Exclusive Interview: Giselle Holloway, International Rescue Committee

FS: How do you plan for something of this magnitude?
GH: The best way to plan for fundraising around a major emergency is to do as much prep work beforehand to determine how information will be disseminated, what tasks need to be performed and who will perform them, what systems need to be in place for collecting gifts and storing data, and how results will be measured across all channels. It also helps to have templates in place for things like emergency e-mail alerts, direct-mail urgent-grams and telemarketing scripts so that you can quickly drop in language for a particular crisis and start raising money immediately.