Milaap creates sustainability by blending crowdfunding and micro lending

Target audience: Nonprofits, cause organizations, foundations, NGOs, social enterprises, educators, journalists, general public.

Icould begin this post by regurgitating any number of statistics on the sensory and information overload we all experience these days, but I won’t. We all know that that’s the world we live in. Technology has really broken down barriers to information and while that’s mostly a good thing, it can be really overwhelming as well.

As a result, breaking through the digital clutter these days is tough. So what do you do when your cause depends on you doing just that? How do you make sustainable giving a reality, so that both your cause and supporters benefit?

Milaap (disclosure: my client) is a unique online platform that blends crowdfunding with micro lending, giving people from around the world the ability to both lend and/or create personal fundraisers for India’s working poor. These micro loans – which start as low as $25 and are repaid in full at the end of the loan term – fund projects in fields as diverse as energy, water, and education. To date, Milaap has a 98% repayment rate, which is quite remarkable.

Here are three ways Milaap is socializing and changing the face of giving:

1. Anyone who gives through Milaap can set up a fundraiser for a project they are touched by. But here’s where it gets interesting; you can make these fundraisers social. In other words, you can bring your community in, asking them to join you in lending to this specific project, telling them why. So, all of a sudden, you don’t just have one person fundraising, you have 3, or 6, or 19… the possibilities are endless! Takeaway: Many hands do make light work. When you encourage people to involve their communities, you grow your own at the same time. This is what has enabled Milaap, over the last four years, to raise $1.6 million, give out almost 13,000 loans and take close to 50,000 people from oppression to opportunity.

2. What I really like about giving through Milaap is that the money you give is a loan—not a donation. While this in no way negates making donations to nonprofits, I think it’s a really smart approach. With the immense donor fatigue we all experience, it’s refreshing to know you will get your money back once the loan matures (unless you choose to relend it, of course, which many people do). As a small business owner myself, I love that approach, as there is accountability built into the process. Takeaway: Elevate your supporters’ investment of time and energy in your cause. Showing them the end-recipients are equally invested is a great way to do so.

3. The best way to touch someone’s heart is by telling them a story. And Milaap has great stories to tell—of its borrowers, of its supporters, of its employees and partners. It has a really rich content bank, especially of visual assets. But what it does very well is let its borrowers stories speak for themselves. I defy anyone to not be moved by the video above we put together for its flagship campaign in 2014, the #HopeProject. Takeaway: Stories work best when they come straight from the source. As much as possible, let those in your stories tell them.

Today is Milaap’s fourth birthday. To celebrate, it is hosting a round-the-clock, global online conversation on sustainable giving, and I do hope you’ll join. Here’s more on today’s #Milaap4Hope event (it’s very easy to join, just log onto the respective platform based on which event catches your fancy, and follow/use that hashtag).

If we all do our part, we can change the face of giving.

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Two persuasive techniques to encourage big giving

Guest post by Frank Barry
Blackbaud

Year-end fundraising is a big deal.

About one-third of all charitable giving happens in the last three months of the year with 34.8 percent of all online fundraising happening in Q4. December accounts for over 20 percent of the total (see complete Online Giving Research).

But we’re already into the second week of December, you say. Time is running out!

What can you do now to kick-start — or resuscitate or rejuvenate — your online fundraising efforts for the final fundraising push? Here are two extremely effective tactics based on persuasion principles you can use to generate more positive responses to your year-end fundraising appeals.

Social proof: People do what others do

Granted, the above isn’t an example from a nonprofit fundraising campaign, but it’s still a great example to learn from and apply to year-end fundraising. First off, I might buy one of these bags some day – I mean any person who travels knows how important power is.

Second, the Kickstarter project (see it in action here) uses the power of social proof to encourage others to participate. By showing how many people have backed the project and the amount raised, they are letting new visitors know that this is a project worth supporting.

Essentially, social proof adds credibility and helps people take action because people tend to do what other people are already doing.

