Case Study: Smith College achieves a $486M campaign total (surpassing $450M goal) with Salesforce for Nonprofits

Smith College - Customer Case Study

Smith College, a private women's liberal arts college in Northampton, Massachusetts with about 2,600 undergraduates, entered the final year of its “Women for the World” campaign with an ambitious $450M goal. The college’s legacy advancement system was overly complex and slow, producing data errors, two-week delays in recording donor visits, and little reporting or managerial visibility—forcing gift officers to rely on spreadsheets and manual calendars and limiting fundraising effectiveness.

In a focused six-week rollout, Smith implemented a targeted Salesforce solution that centralized donor data, provided a “tickler” for next steps, enforced data quality, and delivered robust reporting. The result: the campaign closed at $486M (surpassing the goal by $36M), donor visit details are now in the system within two days, recorded interactions rose 42%, and improved reporting eliminated a recurring team meeting, saving each member about two hours per month.

Smith College

Pamela McNulty

Senior Philanthropic Officer