Community now Social Media and Money: A Pre-Annual Meeting Chat
Associations Now magazine organized an online chat/interview with Lindy Dreyer, Sarah Seers and me to talk about using Twitter for fund-raising.
The "starter question" was ... "The question will be: How can associations use social media to raise money without alienating members?"
Being interviewed via Google Talk was interesting ... it is essentially a live chat. And, since we were typing responses and questions, sort of hard to say "I was mis-quoted!"
The story appears in the May issue of ASSOCIATIONS NOW ... here's the link:
http://bit.ly/a58Ea1
Sunday, May 16, 2010
Spam, Scam or Cause
Saw a Tweet this morning that made me pause:
Do you Support Non Profits? We are a Social Cause Marketing network. Connect, Fundraise, & Learn. Join us at http://bit.ly/8LKUAF.
Here's the key "headline" for those who look at the page:
Yes! Pay it forward... and Get Paid!
With your participation in this simple online fundraising systemwe can generate thousands of dollars for non-profit organizations ... As well as generate thousands of dollars in profit for online users, just like you !
Note that to participate, you pay $1,997 to the firm.
As I looked at the site, I'm thinking: "Is this spam, scam or cause?"
The premise appears to be we'll pay you if you help raise funds for your favorite charities.
Some of the questions are what to you get paid? What does the company get paid? What goes to charities?
What do you think?
Do you Support Non Profits? We are a Social Cause Marketing network. Connect, Fundraise, & Learn. Join us at http://bit.ly/8LKUAF.
Here's the key "headline" for those who look at the page:
Yes! Pay it forward... and Get Paid!
With your participation in this simple online fundraising systemwe can generate thousands of dollars for non-profit organizations ... As well as generate thousands of dollars in profit for online users, just like you !
Note that to participate, you pay $1,997 to the firm.
As I looked at the site, I'm thinking: "Is this spam, scam or cause?"
The premise appears to be we'll pay you if you help raise funds for your favorite charities.
Some of the questions are what to you get paid? What does the company get paid? What goes to charities?
What do you think?
Tuesday, February 2, 2010
Tips for using Twitter as a Fundraising Tool
Associations Now magazine has invited us to share tips and techniques on using Twitter for fundraising. We have gleaned ideas from Twestival, Tweetsgiving and TweetUp4Troops. And, now we are turning to crowdsourcing to determine which tips are most valuable in your use of Twitter as a fundraising tool. To participate in crowdsourcing these tips, please complete the survey at .... http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/DrakeCoTwitterTips.
Three "case studies" on using Twitter to engage people in a cause and to use Twitter as a fund-raising platform:
Twestival: On one day in February of 2009, Charity: Water held Twestivals around the world. This event combined Twitter with offline events in about 200 cities around the globe. The events generated more than $250,000 in support of Charity: Water's clean water efforts in Africa.
TweetUp4Troops: During the week of Veteran’s Day in November 2009, the Christmas SPIRIT Foundation held Twitter-initiated local events to honor veterans, generate support for its Trees for Troops program and have fun. CSF announced the program and began recruiting local hosts in mid-September. In addition to locally hosted events, Applebee's restaurants in the Phoenix area joined by providing funds from a single day event.
Tweetsgiving: Epic Change is a new nonprofit organized that amplifies the voices and impact of grassroots changemakers and social entrepreneurs. One of its major projects involves support for Momma Lucy's school in Tanzania. In 2008, Epic Change held a global 2008 Twitter campaign to "share your gratitude." The effort -- organized by two volunteers and launched six days later -- led to more that $9,000 in donations to Epic Change. In 2009, Epic Change began organizing in May and launched in September. Events around the world increased donations to more than $36,000.
These three campaigns combined Twitter's online functions with off-line hosted events.
We've developed the following "lessons"/"tips" from these campaigns that could benefit other organizations seeking to use Twitter as a platform for fund-raising.