Fundraising translation: Show how many people have donated and how much you have raised online (along with a goal and a deadline so people know where you’re headed). People actually want to see how well your online fundraising campaign is doing. Take note of what what successful peer-to-peer fundraisers have been doing for years now.

Scarcity: Perceived scarcity will generate demand

The second thing Kickstarter projects do well is create scarcity using incentives (and tie it to social proof. See the “Limited (1 of 250 left)” image above for an example).

By giving potential backers the ability to pledge various amounts from $1 all the way up to $10k+ (seen in right column at Kickstarter), but limiting the number of incentives that come with higher level backing amounts (i.e., only one person gets the behind-the-scenes tour for their $5k pledge), they’re both giving people cool prizes for backing the project and creating a situation where people need to act quickly.

Giving levels and fundraising incentives are not new to year-end fundraising, nor are they new to online fundraising in general, but tying everything together online in this way isn’t something we do well … just yet.

Fundraising translation: Add an element of scarcity to your your online fundraising campaign (read: donation form and/or campaign micro-site) by adding giving levels as well as incentives, but make sure to create scarcity by introducing smaller amounts of more enticing incentives for larger gifts.

Your turn

Where have you seen social proof and scarcity used well in fundraising? Have you seen any good end-of-year fundraising campaigns using these two persuasion techniques?

The post Kick-start your end-of-year fundraising appeared first on Socialbrite.

A few small changes that get more from online efforts

Guest Blog by Ritu Sharma
Social Media for Nonprofits

Of the $317 billion donated to nonprofits by individuals, currently about 15% is transacted online, but it’s growing at a whopping 35-55% a year. With Facebook now boasting over 1 billion active users and the “value” of a Like now said to be $217 per year for a nonprofit, social media is clearly playing an increasingly important role in helping causes secure the support they need to maximize impact.

We all wish we could raise more money online, but there are a select few tried and true ways for making that happen without investing tons of time or money, both of which are in short supply at just about every nonprofit.

Whether you’re raising money through your website, Facebook, and/or a social fundraising platform, there are three simple things you can play with to optimize your online fundraising efforts. A special thanks goes out to the 100+ presenters who shared these actionable tips with the 3,500+ nonprofits who have attended our Social Media for Nonprofits conferences throughout the country. (Here’s what’s coming up: Austin on Tuesday, Seattle on Nov. 5 and New Delhi on Dec. 5.)

The top 3 tips for online fundraising our presenters have identified are:

Make your donate button shine

1When the online fundraising service Network for Good changed its donate button’s color from gray to red, donations immediately went up by 30%. Sometimes, it’s just that easy. So run a little experiment and systematically change your button’s font, color, and size, then track the results to see what combination gets you the best results.

Default levels are key

2It’s usually important to give potential online donors default donation levels (i.e., $25, $50, $100, $250, and other/fill in the blank) to guide their generosity. But just like with the other tips, embrace data vs. gut; take the time to play around with these levels and see what gets the most dollars rolling in. Every once in a while, deleting these completely can work, although that’s very much the exception to the rule. If you don’t have any levels, integrate them into your efforts ASAP! Also, be sure to plug a monthly sustainer program to generate revenue you can count on throughout the year.

Map donations to impact

3Sally Struthers had at least one thing right: Giving changes lives. But the key is helping potential supporters understand the incremental impact their contribution will have on your efforts. As Kay Sprinkel Grace says, “People don’t give to you, they give through you.” So help make their gift concrete. For instance, a $100 donation may feed 50 children in a particular war torn region, a mere $50 purchases life-saving medication for 60 pregnant women in Africa, etc. Every default donation level must have a specific impact associated with it, but toy around with how you operationalize your impact to gauge what moves people to dig a bit deeper.

We hope you decide to take advantage of these simple yet powerful tips and that you’ll join us at any of the upcoming Social Media for Nonprofits conferences around the world for more insights, tips, and tools. Use the discount code “Socialbrite” to get $20 off your registration rate!

