How can one little individual make a BIG difference? Siouxsie Jennett, the President of Mambo Media, is on the board of the Clackamas Women’s Services (CWS), an organization that provides critical services to survivors of domestic and sexual violence. She brought that question to her Mambo team, challenging them to create a social media fundraising campaign that could be used as a pilot, with the ultimate goal of creating a campaign template for board members and other organization advocates to replicate in the future.
Campaign Strategy
Because the ultimate goal was to create a template that could be easily replicated across a diverse group of people, we needed to make sure the campaign achieved the following objectives:
- Easy to understand and communicate to a large group
- Takes little time to execute
- Requires no special technical skills
- Leverages advocate’s social network
- Costs nothing up front
- Lasts no more than one month
The following components were developed for the campaign:
PERSONAL FUNDRAISING PAGE SOLUTION: We evaluated several personal fundraising page options and based on cost of service, ease of use and sharing tools we chose Crowdrise. Siouxsie then created a Crowdrise profile that included a personal message about the organization and why she supports it.
CAMPAIGN DOLLAR GOAL: We set the goal of $1,000 to be raised over one month, exclusively through Siouxsie’s Facebook network.
CAMPAIGN TIMING/THEME: We chose the very-short month of February and created the “Love Shouldn’t Hurt” campaign to capitalize on Valentine’s Day and love themes that are typical for that month. Additionally, February is Siouxsie’s birth month so she was able to capitalize on messaging around that for her friends.
ONE-MONTH MESSAGING CALENDAR: We created a one-month messaging calendar that supported the campaign and included relevant content and calls to action and a schedule that Siouxsie would use throughout the month. All outbound messaging would be disseminated via Facebook posts.
Facebook post example
- Hi Friends! In honor of my BIRTHDAY month, I am asking you all to forgo the Tiffany jewelry and donate to my favorite local charity. I am trying to get to $1000 by the end of the month. Any increment would help this amazing organization that helps women and kids in really tough situations. Please take a moment right now and donate!
Penetration of Tiers in Siouxsie’s Network
Siouxsie assigned each member of her network to a tier, to determine where her donors came from:
- Tier 1 = Immediate friends and family. Think mom and best friends.
- Tier 2 = Casual friends and acquaintances. Think workmates or friend of a friend you met recently at a party.
- Tier 3 = Very distant relationships, not connected for many years other than “friend” on Facebook. Think girl in Calculus class that helped you through the final 15 years ago.
Siouxsie’s donors came from:
- Tier 1: $859 74.4%
- Tier 2: $ 60 5.2%
- Tier 3: $236 20.4%
RESULTS!
- Siouxsie wrote a total of 17 Facebook status updates and spent a total of approximately 3 hours of her time to the campaign, and there was no cash outlay
- The campaign raised 116% of goal during the course of the campaign, for a total of $1,155
- The average donation from her 19 contributors was $60.79
- We now have an easy-to-follow campaign template that will be used by the board later this year
- The campaign received donations from Tier 1, 2 and 3 of Siouxsie’s network
This social media campaign proves the power of personal networks and issue advocacy, and presents a fantastic opportunity for resource-strapped organizations in their fundraising efforts. If just a few people dedicated time and savvy to raising funds on behalf of their nonprofit organization, social media could change nonprofits’ business model – and the world!
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