Have you checked out TechSoup? It is a website that offers lots of resources for nonprofits, including regular eNewsletters and RSS feeds of technology news and offerings pertinant to nonprofits. One particular service that could be helpful is TechSoup Stock. TechSoup Stock is a clearinghouse of deals offered/donated from various providers to eligible nonprofits. The offerings are changing all the time, but they range from desktop software like Microsoft Access (only $14 Admin fee) to Donor Management Software like eTapestry ($60 for up to 500 records) to Prospect Research tools like NOZA (200 credits for a $12.50 Admin fee).

To take advantage of these highly subsidized offerings, a nonprofit simply has to join TechSoup, create a member profile, and then register your organization to be eligible to take advantage of some of these donated offerings. If you sign up for the TechSoup Stock’s New Product Alert eNewsletter, you’ll receive updates on new products offered on TechSoup.

Have you used TechSoup? Let us know what you’ve utilized and how it worked for your organization.

At the recent Craigslist Nonprofit Bootcamp in New York, I spoke with a representative from Zazzle. Zazzle is a website that allows anyone to upload images to create merchandise to sell on the site including t-shirts, sweatshirts, buttons, magnets, stamps, and even shoes. Setting up an account is free. Zazzle takes care of creating the merchandise with your logo, shipping it out to customers, and all customer support issues. The user then gets a percentage of every sale made on the site.

For nonprofits, Zazzle has the Zazzle Giving Program. This program allows nonprofits to share even more in the sales of their merchandise, as much as 20% or more of each sale.

I like Zazzle because it is easy to use and there are no upfront costs to create fun merchandise with the nonprofit’s logo on it. A camp, for example, can test a variety of designs and types of merchandise with no risk. It also allows a camp to create custom merchandise for various promotions without knowing what kind of response they will get. Maybe a camp is considering giving out a mousepad for anyone who donates over $50 using online giving; this will promote the option of online giving and also help the camp collect new email addresses for their alumni database. There is no need to purchase hundreds of these mousepads in advance in anticipation of the response. Instead, the camp can simply design the mousepad and then order them individually as people donate online. If there is a huge response, these mousepads could then be promoted online for anyone to purchase, further promoting the camp and bringing in a little money as well.

In addition, Zazzle offers an RSS feed of your merchandise. Using this feed, you can share your “store” on zazzle on your blog or website for free to sell to your constituents. Finally, Zazzle offers tons of tips to promote your merchandise. There are some good ideas here that you can utilize whether you use Zazzle or not. Check out my example Zazzle “store” on the right sidebar of this blog to see one of many ways to promote your merchandise.

Are you using any online service to create and sell merchandise? If not, you may want to give Zazzle a try. If so, let us know in the comments below what service you are using and how effective it has been.