Facebook: To Promote or Not to Promote? (…and Is That The Question?)

Posted by acarlman on October 2nd, 2012

GlobalGiving’s Experiment With Promoted Posts
by Alison Carlman and Oscar Norsworthy

This case study was originally posted on Beth Kanter’s blog as an example of an experiment with social media measurement. We hope you’ll find it useful as you think through your strategy for Facebook.

Promoting a post on Facebook

Listen. Post. Learn. Repeat.

On the Unmarketing team at GlobalGiving, we put a lot of effort into figuring out how to use Facebook to support the thousands of charity projects on our website. The more we learn, the better able we are to advise our nonprofit partners. One of the newest features on Facebook is the “Promoted Post.” Promoted Posts are pictures, links, videos, or text that administrators can pay to appear on more Facebook users’ news feeds. (Did you know that only an average of about 15% of your fans see your posts in their news feeds?) We conducted a month-long experiment to see if Promoted Posts make sense for our strategy.

First Thing First: What’s our Goal?

We wanted to see whether or not Promoted Posts help us reach our goals on Facebook. One way to explain our Facebook strategy is the social funnel. People interact with us on Facebook at all levels of this funnel. While ultimately we’d love to see every fan make a donation to a project on our website, our goal on Facebook is first and foremost to develop an active community of fans around the topics of philanthropy and social change. We wanted to see how well Promoted Posts reach our fans on all levels.

Here’s what success – or a positive return on investment (ROI) – at each of the levels would look like for us:

 
The Social Funnel
 Awareness: Getting our messages into the news feeds of people who haven’t heard from us in a while – or never have before. Key metric: reach
Engagement: Inspiring interactions (clicks, likes, comments and shares) from people who don’t usually interact with us. This helps the content spread to their networks.Key metric: clicks
Donations: Telling a story that is compelling enough that people give to a project on GlobalGiving.org. (Ideally donations exceed the cost of the post!)Key metric: donations; net dollars after the cost of the post.

 

Our Promoted Posts Experiment

During the summer we promoted three posts, each about a different topic. We spent less than $100 on each post, and we only promoted the posts to our fans. We also posted regular (non-promoted) links and photo posts related to each of the three topics so that we could compare the performance of regular posts versus paid posts. While we couldn’t control all variables, we did our best to aim for consistency with as much as possible, including the time of day we posted and the content of the post, so that we could draw better conclusions when comparing our results.

Below are the nine updates (under three topics) that we posted this summer as part of the experiment, and how they fared in terms of reach (views), engagement (clicks), and donations (dollars). You can see that the promoted posts were the only ones that drove donations, and they drove significantly higher view and click rates.

ROI: Reach, Engagement, and Donations
From Regular and Promoted Posts on Facebook

Post Topic: Natural Disasters
(Promoted Post net revenue= $667)

Link 4,035 views; 62 clicks
Photo 5,483 views; 66 clicks
Promoted 20,282 views; 218 clicks; $750 donations

Post Topic: Everyday Project Stories
(Promoted Post net revenue= -$30)

Link 3,311 views, 24 clicks
Photo 6,347 views; 58 clicks
Promoted 22,498 views; 301 clicks; $30 donations


Post Topic: Special Campaign
(Promoted Post net revenue= $550)

Link 4,204 views; 51 clicks
Photo 4,975 views; 45 clicks
Promoted 31,510 views; 363 clicks; $600 donations


What we learned

We learned two main things from our experiment. First, as you can see above, promoted posts did drive more engagement at all levels of the social funnel. On average, our promoted posts had five times higher reach and seven times higher click rate (!) compared to posts that weren’t promoted. The financial return, however, varied greatly based on the content of the post. We found that promoting general, ‘everyday’ project stories didn’t drive many donations (in fact, it lead to a negative net financial return), but promoting very timely stories or unique campaigns resulted in a significant uptick in donations (netting approximately $600 per post).

