licence costs depending on your existing Salesforce agreement.
Implementation partner fees: A qualified Salesforce implementation partner will typically charge between $20,000 and $100,000 for a grants configuration, depending on complexity, data migration needs, and the scope of automation required. Simple configurations at the lower end; multi-programme, multi-team configurations at the higher end.
Ongoing Salesforce administration: A dedicated Salesforce administrator commands a significant salary. Alternatively, engaging an external Salesforce consultant for routine changes typically costs several hundred pounds or dollars per day.
AppExchange add-ons: Third-party integrations for document generation, e-signatures, and data enrichment carry their own licence fees, which accumulate.
Training: Salesforce's complexity means initial and ongoing training costs are real budget items.
For most organisations, the total first-year cost of Salesforce Grants Management — licences, implementation, and administration — significantly exceeds the equivalent cost of a dedicated grant management platform. The investment can be justified where Salesforce is already the organisational CRM and the grants integration value is high. It is rarely justified as a greenfield adoption specifically for grant management.
Who should actually consider Salesforce Grants Management?
Salesforce Grants Management makes sense for a relatively narrow set of organisations:
Organisations already running Salesforce as their primary CRM: If your fundraising, donor management, and stakeholder relationships all live in Salesforce, there is genuine value in keeping grants in the same system. The integration benefits — shared contact records, unified relationship history, consolidated reporting across fundraising and grantmaking — are real.
Organisations with existing Salesforce admin capacity: Teams that already have a Salesforce administrator can absorb the incremental work of managing a Grants Management configuration without proportionately increasing their technology costs.
Organisations funding complex, multi-relationship programmes: Where a single funder relationship spans donations, grants, events, and partnerships, managing this in a single CRM provides a cleaner picture than multiple systems.
Organisations with large technology budgets: The total cost of Salesforce Grants Management is an enterprise-tier investment. It requires resources proportionate to that tier.
How does Salesforce Grants Management compare to enterprise alternatives?
| Salesforce Nonprofit Cloud | Blackbaud Grantmaking | Fluxx Grantmaker | Plinth | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Built for grantmaking | No — CRM adapted | Partially | Yes | Yes |
| Primary strength | CRM integration | Broad nonprofit suite | Grant-specific depth | UK compliance + AI |
| Implementation time | 3–6 months | 3–6 months | 3–6 months | Weeks–2 months |
| Total cost | High (platform + partner) | High (opaque pricing) | High (custom) | Transparent / free tier |
| Salesforce expertise required | Yes | No | No | No |
| UK compliance built in | No | No | No | Yes |
| AI for grantmaking | Generic only | Aspirational | Limited | AI assessment, DD, reporting |
| Free tier | 10 licences (non-grants) | No | No | Yes |
| Grant-specific features OOB | Requires configuration | Moderate | Strong | Strong |
Blackbaud Grantmaking and Fluxx Grantmaker are the closest enterprise-tier comparisons. Both are dedicated grantmaking platforms rather than CRMs, which means they provide more grant-specific functionality out of the box than Salesforce does. Fluxx in particular is known for its configurability and analytics depth at the enterprise level. Neither Blackbaud nor Fluxx addresses UK compliance requirements natively, but both provide a more grantmaking-native experience from deployment.
For UK funders not already on Salesforce, the comparison generally favours a purpose-built grant management platform over the complexity and cost of Salesforce configuration.
What about the Power of Us programme?
Salesforce's Power of Us programme offers 10 free licences of Sales Cloud or Service Cloud to qualifying nonprofits. This is a genuine and well-established subsidy that has helped many nonprofits adopt Salesforce for donor management and CRM functions.
However, the Grants Management module sits within Nonprofit Cloud, not the standard Sales or Service Cloud included in the Power of Us offer. The practical value of the Power of Us programme for grantmaking is therefore more limited than it first appears — you still need Nonprofit Cloud licences and a grants-specific implementation on top of the free licences.
