Salesforce.com may be more commonly associated with cloud computing software used by businesses, but more nonprofit organisations are also using it to do good.
Under a Salesforce philanthropic initiative to improve communities around the world, over 23,000 higher education and nonprofit organisations have been using Salesforce.com for free or at a reduced cost.
Nonprofits may turn out to be the biggest beneficiaries of cloud computing, given their limited manpower, lack of IT expertise and high dependence on donor relationships, which can be better monitored through a cloud CRM system rather than spreadsheets.
Take Halogen Foundation Singapore, an educational charity focused on building young leaders and entrepreneurs. Started in 2003, the foundation conducts leadership training programmes for youths and teachers. It has also worked with schools such as Ngee Ann Secondary to raise awareness about autism.
In 2011, it started using donated licenses of Salesforce.com to stay in touch with 400 schools and 2,800 educators. The cloud-based software proved to be useful, says Ivy Tse, Halogen’s chief operating officer.
“In the past, the process was a lot more manual, and there was no record of when we met the teachers,” she says. “If we contacted the wrong teachers, it would be hard for us to deliver the programmes to their students.”
With its database of schools and teachers now housed and organised in Salesforce.com rather than spreadsheets, Halogen is able to send targeted electronic mailers to market its programmes, thanks to the MailChimp app available in the Salesforce AppExchange marketplace.
While Halogen’s use of Salesforce.com seems rudimentary, Tse says the foundation is planning to use the software’s analytics capabilities to analyse donor profiles and craft strategies to reach out to a broader pool of donors.
Meanwhile, Tse says the foundation is already looking at some historical data on its dashboards to deepen its engagements with schools. “If we have worked with a school for five years, we could propose a train-the-trainer programme to train the educators, going beyond delivering workshops for students,” she says.
Earlier in September, Salesforce.com expanded Salesforce1 for Nonprofits with NGO Connect, a new app that helps nonprofits build and retain lifetime relationships with their constituents.
Nonprofits can use it to get a complete picture of funders and supporters, manage events and track RSVPs, schedule and monitor volunteer shifts, as well as manage donor information and preferences.