Perhaps the most interesting thing we learned actually happened while we were designing the experiment. When figuring out whether to promote links or photos, we found that photo posts drove more Facebook interaction, achieving a higher reach and better overall engagement (the middle of the funnel!). On the other hand, posting links sometimes led to higher click-through rates to our website, generally driving more donations (the bottom of the funnel!). When we looked back in our Facebook Insights data, we found that this pattern seemed consistent with other posts over the past several months. This information is useful to us whether or not we’re talking about promoted posts.

What does this mean for our strategy?

We found that Facebook’s Promoted Posts can get the job done, successfully driving both engagement and donations. It’s important to note though that we’re still not planning to rely on Promoted Posts to push all our fans through the social funnel.

At GlobalGiving we have an “unmarketing” approach to engagement. This means that we believe there’s inherent value in developing authentic, meaningful, and helpful relationships with our audience through social media to help tell our story. In short, it’s not all about driving dollars. Engagement is important to us.

We’ve concluded that an ongoing Facebook strategy based primarily on Promoted Posts wouldn’t be savvy or sustainable, (remember how the ‘everyday’ project stories posts actually ended up costing us money?) but we’ve decided that we will continue to promote posts when they are particularly timely, relevant, or important for our key audiences. We should also be sure to note that we’ll never be promoting content that would otherwise have been unsuccessful on Facebook in general. As you can imagine, the last thing we want to do is bring irrelevant content to the attention of people who rarely hear from us anyway!

What does this mean for you?

If you can find the budget to experiment with Promoted Posts, it’s important to think through how you’ll measure your return on your investment. Can you put a dollar value on message views, click-throughs to your website, or goal conversions (donations, petition signatures, etc.)? If you’re spending advertising dollars on other media, you may find that Facebook Promoted Posts can also help you meet your goals, so it would be worth comparing your results.

Our fans told us emphatically on Facebook, they don’t love the idea of nonprofits paying for a spot on their news feeds. (The irony, of course, was that we didn’t see a single pushback to the promoted posts when we did them without pointing it out, so peoples’ behaviors didn’t exactly match how they said they would react. But that’s a whole different social psychology experiment, right?) If you do choose to promote Facebook posts, you’ll need to do strategically. You should only promote content that you’re proud of, and it would be wise to measure the results carefully so that you can prove that your dollars are helping you meet your overall goals!

If you don’t have any budget for Promoted Posts, you could still look into your Facebook Insights data to see the different types of engagement that photo posts drive for you compared to link posts. Does your data lead you to the same conclusions that ours did?

Do you have thoughts about whether links or photos get you results on Facebook? Have you experimented yet with Promoted Posts?

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October 17th Bonus Day

Posted by Alexis Nadin on September 13th, 2012

GlobalGiving is excited to host our third and final Bonus Day of the year on October 17, 2012. GlobalGiving’s previous Bonus Day was a huge success with projects collectively earning $350,449 and $100,000 in matching funds!

See below for complete Terms and Conditions as well as tips for successfully mobilizing donors this Bonus Day!

Bonus Day Terms and Conditions

  • Bonus Day begins at 12:01 am EDT on October 17, 2012.
  • GlobalGiving is offering a 30% match on all donations up to $1,000 per donor per project.
  • There is $50,000 in matching funds. Once funds have been depleted, no more donations will be matched.
  • The organization that raises the most funds on Bonus Day will receive an additional $1,000 from GlobalGiving.
  • The organization that has the most unique donors on Bonus Day will receive an additional $1,000 from GlobalGiving.
  • Projects must be approved and live on the GlobalGiving.org website by October 12th  to be eligible.
  • Only online donations (credit card or PayPal) are eligible for matching. Donations made by check or text-to-give are not eligible.
  • Donations made on www.globalgiving.co.uk or any GlobalGiving sites (including Nike, Eli Lilly, Global Action Atlas, etc) are NOT eligible for matching.
  • Unique donors are determined using numerous criteria, including name, email address, credit card number, mailing address, and IP address. We are monitoring these and other parameters in our system to ensure that only unique, distinct donors are counted towards the donor bonus award.
  • GlobalGiving maintains the right to make a final decision on all matters concerning bonus awards and matching.