Planning the Campaign:
Three "case studies" on using Twitter to engage people in a cause and to use Twitter as a fund-raising platform:
Twestival: On one day in February of 2009, Charity: Water held Twestivals around the world. This event combined Twitter with offline events in about 200 cities around the globe. The events generated more than $250,000 in support of Charity: Water's clean water efforts in Africa.
TweetUp4Troops: During the week of Veteran’s Day in November 2009, the Christmas SPIRIT Foundation held Twitter-initiated local events to honor veterans, generate support for its Trees for Troops program and have fun. CSF announced the program and began recruiting local hosts in mid-September. In addition to locally hosted events, Applebee's restaurants in the Phoenix area joined by providing funds from a single day event.
Tweetsgiving: Epic Change is a new nonprofit organized that amplifies the voices and impact of grassroots changemakers and social entrepreneurs. One of its major projects involves support for Momma Lucy's school in Tanzania. In 2008, Epic Change held a global 2008 Twitter campaign to "share your gratitude." The effort -- organized by two volunteers and launched six days later -- led to more that $9,000 in donations to Epic Change. In 2009, Epic Change began organizing in May and launched in September. Events around the world increased donations to more than $36,000.
These three campaigns combined Twitter's online functions with off-line hosted events.
We've developed the following "lessons"/"tips" from these campaigns that could benefit other organizations seeking to use Twitter as a platform for fund-raising.
Planning the Campaign:
- Start early (ideally six to nine months before “event”).
- Keep it simple: remember you have only 140 characters!
- Make it easy and secure to donate and to spread the story and message.
- Avoid the curse of knowledge (forgetting what it is like not to be on the “inside”).
- Select the social media platform that fits your organization and your community. Whatever social media you’re using, use it often!
Growing the Campaign:
- Start by engaging your existing network/community and grow from there.
- Build a strong database of participants to continue keeping in touch with after the event is over.
- Pursue those who show interest beyond online conversation.
- Illustrate where contributions go and what donations support (photos, videos, testimonials).
- Be transparent (include any qualifications, share exact dollar ($) amount that goes to the charity; include a “leader board” for fund-raising updates.
- Make your Web presence strong and the site easy to navigate.
- Use a variety of mediums to tell your story: video, photos, audio, etc.
- Seek volunteers aligned with your cause in many regions of the country/globe.
- "Manage” the volunteers and ensure they abide by your values, message, and purpose.
- Provide a link to a place where people can make donations quickly and easily.
- Network, network, network and find others who will spread your message.
Using Twitter for Your Campaign
- Do NOT ask for donations at the beginning; start by building/engaging a community around your cause.
- Team up with other cause marketers or cause marketing programs already on Twitter.
- Communicate personally with followers, especially those who find you. Go to their bio, read their blog, direct message them back with some bit of information that shows you took the time and effort to read about them.
- Search for people who may be interested in your cause on Twitter – do a keyword search to find them.
- Ask core volunteers to retweet for you.
- Select a hashtag (#) that makes sense and is easy to remember/use. Start using it early.
- Consider adding a Twibbon for all who are Tweeting on your cause.
- Remember to thank people on Twitter (or other social networks) for their support/donation. Also retweet when they post/tweet something nice about your organization.
- Tweet the status of the fundraising campaign regularly.
So, what do you think? Which of these are the most important? What is missing to create success?
Please share your thoughts by completing the survey at http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/DrakeCoTwitterTips.
Thanks!
Thursday, January 7, 2010
What Happens When Your Cause is "Brandjacked?"
What Happens When Your Nonprofit is “Brandjacked?”
Posted by: Debra Askanase In: guest posts reputation management
In early November, the Christmas SPIRIT Foundation (CSF) (which my association management company manages) accidentally discovered an industry competitor had created a copycat ripoff of our TweetUp4Troops effort to generate support for the Foundation’s Trees for Troops program.