The Power of Us programme is most valuable for fundraising and donor-facing CRM functions. Organisations hoping to use it primarily as a route to low-cost grant management should get a clear and detailed quote for the full Nonprofit Cloud and implementation costs before assuming the free licences make Salesforce an affordable option.
Is Salesforce Grants Management right for UK funders?
For UK funders not already on Salesforce, the answer is generally no. The combination of high implementation costs, long deployment timelines, ongoing admin dependency, and the absence of UK compliance features makes Salesforce a poor fit for most UK grant programmes.
UK funders operate in a specific compliance environment. Verifying applicants against the Charity Commission register, checking company status at Companies House, and screening against OFSI's consolidated sanctions list are standard due diligence requirements. None of these are built into Salesforce Grants Management. A platform built for the UK market — such as Plinth — includes these checks as core features, not add-ons requiring separate integration.
For UK funders already running Salesforce as their organisational CRM, the picture is more nuanced. The integration value is real, and the question becomes whether that value justifies the additional cost and configuration compared to running a dedicated grant management platform alongside Salesforce. Many organisations that use Salesforce for fundraising choose a purpose-built grant management platform rather than extending Salesforce — partly because the dedicated platform provides better grant-specific functionality, and partly because it can connect to Salesforce via API without requiring the full Salesforce grantmaking configuration.
FAQ
Does Salesforce Nonprofit Cloud include grant management?
Yes. Salesforce Nonprofit Cloud includes a Grants Management module, and the newer "Nonprofit Cloud for Grantmaking" offering provides more structured grant workflow capabilities using OmniStudio. However, both require significant configuration to provide the application intake, assessment, and monitoring functionality that dedicated grant management platforms offer out of the box.
How much does Salesforce Grants Management cost to implement?
Implementation by a qualified Salesforce partner typically costs between $20,000 and $100,000 for a complex grants configuration, not including platform licence fees or ongoing administration. For most organisations, total first-year costs are substantially higher than dedicated grant management alternatives.
Does the Power of Us programme cover Grants Management?
The Power of Us programme provides 10 free Sales or Service Cloud licences to qualifying nonprofits, but Grants Management requires Nonprofit Cloud licences, which are priced separately. The free licences are most relevant for donor management and CRM functions, not grantmaking.
How long does Salesforce Grants Management take to implement?
A typical implementation runs three to six months. Complex multi-programme configurations can take longer. This is significantly longer than purpose-built grant management platforms, which often deploy in weeks.
Does Salesforce Grants Management work for UK funders?
Salesforce Grants Management does not include built-in UK compliance features — there is no native integration with the Charity Commission, Companies House, or OFSI's sanctions list. UK funders with formal due diligence requirements need to source these capabilities separately or use a platform built for the UK market. See our guide to automating due diligence for what UK funders typically need.
What Salesforce alternatives should I consider for grant management?
For organisations not already on Salesforce, dedicated grant management platforms provide better value: Fluxx Grantmaker and SmartSimple at the enterprise end, Foundant GLM for mid-sized foundations, and Plinth for UK funders who want AI-assisted assessment, built-in UK compliance checks, and rapid deployment. See the grant management systems comparison for a full side-by-side.
Can I integrate a dedicated grant management platform with Salesforce?
Yes. Many organisations use a purpose-built grant management platform for their grants programme while keeping Salesforce for fundraising and donor management, connecting the two via API or regular data exports. This approach often delivers better grant-specific functionality than extending Salesforce, while still maintaining a connection to your CRM data.
Recommended next pages
- Grant Management Systems Compared: Fluxx, Submittable, Foundant, SmartSimple and More — Side-by-side comparison of the major platforms in the market
- Fluxx Grantmaker Review — A detailed review of the leading dedicated enterprise grant platform
- AI for Funders: The Future of Grantmaking — AI capabilities to look for in grant management platforms
- How to Automate Due Diligence in Grantmaking — What UK funders need from compliance and verification tools
- Salesforce vs Plinth for Grant Management — A more detailed head-to-head comparison of these two platforms
Last updated: February 2026