PLEASE NOTE:  Matching funds ran out very quickly in our June Bonus Day. We expect funds to last longer this October 17th—we ended last year’s October Bonus Day with $13,000 to spare! But we encourage you to get donations in early.  Be creative! Take into account your time zone and ways that you can motivate donors to give early in the day (or even the night before).

As we plan for 2013, we are considering ways that we can ensure that Bonus Day is beneficial for every organization and donor—even if funds run out early! Thank you for your suggestions. Stay tuned for more announcements about Bonus Days in 2013.

Tips on mobilizing donors

1. Give your donors advanced notice. Let them know about the Bonus Day a week in advance.

2. Identify advocates. Ask them to help you spread the word about Bonus Day. Consider giving them a specific goal—to raise $1,000 or to recruit 10 donors. Offer an incentive—a small gift, website recognition—to your supporters for fundraising on your behalf.

3. Post a project report. Your project reports are emailed directly to your donors. Use them to notify your supporters about this matching opportunity. Project reports are emailed the day after they’re approved.

4. Email your supporters early on Bonus Day. There are limited funds available for matching! Matching begins at 12:01 am EDT. Get started early! Emphasize the match and the importance of giving now.

5. Make sure that your project link is easy to find and sends donors directly to your project.

6.  Build excitement on your Facebook and Twitter! Ask your fans and followers to donate and spread the word. Update them throughout the day with your progress. Ask donors to comment once they’ve made a donation.

7. Reach out to your large donors personally. GlobalGiving will match up to $1,000 per donor per project on Bonus Day. Reach out to your large donors via email or phone.

Questions?

Email Katherine Sammons at ksammons@globalgiving.org.

 

Posted in Campaigns, Fundraising Tips, GlobalGiving | 1 Comment »

Human Centered Design with Sean Hewens

Posted by Alexis Nadin on September 13th, 2012

We were lucky to have Sean Hewens from IDEO give a webinar on human-centered design and storytelling in the social sector. If you were unable to attend Sean’s webinar you can find a link below which will take you to his recorded presentation and slides. Sean shared valuable information on storytelling, including 5 reasons to tell your story and shared 11 tips on how to effectively get your message out. Please find the link to Sean’s webinar here.

Why Tell your Story?

1)      Creates excitement. Telling your story gets people excited about your project.

2)      Telling a story promotes the continuation of your project. Storytelling assists with documentation. This is especially helpful if you are a volunteer run organization.

3)      Helps others learn from your successes and failures. Admitting to your failures and sharing this with others is beneficial to the learning process.  Sean suggests referencing AdmittingFailure.

4)      A good story makes a great prototyping tool. It can help you imagine the future. Sean suggests using stories during your organizational and project design process.

5)      Stories are a great synthesizing tool, allowing you to focus on key parts of an event.

11 Tips for Telling a Good Story

1)      Stop trying to write, just start writing instead. It can be difficult to get started, but just go for it!

2)      Simplify

3)      Know your audience. Ask yourself who you are telling your story to, ex: volunteers or donors? Tailor your story depending on the audience.

4)      Have a beginning, middle and an end.

5)      Have a central message. Be concise.

6)      Have a goal for your story. Try to finish this sentence when deciding why you are telling your story. “This story will be successful if…”

7)      Make is personal. Don’t be afraid to have a point of view.

8)      Powerful stories touch hearts, not just minds. Numbers are great to have, but heart is important too.

9)      Paint the scene. Little details can make a huge difference.

10)   Pair your stories with powerful photos and videos. Take lots of photos and videos. You never know which photo will capture that moment!

11)   Don’t just talk about the good parts of the story. People learn more from mistakes. This is one of our values here at GlobalGiving as well. Listen.Act.Learn.Repeat. .

For more resources on human-centered design feel free to reference IDEO’s human-centered design tool-kit, which can be found here.

