Realm Reviews

Realm is extremely user-friendly. I love that they have teamed with Vanco for donations/payments and the payments are recorded directly into the person's record in Realm. The pastor likes to do analytics and uses that feature all the time. I work in the contribution section every week and it couldn't be easier. The "icing on the cake" is the world-class Customer Service. After two quick prompts, a real person answers the phone within seconds. I don't get transferred. The person is very knowledgeable, friendly, polite, and most of all can answer my questions. They will also log onto my computer - with my permission - if that is the best way to help me.

I can't get all the reports I used to get in ACS People. Also, I have not found a way to link different families together (i.e. showing one family is a mother and father to another family). I also wish that Realm Financials would stop pushing back their timeline to include Payroll so we can switch from ACS Financials to Realm for that part of business, also.

It is very user-friendly and easy to train new employees on it.
Being a new product, they are constantly updating and improving on the features.
It was developed from years of software experience, so it is very relevant in everyday church use.

Several of the newer releases address needs we've been asking for, but they are done in a somewhat complicated way. It addresses the need, but not as directly and simply as I would like.
I feel like they need to take a step back from some new features and refine and improve what they currently offer.

I most like the e-mail communication with Realm. It is easy to communicate with groups that have already been setup. I can send attachments which is a big deal. It also allows me to create customized groups and have options for different forms of communication with them.

Realm is not very intuitive and seems a big clunky. When trying to navigate through Realm (especially for the average member) it is hard for them to find what they need. The giving area can be hard to understand and the fact that the app doesn't allow admins from the usual access they need makes the app almost useless.

I've worked with many databases in the past, including helping to build them from the end user point of view, and Realm is the best I've used. It is very flexible and user friendly. The Help feature is really helpful and the rare times I've had to contact customer service, they've been super friendly and very knowledgeable. I love using Realm!

My biggest complaint is that I have some members in my groups that do not receive the Realm emails when I send them out. I've called customer service a couple of times and have been directed to look for the emails in Spam, but that is not always the problem. I don't understand why some emails don't get received.

Because we were previously on ACS, it was easy to import previous data. The online interface is much friendlier than the old version, and it generally has good features and capabilities, but as with any database/CRM, it's all in how you set it up and implement use. Overall, it's a solid choice.

Being a Planning Center Services user who's dabbled in other Planning Center products, I prefer the integration and user interface of planning center. Overall Realm feels more PC than Mac - sturdy, but not as pretty and at times a bit frustrating with the number of clicks you need to do to get to where you want to go. It's functional, but it feels like it'll take longer for people to learn how to set things up and do things properly, which will impede good rollout and ultimately depth of functionality because of that.

It is a communication tool as well as a database. They keep improving Realm. Ease of finding duplicate entries. Customer support is the best in the industry.

There are many features that larger churches need to use the software the best and Realm does not seem to be in any hurry to provide those features. They make larger churches figure out work arounds which is never good. Difficult to get the needed reports for our auditor each year. Contributions is not done by the best practices for debits and credits. They line through entries when a charge back is made at the bank instead doing a debit, which shows a money trail for audit purposes.

The best part of the feature that all religious institutions could benefit from is the giving module. The online giving is very easy and user friendly and processing of the gifts is very easy for the administrators of the church. We recently rolled out groups and have a BETA group using it. They are very excited about the capabilities and have added their own members and published documents for them to use and communicate. We use the product for event registration and that process has been easy as well, it is intuitive and provides a lot of options for tailoring to particular event needs.

Currently the serving module needs to be built out more for us to fully utilize it. We are trying to avoid having the serving team send emails back and forth about coverage and needs. We also would like more customizable features when it comes to background color and newsletter type communications.

It’s easy to use and learn. Love the interface with our website for payment processing.

Difficult to get parishioners to use online although online payments have been better since COVID. Can’t always find or create reports.

This software is so useful no matter where you are, in the office, at home or even on vacation. Staying connected is a breeze getting work done or just to keep up with the church news feed, checking the events calendar and so much more. As a leader running reports and entering information can be done from anywhere. I highly recommend Realm.

We transferred from ACS OnDemand to Realm and it's been only an improvement. I have not started using the Serving feature just different groups. All are needs are accomplished so far. So I honestly can say I don't have any dislikes except one report we ran in OnDemand is not the same in Realm (Account Inquiry Detail (Filtered).

Transferring data and setting up new procedures to Realm was easy. It has made a huge impact on the time I spend working on the accounting and people side for our church. Transferring to Realm was a huge benefit to not only me as the administrator of the church but to our members and visitors.

Realm does offering a check in system for nursery, classes, etc. but not user friendly. Set up is difficult and requires to many devices to work. Currently we are using another system that only requires a tablet and wireless printer.

The most favorable thing about this software is it intended as a single system for Church Management as well as ministry and group support. From the promotional videos it appears there is a very dynamic and interactive church management portion of the software to which I do not have access.

I can only comment on the ministry portion since I am not church staff and have no access to that portion. As an end user involved in leadership of several different ministries I was looking for this part of the program to be user friendly, attractive and engaging output, and easy to communicate and interact with group members. In its current format it does not support this type of need. It is a good membership listing but offers no analytics or graphical capabilities to the end user and really no ability to interact with the church. A standard e-mail system, which it should replace, is much more functional.
The architecture of this portion of the software is very simplistic but not very simple. Finding where you need to go is difficult and getting back to where you previously were is equally difficult. There is a chat portion which is a nice idea but it tends to draw the user away from the program. The event posting has an RSVP but you can’t see all the names of those responding, only 1 or 2, and then the number of responders. There is minimal text formatting available. You can’t change font. or sizes, no bullet or number list, no centering. You can send a picture but it must be at bottom of message and will not accept a link. You can copy and paste but not pictures. You cannot change coloring of fonts or background.

This software is average at best. They sold us because they are the biggest player in the market. They promised that this tech was market ready when we came online and to this day we still have "trouble tickets" in que....3 years later.

They said this was going to be like facebook for your church...people already have facebook - they dont want another.

They always seem to forget to included the final important details. Example - they told us that the online giving link allows people to make their offering without having to sign into their realm account (because all of the information is taken through the credit card anyway)...they failed to add the detail that if people regularly give a recurring donation you actually have to sign in to your account. They didn't tell or add that to their link. Sp now we have to double back and send an email to the recurring givers. Just poor form

The software is great for keeping records of donations and contributions. Also, it helps to track members attendance and giving.

It is not very user friendly, so many members didn’t utilize it. You have to search the help menu to find what you are looking for and it is not very easy to find it.

Everything

Nothing really!

- Messages and Topics are available as push notifications from the app
- Huge improvements from it's predecessor program, The City
- For larger churches, easy searches focusing on specific members or parameters
- Giving to a church is easy
- The Kids Check-In is initiative and easy to pick up for parents
- Easy to create events that require registration and payment

- There is a learning curve for the average user
- There is a time lag between messages sent via laptop/desktop and the app
- The larger the church, and the more you use Realm, you will need to dedicate a significant amount of time to the software to keep it humming.

Easy to use for members and staff; cloud-based means you can access it from anywhere! We are still growing into attendance and check-in functions but look forward to using them.

Easier group functions could be useful! When we first transitioned they didn't have payroll so we aren't currently using Realm Financials.