Follow us on Facebook or Twitter for details. Come see great speakers and senior leaders from leading social networks like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Google+, plus nonprofit executives from National Geographic, American Red Cross, Greenpeace, Kiva.org, Story of Stuff, DonorsChoose, and charity:water. To ensure broad accessibility, we keep conference registration fees down to about $100, including breakfast, lunch, and access to the full-day program. Scholarships are always available for smaller nonprofits.

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Techniques to lay the groundwork before approaching prospects

Guest post by Geri Stengel
Ventureneer

Target audience: Nonprofits, cause organizations, foundations, NGOs.

Many nonprofits already use social media, including mobile, to raise money among individual donors. Small donations add up, as Mark Hanis found. His first Facebook campaign raised $250,000 in 2005 for Genocide Intervention Network, now known as Endgenocide.org.

But few nonprofits use social media to build relationships with potential big fish donors. Yup, you can target and build these important relationships by engaging with them through LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. The relationship starts online, but the “ask” happens offline, perhaps on the phone, but most likely face to face.

Building these relationships is hard work, but the benefits are enormous. Effective social media outreach takes at least 25 hours of staff time per week, according to the Ditch Digital Dabbling research report. Hanis has tips for those willing to undertake the task, based on his experience as head of the Genocide Intervention Network:

1Identify prospects using annual reports and gala invites from nonprofits working in that sector, which are among Hanis’ favorite methods. The Foundation Center also recommends reading press releases from nonprofits announcing donors as well as newspapers, magazines, etc. They also recommend using database such as WealthEngine or DonorSearch. The Foundation Center subscribes to DonorSearch so you can use this for free from their library.

2Research which social media these major donors are using. Hanis found that millennials are more likely to use Facebook while baby boomers like LinkedIn. Engage with a prospect using the social medium they use.

3Learn their areas of interest and how engaged they are in your cause. The more you know about an individual, the better able you’ll be  to engage them. Both free and fee-based resources to find out more about them are plentiful online. Check out Going Beyond Google to Find and Research Donor Prospects for a list of websites that Maria Semple,  The Prospect Finder, suggests for getting started.

4Engage on an ongoing basis. Cultivating a prospect is not a one-time event. Use social media to engage in a dialog. Get to know the prospect and build a long-term relationship, just as you would in person.

5Coordinate all internal efforts. All departments of the organization need to know what the other departments are doing.

An organization dedicated to “never again” standing by while a genocide occurs — such as those in Europe, Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia, and Darfur — must raise awareness and advocate with as much energy as it raises money. Each department needs to know when the others are contacting a prospect and what they are saying. Too many contracts become irritating. Conflicting statements become confusing. Work together to build a solid, consistent message.

Genocide Intervention Network used  Salesforce, which has a robust contact management system, to keep everyone in the loop about interactions with major prospects.

6Reach out. It’s always best to get an introduction even if you have a relationship through social media. Who do you know who knows the prospect and are they willing to make an introduction? The introduction can take place online. LinkedIn makes this particularly easy to do. However, you can always go old school and coordinate through email or phone.

Don’t know anyone to make the introduction? No problem. Cold calling or emailing isn’t as hard as you think when you share a common interest and your name is already recognized from online interaction.

Hanis will take his experience cultivating big fish donors to the new organization that he is forming, Organ Alliance. Keep an eye on it. When you want to know how to do something, follow the lead of someone who does it well.

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Platform offers free fundraising option & other services

Target audience: Nonprofits, cause organizations, social change advocates, foundations, NGOs, social enterprises, educators, community organizations.

Guest post by Christina Hirsch
Empowered.org

In the fall of 2010, a group of us launched Empowered.org, a free platform designed to help groups making a social impact. Our platform allows organizations to manage members, fund-raise effectively, recruit volunteers, grow organically and share your successes with their community and the world.

We’re made up of a group of passionate and proven leaders from the nonprofit sector, mostly volunteers, who want to share our knowledge to exponentially grow grassroots organizations using effective online strategies. We support nearly every type of service activity, including international trips, local community projects, run-walks and leadership conferences.