Posted in Trainings | Comments Off

Who’s Who on the GlobalGiving Project Team

Posted by Alexis Nadin on September 12th, 2012

This month, we are excited to welcome Katherine Sammons, a new Program Associate on the Project Team at GlobalGiving! Katherine just recently joined GlobalGiving full time after several months of interning with GlobalGiving this past summer. She comes to us with a Masters in Social Work from Boston College. Over the past several years, Katherine has worked for organizations here in the U.S. and overseas, including the Jesuit Refugee Service and SEIU.

We’re excited to have you on the team, Katherine!

Now that we have this exciting new addition on our team, we’d like to pause to introduce you to the entire team and to share a little bit about the work we each do here at GlobalGiving!

If you’re currently a partner of GlobalGiving, you should get to know…

Alexis Nadin
anadin@globalgiving.org
Alexis provides one-on-one support to our partners. She’s here to help your organization succeed in fundraising on GlobalGiving

Alexis also manages the In the Field Program, which sends well-qualified interns and volunteers to visit GlobalGiving’s partners overseas.

Katherine Sammons
ksammons@globalgiving.org
Katherine manages GlobalGiving’s fundraising campaigns and promotions, including Bonus Days. She also organizes and hosts GlobalGiving’s monthly trainings.

Katherine is here to help you with your questions about tools, promotions, and trainings on GlobalGiving.

Britt Lake
blake@globalgiving.org
Britt oversees GlobalGiving’s relationships with and services for current partners. She is in charge of GlobalGiving’s disaster response and she manages the Storytelling Project, an experiment in building community feedback loops.

 

If your organization joined GlobalGiving through an Open Challenge, you’ve probably worked with…

Manmeet Mehta
mmehta@globalgiving.org
Manmeet oversees GlobalGiving’s Open Challenges, including the due diligence process and fundraising training.  She also manages relationships with a network of strategic partners.

 

Sonja Lehner
slehner@globalgiving.org
Sonja manages Open Challenge related communication, training, and customer service. She also manages the due diligence renewal process.

 

If you follow GlobalGiving’s experiments, you’ve probably heard of…

John Hecklinger
jhecklnger@globalgiving.org
John oversees the Project Team. He seeks programmatic growth capital and works collaboratively with several platforms for good, while exploring and managing other exciting experiments. He champions GlobalGiving and our partners around the world by speaking at events and identifying new opportunities for collaboration and growth.

Marc Maxson
mmaxson@globalgiving.org
Marc implements the Storytelling Project, an experiment in building community feedback loops.  He also conducts background checks on hundreds of organizations each year via our due diligence process and field visits and provides fundraising training in East Africa.

Posted in GlobalGiving | 1 Comment »

tohoku recovery 100% matching campaign – november 1-15!

Posted by Britt Lake on September 12th, 2012

GlobalGiving is excited to host the Tohoku Recovery Matching Campaign starting November 1st to 15th this year! Starting at 12:01 am EDT on November 1st (13:01 pm JST on November 1st) GlobalGiving will match online donations at 100% made to projects that are related to earthquake and tsunami recovery activities in Tohoku, Japan. Qualifying organizations will receive an email from GlobalGiving with more information about participating. If you are working in the Tohoku region and have not received an invitation to participate, contact Mari Seto at mseto@globalgiving.org.

  • All donations will be matched 100%

What are the terms for the Matching Campaign?

