I was in New York this past weekend and saw this truck on the street. Capitalism has a way of co-opting movements. Is this what environmentalism has come to already?
American Jews, like Americans generally, opened their hearts and wallets to help in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. A lot of the giving went through the Red Cross, but for many Jews it was important to find a Jewish response. In reaction to this desire, the main organs of Jewish philanthropy set up funds to help.
But here we are, two years later. New Orleans is in trouble. The response to Katrina from all levels of government has been inadequate. New Orleans had problems long before the hurricane and the destruction only has exacerbated a long list of problems.
I am very excited to say that a new continuing Jewish response to help New Orleans is being launched by AVODAH: The Jewish Service Corp. AVODAH puts young Jews to work in a year-long program of service. While working locally, these folks live communally and study both how to make change in the world and the Jewish connections to social justice. Right now, AVODAH has houses in New York, Washington and Chicago. Starting next fall, AVODAH will be in New Orleans putting “boots on the ground” to help the city recover.
I am on the national Board of Directors of AVODAH and yesterday, in an all-day meeting in New York, we decided to greenlight the expansion to New Orleans. We will need to raise money for this effort, and there are lots of logistical challenges. But we all felt that in running a national service program we could not avoid addressing New Orleans. Our broader goal is to invigorate Jewish life in America with the values of service and we hope that this effort can help energize a new generation of Jewish leaders to step up and act.
Learn more about AVODAH and make a donation while you’re at it. And if you think New Orleans isn’t still in need, have a look at this recent piece by Robert Greenwald.
I diluted my own opinion in my last post. What I said I wanted was a way for people who are part of YouTube’s nonprofit program to be able to collect email addresses and not just donations. YouTube doesn’t do that. You will only get someone’s email if they actually donate. I then said, well… maybe it would be OK if they allowed you to connect like in Facebook.
The problem is, YouTube isn’t Facebook. While there are people who use YouTube as a pure social network, the majority of YouTube users are passive viewers of video. So connecting through the traditional social networking type of connections doesn’t have the impact on YouTube as it would on Facebook.
So, back to my original request. YouTube knows the email addresses of every registered user. With a single click, a user could give their information to the nonprofit, through YouTube. That would be a huge benefit to the nonprofit and I think it would prove to be much more valuable than the donation functionality they have given. It could be a double opt-in — meaning the individual would first have to click on the opt-in on the video page to give their name to the nonprofit, then they would get an email from YouTube giving them a link to confirm that this is what they wanted to do. In this way, no one would mistake their opt-in for spam.
We can thank Google for giving nonprofits access to Google Checkout. But a cynic might point out that Google is trying really hard to get people used to using Google Checkout and so this gift has a self-serving feel to it. Add to their functions the ability to really give the nonprofits something of value — a relationship with individuals on their own terms — then we could really celebrate the Google/YouTube Nonprofit initiative.
As part of the new YouTube for Nonprofits, Google has integrated Google Checkout donation processing for organizations in the program. What this means is that if you are in the program, viewers will see a “Donate” button both on your channel page and when your video is playing in a standard page.
Here’s an example in the channel page:
24 Hours for Darfur Channel
Here’s an example on the standard video page:
24 Hours for Darfur standard view
If you are a 501(c)3 it’s a no-brainer to sign up. Why not?
What we don’t know yet is whether it will work. If a decent percentage of people who view a nonprofit video actually give, then we have a revolution on our hands. The viewers/donors might look similar to what we see on Facebook causes but we will wait until we have some real data before speculating further.
What we at See3 would like to propose to Google is an addition to their nonprofit program that could greatly enhance the value to organizations. We all know that a newsletter sign-up or advocacy ask is an easier ask than a donation. Imagine if next to the Donate button we had a “Join This Cause” button. And when a registered YouTube user clicked on it, the email address (and other info) of the user was transfered to the nonprofit. (Like with comments, the system could tell a non-registered user that they needed to register.)
Another approach — not as good for the nonprofits but maybe more acceptable to Google — would be more like the Facebook approach. Don’t give me their email, but connect me to them through the social network. I think there has to be something more than Subscribe — which they already have. There has to be a way to say, “I am a supporter, but this doesn’t mean I have to watch every video you produce all the time.” A one-click to Join would have the most benefit if it enabled the nonprofit to message the viewer on a regular basis beyond pushing out new videos.
Facebook has taught us that people will opt-in to support the cause far more than they will donate. You can see the evidence in the mostly small donation totals in the Causes application.
Maybe we can make this request to Google through out friends and partners at NTEN. What do you think Holly?
I saw Bruce last night at the United Center here in Chicago. It was mostly great, as I knew it would be. What struck me was how emotional some of the songs were for me and for other people in the audience. Bruce’s stories of fighting authority, finding your way, hitting the road… for many of us who grew up with these songs when coming of age they had a powerful impact. Listening to him sing them, and the crowd sing along, brought up strong feelings of loss and possibilities — lost opportunities, about a future that seemed so far away and so open into a present that can often feel constrained by mortgages and responsibilities. And I felt old — certainly looking at all the geezers in a crowd.
