Philanthropic Revolution: Helping Haiti With (the Mobile Phone in) Your Own Two Hands

When the Indian Ocean tsunami struck in 2004, people donated by writing checks or charging their credit cards. In 2005 when Hurricane Katrina destroyed New Orleans, people primarily donated by writing checks or charging their credit cards. When the 7.0-magnitute Haitian earthquake occurred on January 12, 2010, Mobile Accord’s mGive platform was processing more than $10,000 in text pledges per minute during peak donation periods on behalf of the Red Cross’ “Text HAITI to 90999 to give $10” campaign. In only 48 hours after the earthquake took place, the American Red Cross had fundraised $5 million—12 times the amount sent via text messaging during Hurricane Katrina. As of yet, the campaign has raised over $29 million.

There are several reasons why the Red Cross text donation campaign (as well as other organizations’ coinciding text campaigns) has been so successful so quickly. People are adapting quickly to this new texting channel because of its convenience, and because mobile giving essentially eliminates all excuses for the time-poor. Anyone with a mobile phone and SMS capabilities (99% of all mobile users) can make a donation in a minute or less—anytime, anywhere. Furthermore, there’s no fear of privacy leaks when transmitting credit card information online since your text donation is added to your service provider’s monthly bill.

What’s different about today and a few years ago is not people’s willingness to lend a hand (or penny) during times of disaster; what is different is their ability to. The amount of mobile users makes for the largest reach. There are more mobile subscribers (270m) than television households (112m) or internet-connected households (220m) nationwide. Mobile phones are additionally one of the few items that people generally keep on their person. The device enables you to effortlessly send a text donation to aid relief in Haiti, and for smart phone users, also spread the word via integration of the internet, and Twitter and Facebook apps.

Obviously more than green paper is needed to truly make a difference in Haiti. We need doctors, volunteers, facilities, transportation, housing, communications and water purification capabilities—the list goes on. There isn’t much the average American can do to bring more doctors to Haiti or provide transportation where it’s most needed. Despite being a bit strapped for cash in this dismal economy, the average American can, however, give a small and painless donation by texting a 5-digit word to a 5-digit number.

KEY POINTS:

There are some laggards who still don’t understand the purpose of texting or why on earth anyone would want to blog or join Twitter, for example. And that’s fine, I suppose. On the other hand, communication and connectivity are fundamental elements of human nature. We were designed to connect with each other based on shared experiences, and mobile technologies, as well as social networks, are simply facilitating this communication while making it easier to connect with more people faster. The public’s response to the Haiti earthquake is proof of this: The flood of text message donations (that continue to roll in) in addition to the innumerable tweets and status updates in response to the earthquake are unprecedented. Mobile phones and social media tools have given the individual the potential to make a far bigger philanthropic impact than ever before. At one point, Facebook reported incredible 1,500 status updates per minute including the word “Haiti.” These tools have allowed individuals to share their philanthropic efforts and remind the friends, family members, peers, and colleagues within their networks—who they would probably not call otherwise—to do also their part.

There is also an important marketing lesson to be learned here. No matter what the purpose of your marketing is or what action you want your target audience to take—whether it’s to raise money for a non-profit to benefit a national disaster or to solicit customer feedback regarding a recently launched product—your most successful media channel will be the one that virtually eliminates all or most opportunity costs for that donor or customer. There’s a reason why the most commonly used keyword in Twitter mentions about “text to Haiti” is “donate.” In the simplest of terms, it’s easy. It’s doable. It’s affordable. It requires little to no time, and it still makes a difference.

Facebook, Twitter, mobile technology all facilitate communication. They make it easier to say the things we already want to say, and make it easier for us to say it to more people. If you want your message to spread like wildfire, influence people in the spaces in which their conversations are taking place.

Where do you want your message to be?

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And if you haven’t already, please choose from one of many possible ways to text a donation to Haiti relief.

Related articles by Zemanta

• Burst of Mobile Giving Adds Millions in Relief Funds (innovationtoronto.com)
• Is mobile giving a good idea? (slate.com)
• Facebook Helps Spur Donations to Haiti (insidefacebook.com)
• Haiti Text Donations To Red Cross Pass $5 Million (huffingtonpost.com)
• Burst of Mobile Giving Adds Millions in Relief Funds (nytimes.com)

Tagged as: 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake, Add new tag, American Red Cross, facebook, Haiti, Hurricane Katrina, mGive, Red Cross, twitter