The Background:
The Christmas SPIRIT Foundation, the 501(c)(3) charitable branch of the National Christmas Tree Association, advances the spirit of Christmas for kids, families and the environment. For four years, the Foundation — with in-kind support from FedEx Freight — has implemented a hugely successful Trees for Troops program which touches the lives of military families by providing them a free, farm-grown Christmas tree. The majority of trees go to troops with someone stationed overseas during the holidays. In its first four years, the Foundation has reached 50,082 military families around the world. We trademarked Trees for Troops to protect the name. In 2007, we added Trees for Troops Weekends during which consumers could purchase a farm-grown tree and donate it to the Trees for Troops program. (In three years, about 11,000 consumers have been involved in this effort.)
To engage more consumers in the program and to generate financial support for Trees for Troops, the Foundation created and organized TweetUp4Troops events to be held during Veterans Day Week (Nov 7-14). As part of the campaign, the Foundation created a TweetUp4Troops group site, web site and Twitter handle.
The Scam
At the beginning of November, a Foundation staffer accidentally typed in http://tweetupfortroops.org/ and discovered that an artificial tree company had registered this domain name and directed people to its commercial Web site that is purely sales, a giant advertisement for artificial Christmas trees. The site’s creator has NOTHING to do with the Christmas SPIRIT Foundation and does NOTHING to support the Trees for Troops program.
The Christmas SPIRIT Foundation sees the fake tree industry’s action as a rouse designed to “capture and divert” people who support (or want to support) the Foundation and its Trees for Troops program. We don’t know how many potential sponsors accidentally typed “for” rather than “4″ and got the fake page rather than the real TweetUp4Troops site.
The Foundation was stunned that a company/industry would stoop so low as to try to deceive donors interested in supporting U.S. military families.
The first thing we did was check with legal regarding sending a cease and desist letter. (However, because of the crush of implementation for Trees for Troops and TweetUp4Troops, we did not send the letter.) We reached out to the Twitter community to seek advice on how to respond. I wrote this blog post asking social media community to give me feedback and advice.
We were overwhelmed with the fabulous response from our social media community!
Following the community’s advice, the Christmas SPIRIT Foundation issued a news release. In addition to sending it to the legacy media, we tweeted it to our social media community on Twitter and Facebook. Within minutes the word was spreading to hundreds, then thousands of people interested in social media, cause marketing, associations and non profits. Some re-tweeted. Others posted blogs about this case. Based on a quick analysis, the message was tweeted to more than 600,000 followers within 24 hours.
Follow-Up Questions and Answers
Q: Has there been an effect on donations positively or negatively? Can you compare or quantify that?
Since TweetUp4Troops is a new initiative, we have no baseline thus no real numbers or way to measure impact on results. The Foundation (and NCTA) has commissioned Harris Interactive to conduct a post-season consumer tracking poll annually. We will have those results in mid-January.
Q: What lessons have you learned about brand management?
Monitor your brand across multiple channels. This means: implement regular monitoring of your brand to find anyone trying to hijack it. (Remember, we discovered the TweetUp4Troops brandjacking accidentally!) Use social media platforms to help your cause if it is hijacked. Get legal “protection” of your brand through copyright and trade mark/service mark registrations. Register multiple domain names and Social Media accounts. You cannot consider all possibilities but look at as many as possible.
This has influenced our thinking for the 2010 program! As a result of both the brandjacking and lessons we learned from talking with the folks at Tweetsgiving, we’re likely to implement the 2010 program through our “master” (and legally protected) Trees for Troops sites. We are likely to move to legally register the name so we have greater protection in event of new attempts at brandjacking.
For more information about Trees For Troops: read this November 2009 Ad Age column
ASAE Great Ideas Conference
Lessons learned from the TweetUp4Troops (along with Tweetsgiving) will be part of Steve Drake's presentation at the ASAE Great Ideas Conference in Colorado Springs starting at 12:30 pm., Tuesday, March 9. The topic title is "From Dialing for Dollars to Tweetups & Twestivals: How Social Media Can Engage New Donors."
Hope you'll attend! For more information, click this link http://bit.ly/8SdDjx
Posted by: Debra Askanase In: guest posts reputation management
In early November, the Christmas SPIRIT Foundation (CSF) (which my association management company manages) accidentally discovered an industry competitor had created a copycat ripoff of our TweetUp4Troops effort to generate support for the Foundation’s Trees for Troops program.
