One platform, more wishes: Make-A-Wish harnesses data to change lives.

See how it increases transparency and collaboration, and helps grant more wishes to children battling critical illnesses.

2 min read

Products Used

Marketing Cloud

Sales Cloud

Premier Success Plan

Make-A-Wish centralized data from 58 chapters onto one platform to increase financial transparency, improve collaboration across the organization, and ultimately grant more wishes to children battling critical illnesses.

In a nutshell

In times of economic uncertainty, nonprofits are held to greater transparency and accountability standards by their boards, donors, and the public. But these times are also when nonprofits are needed most, and that makes data-driven decisions more imperative than ever. With Salesforce, Make-A-Wish has a single view of all activities across the organization, so it can track important metrics to drive its mission forward, like how frequently donors contribute and which volunteers assist in multiple chapters.

Behind every child’s wish is an operation involving volunteers, donors, and staff to make them come true. Whether it’s a magical evening at a theme park or signing a record label with their favorite artist, children are waiting for their wishes to be granted from every corner of the country. Make-A-Wish unified its data across every chapter. Now, the organization transfers wishes easily, identifies which chapters need assistance, and promotes cross-chapter collaboration. The result? The organization grants an average of 15,000 wishes per year, with aspirations for more.

All 58 chapters consolidated their data into one platform. We unlocked our potential by having all the data and real-time intelligence in one place.

Teresa Duran

Chief Information Officer, Make-A-Wish

What the difference looks like

Before Salesforce, each chapter operated almost entirely independently with siloed data. Here’s what the employee experience looks like today:

Staff can now enter all their information through the portal built on Experience Cloud. This allows team members to track how many children want to visit a specific location, and helps coordinate their visits more efficiently. With each wish varying in level of complexity, simplifying communication provides more equity to children who may not have access to experience their dream locally.
Make-A-Wish previously sent thank-you messages to donors manually after they made a gift. Now, the organization automatically sends personalized thank-you messages after every contribution with Marketing Cloud.
Sensitive data, like health records, contact information, and the approval process, is stored securely in Sales Cloud. This is the backbone for all member and customer information and ensures the organization complies with privacy and security regulations.
Each chapter communicates more effectively with each other and the national office, promoting a level of collaboration it has never seen before. Larger chapters now provide marketing and financial resources to smaller ones, including chapters with only seven staff members and no marketing stack. Wish transfers are now automated, which means children who move during the wish process experience no delays. What was a long and manual process now only takes a few clicks.
Anytime Make-A-Wish has challenges or questions — whether around implementation, architecture, release management, or looking for niche vendors — it utilizes Premier Success to help on its journey and meet its mission.