America's Giving Challenge: Day 7

Sharing Foundation Calendar

I'm on Day 7 of participating in the America's Giving Challenge.  My goals are to raise money for the Sharing Foundation (and maybe with your help get $50,000 for the Sharing Foundation), share stories about the Sharing Foundation's programs, and share what I'm learning about using social networks to raise money as an extra organizational activist on my blog over the course of the 50-day giving challenge.

The Sharing Foundation Calendar Project

The Sharing Foundation will be celebrating 10 years of helping to care for Cambodia's children in 2008.  This calendar project, produced lovely by a proud adoptive parent, is one of the ways the organization acknowledging this important milestone.  Everyone on the board has purchased in bulk or is selling calendars right now!  This is an example of how we work together to support our cause and bring people in.   

Another indicator is leadership,  particularly our founder Dr. Hendrie, who knows how to inspire and motivate.  Many board members and volunteers give many hours of their time to this organization.  There is definitely a warm and loving community surrounding this organization.  In Cambodia, the Sharing Foundation hires Cambodians to manage all programs and through strong oversight and mentoring, the number of trained Cambodians ready to lead their communities is steadily increasing. 

Reflections

• It's been a week of small experiments and trials to get a better understanding of where to focus my efforts.  I'm convinced that experimentation is the key to understanding, even if there is a lot of tension, stress, and frustration involved.    The best approach - in terms of winning this contest - is to focus people to one giving channel.  I think we have the best chances of winning the $50,000 through Global Giving.   

• I spent quite a bit of time today analyzing the top 50 causes.  We are number 49.  I looked at each cause, the number of members and the number of donors.   There is too much competition and to win the top prize, it really favors existing networks. 
  

• The causes represent a spectrum - from those launched by organizations, by extra organizational activists (like me), and by student networks.   Because of the networked effect, the causes connected with school networks may have a distinct advantage over those launched by a single activist for the grant prize.   

• Questions to ponder:

• Is the $1,000 daily prize worth the time investment?

No.  And it is doubtful that we could win one of the daily prizes. 

• Is there an opportunity to engage cause participants so they become regular donors or supporters beyond the contest period?

Maybe.   The interaction design on causes does not match a ladder of engagement.  It is really hard to cultivate and get to know people on a one-to-one basis.  And, if you message people privately and cut and paste, Facebook might punish you by deleting your account. 

• Given TSF is on both Networked for Good and Global Giving and it doesn't make sense to use both for the campaign, which on to choose?

We've decided to focus on our Global Giving fundraiser for a variety of reasons. Since the badges will be used by our core volunteers who are not technology savvy, I set up a test.  I had to create a separate page to make it easy.

• What is the best strategy for directing the people who have joined the Facebook cause to make a donation over at Global Giving?

I'm mulling this over and would love your advice.

Call To Action

• Donate $10 or more to our cause through Global Giving now!

• Are you a blogger?  Please sign up to help me!  You'll find the information here

Comments

[Lars Hasselblad Torres]

Hi Beth - it is interesting to read your response to AGC; I've seen at least a dozen of these pop up over the last six months, and I can tell you they've worn me kind of thin. Somewhere else, this got me musing about whether this kind of "micro-giving" is going to last as an funding infrastructure. Right now, I think I'm hearing a "no," and here are a few high-level observations that set it up for demise:

1 - The process privileges the donor. They set the agenda and tone of the campaign. Its the NPOs responsibility to "plug in," or "get on board" as it were. Its old school top-down mindset wrapped in new Web2.0 clothes.

2 - The process naturally favors big networks. Because they tend to turn on recruitment and voting schemes, these efforts favor groups that can activate an existing network large enough to "flash recruit" others to "get involved."

3 - The half-life of interest is short. Seriously, how many calls can an NPO (or any entity for that matter) put out to scramble its base for a modest sum? Pretty soon, they are going to wonder why they're not more busy grant-writing. Network fatigue?

4 - ROI is too small. Campaigns don't run themselves; to succeed in one of these things, competitors have to dedicate time, energy, and creativity to making effective appeals to members to get involved - and more importantly, stay involved - if the campaign is to succeed. Why not ask 1000 people for $10 each instead? If the need is specific, a Web2.0 strategy in this direction is probably just as effective...

5 - There's rarely any follow-up. So if you're actually interested in how the campaign goes down, who won and why, and how the money was used, you're not likely to hear about it, nor are the people who participated. In general, these things seem to go down like a cry in the dark.

6 - And this might be controversial, but having a big network isn't the same as doing great work. Such competitions don't necessarily help the "best" activities "bubble up." It certainly helps the "loudest," the "biggest," and even the "slickest..."

With these weaknesses, or some combination of them, I get to wondering about what the possible benefits of participating in such campaigns might be. The best is to choose one or two a year that promise to get some good visibility and get the NPO or activity associated with some big name. Then, you may or may not have a few reasons to:

- Generate a press release (aim: get your story out there)
- Communicate with your network (aim: make at least two specific asks)
- Expand your network (aim: convince more people what you do is important ie its NOT about the campaign)

Anyway, I look forward to learning more about why donors might be choosing this route over, say, a lottery or their own internal process. I liked the Omidyar Network's short-lived strategy of cultivating its own social network and enabling the community to identify the activities it valued etc. Too bad it was short-lived: there was a lot to learn from this "engaged, networked" foundation approach.

If anyone has data to point to different conclusions from these, I'd love to hear them. Cheers,

lars