The Charity Place

Social networks take word of mouth to a global level

I’m still totally captivated by the enormous possibilities of social media to share ideas and information, and am inspired to post (yet again) on the subject of how people are using them to come together and do good – because I’ve been motivated to give in the last few days via Twitter.

Just look at what Jeremiah Owyang has started through his blog and his Twitter feed, which Oliver Ding then turned into this presentation on Slideshare...

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Through the content that Jeremiah and Oliver have generated, people have been driven to charity sites and give a donation, and/ or to pages like this one.

So far, Oliver Ding’s 24 ways to give presentation has received 1,065 views, and has been nominated ‘slideshow of the day’, which has to make a difference to the amount of money raised.  (I don't need to tell you how to make a donation, because everything you need to know is in the slideshow)...

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The Pledgebank campaign has 264 people signed up, and  counting (you can sign up by clicking here).

There are at least 30 people who have indicated they’ve given through Jeremiah’s updates on Twitter, and more – no doubt – who have given privately.

I'm sorry to say that I had previously received an approach from two charities - one via Facebook and the other by email - but hadn't yet made a donation.  However, Jeremiah's Twitter message changed that.

Charities, take note...

What, you mean you don’t give to charity???

I found myself suggesting to a friend recently that supporting good causes was undergoing a huge change; that it's becoming almost fashionable to support a charity and more and more people are doing it because they think everyone else is, and it’s the thing to do.

This was prompted, in part, because a couple of days before another friend had said to me: ‘I feel like I should support a charity, but I’m not sure which one to support.’

I thought that was really insightful –- because they were clearly not motivated by a cause or a need, or something they believed passionately in.  Instead, it felt like they were saying, ‘I’ve got a great career, a nice car, I wear good clothes, I can afford nice wine these days. Everyone else seems to give to a charity, so it must be what one does; like going snowboarding or playing golf.  I don’t want to be the odd one out.’

I think social media is the big lever in this, because it gives people a platform to show others what they’re doing, where they’re going, who with, what they did, how much fun they had doing it; it gives us all a way to share more about ourselves with the people we’ve got a connection with.  You could argue that there’s an element of competitiveness about some of what people share, but it’s also hugely positive -- because it gives us a deeper understanding about the people we know, through this series of windows into their lives and their psyches, to an extent we never had in the past.

We find out that a business associate we’ve known for years takes the most beautiful photographs, that a friend we haven’t seen for a while is backpacking solo in Japan, that one of our old clients is an aficionado of facial hair, that an old house mate now has two gorgeous children and two enormous pedigree cats, that someone we went to school with likes Jon Spencer Blues Explosion too.  And we find out which charities they all support -- because they invite us to join the group or campaign they’ve set up for the cause on Facebook.

There’s something highly tribal about this –- which is effectively what fashion is all about –- and I think the power it has to spread ideas and information is going make charity giving ‘mainstream’ in a way it has never quite been previously.

I realise this could be perceived as a slightly tasteless thing to say, when so many charities are raising money for deeply serious causes, but I’d rather people gave money to charity than spend it on Louis Vuitton handbags any day -– so shoot me.

Is it worth building your own online networks?

You probably had a look at MyActionAid when it was launched by ActionAid last February -- perhaps you've even used it?

It’s a brilliant platform for events and community fundraising -- a bit like an own-branded version of Just Giving -- and you can see how it has the potential to be so much more; a social networking platform for ActionAid to engage with its supporters, for them to engage with each other, to take ActionAid’s messages to their social networks and bring their friends into the fold.

Adding different ways for people to engage aside from fundraising – I'm thinking campaigning in particular – and further integration with other platforms would add value to the experience and make this site a really rich way to engage with ActionAid, its work and its community of supporters.

It’s great to get some insights from their experiences and to find out a little about their future plans, including making widgets available to integrate with supporters on Facebook.

I always want to hear about how this kind of initiative is working, and I’m impressed that they're citing ‘double the giving rate compared to presence on other sites’. That's got to make doing something like this well worth the effort, surely?

Campaign for Mohammed Maree

This captured my imagination this morning.   What a fantastic illustration of how social media can be used to spread a message and affect change.

I've got my fingers crossed for Mohammed Maree.  I also searched and James Karl Buck has set-up a petition page and a facebook group campaigning for him to be returned.

I hope it's quickly and that he's unharmed.  Sign up now.

Social networking - an income generator?

I’ve been thinking a lot about this subject recently, and I saw an article today from the States that has inspired me to post.

It’s always interesting to hear how charities are beginning to tap into the potential of online social networks, because it's such early days yet, and there's still not much evidence around of this type of engagement with charities converting into income on any scale.  However, I think organisations need to change their perceptions about this anyway.

Debates seem to be raging all over the place – particularly online – about whether digital media will replace print media (most people are focusing, as usual, on direct mail), and whether charities should ‘switch their budgets’ from one to the other.  I've also heard budget-holders say that they're considering digital because it’s ‘a cheaper medium to reach more people’ than direct mail. This all seems to be in the context of recruiting financial supporters.

(A bit of an aside: I’m supposing direct mail receives all the focus because it’s more expensive than doordrops and inserts, and that digital media would seem to provide the same direct route to the individual that direct mail does, at a fraction of the cost.)

Well, I think that all of this is missing the point a bit, because:

1.    Not every charity will have, or be able to develop, propositions that will work across all media

2.    No approach will work unless it matches the right ask to the right audience and uses the most appropriate media to deliver it

3.    Social media are relationship-building tools that will help organisations engage with individuals who might support their mission in many ways; not necessarily financial.

Time will tell, but my hunch is that social media offer excellent channels to connect with new audiences, increase awareness, recruit campaigners and advocates (remember that a lot of these people have proactively joined up around your cause – they’re online activists), and create a new kind of self-selecting prospect pool, from which a percentage will convert to financial support if you engage them in the right way.

Mind you, they’ve got to fix this first, or I’m off ;p