  • All donations will be matched 100%;
  • Matching Campaign begins at 12:01am EDT on November 1, 2012 (13:01 pm JST on November 1st) until November 15, 2012 at 11:59pm EDT (13:59pm JST on November 16) or until funds run out.
  • There is $100,000 in matching funds. Once funds have been depleted, no more donations will be matched.
  • Only organizations that are working on relief or recovery efforts in the Tohoku region of Japan are eligible for these matching funds. GlobalGiving reserves the right to approve all projects included in the campaign ahead of time.
  • GlobalGiving will match up until $1,000 per donor per project through Nov 15, 212 until matching funds run out;
  • GlobalGiving will match up to $25,000 per organization.
  • The project that raises the most funds during the campaign will receive an additional $1,000 bonus grant from GlobalGiving.
  • The project that has the most unique donors during the campaign will receive an additional $1,000 bonus grant from GlobalGiving.
  • Projects must be approved and live on the GlobalGiving.org website by October 29th to be eligible;
  • Projects that located in Japan, but not working on Tohoku-related issues will NOT eligible for this matching campaign.
  • Only online donations (credit card or PayPal) are eligible for matching. Donations made by check or text-to-give are not eligible;
  • Only donations made at www.globalgiving.org are eligible for this match. Donations made on www.globalgiving.co.uk or any GlobalGiving corporate sites (including Nike, Eli Lilly, Global Action Atlas, etc) are NOT eligible for matching.
  • We encourage you to get donations in early, because matching funds will likely run out before the end of the campaign.
  • Unique donors are determined using numerous criteria, including name, email address, credit card number, mailing address, and IP address. We are monitoring these and other parameters in our system to ensure that only unique, distinct donors are counted towards the donor bonus award.
  • Please note that GlobalGiving maintains the right to make a final decision on all matters concerning bonus awards and matching.

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Photos and Stories on GlobalGiving

Posted by Alexis Nadin on August 20th, 2012

At GlobalGiving, we believe that using vibrant and compelling photos is one of the most effective ways to share your organization’s mission and message. Through imagery and stories, your current and prospective supporters can learn about the value of your work and the impact that you’re having on peoples’ lives.

We also believe that, as members of the global nonprofit community, we all have an obligation to protect the integrity and the rights of children and vulnerable individuals, and to protect the intellectual property rights of photographers and reporters. For this reason, we would like to outline some guidelines for the use of photos and stories on GlobalGiving’s website.

Protecting the Integrity of Children and Vulnerable Communities

Whenever possible, GlobalGiving chooses to share images and stories that instill hope, optimism, and promise. Check out our email newsletters and our Facebook page for examples. We know from experience that our supporters respond well to impact. They want to know how our partners are already having a world-changing impact in communities around the world.

We are also determined to make sure that we are not playing a role in perpetuating any steryotypes or promoting a sense of pity that negative photographs and stories can sometimes portray.   We know that behind every photo is a person or a community that is deserving of respect and dignity.

We have borrowed from UNICEF’s Principles and Guidelines for Ethical Reporting on Children and Young People under 18 years old and Guidelines for journalists and media professionals from the International Federation of Journalists to create our suggested guidelines for using photos of children and vulnerable individuals:

  • Do not publish a story or an image that might put the individual or peers at risk even when identities are changed, obscured or not used.
  • Explain the purpose of the photo and/or interview and its intended use to the individual. Use fair, open and straightforward methods for obtaining pictures and request consent of individual or a responsible adult, guardian or caregiver.
  • Do not further stigmatize any child or individual; avoid sensational stereotypes or categorizations that expose people to negative reprisals – including physical or psychological harm or discrimination or rejection by their local communities.
  • Always change the name and obscure the identity of any child who is identified as:
    • A victim of sexual abuse or exploitation,
    • A perpetrator of physical or sexual abuse,
    • HIV positive, living with AIDS or has died from AIDS, unless the child, a parent or a guardian gives fully informed consent,
    • Charged or convicted of a crime.
    • A current or former child combatant,
    • An asylum seeker, a refugee or an internally displaced person.
    • Consider carefully the consequences of publication of any material concerning children or vulnerable adults.
    • When in doubt about whether an individual is at risk, report on the general situation rather than on an individual, no matter how newsworthy the story.

In addition to these suggested guidelines, GlobalGiving asks that you do not post photos on the website that portray severe or extreme injuries, illness, emaciation, or death, nudity, or sexual activity. In some cases, these restrictions may apply to photos of animals as well.

Complying with Copyright Restrictions

According to GlobalGiving’s Terms and Conditions, which are signed and agreed upon by all of GlobalGiving’s partners during the due diligence process,  “GlobalGiving shares the copyright with you to the project content and other media (pictures, video, etc.) uploaded to globalgiving.org and will attribute content used to your organization.”

