Catch Impact builds flexible, long-term data systems for charities using Zoho Creator

The company

Catch Impact is a UK-based consultancy founded in 2012. After spending years working with charities, Lindsay saw a clear gap: Organizations were being encouraged to measure their social impact, yet they lacked the digital foundations needed to support meaningful analysis.

Most of the charities she encountered were managing their data through a mix of pen-and-paper forms, static word documents, and isolated spreadsheets maintained by different people. This made it almost impossible to tell a cohesive story about the outcomes of their programs, let alone evaluate their effectiveness.

Catch Impact was created to solve this gap. Its mission is to help nonprofits modernize the way they collect, manage, and use data, so they can measure their impact and ultimately channel resources into the interventions that create the greatest social value.

The challenge

While the charity sector needed stronger data systems, it also faced significant constraints that made traditional software unsuitable.

Fragmented, inaccessible data

Charities were often storing years of information across multiple files, formats, and platforms. With no central source of truth, pulling reports together for trustees, partners, or funders took days and sometimes even weeks.

Unable to demonstrate their value

Although funders at that time increasingly required outcomes-focussed reporting, charities simply didn’t have the systems to support it. Their data wasn’t structured, integrated, or reliable enough to analyze outcomes or quantify impact.

Limited budgets and high vendor dependency

Charities rarely have the budget for expensive IT systems or long development projects. Even when they tried working with software vendors, they found themselves tied in to rigid systems, contracts, and plans that couldn’t adapt as their programs evolved.

Lack of in-house technical expertise

Most of the teams Lindsay worked with didn’t have dedicated IT staff. They needed a system that was easy to learn, easy to use, and didn’t require technical specialists for every update.

The solution

When Lindsay discovered Zoho Creator, she immediately recognized it as the tool that could bridge the gap she saw across the sector. The platform’s low-code nature meant she could build exactly what each charity needed without long procurement cycles, expensive developers, or rigid templates.

Flexible low-code development that fits any organization

Creator became the foundation on which Catch Impact rebuilt the way charities worked with data. Every project begins with a deep dive into the charity’s existing processes: how they collect information, how their teams work, and what gaps or delays exist.

From there, Lindsay designs and builds a Creator application that brings everything together into one system—structured, searchable, and easy to report from. Some charities prefer to collaborate on the build, learning as they go, while others ask her to develop the entire system.

Either way, Creator empowers each charitable organization to extend and adapt the system long after the initial deployment.

Reasonable pricing that makes digital transformation accessible

For a sector where budgets are tight and every spend must be justified, Creator’s pricing model makes modernization possible. Charities can choose a subscription that matches their size and income, making it an investment that can grow in line with the organization.

A system that evolves with program changes

Whether a charity launches a new program, shifts its reporting requirements, or secures a new funder with completely different data needs, Creator allows them to adapt instantly. This is because new fields, workflows, reports, and forms can be created or modified without starting from scratch.

Benefits & ROI

Operationally, financially, and strategically, the impact of moving to Zoho Creator is felt across every organization that Catch Impact supports.

Huge time and cost savings

Before Creator, reporting to funders involved searching through old emails, handwritten notes, and disconnected spreadsheets. Many charities report to numerous funders, each with its own requirements. Creator consolidates everything into one place, letting them generate multiple reports.

Better impact articulation and improved funding outcomes

With structured data flowing into dashboards and reports, charities can clearly demonstrate the outcomes and value of their work, something that was nearly impossible before. This not only improves transparency with existing funders but also strengthens their ability to attract new funding.

Stronger organizational capability

As teams learn to use and modify Creator, their confidence with data and its low-code capabilities grows. They become less dependent on consultants or external IT teams and more able to manage and adapt their systems themselves. These skills often travel with staff as they move across the sector, raising the digital capability of the charity ecosystem as a whole.

Systems built for the long term

Some of Lindsay’s clients have been using their Creator applications for 14 years, evolving their systems continuously as their work changes. It’s proof, she says, that Creator can support long-term digital transformation without the usual risks of traditional IT projects.

Future plans

For Catch Impact, Zoho Creator does more than help charities manage data. It gives them the foundation they need to understand whether their programs truly create social change.