How we help the social good community

The Empowered platform allows organizations to conduct all of their fundraising, volunteer coordination, donor reporting, event planning and chapter management on one platform. The secret to our approach is that the Empowered platform can be integrated into your organization’s own website, allowing you to maintain you own branding and design all at no cost.

We believe that fundraising should be free. Because we work exclusively with social change organizations, we know that money spent on fundraising means less money toward the ground projects that make a difference in the world. We’re proud to be completely free for social good organizations, with custom features available at a low pricing.

Organizations can create activities, surveys and events and manage their volunteers with unlimited free access. Unlike other platforms, we allow for all fees, including merchant fees, to be passed to donors during checkout instead of as an additional cost to participating organizations.  This means that not only do we make fundraising free, but organizations can also cover their credit card and merchant processing fees.

How Empowered helped Global Brigades triple its members

Global Brigades, the world’s largest student-led health and development organization, turned to Empowered in 2010 to take over all of their online membership, fundraising and chapter management activities. To date, Empowered has helped Global Brigades to grow its membership by 300 percent!

Most successfully for Global Brigades, Empowered has leveraged social networking to exponentially grow the organization’s volunteer base. Empowered has customized Facebook share options, allowing volunteers to share with their Facebook friends when they have made a donation through direct wall postings and general Open Graph actions. Optimizing social messaging and sharing has resulted in Global Brigades receiving 100 volunteers through Facebook every month and one-third of its donations come through Facebook, all via Empowered’s social share functions.

Global Brigades operates on a chapter model, with hundreds of chapters across North America and Europe, representing thousands of volunteers. Empowered allows organizations to create unlimited “group pages” for their chapters across the world, while all being linked to the organization’s underlying account. This model has allowed Global Brigades to experience viral and decentralized growth with targeted messaging and opportunities to specific chapters and sub groups. Members are able to interact around specific initiatives while still being linked to Global Brigades’ underlying organization account. As a result, Global Brigades has tripled its growth to over 520 chapters with more than 12,000 members – all of whom are connecting, organizing, and fundraising through one centralized and free platform!

See how Empowered can take your membership organization and fundraising efforts to the next level. Visit Empowered.org or contact us at jack@empowered.org.

Related on Socialbrite

• Growing nonprofits and social movements with NationBuilder

• How Salsa Labs enables positive social action

• 24 tools for fundraising with social media

• Socialbrite directory of cause organizations

• Articles by Movements.org on Socialbrite

The post Empowered.org: Out to grow grassroots movements appeared first on Socialbrite.

Twive competition pits cities against each other to see who’s most generous

Guest post by Ifdy Perez
Community manager, Razoo

More than 200 organizations are preparing to bombard the online world with Twive and Receive — Twive combines the words Twitter and Give — a 24-hour fundraising competition on June 14. Twive pits cities against each other in a competition to see which city is the most generous in America, and one of the tools these nonprofits will be using includes Pinterest, the third most-visited social network in the country.

Here’s a list of five ways you can use Pinterest to drive traffic to your online fundraiser that works both for Twive and any other fundraiser your nonprofit starts!

Pin images and videos about what you do

1Through Socialbrite’s John Haydon, I learned that the emotional part of our brains processes images better than words. Tell your nonprofit’s story by uploading pictures or videos from events your organization held, the people and communities you’ve helped, and even of your staff members. Images are all around you — you just have to look for the ones that represent what you do.

If you’re pinning a blog post, make sure you have images on there that Pinterest can capture. Also avoid any copyright issues by using images with a Creative Commons license, such as these on Flickr.

Communicate often and consistently

2For fundraising events like Twive and Receive, communicating to your donors about what you need them to do often and consistently (on Pinterest or elsewhere) is very important because the more you appear in front of them, the more they’ll remember what you’re telling them. Narrow down the primary things you need your donors to support you on. Try keeping the list to three or fewer items.

