Creating a test constituent account in your NeonCRM allows you, a User, to view Neon pages through the eyes of your constituents. You can also use a test account to practice different Neon functionality without impacting your actual constituent data.
For example, you might practice importing different types of data or running an account batch update using your test account before performing the import to update any important account data. Once you are comfortable with the process, you can proceed with the task using your real constituent data.
View Your Constituent Login Portal With Your Test Account
Set Up Your Test Account
To create a test constituent account, navigate to the Quick Add button New Individual.
Next, enter a First Name and a Last Name for your test constituent account. Adding a valid email address to your test constituent account is helpful to test your System Emails and Campaign Emails.
Select the left-side arrow to Show More.
Scroll down & choose a Login Name and Password. Please choose a Login Name that is different from your User email address. Then, Create Account.
To see your front-end pages as your constituents do, use this login information instead of your system user information when you next log in to your system. We recommend that if you are testing your front-end pages with your constituent account - try it in a different browser than your system user account. This way you can see both sides at once.
Test Transactions Using Your Test Account
You might want to test out what it's like to register or donate on public pages or as a constituent - or see what the system email in response to these actions is like. You can find links to these public pages under Web Content Form Links & Landing Pages.
To test out transactions without actually paying, you will want to make your event or membership registration free while you are testing. Alternatively (and for donations), temporarily allow for deferred payments so that you do not have to actually pay during your test, but you can promise to send in a check later. Read more about deferred payments here. Remember, the transaction is not complete until that check is marked received on the account.
To create a fake transaction and payment on the back end as a system user, or to mark a deferred test from the front-end as complete, add a payment to a transaction using tender type check - and mark it as received. (You will need to log back in as a system user to do this.)
Just delete the test account's individual registration/donation/membership when you are finished so it does not cause confusion in your actual attendance/donation/member count. No refund is necessary because there was no real payment.
Create a Test Email Audience Using Your Test Account
You can also use your test account to test out emails in Neon. For example, you can create an email audience that contains only your test account so you can send yourself a Campaign Email. This way, you can test out your Campaign Email and make sure that it is to your liking prior to sending out the email to your constituents.
To create your test email audience, navigate to Emails Email Audiences, then click the New Audience button
Next, give your test Email Audience a name. Optionally, you may want to give a description for your reference. Also, set the Audience Type as Standard Email Audience.
To add your test account into the audience, click Add New Search.
Enter the following search criteria by clicking Edit Criteria:
Email: Equal [your email address]
Enter the criteria and click the Load Criteria button to return to the search details.
Now click the Run Report button to run a search for your test email address.
Your Test Account should now appear in the results. Click Save Email List to save your search results.
Your test account will now appear in the Email List of your Email Audience.
View Your Constituent Login Portal With Your Test Account
If you are encouraging constituents to log in, we recommend that you log in with your test account so you can see the Portal through the eyes of one of your constituents.
You can now take a look at a number of features of your Neon system in the same way that your constituents can. For example, you can go through the process to submit a donation to your organization.
Or you can see what the process is like to sign up for an email subscription for your organization.