He is powerful because he is authentic. And this is rule #1 of storytelling that you can take with you to your nonprofit work. Be real and it will have power you can’t manufacture.
Another thing to note: Several times last night he mentioned the Chicago Food Depository. I assume he is doing that in each city, calling out a local charity and giving them some love as well as allowing them to collect donations at the concert.
Here’s Bruce doing Thunder Road 32 years ago. Same Bruce doing Thunder Road last night. A little more gray hair, but same band, same energy.
The last session at the Convio Summit in Austin was well attended, and a fun way to finish the event on Friday. Called “Web 2.0 – New Outreach and Fundraising Techniques,” the topic of this workshop is something every nonprofit marketing manager and online communications professional wants to talk about. The presenters were Carie Lewis of the Humane Society, and Tim Fullerton of Oxfam America, who both gave great insight on what’s happening in the trenches – actual day-to-day examples of how nonprofits can work online communities to gain new supporters, coming directly from the people writing the blog posts, friending people on MySpace, and testing new strategies.
Carie opened with an intro to social media. She says social networks are “not just a bunch of lonely teenage boys.” 84% of people comment, 82% message others, and 39% create content. She notes that people really rely on social networks for influence on decision-making. To me, this confirms as viable the strategy of finding those community leaders who will carry your torch for you, and then messaging them with content to distribute to their friends. She acknowledged it can be very time consuming, and reiterated a suggestion See3 often makes to our clients: get interns and volunteers!
Both HSUS and Oxfam’s primary efforts are on what Carie calls “the big four”: MySpace, Facebook, YouTube, and Flickr. I agree based on sheer traffic volume, the first 3 are no-brainers for any nonprofit to start. However, neither Carie nor Tim discussed social bookmarking or social news strategies in any depth, and Digg, Stumble Upon, and del.icio.us certainly have enough traffic to warrant a deep approach.
On MySpace: Both Oxfam and HSUS prove what we already know from Greenpeace and others – MySpace is a great place to get new advocates. How did they get so many friends? One at a time. When she started the MySpace page, Carie literally requested friends one by one. Tim started by seeing who was already talking about Oxfam. They recommend spending an hour per day building your network. Oxfam now has a very nice custom page. They both use the MySpace blog, which reminds us again to speak to the community where they are, don’t try and drag them over to your main blog. HSUS is now getting 200 friend requests/day. Of the people that friend them, 29% found their page via search, and 13% came from their website. If you are a small organization, you won’t get that traffic. But 36% discovered them through a friend’s profile. This shows the viral potential of raising awareness in the social networks. Tim says MySpace is not good for fundraising, although we have seen some examples of orgs running successful fundraising campaigns, such as Dollars for Darfur.
On Facebook: I think everyone agrees it’s very early. So far, the only real strategy to analyze besides creating groups is the Causes application. Tim says it’s great to see thousands of people join the Oxfam cause, but he does not know who those people are and has no way to follow up with them. Carie says HSUS has raised $20k through the Causes app, though I’m not finding that in my search of Causes. Regardless, very few orgs (though some) have raised real cash via the Causes app. Developing custom Facebook apps may be the way to go, as already discussed on this blog.
On YouTube: everyone loves video. Oxfam ran a campaign against Starbucks with a video being crucial to the resulting success. HSUS ran a video contest during the outcry over the Michael Vick story that received 22 submissions, over 43,000 views of the contest intro video (featuring Hulk Hogan), and garnered 2,000 new list members. They ran their contest on YouTube, but See3 has a private label, fully customizable video contest hosting, management, and marketing solution.
On blogging and blogger outreach: They both moderate every single comment on the blog (they recommend not to allow auto-posting), and someone responds personally to each comment. They also suggest: make it personal, using your real voice; don’t reprint press releases or other web stories; be concise (advice I am not following here 
). There was a question from the audience on blogger outreach, from someone who got no traffic from buying an ad on a relevant blog, and got no love from the blogger either. Carie and Tim say customize and personalize each message to bloggers, warm them up, and sell your story. Carie suggests offering exclusivity on a news story in return for promotion, and reminds us to always ask them to link back to your blog. Shana Glickfield of Issue Dynamics Inc., a blogger and consultant on blogger relations, added that your first contact with a blogger should not be an ask. You should touch base with them prior to your campaign, send them swag and information of interest on an ongoing basis.
On Second Life: Tim and Carie both say stay away. I say wait for the MacArthur Foundation’s year-long exploration of the role of philanthropy in virtual worlds, and for significantly increased daily activity on Second Life, and in the meantime focus on video and other live action social media opportunities.
The best part of this is the news crawl at the bottom:
Some final thoughts from my trip to the Convio Summit this week:
1. Some commentators misread notwithstanding, the Convio Open initiative is significant, and the Facebook application builder, while not nearly perfect or complete, represents a great short-cut to building a custom application for Facebook for most Convio customers. Having content go directly from your CMS to your Facebook application pages makes having a Facebook app much more manageable to most and keeps the interactions with Facebook users within your primary CRM tool.
