This unique twist of combining daily deals with philanthropy has led Sharing Spree to 500% subscriber base growth since January, and even better, the site has now donated $167,000 to non-profits and schools.
Launch a social media campaign that will build your brand and deliver results in our online Social Media Marketing Boot Camp starting June 7. Speakers include Abigail Cusick (Bravo Digital), Gregory Galant (Sawhorse Media), Alex Leo (Thomson Reuters Digital), Jim Tobin (Ignite Social Media), and many more. Read the reviews. 
Ed Trimble is the CEO and founder of Endorse for a Cause. Endorse for a Cause is an online community that encourages consumers to shop and share while earning money for their favorite social cause. Social Times had a chance to talk with Trimble about Endorse for a Cause, social media for philanthropy and charity, and the future of this space.
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You can now support your favorite charity with the click of a mouse using Endorse for a Cause. This new social media / philanthropy platform was launched last week, and connects consumers with charities using social networking and online shopping to encourage people to show their support. Each purchase that a user completes – either directly through Endorse for a Cause or through one of the more than 500 retailers – sees a percentage of the money spent go towards a charity of the user’s choice. While philanthropic shopping isn’t new, Endorse for a Cause is unique in how it leverages user’s existing social networks to promote charity. Below the jump, a detailed look at how you can shop for a cause.
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The flood that devastated Pakistan earlier this month was worse than the 2009 earthquake in Haiti, the 2006 Kashmir earthquake, and the 2005 Asian tsunami – combined. Peanut Labs, the only provider of surveys for Facebook Credits on the network and the largest survey providers on the web, is mobilizing its network for an ambitious fundraising effort to alleviate some of the hardships the Pakistani people are facing as a result of this natural disaster. From now until August 31st the company is running a Facebook fundraising campaign to raise $25,000 (and see this amount matched by a donor), and to raise awareness about the lack of international will and media coverage that this tragedy has fostered.
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While the uninitiated may think of virtual worlds as an escape from real-life, the effects that virtual worlds have on our selves and the world around us beg to differ. There are many ways that virtual worlds impact the real world, but one of the most profound is through awareness and fundraising campaigns. Charities and non-profits have a growing presence in virtual worlds, often teaming up with the creators to run world-wide events to raise real money for a good cause. The reach that a charity can have on a virtual network as opposed to real-world is wide, and often results in more impact for less money. Here are five successful examples of non-profits that have made a real-life difference while raising awareness and money on virtual worlds.
Social networks and geolocation services have proven to be immensely useful tools in the service of non-profits and fundraising campaigns. We’ve compiled a list of three ways that social media is being used to raise funds and awareness for the people and environment affected by the Gulf oil spill, and each illustrates the power of community, marketing, and communication that social media is known for.
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Each in its own way, two consumer products companies launched Facebook campaigns to engage consumers in their charitable causes. The Clorox Family of Toilet Products has partnered the World Toilet Organization (WTO) to launch “Flushing for a Cause,” a campaign to bring attention to the issue that nearly 40 percent of the world does not have access to toilets. And Southern Comfort announced its campaign to aid the Gulf Relief Foundation to help the fishing community and support wetland preservation in Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana.
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Last week Tim O’Reilly keynoted at the Web 2.0 Expo and rather than promoting all the potential that Web 2.0 provides, he criticized developers for investing many of their resources on building completely useless applications. From throwing sheep to chugging beer, many of the applications have not provided much substantive value. The question that I have is if it is really the developers who are at fault or is it the users that download and install the applications that should be criticized?
Over the past couple years, a large movement has been brewing on the web. With the help of social technology, internet users now have access to over 1.4 billion individuals (Source: Internetworldstats.com). With all of this connectivity, we figure that there must be some way that we can drive change like never before. We have seen the launch of Change.org, Idealist.org, Zaadz.com and a whole slew of newer services that help individuals drive change.
Just last year when Facebook launched their platform, Causes was launched by Sean Parker and Joseph Green and the team has been working to try to drive the number of donations being given through the application. We still have a long way to go though. If you take a look at the top cause on the Causes application, there are over 3.375 million members supporting “Support the Campaign for Cancer Prevention” and $72,697 has been donated. This amounts to approximately $0.02 raised per user.
Advertisements could have easily generated more than $0.02 per user. So can social networks be used to drive change, if so, how?
It’s clear that there is a ton of untapped potential in social networks to drive change. As Tim O’Reilly pointed out, much of that potential is being funneled into ways that individuals can waste time. Can we really be disappointed by our escapist desires? So far, I have yet to find a single social network which has truly impacted the world in a way that idealists believe social networks could positively impact the world.
Simply through their existence, web-based social networks help to spread democratic ideals and help individuals around the world share their experiences with others. I’d suggest that as a whole we have yet to develop effective metrics for measuring change. Right now Causes could use dollars generated as one metric, but how about the application’s ability to drive users to action?
This is just one metric and I’m sure that there are hundreds of others. We all have that gut feeling that social networks can drive substantial change. Some of them already are but frequently we end up creating a network of individuals that talk about change rather than do something about it. While passive change is one form of change I have a feeling that there is a lot more opportunity out there.
What ways do you think social networks can more effectively drive change? How can we measure the impact?
