BLKB vs CRM: Which Is the Better Buy in 2026?

Same yardstick, side by side (as of August 2026). Valuation lined up like this is most meaningful for two names in the same corner of the market, which these are. Figures are approximate; verify before investing.

Reading it: BLKB is the cheaper of the two on forward earnings, but cheaper is not the same as better. Pair the valuation with growth (how far the forward P/E sits below the trailing P/E) and risk (beta) before you decide.

The metrics above tell you which is the marginally better business. The bigger risk for most people is not picking the slightly worse stock, it is over-concentrating. BLKB and CRM share themes, so owning both, or adding either to what you already hold, can quietly push a large share of your portfolio into one bet.

This is the part a generic comparison page cannot answer, because it depends on what you own. Connect your brokerage and Walnut shows your real, combined BLKB and CRM exposure, flags overlap with your existing positions, and tells you if adding one would tip you past a concentration you are comfortable with, read-only by default, with your login staying at your broker. Walnut is not an investment adviser.

Blackbaud has spent more than four decades building software for what it calls the social impact sector. Its products run the back office of the organizations that use them: Raiser's Edge NXT for fundraising and donor management, Financial Edge NXT for nonprofit fund accounting, Blackbaud Tuition Management and school administration systems for K-12 and higher education, JustGiving for consumer-facing online giving, and YourCause for corporate grantmaking and employee giving. Sitting alongside the subscriptions is Blackbaud Integrated Payments, which takes a cut of donation and tuition volume flowing through the platform. Roughly ~98% of second-quarter 2026 revenue was recurring, split between ~$186 million of contractual subscription revenue and ~$99 million of transactional revenue tied to payment volume. About ~18% of first-half revenue came from outside the United States, mainly the United Kingdom, and the company employs around 2,800 people from its Charleston, South Carolina headquarters.

Full BLKB guide

Salesforce is the leading provider of cloud-based customer relationship management (CRM) software, helping companies manage sales, customer service, marketing, e-commerce, and analytics. Its core products include Sales Cloud, Service Cloud, Marketing Cloud, and Commerce Cloud, plus a broad platform for building custom applications. Through major acquisitions it also owns Slack (workplace collaboration), Tableau (data visualization and analytics), and MuleSoft (data integration), and it has pushed aggressively into artificial intelligence with its Einstein features and, more recently, Agentforce, a platform for deploying AI agents that automate sales, service, and other workflows. Salesforce makes money primarily through recurring subscription and support revenue, billed per user, giving it highly predictable, sticky software revenue at large scale. It is one of the largest enterprise software companies in the world, headquartered in San Francisco, and serves businesses of all sizes across virtually every industry globally.

Full CRM guide

Both fit overlapping themes, but they are not interchangeable. The useful comparison is which set of drivers and risks you want exposure to.

• BLKB drivers: Contract repricing on a three-year renewal cycle; Payments and tuition volume.
• CRM drivers: Agentforce and AI monetization; Dominant CRM franchise and data moat.

A faster-growing, richer-valued name usually swings harder, so it suits a longer horizon and a higher tolerance for volatility; a steadier, more cash-generative business suits a more conservative or income-minded investor. The honest test is which set of risks you could hold through a drawdown: Growth is the central problem: organic revenue rose only ~3.0% in the second quarter of 2026, and 2025 gross dollar retention was approximately ~92%, meaning the base loses value each year before price increases and cross-sell are added back. For CRM, salesforce's subscription growth has decelerated from its hyper-growth past into the low-to-mid teens or lower, and the durability of reacceleration from AI is unproven.

Pick BLKB if you believe its drivers more; CRM if you believe its. Many investors hold both, but since they share themes, that is a concentrated bet, not diversification. Decide deliberately and check overlap. For the full detail, see the BLKB and CRM guides.

BLKB. At roughly ~$46 per share and about ~45 million diluted shares, the market cap sits near ~$2.1 billion, or close to ~9 times the midpoint of 2026 non-GAAP EPS guidance. Adding net debt of roughly ~$1.1 billion puts enterprise value near ~$3.2 billion, around ~7.4 times the midpoint of guided adjusted EBITDA of ~$430 million to ~$438 million. Trailing GAAP earnings look cheaper than they read at first glance because 2024 carried a large impairment, so the year-over-year GAAP comparisons flatter the recovery.

CRM. Salesforce trades at a software premium that reflects its CRM market leadership, sticky recurring revenue, and dramatically improved margins and free cash flow. The valuation now balances a maturing growth profile against optionality from AI (Agentforce and Data Cloud). The market is essentially weighing whether AI can reaccelerate growth enough to justify the multiple as core seat growth slows.

Headline figures (approximate, August 2026): BLKB shows revenue (ttm) ~$1.15 billion, with 2026 guidance of ~$1.173 billion to ~$1.179 billion, recurring revenue mix ~98.2% of Q2 2026 revenue, split ~$186.4 million contractual and ~$98.9 million transactional, free cash flow ~$329 million trailing; 2026 guidance of ~$280 million to ~$290 million, gross dollar retention (2025) ~92%; Blackbaud reports gross dollar retention and does not disclose a net revenue retention figure; CRM shows revenue (ttm) ~$38 billion, operating margin (gaap) ~20%; adjusted margins meaningfully higher, revenue growth high-single-digit to low-teens, decelerated from past, dividend yield ~0.5-0.7% (recently initiated).

BLKB and CRM are related but distinct: same themes, different businesses and risks. Neither wins in the abstract; the right pick is whichever thesis you actually believe, sized so you are not over-concentrated in one theme. Walnut can show your combined BLKB and CRM exposure against your real portfolio. It is not an investment adviser.