The Background:
The Christmas SPIRIT Foundation, the 501(c)(3) charitable branch of the National Christmas Tree Association, advances the spirit of Christmas for kids, families and the environment. For four years, the Foundation — with in-kind support from FedEx Freight — has implemented a hugely successful Trees for Troops program which touches the lives of military families by providing them a free, farm-grown Christmas tree. The majority of trees go to troops with someone stationed overseas during the holidays. In its first four years, the Foundation has reached 50,082 military families around the world. We trademarked Trees for Troops to protect the name. In 2007, we added Trees for Troops Weekends during which consumers could purchase a farm-grown tree and donate it to the Trees for Troops program. (In three years, about 11,000 consumers have been involved in this effort.)
To engage more consumers in the program and to generate financial support for Trees for Troops, the Foundation created and organized TweetUp4Troops events to be held during Veterans Day Week (Nov 7-14). As part of the campaign, the Foundation created a TweetUp4Troops group site, web site and Twitter handle.
The Scam
At the beginning of November, a Foundation staffer accidentally typed in http://tweetupfortroops.org/ and discovered that an artificial tree company had registered this domain name and directed people to its commercial Web site that is purely sales, a giant advertisement for artificial Christmas trees. The site’s creator has NOTHING to do with the Christmas SPIRIT Foundation and does NOTHING to support the Trees for Troops program.
The Christmas SPIRIT Foundation sees the fake tree industry’s action as a rouse designed to “capture and divert” people who support (or want to support) the Foundation and its Trees for Troops program. We don’t know how many potential sponsors accidentally typed “for” rather than “4″ and got the fake page rather than the real TweetUp4Troops site.
The Foundation was stunned that a company/industry would stoop so low as to try to deceive donors interested in supporting U.S. military families.
The first thing we did was check with legal regarding sending a cease and desist letter. (However, because of the crush of implementation for Trees for Troops and TweetUp4Troops, we did not send the letter.) We reached out to the Twitter community to seek advice on how to respond. I wrote this blog post asking social media community to give me feedback and advice.
We were overwhelmed with the fabulous response from our social media community!
Following the community’s advice, the Christmas SPIRIT Foundation issued a news release. In addition to sending it to the legacy media, we tweeted it to our social media community on Twitter and Facebook. Within minutes the word was spreading to hundreds, then thousands of people interested in social media, cause marketing, associations and non profits. Some re-tweeted. Others posted blogs about this case. Based on a quick analysis, the message was tweeted to more than 600,000 followers within 24 hours.
Follow-Up Questions and Answers
Q: Has there been an effect on donations positively or negatively? Can you compare or quantify that?
Since TweetUp4Troops is a new initiative, we have no baseline thus no real numbers or way to measure impact on results. The Foundation (and NCTA) has commissioned Harris Interactive to conduct a post-season consumer tracking poll annually. We will have those results in mid-January.
Q: What lessons have you learned about brand management?
Monitor your brand across multiple channels. This means: implement regular monitoring of your brand to find anyone trying to hijack it. (Remember, we discovered the TweetUp4Troops brandjacking accidentally!) Use social media platforms to help your cause if it is hijacked. Get legal “protection” of your brand through copyright and trade mark/service mark registrations. Register multiple domain names and Social Media accounts. You cannot consider all possibilities but look at as many as possible.
This has influenced our thinking for the 2010 program! As a result of both the brandjacking and lessons we learned from talking with the folks at Tweetsgiving, we’re likely to implement the 2010 program through our “master” (and legally protected) Trees for Troops sites. We are likely to move to legally register the name so we have greater protection in event of new attempts at brandjacking.
For more information about Trees For Troops: read this November 2009 Ad Age column
ASAE Great Ideas Conference
Lessons learned from the TweetUp4Troops (along with Tweetsgiving) will be part of Steve Drake's presentation at the ASAE Great Ideas Conference in Colorado Springs starting at 12:30 pm., Tuesday, March 9. The topic title is "From Dialing for Dollars to Tweetups & Twestivals: How Social Media Can Engage New Donors."