It is your organization’s responsibility to ensure that you have the expressed permission from the photograph subject(s), photographer, and/or owner(s) to use the photo. Our assumption is that your organization has all of the relevant rights to any photos or stories that you upload to our website. We reserve the right to use any photos that are uploaded to our website for the purposes of promotion and fundraising, under the condition that those photos are properly credited to both your organization and GlobalGiving.

What does this mean? Your organization may not upload photographs from news outlets or other online sources without either purchasing the rights to the photo or otherwise obtaining permission from the photographer or copyright owner to use the photo.

GlobalGiving is committed to respecting the opinions and wishes of our partners. Should we have any questions or concerns about a photo that you have posted on GlobalGiving, we will contact you directly. GlobalGiving reserves the right to make final decisions about content on the website and to remove photos or stories that we deem inappropriate.

Questions? Feel free to contact us at projecthelp@globalgiving.org

Posted in GlobalGiving, GlobalGiving Tips | Comments Off

How to Double Your Recurring Donations

Posted by kconroy on July 31st, 2012

We’re constantly experimenting with GlobalGiving.org in order to improve the website for all of our users, and we do our best to listen to (and act upon) your feedback. We’ve heard you tell us that monthly recurring donations of smaller amounts are more valuable than once-off donations; that recurring donations are a more reliable and sustainable source of funds that help you budget and plan. Therefore, we decided to undertake an experiment to figure out how we could get more recurring donations to more of your projects.

Since last November we’ve been trying to see if there’s a really good way to convert someone who was going to make a one-time donation to a project into a monthly recurring donor during the checkout process. With the help of several behavioral economists we conducted three rounds of testing with more than 20 different test conditions, all aimed at increasing recurring donations on the site.

Today we’re pleased to make two big announcements as a result of this work: first, we’ve found a way to double the rate at which donors sign up for recurring donations and second, we’re going to implement this finding into our site as a permanent feature.

How We Doubled Recurring Donations

We experimented with a number of different calls-to-action to get donors to upgrade to recurring donations. Thanks to a generous donor who was interested in this experiment (and who prefers to remain anonymous), we were able to offer matching funds as a part of the experiment.

Here’s how it worked: when donors added a project to their giving cart on GlobalGiving for $100 or less we presented them with one of our experimental offers.

First, we tried just asking them nicely to upgrade. Although our mothers’ would be proud of our manners, donors didn’t respond and hardly anyone switched from a one-time to recurring donation.

Then, we tried offering a simple 1-to-1 match offer:  “Upgrade to a recurring donation and we’ll match it.” This worked well, but was only slightly better than not even asking donors at all.

Finally, after many rounds of testing, we found that the most effective offer was to leverage the social pressure of groups. We said, “If 75% of donors who see this message upgrade to a recurring donation today, we’ll match all of their donations.” What we discovered is that when we created a sense of collective responsibility and shared reward, donors were twice as likely to upgrade to a recurring donation (compared to us not having asked at all.)

How We’re Helping You Raise More Money

Based on this finding, GlobalGiving is pleased to announce that starting today we will be making this an ongoing offer for every project on GlobalGiving.org.

To be clear, this offer is very different than our typical matching or Bonus Days in which every single donation is matched. Our goal with this new recurring matching opportunity is to take our limited supply of matching funds and use them to convert donors who would have made one-time donations to your project into monthly recurring donors for your project, giving you a steady stream of donations that you can use to plan and expand your services.

In order to prevent anyone from abusing this offer in an attempt to get matching funds, we’ve set up a few terms and conditions which you can read at the link below: http://www.globalgiving.org/recurring-donations-matched/

More Donations To Your Projects

So what should you do differently as a result of this offer? Not much. Keep promoting your project and asking your supporters to donate to your GlobalGiving project like you have been. When your supporters come to make a donation they’ll see the offer and, on average, twice as many will set up recurring donations. (Remember: As stated in the terms and conditions, although your organization’s staff and board of directors are welcome to make recurring donations to your project, they are not eligible for matching funds.)

