Salesforce Nonprofit Cloud (NPSP) Licensing:
Power of Us Programme, Discounts & Eligibility

What Is the Salesforce Power of Us Programme?

The Salesforce Power of Us programme provides qualifying nonprofit organisations with 10 free Sales Cloud Enterprise Edition licences per year, access to the Nonprofit Success Pack (NPSP) as a free managed package, and deeply discounted pricing on additional licences. Salesforce launched this programme in 2000 as part of its 1-1-1 philanthropy model, and it remains the most comprehensive CRM donation programme in the enterprise software industry. In 2026, over 60,000 nonprofits globally are registered Power of Us members.

The programme is administered through Salesforce.org (now integrated into Salesforce as Nonprofit Cloud). To qualify in the United States, your organisation must hold 501(c)(3) status with the IRS. International nonprofits qualify under equivalent charitable registration in their jurisdiction — UK-registered charities under Charity Commission registration, Australian organisations under ACNC, and so on. Government entities, healthcare organisations with a commercial arm, and political organisations are explicitly excluded regardless of non-profit structure. If your organisation fits an ambiguous classification — such as a social enterprise with nonprofit components — you should verify eligibility before building systems on the assumption of Power of Us pricing. Download our Salesforce licence optimisation guide for a full eligibility checklist and decision framework.

NPSP vs Nonprofit Cloud: Understanding the Product Split

Salesforce has historically served nonprofits through two distinct offerings, and the distinction matters for licensing decisions. The Nonprofit Success Pack (NPSP) is a free open-source managed package built on top of standard Salesforce Sales Cloud, maintained by Salesforce.org. It adds objects for Households, Affiliations, Relationships, and Donation records. NPSP is available to any organisation with a Salesforce licence — it is not exclusive to nonprofits — but it requires Sales Cloud as the base platform.

Nonprofit Cloud is Salesforce's newer purpose-built product launched in 2022, built on the Salesforce Industries architecture (formerly Vlocity). It replaces NPSP's data model with an industry-specific schema more aligned with enterprise nonprofit operations: Programme Management, Outcome Tracking, Fundraising, and Case Management modules. Nonprofit Cloud is priced separately from NPSP-based implementations — and notably, Nonprofit Cloud licences are not automatically covered by the Power of Us 10-free-licence grant in all cases. Organisations planning to migrate from NPSP to Nonprofit Cloud should verify whether their Power of Us entitlement transfers before committing to the migration. The pricing architecture for Nonprofit Cloud more closely resembles the Salesforce Platform licence model than standard Sales Cloud, with access restricted to Nonprofit Cloud-specific objects rather than full CRM functionality.

Pricing Beyond the 10 Free Licences: What Nonprofits Actually Pay

The 10 free licences are an effective starting point for small nonprofits, but organisations above 10 users discover a significant cost cliff. Additional Sales Cloud Enterprise licences under Power of Us are priced at a 75% discount versus commercial rates — translating to approximately $36/user/month versus the standard $165/user/month list price in 2026. For a 50-person nonprofit using Salesforce across fundraising, programme delivery, and operations, the costs are: 10 free + 40 users at $36/user/month = $17,280/year. That figure is materially cheaper than the commercial rate of $99,000/year for the same 50 users, but it is not insignificant for an organisation with limited IT budget.

The pricing structure has additional layers that catch organisations off guard. The 75% discount applies to Sales Cloud and Service Cloud licences, but not uniformly to all add-ons. Salesforce Marketing Cloud for Nonprofits is sold separately under the Nonprofit Success Cloud bundle, starting at approximately $5,000/year for up to 10,000 contacts. Salesforce Shield for nonprofit organisations is not discounted at the same 75% rate — it is typically offered at a 50% reduction, making the Shield add-on still a significant cost line for nonprofits handling sensitive donor or beneficiary data. Add-ons like Tableau CRM (now Salesforce Analytics) and Slack Enterprise Grid are subject to separate nonprofit pricing discussions rather than automatic Power of Us discounts. This means that a nonprofit's total cost of Salesforce ownership can easily reach £80,000–£150,000 per year once add-ons, implementation, and additional licences are accounted for, despite the programme's headline "free" positioning.

Negotiation Leverage for Growing Nonprofits

Nonprofits that have outgrown the 10-free-licence tier have more negotiation leverage than they typically use. The first lever is multi-year commitment: Salesforce will discount additional licences by a further 10–20% in exchange for a three-year contract versus an annual renewal. For a 100-user nonprofit paying $43,200/year on a one-year term, a three-year commitment could reduce the annual rate to $35,000–$38,000 — saving $15,000–$25,000 over the term. The second lever is the threat of Salesforce alternatives. Microsoft Dynamics 365 has a dedicated Nonprofit Accelerator that provides comparable functionality, and Microsoft offers similar 10-seat donation programmes. Naming Dynamics 365 explicitly in renewal negotiations consistently produces Salesforce concessions of 10–15% beyond the standard Power of Us rate.

The third lever — which most nonprofits overlook — is licence right-sizing. Many nonprofit Salesforce deployments include users who only need read-only access to donor records or programme dashboards. These users can be converted to Salesforce Community Cloud (now Experience Cloud) licences, which are priced at $2–$5/user/month for external portal access, rather than full internal Sales Cloud licences at $36/user/month. For organisations with 20–30 part-time staff or volunteers who use Salesforce infrequently, this conversion alone saves $7,000–$15,000 annually. If you are managing a significant Salesforce investment and want an independent view of your options, our team is available to book a confidential review call at any point in the renewal cycle. For a structured framework covering all contract term considerations, our Salesforce contract terms guide covers the 10 clauses most critical to nonprofit contract protection.