In 2008 we’ve been privileged to work on many issues ranging from human rights to health, from women’s issues to technology, from poverty to the environment, from education to the arts.

At the end of the year, we have a lot to celebrate.

With the end of the year approaching, we created a special video that captures one of the most popular trends in online video we saw in 2008. “The Girl Effect” did it best, and you must see it in order to truly enjoy our end-of-the-year homage.

Please watch our holiday video, “The Regift Effect“, and then tell us what change you want to see in 2009.

Thank you for another wonderful year!

“With the economy currently in crisis, your support is needed more than ever.”

If you haven’t read these words, you probably will. Every organization is feeling stressed by the economy, wondering how they will make their budgets in these tough times. And because everyone is feeling it, it makes sense to talk about it, right? We should remind people that it’s particularly important in a tough economy to support us, right?

Wrong!

M+R Strategic Services has done some important research with their client testing language about the economy.

Here’s the money quote:

What are other nonprofits doing to stay the course? One M+R client recently tested two versions of a special appeal: One simply stated the need for funds for many reasons, but did not make mention of global financial crisis. The other appeal led with a brief sentence stating that the current global financial crisis has made the need even greater. Both email messages had identical open rates, but the email with the mention of the financial crisis received 20% fewer click-throughs, and a 12% lower response rate than the email that did not. The lesson learned? Reminding your constituents of the current economic crisis, even when it is topical and strengthens your case for giving, does not make donors more likely to give, and may actually turn them away from giving.

Link [M+R Strategic Services Report]

There have been videos around that use words and music only to make a point. The best of these is a video called The Girl Effect. It is really the only MUST WATCH video of this genre.

Here it is:

Since this is so moving, many folks have watched it and then thought — hey we should make one of these about our issue. OK, listen to me. ENOUGH!

Starbucks did their knock-off (ripoff):

And it’s a shame more people have seen the Starbucks video than the Girl Effect video.

Then we have Toms Shoes… which did their version:

I was notified of the Toms Shoes video from one of our production staff who said “Can we pledge not to do this?”

Of course you have the Twin Cities United Way getting into the act:

And I got a tweet saying, what do you think of this video. I think, stop it!

If you have more of these examples, post them in the comments. And if you are thinking of doing your own Girl Effect video… do something original. Think of your story and find your voice, you will be much better off.

Tweetsgiving was one of the first Twitter campaigns designed to raise money. Built around Thanksgiving, the idea was for Twitterers to tweet (post) something they are grateful for, and at the same time post a link to Tweetsgiving where a donation could be made to build a classroom in Tanzania. The goal was $10,000.

The highlights:

* $11,021 raised from 364 donations

* 15,830 Total Pageviews from 7,563 Unique Visitors in 101 different countries

* over 100 press and blogger mentions

Not bad! This all happened over a very short period of time.

Some thoughts on why it was successful. It was designed FOR Twitter — not just something put on Twitter. The goal was SPECIFIC — a classroom, not support of an organization. (Don’t forget that no one gives to your organization, they give THROUGH your organization to make change.)

It cost almost nothing to do this, just the guts to try and the time.

I am sure we will see more on this front. What are you inspired to do now?

Link [Tweetsgiving and MeshugAvi Blog]

Vinay Bhagat, Founder & Chief Strategy Officer over at Convio has a new blog post about why to invest online in the tough economic times we are having.

A couple of points he makes:

“Direct mail-based donor acquisition has been getting more difficult and more expensive due to postage rate increases, mailing list fatigue, postal mail delivery challenges, and shifting consumer preferences.”

“As direct mail-based fundraising has become less effective, online fundraising has grown significantly.”

“Much of the online fundraising growth has come from new, younger donors. Online donors are typically 15 years younger than direct mail donors.”

[Younger doesn't have to mean young. Often this age gap means that online donors are in their 50s while direct mail donors are in the their 70s]

“If there is a silver lining in the economic cloud, it is that consumers and nonprofits are aligning around the online channel. Given its growth, it is imperative that nonprofits invest appropriately in the online channel to realize its full potential.”

And a very important point:

The value of online marketing should not be measured solely by money raised online. There is increasing proof that online marketing attracts new donors and influences existing offline donors to give more. At the 2007 Convio Client Summit, Jeff Regen, VP Online Marketing & Communications at Defenders of Wildlife, shared how the organization uses online advocacy as a way to attract new constituents, and subsequently deploys a multi-channel approach using email, direct mail and telemarketing to convert non-donor activists to donors.

At See3 we are more and more managing campaigns designed to use compelling creative (often including video) to reach people and get them to affiliate first. It is then the job of the email strategy — primarily — to deepen the engagement leading up to an ask for a gift.

Link [Convio]