GlobalGiving will track everyone that sees the offer and upgrades and we’ll disburse matching funds for eligible donations with your regular monthly disbursements. These matching funds will appear as “Recurring Matching Funds” on your disbursement reports. In fact, many of you may have already seen these very funds in your disbursements over the last few months as a part of our experiments.

You can read the full terms and conditions on the recurring matching program at http://www.globalgiving.org/recurring-donations-matched/

We’re committed to listening to your feedback, experimenting, and learning in order to help you  raise more funds for your projects. As always, if you have any questions or comments about how we can better do so, please contact us.

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Mobilizing Votes for the Photo Contest

Posted by Alexis Nadin on July 25th, 2012

A big thank you to all the organizations that submitted photos to GlobalGiving’s Photo Contest! Our outside judge, Bud Force  is currently choosing the finalists; we can’t wait to see the results!

Katie Meyler from More than Me Foundation  (the winner of GlobalGiving’s past two Photo Contests) hosted an insightful and energetic webinar on July 18, 2012.  Katie shared tips on getting supporters excited to vote for your photos.

If you weren’t able to attend the webinar you can find some of Katie’s tips below.

Mobilizing Voters

  • Think outside of the box! Instead of solely using e-mail to contact prior supporters build your network by getting potential supporters involved in person.  Go to a coffee shop with your lap top and ask people to vote right then and there.
  • Identify enthusiastic staff members or volunteers who feel comfortable talking to potential supporters and getting them to vote for your project’s photo. This is a great volunteer opportunity! 
  • Use social media.  Even though voting will not take place on Facebook, you can still send your Facebook connections the link to the Photo Contest on the GlobalGiving site.

Finalists will be notified by July 30, 2012! Get excited to mobilize!

If you have any questions, please email Katherine Sammons at ksammons@globalgiving.org

Posted in Campaigns, Trainings | Comments Off

Join Girl Effect Challenge!

Posted by Britt Lake on July 9th, 2012

We are excited to announce that GlobalGiving is again partnering with the Nike Foundation to run the Girl Effect Challenge! Does your organization want to take part in the Girl Effect Challenge? Read on for more information on the Girl Effect and how your organization can take part before the July 20 deadline.

http://cloud.globalgiving.org/pfil/2150/pict_large.jpg

What is the Girl Effect?
The Girl Effect is a campaign that harnesses the unique potential of adolescent girls to end poverty for themselves and the world. Almost 8,000 donors have already given almost a million dollars to the Girl Effect Fund, which currently supports twelve GlobalGiving projects! This is your opportunity to get your organization included in the Girl Effect Fund.

What is the Girl Effect GlobalGiving Challenge?
The Girl Effect Fund features innovative projects addressing the challenges adolescent girls are facing around the world. GlobalGiving, in partnership with the Nike Foundation, will host the Girl Effect Challenge to select 12 organizations to be included in the Girl Effect Fund for one year. Organizations featured will receive donations through the Girl Effect Fund (current Girl Effect Fund organizations are on track to raise over $30,000 each this year!)

Organizations must have a project that specifically targets marginalized girls ages 10-19 living in developing countries, and must incorporate one or more elements of Girl-Centered Design described in this handbook. The full Terms and Conditions are here.

The Girl Effect Challenge will take place from November 1-30, 2012. During this Challenge you’ll have a month to raise funds and the top six organizations with the most unique donors will be included in the Girl Effect Fund for a full year.

Six additional organizations will be selected by a Girl Effect expert panel, giving preference to compelling projects that are particularly innovative, inspirational, or effective.

You must fill out an expression of interest form before July 20, 2012 to be included in the campaign. The expression of interest form will ask general questions about your project, project beneficiary information and project activity information. The form is one page long and all questions can be found here. You’ll be notified if you’re eligible to participate no later than August 6, 2012. And since you’ve already been vetted by GlobalGiving, all you’ll have to do to participate is post a new project or continue fundraising for your active, eligible project that’s already on GlobalGiving.org during the Challenge dates!