Hope you'll attend! For more information, click this link http://bit.ly/8SdDjx
Saturday, December 5, 2009
Trash to Christmas Trees
While traveling for the Christmas SPIRIT Foundation's Trees for Troops program today in Denver area, I "stumbled upon" a really neat local environmental program linked with farm-grown Christmas trees.
It shows the 
power of locate creativity. The program -- created and hosted by the Inverness Hotel of Englewood -- is called Trash to Trees. Here's the link about the program. 
http://www.invernesshotel.com/trash_to_trees/?esitecname=trash+to+trees
power of locate creativity. The program -- created and hosted by the Inverness Hotel of Englewood -- is called Trash to Trees. Here's the link about the program. 
http://www.invernesshotel.com/trash_to_trees/?esitecname=trash+to+treesI visited with Peggy Scaggs, the hotel's convention manager, and the Trash to Trees program coordinator for 2009. This is second year for Trash to Trees. This year, more than 375 students from 32 schools came to the hotel to decorate farm grown Christmas trees.
The criteria: the decorations had to be made with recycled or sustainable products. What creativity! Ornaments made from recycled soda cans, recycled CDs, recycled grocery bags and more. One tree was made especially to meet needs of wild birds and will be donated to the Audubon Society.
Thanks to the Inverness Hotel for a wonderful program; to Tagawa Gardens for presenting the trees for the schools to use and to the other sponsors.
Thursday, November 19, 2009
Brandjacking, Trees for Troops, Social Media ROI
Wow!
Today helps answer both the ROI of social media and the power/speed of Social Media.
I was stunned when we discovered a for profit company was trying to "brandjack" our Trees for Troops cause and donors.
I've been overwhelmed with the fabulous response from our social media community!
But, a quick recap for those reading and wondering what the heck I'm talking about!
The Christmas SPIRIT Foundation -- a client for which we serve as staff and headquarters -- holds an annual Trees for Troops program in conjunction with National Christmas Tree Association members and FedEx. Here's an Ad Age column that provides more information about the program. http://ow.ly/DOsE
To help generate support for Trees for Troops while honoring U.S. veterans, the Foundation created a concept called TweetUp4Troops.
Earlier this week, we discovered that an artificial tree company had created a URL similar to TweetUp4Troops in an obvious attempt to divert protect donors from the charity helping military families to its own chimerical sales Web site.
We were stunned. Had trouble believing that someone could stoop so low as to try to divert donors attempted to help U.S. military families.
So, I posted this blog http://bit.ly/ncVC7 asking social media community to give me feedback and advice.
And, following that advice, the Christmas SPIRIT Foundation issued this news release today. http://bit.ly/2c5gC0 In addition to sending it to the legacy media, we tweeted it to our social media community. Wow! Within minutes the word was spreading to hundreds, then thousands of people interested in social media, cause marketing, associations and non profits. Some retweeted. Others are planning to blog about this case.
The response was so fast and so overwhelming, I'm still in awe!
For the last few months, I've had many people ask me "What is the ROI of social media?" I've been researching it in an attempt to answer the question for a Social Media Workshop I am helping lead in February.
Well, today, I discovered the ROI of social media ... a true case study.
This case illustrates a couple of key points for all involved in cause marketing:
1) Protect your brand (that includes considering URLs that closely match the "real one" you are using).
2) Which means monitor your brand to find anyone trying to hijack it.
3) Social media can be a powerful tool to help your cause if it is hijacked.
Thank you to all who have helped us defend the Trees for Troops program.
If you want to learn more about helping, please see this link: http://bit.ly/41hk8N
Today helps answer both the ROI of social media and the power/speed of Social Media.
I was stunned when we discovered a for profit company was trying to "brandjack" our Trees for Troops cause and donors.
I've been overwhelmed with the fabulous response from our social media community!
But, a quick recap for those reading and wondering what the heck I'm talking about!
