Background & Challenges
Dare2Share, a dynamic youth ministry organization reaching teenagers across the globe, found themselves at a crossroads. Their digital infrastructure had grown organically over the years, resulting in disconnected systems that made it difficult for their community to engage effectively. Ministry leaders struggled to access training resources, donors couldn't easily manage recurring contributions, and the organization lacked a cohesive ecommerce presence for their extensive catalog of ministry materials.
The organization had three distinct user groups with vastly different needs: Gospel Advancing Leaders who required specialized training and resources, faithful donors who wanted transparency and control over their giving, and the general public who needed to discover and purchase ministry materials. Each group needed a tailored experience, but the existing systems couldn't deliver.
Adding to the complexity, Dare2Share's reach extends far beyond English-speaking communities. They needed a solution that could seamlessly serve users in Spanish, French, Arabic, Hindi, Portuguese, and Chinese-without sacrificing functionality or user experience.
Solution & Implementation
We architected and built a comprehensive Salesforce Experience Cloud solution from the ground up, creating three interconnected but distinct digital experiences on a unified platform. Every component was custom-built using Lightning Web Components, following enterprise best practices and SOLID principles.
1. Premium Ecommerce Storefront
The cornerstone of the implementation is a fully-featured ecommerce platform that rivals commercial solutions. The storefront includes advanced product discovery with faceted filtering, category navigation, and intelligent search. Customers can browse hundreds of ministry resources, view detailed product information with media galleries, and add items to a persistent shopping cart that works seamlessly for both guests and authenticated users.
The checkout experience integrates Authorize.Net through FinDock, supporting both credit cards and ACH payments. We implemented Accept.js for PCI-compliant tokenized payments, ensuring security without sacrificing user experience. The entire flow-from cart to checkout to order confirmation-is smooth, responsive, and optimized for mobile devices.
2. Gospel Advancing Leader Portal
Ministry leaders receive a specialized portal experience tailored to their journey. Upon registration (via Google SSO or standard registration), leaders complete an assessment that determines their stage in the Gospel Advancing journey-from Commit through Align, Prioritize, Accelerate, to Multiply.
Based on their stage, the portal dynamically presents personalized recommendations for training, resources, and action steps. Leaders can access their curated training modules, track their progress, manage their strategic plans with milestones, and receive targeted messages from the Dare2Share team. The portal includes a sophisticated recommendation engine that suggests relevant content, a resource library for quick access to materials, and a submission system for leaders to share their impact stories.
The experience is cohesive yet modular-each section (training, resources, strategic planning, messaging) is a reusable component that can be configured independently while maintaining visual and functional consistency.
3. Donor Engagement Portal
Donors receive complete transparency and control over their relationship with Dare2Share. The donor portal provides an at-a-glance view of giving history, recurring donations, and saved payment methods. Donors can set up monthly contributions with custom frequencies (monthly, quarterly, annually), pause or modify existing recurring donations, and manage their payment methods-all without contacting support.
The recurring donation management system is particularly sophisticated, allowing donors to update payment methods through a seamless FinDock oon integration, customize customize individual i installment amounts, and view detailed transaction history. We even built functionality for "President's Campaign" donations with special handling rules.
Technical Excellence
Under the hood, the implementation follows enterprise architecture principles. We built over 100 custom Lightning Web Components, each designed as a single-responsibility, loosely-coupled module. The Apex backend leverages service classes, trigger handlers following the triggerhandler pattern, and comprehensiveetest coverage targeting near-100% code coverage with bulkified operations.
Payment processing required sophisticated integration work. We created a custom service layer that orchestrates Authorize.Net transactions through FinDock, handling both one-time and recurring payments, tokenization for saved payment payr methods, and complex async processing to avoid mixed DML operations.
Internationalization was baked in from the beginning. The entire experience uses Custom Labels for all user-facing text, with complete translation support for six languages. The translation system includes specialized tooling for administrators to manage translations directly within Salesforce.
Results & Outcomes
The implementation has transformed how Dare2Share engages with their community. Ministry leaders now have a centralized hub for their entire journey with the organization, from initial registration through ongoing training and resource access. The personalized recommendation system ensures leaders receive relevant content at the right time, matching their specific stage of ministry development.
Technical Innovation Highlights
- Configuration-Driven Architecture – Components are designed to be configurable rather than hardcoded. The donation form, for instance, can be configured for one-time or recurring donations, different suggested amounts, campaign associations, and fee coverage options-all through Experience Builder properties.
- Async Processing Patterns – To handle the complexity of mixed DML operations (updating User and Contact records, or processing payments), we implemented sophisticated async patterns using @future methods and proper transaction boundaries, ensuring data integrity without sacrificing user experience.
- Guest User Security Model – The ecommerce experience works seamlessly for unauthenticated users while maintaining security. We carefully designed the sharing model and Apex classes to support guest checkout while protecting sensitive data through time-based access windows and status validations.
- Component Reusability – Components like addressInput, orderSummary, and productCard are used across multiple contexts-checkout, profile editing, order confirmation. Each is designed as a clean API with clear inputs and outputs, making them truly reusable building blocks.
While other firms say "yes" to everything and deliver half of what we want, Elevate understood what we really needed, and delivered more than we expected. Their honesty, unmatched technical expertise, and transparent pricing gave us confidence every step of the way. No hidden fees. No surprise hours. Just a reliable partner who gets it right.