For example, you may want to ask them to “Donate and Ask Your Friends!” and provide the links so they can do it easily without any confusion. The number of times you communicate to them should be based on how you currently communicate with them. If they’re used to hearing from you once a month, start with that and build up to a couple of times a month or weekly as the event date gets closer.

Create a contest within a contest

3Creating a small contest within your overall Twive and Receive strategy could get your supporters pumped to help you win! You could offer gift cards or other rewards to the person who gets the most pins/likes related to your fundraiser. This could help boost the engagement you get on Pinterest and will get your supporters excited (to help you win a prize on Twive day). Another outcome is that you’ll be directing them to your website, which can increase donations with a strong site.

Respond to every comment

4Part of engaging your supporters is by responding to their messages to you. Answer any questions and comments they leave on your pins. They’ll notice that you acknowledged them, and this will help you build a relationship that can last beyond Twive and Receive. You’ll reinforce the message about your fundraiser by being interactive with your followers. And by doing that, you’re giving them more reason to trust you, support your fundraiser, and become lifetime donors of your organization.

Show you’re relevant and resourceful with boards

5Pinterest is a way for your nonprofit to be a resource for your followers by curating good content they’ll want to read, while you promote the good works of your organization. Think about the major topics related to your nonprofit’s audience. You can have a board of “Success Stories,” “2011 Gala Pics,” or “Video Testimonials.” Make sure the board is topical and clearly tied to your fundraiser/cause’s effort so that it builds value.

A final word

See what the 200-plus Twive and Receive participants are doing to spread the word about their fundraiser! Here’s how to sign up!

The post 5 ways to use Pinterest to promote your cause or fundraiser appeared first on Socialbrite.

36 million pages makes it easy for people to find their favorite causes

Target audience: Nonprofits, foundations, NGOs, cause organizations, cause supporters.

Guest post by Janet Fouts
Social Media Coach

You may have read my post here a few months ago about social fundraising, and I wanted to share a new start-up in this category that has a unique twist.

Founded by Wayne Yamamoto and Jason Culverhouse, both of whom have several successful start-ups to their credit, Charity Blossom has listed close to a million nonprofits on their website. The list of charities runs the gamut from huge multi-national organizations like the Red Cross to tiny, very local charities like my favorite, Town Cats, which may not have the bandwidth to set up fundraising pages on their own. Listings on the site give an in-depth background on the charity based on their Form 990 documentation, so donors can make informed choices and even add comments or update some of the information on the charity, upload photos or discuss the charity right on the page.

It’s about search engine optimization

Charity Blossom brings another card to the table with search engine optimization. The website is designed to maximize the benefit of the extensive SEO knowledge of the Charity Blossom team, and as a result it’s heavily indexed by Google and Yahoo. Charity Blossom already has more than 36 million indexed pages. In the end, this is going to make it very easy for people to find their charities through Charity Blossom and donate. As new charities create a presence on the site and attract donors, it becomes even more visible through social sharing with Twitter and Facebook integration as well as the ability to start a discussion on the site with Facebook Connect.

Says Wayne Yamamoto, CEO and founder of Charity Blossom: “Giving is going online — just like airplane ticket sales, banking and shopping. However, a lot of donation activity is currently entrenched in the offline world. When you give at events, over the telephone, or in response to snail mail, so little actually makes it to ‘doing good.’ We want to change this and make giving, easy, efficient, and even fun. Charity Blossom helps donors help their favorite charities blossom.”

Sharing is giving

Currently they are running a promotion to help spread the word where a donor can invite their friends to donate through the site. For every three friends who donate to whatever charity they choose, Charity Blossom will give $10 to the charity of the initial donor. Some additional details:

How the funds are transferred

Charity Blossom partners with Charity Pass to process funds. Charity Pass is a 501(c)(3) public charity that works with nonprofits to process donations on behalf of donors. The full details of how funds are transferred and fees incurred are in the FAQ on their website.

