Some Tips for Fundraising Success From Operation Smile

When all is said and done, Kyla Shawyer, Operation Smile’s senior vice president of response marketing and development, says the key to the organization’s fundraising success hinges on a few simple things.

● Operation Smile continues to diversify and integrate its fundraising activity to create a more balanced and effective development portfolio for long-term revenue sustainability.

● It builds strong relationships with its vendors, thereby “developing strategic partners that are committed to our vision and work with us, not for us,” she says.

● It focuses on key elements that are essential to a successful direct-response program, including a commitment to “donor-first” principles, database quality, and comprehensive organizational and vendor training. Shawyer says an organization should never forget its mission or its donors.

● The success of the direct-response program helped Operation Smile create a strong, sustainable base of donors that has “enabled us to treat thousands more children … and advocate in the wider movement to address the issue of the burden of surgical disease.”

Shawyer’s best advice to nonprofits is to invest “a lot of time and energy” into training and educating their organization representatives.

“They have helped make our programs successful,” she says. “They have personally seen what Operation Smile does and have been able to use that to connect with donors.”