The results are in! Thank you to everyone who took the time to share your thoughts and opinions with us in Opportunity International Australia’s 2015 Supporter Survey.

By giving us more insight into why helping people out of poverty is important to you, we are better equipped to work alongside you and engage other Australians in order to achieve our goal of reaching 20 million families by 2020.

With a total of 689 survey responses, a generous supporter has donated a total of $6,890 – so your insights have helped give a hand up to almost 100 mothers living in poverty with small loans so they can start transforming their families’ futures. Thank you so much.

Please see below for some highlights of our findings.

First off, you shared the main reason you support Opportunity (see graph below). The majority of respondents noted that they believe microfinance is a sustainable solution to poverty (41%), followed by wanting to provide people with a hand up rather than a hand-out (25%). Others noted reasons such as wanting to break the cycle of poverty for the next generation of children (9%); and valuing the impact of donations being increased through the 98% recycling of loans (6%). We are grateful for all the reasons that motivate you to support Opportunity.

Opportunity currently focuses its work in five developing countries: India, Indonesia, the Philippines, China and Ghana (see graph below). Nearly 70% of respondents indicated that the specific country their donations go towards doesn’t matter to them. Being open to supporting programs that target the areas of greatest need allow us to steward your donations for maximum impact on families in poverty.

 

You also told us what you like to hear about (see graph below). Many of you shared that you appreciate hearing about information on our microfinance programs in developing countries (73%), while just over half noted that you enjoy hearing personal stories of the families you are helping.

Moreover, 39% of you like hearing about how we use data to measure and understand the impact of our programs. As you may be aware, Opportunity utilises Social Performance Management to continuously improve our programs and enhance the impact your support is having on families living in poverty (read more about this in our recently published 2015 report.)

We look forward to sharing more on these topics in our upcoming communications.

 

In addition to your current support (see graph below), over one third of respondents said they would consider buying gifts for family and friends through Opportunity’s gift catalogue, Something Bigger. As Christmas is fast approaching, now’s a great time to purchase our charity gifts online here.

Other popular ways of supporting Opportunity include talking to others about our work (25%) and travelling on an Insight Trip to see Opportunity’s work in developing countries firsthand (24%). If you’re looking for travel with meaning, find out more about our upcoming trips in 2016 here.

 

We were pleased to learn that so many of you are keen to spread the word and recommend Opportunity’s work to your friends, family and colleagues. As members of the Opportunity family, your personal stories about why you give are instrumental to helping us reach other Australians, so that together, we can help more and more families leave poverty behind. In fact, the most common way supporters found out about Opportunity was through a friend (28%).

Thank you so much for having your say in our 2015 Supporter Survey.

Your kind words and feedback mean a lot to us. They inform how we can best serve you in your giving, and in turn, better serve families in desperate need of a hand up. We are so grateful for your ongoing support!