2. I am not sure going public will be a good thing for Convio. On the plus side, raising $80+ million can go a long way toward building out a more robust product, buying competitors, beefing up marketing, etc. On the downside, there will be new pressures for short-term performance that might not always be in the customers’ best interest.
3. The founder of GetActive, the software company that merged with Convio earlier this year, is leaving. Sheeraz Haji became the President of Convio when the merger was announced, but at the summit in Austin, through a video message, Sheeraz said he was leaving. (He just had a kid, so he couldn’t make the trip.) My guess, the whole merger was a way for Sheeraz to exit and find the liquidity in an IPO they could never have achieved alone. Lets hope Sheeraz decides to do something innovative in the nonprofit space. And lets hope that enough of the great spirit of GetActive survives in Convio.
4. I have heard that many GetActive customers have received a lot of hand-holding and positive experience with the whole migration issue to the Convio platform. What I heard at the summit was that this is not the universal experience. To have a successful IPO, Convio must be successful in the migration of GetActive customers. If enough of them bolt, the public market will have issues with this offering.
5. Convio is growing annually at more than 50%. Given how small they are relative to Blackbaud (which has over $200 million in annual revenue and a billion dollar market cap), it’s not enough for them to be a successful public company. I don’t see how Convio can get enough top-line revenue with their existing product in their existing market, without taking every Kintera customer — and that’s not going to happen. Threats are everywhere — for example… Salesforce + third-party applications being one, and an increasingly robust Drupal + CiviCRM being another, plus all kinds of low-end players. So, expect to see Convio adding some new products or reaching out to some new markets to get the growth they will need.
6. Quentin Tarantino is the man. He came into the Tex Mex place I was in on Wednesday night in Austin. (Guero’s Taco Bar, for you Austin people.)
7. The team at Care2 are great. I enjoy hanging out with them. While lots of people run in lots of Web 2.0 directions, the folks at Care2 are focused on giving nonprofits clear ROI for their fundraising and advocacy dollar. If you are a progressive organization, an environmental organization, an animal organization or a medical organization, you should talk to the folks at Care2 and see how they can help you grow your list.
I just left session about Convio open. I will write more about the API later, but everyone is really there to see the Facebook opportunity.
Convio has built a Facebook application builder as part of their Open initiative. For organizations on the Convio platform, the Facebook application is a no-brainer and a HUGE improvement from Causes.
The main difference between Causes and the Facebook application powered by Convio is that with Convio your application on Facebook will have all of your content delivered directly from your Convio database and CMS. So the pages of your app have your content and to change this content all you have to do is use the Convio backend in the way you would normally do. Causes uses information created within their program and data from Guidestar. It doesn’t allow people to take your organizational actions or sign-up for your newsletters the way Convio’s application does.
They have also made it easy to build.
There are a couple of limitations to this. First, you can only create one Facebook application. So if you have different initiatives going on, you can’t create different applications for each using this tool. My assumption is that you could custom build a Facebook application using the API, but if you wanted to use their Facebook connector, you would have to only have one. Another thing mentioned in the session is that using conditional content is complicated. So it might not be so easy to deliver specific messages to specific people within Facebook the way you might elsewhere.
It will be interesting to see how many organizations roll this out in the coming months and to track the success with it.
Some video I shot with my Flip:
Intro to Facebook and their application builder:
Why Convio’s Facebook app builder is better than Causes
Today is the first full day of the Convio Summit. More than 700 people are here in Austin, both clients and partners, to learn about what Convio is up to, and to learn from each other about best practices for nonprofits online.
This morning’s keynote address was from Convio CEO Gene Austin. He made an engaging presentation, the highlight of which was his demo of their Facebook application. He started by putting on a baseball hat backwards, saying he needed to get into his Facebook clothes. He then described (in a very funny way) how upset his college-age kids were by being “friended” by their father on Facebook.
I am genuinely impressed by what I am seeing here. The main thing for me is the level of transparency they show in terms of issues. Gene Austin talked about issues they had this summer with their infrastructure, he talked about their “patient investors” and the IPO as a way to reward them in addition to being fuel for further grown, and he talked about the GetActive merger in a very transparent way, admitting that some things were good from Convio and some things better from GetActive and that it took a couple quarters for them to figure out where they were taking it.
The biggest buzz here is about the API and the initiative they call Open. “The proof” of the success of the Open initiative, Gene Austin said, will be 12-18 months from now — when we see what people are doing with it. The other thing he did that was interesting was take a big swipe at Blackbaud. He said, “we got religion” on the issue of openness. Our product can stand on it’s own and we are confident. Blackbaud, in contrast, wants you to only use their products and only live within their system. “We don’t think that’s good for the environment.”
In addition to conections to Facebook, they have built connections to Raiser’s Edge (without the benefit of a Blackbaud API). They have also built connections to Flickr, a Plaxo tool for importing contacts and Salesforce. He described how much easier it was to work with Salesforce, with a published API, than to work with Blackbaud.
More to come from the Convio Summit 2007
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