I can’t believe it, but SXSW Interactive rolls around again this weekend. I found still-unpublished notes from last year’s Future of volunteerism, Adapt or Die session. Woops! They’re sloppy but fun to revisit so I’ll go ahead and post.
Virtual Relay for life – awareness, advocacy, fundraising
running in parallel, not a replacement
complementary – reaches new constituents
Amer. Cancer Society
National Geographic
March of Dimes – Story telling is a big part of engaging volunteers in social spaces – stories are about babies, preventing birth defects.
Every baby has a story – people can tell stories about their babies.
Flaws from Amer. Cancer Society
-fragmentation – recruiting volunteers different ways for different divisions – moving from Kansas to NYC would give a volunteer a different experience
– no one under 60 wants to stuff envelopes, they want to be more active
– don’t miss opportunities based on location – developer example
– 2 million volunteers – active groups on the ground, driving people to treatments, etc. But no nationwide strategy to communicate
What they’ve shifted to
– new campaign “a little time, a lot of good” (sounds like microvolunteerism!)
– talent strategy officer now
– if they want to keep volunteers, they have to find new jobs for those volunteers
– online team shares for events
“your PR and marketing person isn’t your webmaster, need chairperson for each event online”
-created Facebook volunteer recruitment, building applications that let Facebookers get credit for gathering volunteers.
-opened an “office” in Second Life
–Frozen Pea Fund – yay Austin connection through Connie Reece!
-Youtube has more “social” people uploading video, growth is exponential
– Pew study says 2007 22% shot their own video, 14% posted it online
– looking for case study on usability for the new site
Be honest, be responsive, spot trends, speak up.
Technology and non-profits can go hand-in-hand.
Yahoo now selling ads based on time spent and depth of engagement.
Email asking them to take an action – if they actually place the phone call, the level of engagment is superior.
– they don’t ask much but when they do, they really show up.
Peace Corp – government – nervous about the Internet.
Red Cross – They had volunteers build up the Second Life presence, were able to show money was raised there, they didn’t hire anybody. And with sweat equity and extra hours spent, they could be on Second Life despite their general counsel being very nervous about it.
Metrics – number of friends, money raised, page views.