Charity Blossom accreditation

To make it easier for donors to feel comfortable about donating, Charity Blossom offers a badge of confidence for approved charities to post on their websites. From the website: “Whenever you see the Charity Blossom Badge, you can be assured that the charity has agreed to be truthful and transparent. Only those Charity Blossom members that exhibit trust and transparency can become an Accredited Nonprofit of Charity Blossom and display the Badge.”

For the donors

When a donor makes a donation, it shows up on their Charity Blossom dashboard, where they can easily see who they have donated to, amounts and dates of donations and download a receipt. This means a donor can contribute to several organizations all from their Charity Blossom dashboard and be able to track the receipts easily for tax purposes.

Donors also have to option of donating to a “field of interest” donation. This means the funds will be distributed to Charity Blossom vetted charities.

Have you used Charity Blossom? What do you think?

The post Charity Blossom: Another step forward for social giving appeared first on Socialbrite.

Target audience: Nonprofits, foundations, NGOs, social enterprises, cause organizations, businesses, Web publishers, general public.

Guest post by Carla Chadwick
Creative director, SankyNet

The email marketing and fundraising landscape keeps evolving, and it’s increasingly vital for nonprofits to develop a comprehensive email strategy. We’ve put together a short guide of email best practices to help you better focus their email fundraising and marketing efforts. It never hurts to keep reminding ourselves to focus on the fundamentals!

Here are five tips to keep in mind for your email marketing and fundraising efforts:

1Frequency: There’s a fine line between sending out enough emails to keep people engaged and relay important information, and sending out too many emails, causing open rates to decrease and unsubscribe rates to increase. While it varies among organizations and audiences, a good starting point is ensuring that each constituent typically receives no more than one email per week.

2Subject line: Subject lines should be short; most standards recommend either 35 or 50 characters maximum (including spaces), and testing has shown that shorter is typically better.

3Styling: Always keep web standards in mind to ensure usability. The number of fonts, text sizes, and colors should be limited for the cleanest user experience. Additionally, all text links should be underlined.

4Images: In an HTML email, it is important to include as much text content as possible — the ratio of text to images is a key factor in triggering spam filters. Ideally, images should be gifs instead of jpgs, and images should be compressed so that they are under 250 kilobytes.

5Social media: Excluding fundraising appeals, we recommend including social media engagement in emails, asking people to “like/follow” the organization or “share/tweet” the email.

Email is still one of the best ways to fund-raise and spread your mission online. What are your suggestions on how nonprofits can do email fundraising better?

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Expanding online fundraising options for change-makers of all shapes and sizes

Target audience: Nonprofits, NGOs, cause organizations, social enterprises, community organizations, social entrepreneurs, change-makers, activists, organizers.

Guest post by Tom Dawkins
Co-founder, StartSomeGood

The last half-decade has given rise to many exciting advances in the area of online giving and community building. The Obama for America campaign was powered by an unprecedented flood of small donations. Kiva made microfinance something we could all participate in, and Global Giving connected us to development projects around the world.

A variety of platforms, including Causes, Razoo and Jolkona, now allow nonprofits to leverage the power of social networks to aid in their fundraising goals. But not all nonprofits, or even most. Without an U.S.-based 501(c)(3) charity registration, an organization cannot use most of these sites. And while a newer group of “crowdfunding” (we prefer the term peerfunding) websites, including Kickstarter and IndieGoGo, allow fundraising by all kinds of groups, charities, nonprofits, for-profits and unincorporated organizations, none of these are focused on social impact projects. In fact, as stated in its guidelines, Kickstarter specifically prohibits “charity or cause fundraising.”

So despite the seemingly diverse fundraising opportunities now available, a huge number of potential social change-makers as well as for-profit social enterprises, pre-tax deductible nonprofit startups and unincorporated community groups (for example the Occupy movement) are not well-serviced by by those offerings. To address this gap and inspire more people to get involved in creating social impact, we launched StartSomeGood eight months ago.

The social impact solution

StartSomeGood provides a platform for all social impact initiatives, whether incorporated as a nonprofit or for profit, or not yet incorporated at all, to grow a community of supporters to help fuel their growth and impact.