The Christmas SPIRIT Foundation -- a client for which we serve as staff and headquarters -- holds an annual Trees for Troops program in conjunction with National Christmas Tree Association members and FedEx. Here's an Ad Age column that provides more information about the program. http://ow.ly/DOsE
To help generate support for Trees for Troops while honoring U.S. veterans, the Foundation created a concept called TweetUp4Troops.
Earlier this week, we discovered that an artificial tree company had created a URL similar to TweetUp4Troops in an obvious attempt to divert protect donors from the charity helping military families to its own chimerical sales Web site.
We were stunned. Had trouble believing that someone could stoop so low as to try to divert donors attempted to help U.S. military families.
So, I posted this blog http://bit.ly/ncVC7 asking social media community to give me feedback and advice.
And, following that advice, the Christmas SPIRIT Foundation issued this news release today. http://bit.ly/2c5gC0 In addition to sending it to the legacy media, we tweeted it to our social media community. Wow! Within minutes the word was spreading to hundreds, then thousands of people interested in social media, cause marketing, associations and non profits. Some retweeted. Others are planning to blog about this case.
The response was so fast and so overwhelming, I'm still in awe!
For the last few months, I've had many people ask me "What is the ROI of social media?" I've been researching it in an attempt to answer the question for a Social Media Workshop I am helping lead in February.
Well, today, I discovered the ROI of social media ... a true case study.
This case illustrates a couple of key points for all involved in cause marketing:
1) Protect your brand (that includes considering URLs that closely match the "real one" you are using).
2) Which means monitor your brand to find anyone trying to hijack it.
3) Social media can be a powerful tool to help your cause if it is hijacked.
Thank you to all who have helped us defend the Trees for Troops program.
If you want to learn more about helping, please see this link: http://bit.ly/41hk8N
Saturday, November 14, 2009
Cause Ethics: What to Do If ...
The Christmas SPIRIT Foundation (CSF) accidentally discovered a copycat ripoff of our TweetUp4Troops effort to generate support for its Trees for Troops program.
And, this ripoff creates an ethical dilemma for the Foundation and CSF would like your opinion and suggestions.
Here's the scoop:
- The Christmas SPIRIT Foundation, the 501(c)(3) charitable branch of the National Christmas Tree Association, advances the spirit of Christmas for kids, families and the environment. The National Christmas Tree Association represents the growers, wholesalers and retailers of farm-grown Christmas Trees (often referred to as real trees).
- For four years, the Foundation -- with support from FedEx -- has implemented a hugely successful Trees for Troops program which touches the lives of military families by providing them a free, farm-grown Christmas tree. The Foundation has reached 50,082 military families around the world.
- To help generate financial support for Trees for Troops, the Foundation created and organized TweetUp4Troops events to be held during Veterans Day Week (Nov 7-14). As part of the campaign, the Foundation created a TweetUp4Troops group site, web site and Twitter handle.
- Last week, a Foundation staffer accidentally typed in www.Tweetupfortroops.org and discovered that someone in the artificial tree industry had registered this domain name and created a web site that is purely sales, a giant advertisement for artificial Christmas trees. The site's creator has NOTHING to do with the Christmas SPIRIT Foundation and does NOTHING to support the Trees for Troops program.
The Christmas SPIRIT Foundation sees the fake tree industry's action as a rouse designed to "capture and divert" people who support (or want to support) the Foundation and its Trees for Troops program.
It seems to be a hoax to deceive potential donors.
We don't know how many potential sponsors accidentally typed "for" rather than "4" and got the fake page rather than the real TweetUp4Troops site. We're not sure that matters.
The Foundation remains stunned that a company/industry would stoop so low as to try to deceive donors interested in supporting U.S. military families.
So, we're asking for your advice. What does the Foundation do? How can (or should) it respond? What would you do if someone sabotaged your cause or non-profit and attempted to divert your donors into a different web site that is a sales piece rather than a donation page?
Please post your comments and suggestions.
PS: It's nearly impossible register every domain name that closely resembles the name and/or Website of your cause. We're sorry for any confusion that artificial tree industry created through its
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