A few months ago, I joined several of my coworkers to participate in Junior Achievement’s annual calling campaign.  For the better part of a day, we sat at our makeshift workstations leafing through call sheets – trying to warm strangers just long enough to sucker them out of some money.  Although the cause was admirable and certainly worthy, I couldn’t help but get frustrated with the process.  For the hundreds of calls placed that day, the room’s success rate was unacceptably low.  Volunteers left demoralized and quite accustomed to hearing the word “no.”

This topic, I had planned to explore a while ago, but was emphatically reminded today when an (888) number showed up on the cell phone.  Admittedly, I had given a decent amount to the organization a few years back.  However, now I was being asked for $300 on the spot without any warning or personal connection (the last give was to a friend going overseas for their program).  No disrespect to the caller or group, but this is primarily a waste of everyone’s time.

With the plethora of media outlets these days, it is time for the nonprofit sector to embrace new ways of campaigning for cash.  Gone are the days of mass phone calls and incessant mailings.  The new emphasis is on time-effective and focused campaigns.

I was delighted to see how efficient some of the Haitian fundraisers were.  In a matter of hours, a handful of initiatives had already brought in funds totaling in the tens of millions.  Our expectations literally changed overnight.

So how did they do it?

Twitter

This does not come as much of a surprise to most of you.  With 75 Million users and the ability to directly and immediately send information to loyal followers, it is no wonder that this site can be so helpful.  Encourage retweets by those who care about your cause and word will spread very quickly.

Of course, information at the speed of light is only as good as the infrastructure you have in place to support it.  Use your tweets to point patrons directly to a donation page that explains in more detail.  Make payment as easy as possible and have receipts emailed immediately.  In the event that you are a large enough organization for such a partnership, look into a text message option where carriers will charge a nominal fee to bill customers on your behalf.

Personal Pages

One of the organizations I work closely with has changed up their annual drive by creating personal, customizable pages for every interested party.  Why would they do this?  Because they have found that these people are their best assets.   They are more apt to attract donations on an individual site than a generic one.  Additionally, this instills a sense of pride that pushes fundraisers to be more proactive.

Facebook

Once again, nothing revolutionary here, but the key to Facebook is using it the right way.  If your organization has open events, they need to be posted on FB.  Allow attendees to invite more people, thus compounding your reach.  If a reputable nonprofit in our area is having a fundraiser, the invite will inevitably circulate to someone in our circle.  This, most notably, costs nothing.  Think of the money you could save on mailings and printed invites…

A fan page on FB will allow you to corral people and to contact them directly with minimal effort.  Just like followers on twitter, you can send messages directly to them and keep them abreast of happenings with your nonprofit.

DoGood!

Matt

Feel free to email me: matt@DoGoodedness.com with questions, suggestions, or guest posts!