Operation Smile uses social media to raise money and awareness

At Ragan summit, nonprofit’s communicator tells of its successful plunge into Facebook and Twitter

Renee Hamilton’s job is to tell people stories about smiles.

Hamilton is the social media strategist for Operation Smile, an international children’s medical charity that treats youngsters with cleft lips and cleft palates.

She tells these stories using social media. The organization has an active, adventurous protocol that relies heavily on Facebook and Twitter.

At Ragan’s Healthcare Public Relations, Marketing and Internal Communications Social Media Summit in Arizona, she spoke about how social media has become a main source for fundraising. The organization prides itself on the “Donor First” philosophy.

“We don’t have customers,” Hamilton says. “We have people who love us and are a part of our organization.”

In the beginning, Operation Smile didn’t know to use its social media space effectively. Hamilton says the organization was just “maintaining” a MySpace page and Facebook.

“We’d tell people ‘happy birthday’ on Facebook, but there weren’t any real goals behind that,” Hamilton says.