We are moving social change fundraising beyond the boundaries of tax-deductible organizations and moving peer-funding beyond the creative projects it is most associated with. By allowing all types of social impact initiatives to promote themselves alongside each other, inspiring and mobilizing their communities to make change happen, we hope to speed up the process of social innovation and cultivate a new generation of change-makers.

How it works

StartSomeGood is not simply a clone of existing crowdfunding sites but a unique model designed to suit the needs of social entrepreneurs. Rather than the “all-or-nothing” model ala Kickstarter or “keep what you raise” model of IndieGoGo, StartSomeGood employs a “tipping point” model that better communicates the context of the project’s fundraising needs. Individual entrepreneurs determine the tipping point for their campaign, anywhere from 25 to 100 percent of the total campaign goal. It is only if the campaign reaches this tipping point that pledges are processed.

The architecture of the site also balances fundraising campaigns with organizational profile pages, providing a more stable fundraising home for growing social enterprises and organizations that want to run multiple campaigns over time. Here’s a comparison we put together of some of the leading peerfunding sites.

Inspiring people to give

We believe that the “nonprofit sector” is less important than the “social good sector” — that great world-changing ideas can come from anywhere and that socially minded for-profits can be as effective at bringing about change as traditional nonprofits. We know that important work is being done by unincorporated groups and social change free-agents. We want to break down the silos that say only a specific type of incorporated institution in one country on earth are given access to sophisticated online fundraising tools. We want to dispel the myth that being tax-deductible is the most important driver of giving behavior because, truth be told, below a certain threshold it simply doesn’t matter.

What are important drivers of giving behavior? Great stories, inspiring visions for a better world, a personal connection to an issue and relationships with people affected or involved are just some of the elements we know inspire people to contribute to a social good initiative. These elements are powerful, irrespective of tax status. More important by far are the ideas, inspiration and credibility of the entrepreneur doing the asking.

This is why we prefer calling what we do peer-funding rather than crowdfunding. “Crowd” implies an anonymous, atomized group of individuals. But this is not who will support your project. Your supporters will be your existing networks and the wider cultural and geographic communities connected to your initiative. We prefer to think of these people as collaborators, or peers, in making change happen.

If you are passionate about an issue facing your community, have a unique vision to share and the commitment to implement it, we would love to hear from you. StartSomeGood might be the toolkit you have been looking for to raise the funds you need and get started.

Related

• What social fundraising means for your nonprofit (Socialbrite)

• Social fundraising tools: Our top 5 picks (Socialbrite)

• Fundly: Tap into your supporters’ social networks (Socialbrite)

• Rally: Raise money for your favorite cause (Socialbrite)

• HelpAttack!: Unleash the charitable power of social media (Socialbrite)

The post StartSomeGood: Grow your social impact appeared first on Socialbrite.

Microsites can be a powerful tool for online fundraising and marketing

Target audience: Nonprofits, NGOs, cause organizations, social enterprises, brands, foundations, educators, Web publishers, creative directors.

Guest post by Carla Chadwick
Creative director, SankyNet

Let’s face it: Nonprofit websites often suffer from multiple personality disorder.

There’s the “program” side that wants to tell you all the amazing ways your programs help save homeless pets, feed the hungry, find cures, protect our children, or empower women. There’s the “events” side that must sell tickets. And don’t forget the “communications” side, whose press releases and news items help raise awareness. While often a complicated web of messaging, it’s a necessary evil when many departments must relay information using a single corporate website.

So as fundraisers, how can we tell the real story – expose the true heart of an organization – when our messaging is only one part of a huge multi-dimensional website? The answer is simple: Create a microsite that allows you to focus on a particular topic, present specific calls to action and, with the help of social media, reach large numbers of people much more quickly than a traditional website.

When done correctly, a microsite can be one of the most powerful storytelling tools available to fundraisers. But don’t take my word for it, here are some examples of wonderful and highly effective microsites.

