At BlogWorld Expo, tools and strategies for nonprofits

The first Causes/Activism track at the just-ended Blogworld Expo in Las Vegas drew some 1,500 participants — a promising showing by the nonprofit community. I moderated the Tools for Nonprofit Organizations panel, with panelists Judy Chang of Paypal, Justin Perkins of Care2, David Levy of SocialVibe, James Sutandyo of Causecast and consultant Scott Henderson.

Here’s my Flickr photo set of BlogWorld Expo, about 60 photos in all. I also put together this Delicious tag — delicious.com/bwe09 — to aggregate many of the the services, tools and platforms that nonprofits and social change organizations can use to raise funds to advance their missions online.

About 100 people, chiefly from nonprofits small and large, attended our panel and you can follow what they tweeted about the session at #tools4npo

The panelists collectively came up with these recommendations:

8 tips for raising funds online

1. Make it a specific project, not for the overarching nonprofit or a general fund

2. Tell a compelling story with a strong human-interest angle

3. Create a feedback loop from the recipients to the donors to form an emotional bond

4. Have a hard stop — set a date to donate by

5. Pool your efforts by collaborating with reputable like-minded partners (including trading space in partners’ email newsletters)

6. Don’t pussyfoot around — have a clear and specific “ask” or call to action

7. Consider using contests or drawings to draw in more people

8. Your destination website doesn’t matter as much as it once did, so spread your efforts across several social networks

Successful social media efforts

Panelists pointed to several initiatives that nonprofits could learn from:

• charity: water’s September birthday campaign. “They make it about you,” said Henderson.

• LiveStrong, the Lance Armstrong Foundation, has a strong community outreach program.

• America’s Giving Challenge, allowing users to vote for daily and overall causes they want to support.

• The Nature Conservancy’s Adopt an Acre of Rainforest program — for every 10 gifts you send, you’ll save 1 square foot of Rainforest.

• Invisible Children’s Visible Children Scholarship Program.

Kudos to eBay for underwriting the Causes/Activism track, and to Cause Media Group for organizing the sessions — not an easy undertaking.

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Competition lets you win up to $50,000 for your favorite charity

Yesterday the Case Foundation, Causes and Parade Publications kicked off the 2009 America’s Giving Challenge. It’s a 30-day nationwide online competition that encourages people to use their personal networks and social media to build cause communities that raise funds and recruit supporters for a nonprofit.

Nonprofits and individuals can get involved in two ways:

1. Champion a cause. Individuals who are passionate about a specific cause can become “cause champions” and will compete to obtain the most donations for their cause through the Causes application on Facebook.

2. Promote, donate or join a cause. All individuals are encouraged to take part in the Giving Challenge by joining, promoting and donating to the causes they care about. Facebook membership is not required to donate to a cause. Just go to Causes.com between now and Nov. 6 to win up to $50,000 for your favorite cause.

Today, for example, causes receiving the most votes so far include the National Inclusion Project, Angel Covers, FACE AIDS, Compassion International and Facilitating Leadership in Youth. I just donated to Think Autism. If you already support a cause on Facebook, opt in your existing cause.

The Case Foundation will award a total of $170,000 to the nonprofit beneficiaries of the causes. $50,000 goes to the cause with the most daily donations over the 30 days (you can donate as often as you’d like — say, as little as $10 — and each donation counts as a vote); second prize is $25,000. To keep people engaged, the sponsors are also awarding $1,000 each day to the cause with the most donations (not the most money raised); second prize is $500.

Network for Good is processing donations for the Challenge, and Parade magazine will help publicize the initiative with a cover story about the importance of giving by actor Matt Damon.

Campaign’s effective use of social media

Katya just wrote about the Challenge and said these efforts work because they take advantage of social networking, offer something measurable, provide a way to harness the power of your supporters, and offer a strong incentive to give. “I always say you need to answer four questions to get people to give money: why me? what for? why now? and who says? This kind of campaign answers all four well,” she writes.

Well said. The organizers of this event have made smart use of social media, and we’ll be watching to see what kind of traction it gets over the coming weeks.

Katya also offers these tips when trying to raise money for your cause in the Challenge:

1. The more personal the messaging, the better.

2. Donate yourself.  It’s not inspiring to see zero donations on a cause when you’re asking others to give.

3. Post links everywhere — on your site, blog, email signature, etc.

4. Send a link to all the people you know on Facebook and in your email address book.

5. Ask others with a following to help.  …

6. Focus on the people, not the money.  It’s about relationships. More on this from Joe at Causes.

More tips and resources are at exchange.causes.com.

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