Insight from a Girl Effect Fund winner!
A big thank you to Project Leader Erika Keaveney of Lotus Outreach for taking time to share insight on being part of the Girl Effect Fund!

How has the Girl Effect Fund helped Lotus Outreach?
Erika exclaimed that the “Benefits are transformative!” And the “Effects are tremendous!”

Winning a spot in the Girl Effect Fund helped Erika’s organization reach more girls and as a result ensures hundreds of girls are kept in school.

What are some of the benefits of participating in the Girl Effect Challenge?
Some of the benefits include: Public Relation opportunities, engagement of board members and financial growth.

Erika encourages organizations to take part in the Girl Effect Challenge if they are ready to mobilize!

We look forward to seeing your application and learning more about your organization and the work you do to support adolescent girls! Please send any questions you have to girleffect@globalgiving.org.

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Announcing GlobalGivingTIME–connect with online volunteers!

Posted by Alexis Nadin on July 3rd, 2012

GlobalGiving.org is excited to introduce GlobalGivingTIME, an online volunteering tool that gives you quick, easy and entirely cost-free access to a pool of enthusiastic and skilled online volunteers for advice and support. For the past year, GlobalGivingTIME has been available to organizations through GlobalGiving UK. We are happy to announce that GlobalGivingTIME is now available to all organizations on GlobalGiving.org!

What is GlobalGivingTIME?

GlobalGivingTIME is an online platform where GlobalGiving partner organizations can post small, short-term volunteer tasks (called microvolunteer opportunities) that can be accomplished completely online in less than 2 weeks.

GlobalGivingTIME is powered by Sparked, an American organization that facilitates online volunteering. Sparked is used by individuals and corporations to identify easy-to-do online volunteer opportunities. It is a great tool to connect with skilled, short term volunteers.

What can I get help with?

Graphic design, translations, HR, Marketing. The sky is the limit! You can get help with just about anything! Previous project leaders have received help creating new logos, ‘thank you’ notes, reviewing mission statements and newsletters as well as translating documents. GlobalGivingTIME volunteers are happy to use their experience and expertise to help you if you’re struggling with a task.

Who are these volunteers?

GlobalGivingTIME is used by professionals all over the world, and across all manner of fields.

One of GlobalGiving UK’s key corporate partners, Aegis Media, is running a campaign during the 2012 Olympics on GlobalGivingTIME to encourage their employees (17,000 worldwide!) to share their knowledge, skills and expertise to help you with your most pressing tasks.

How does it work?

Step 1. Start by clicking here or go to www.globalgiving.sparked.com on your browser.

Step 2. Click on ‘Apply to join here’ below ‘GlobalGiving partners’.

Step 3. Tell us what your cause is and click the blue arrow on the bottom of the screen to contine!

Step 4. You’ll then be asked about your needs. Click on the blue arrow to continue once you’ve filled those in. Don’t worry: your tasks don’t always have to be limited to your top 3 needs!

Step 5: Fill in your organization’s details and start posting ‘challenges’ for the volunteers!

GlobalGivingTIME Olympic Challenge

During the London 2012 Olympic games, GlobalGiving and Aegis Media will be hosting the GlobalGivingTIME Olympic Challenge. Aegis employees from all over the world (17,000 in total!) will be answering challenges on GlobalGivingTIME every day as part of a special company-wide promotion. What’s more, employees will also be making financial donations to some of the NGOs they work with.

Want to learn more about the GlobalGivingTIME and the Olympic Challenge?

Introductory Webinars

GlobalGiving UK is hosting webinars on Monday, July 9th and Wednesaday, July 11th to help you post exciting and engaging challenges on GlobalGivingTIME and to learn more about Aegis Media’s Olympic Challenge.

Click here to register for Webinar 1: Monday 9th July, 12 pm EDT (This time in your city)

Click here to register for Webinar 2: Wednesday 11th July, 4 am EDT(This time in your city)

Posted in Campaigns, External Opportunities, GlobalGiving, GlobalGiving Tips | Comments Off

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