3 examples of successful nonprofit microsites

Abolish Child Trafficking

1Covenant House is the largest privately funded agency in the Americas providing food, shelter, crisis care and essential services to homeless and at-risk kids. In an effort to mobilize their existing activists and acquire new ones, Covenant House developed a microsite that digs deep into the issue of domestic child trafficking.

Through the stories of four young victims, the A.C.T. microsite raises awareness of a crisis that affects thousands of American kids each year and issues an urgent call to action. Clear, concise information, bold statistics and striking graphics help further engage the audience and dispel the misconception that human trafficking is a trend confined to foreign soil.

While the content makes a strong case for giving, the main goal of this campaign is to use the broad reach of Facebook, Twitter, email and free infographics to help raise awareness. There is a valuable lesson to be learned in this strategy. Microsites do not have to be used solely for fundraising. Even though microsites cost money to develop, there are times when building a solid warm-prospect list is a legitimate goal that deserves the investment.

NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund

2Problem: How do you educate people about racism in the post-Obama era? For the Legal Defense and Education Fund (LDF), America’s first and foremost civil rights legal organization, the solution had to be educational, factually accurate and, most importantly, compelling enough to remind people that the fight for equality is not over.

LDF decided to tell the story of minority Americans – in 38 states across the country – who still face obstacles at the voting booth. Their microsite revealed documented, widespread threats to voting rights in America and effectively weaved localized challenges into a broad picture of the problem.

Any one of these local challenges may be too small to spark a national call to action, but when combined, they serve to rally a renewed commitment from LDF’s constituency.

This microsite allowed LDF to take a complex issue like voting rights and break it down into small, easy-to-understand pieces. The site also enabled the Legal Defense and Education Fund to break out of its normal website messaging mode and dig deeper, providing more detail, substance and emotion. The Voting Rights microsite shows that often the greatest impact is made with a singularly focused story.

Making AIDS History

3Dedicated to ending the global AIDS epidemic, American Foundation for AIDS Research (amfAR) has invested nearly $325 million in innovative research and awarded grants to more than 2,000 research teams since 1985. It has increased the world’s understanding of HIV and helped lay the groundwork for major advances in the study and treatment of HIV/AIDS.

While finding a cure for AIDS is the driving force behind amfAR’s work, their motivation comes from the sum of 50 million personal stories of heartache, courage and triumph over adversity. To help mark the 25th anniversary of their founding, amfAR decided to share a handful of these stories on the Making AIDS History microsite. With compelling video and a simple call to action – a $25 gift in recognition of amfAR’s 25 years – this microsite encourages a renewed, collective commitment to the organization.

Making AIDS History is an example of how a microsite can complement its parent site and act as a powerful fundraising tool at the same time. While the main website establishes amfAR as a world leader in HIV/AIDS research, their microsite connects donors to the people who have benefited from the research.

Is a microsite right for your organization?

There is no question that microsites allow you to effectively tell the story of a single compelling issue – one that is important to your organization and the people you serve. They can easily take off, gathering new supporters for your cause and generating many types of action. They are also just as effective for mobilizing your existing base and serve as a starting point for engaging people in social media conversations.

But don’t jump on the microsite bandwagon just because other nonprofits are doing it – make sure you put some careful planning in before deciding if a microsite is right for your organization.

Only use microsites when you have something urgent to say, when you feel a specific topic or area deserves specialized attention and when you’re willing to set aside or reduce your core messaging. It’s true that microsites allow you the freedom to break away from your normal brand – but remember, you have to give a microsite as much attention to detail as you would a flagship site. You need to create a good design, you need to do keyword research and SEO, you need functional/practical on-site navigation and ultimately you need to have a compelling story to tell.

We are all looking for innovative ways to reactivate our existing audiences and cultivate new ones. The more we can provide constituents with interactive ways to connect with us, the better we will be in growing our communities. While microsites are an investment, they are a powerful tool in the new age of online fundraising and marketing.

Has your organization had success in building a microsite? Please share your experience in the comments.

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