Last Thursday, the Toronto Cause Marketers Meetup group gathered at the Centre for Social Innovation to hear a case study presentation. Talking with our thumbs: text message campaigns for nonprofits featured a presentation by Andrew Delaware, National Director of Marketing and Communications for the Canadian Foundation for Aids Research (CANFAR). For those who weren’t able to attend, I’m sharing my notes on the experience here.
First of all, the event was a veritable roundup of cause marketers reflecting the full spectrum of nonprofit sub-sectors:
- Evergreen
- Credit Valley Hospital Foundation
- Barbra Schlifer Commemorative Clinic
- Dignitas International
- Art of Living Foundation
- Earth Day Canada
- TechSoup Canada
- Annex Cat Rescue
- Kids Help Phone
- Canadian Physiotherapy Association
- Canadian Cancer Society
Participants expressed an interest in the potential for text message campaigns for fundraising, promoting programs or services, raising awareness and any other way this technology can help a nonprofit organization.
Andrew covered the basics of text message campaigns, along with the ups and downs of CANFAR being Canada’s first nonprofit to go live with a text campaign – days after the Mobile Giving Foundation made its foray into the Canadian marketplace!
Some of the basics:
- The Mobile Giving Foundation (MGF) is a charitable organization that serves as the link between a charitable giving campaign, the wireless industry and wireless users. MGF channels funds, set standards and ensures compliance with regulations. They are responsible for receiving donations and routing them through to the intended recipient organizations for a 10-cent/message fee.
- Current Canadian service providers are MyThum Interactive, Zipstripe and Atlas Telecom Mobile.
- Fee structures are based on either a flat fee or per/donation.
- Text messages have 136 character limit.
CANFAR’s use of text messaging
To date, CANFAR has implemented two text campaigns: a ‘virtual red ribbon’ campaign in November 2009 and a ‘Have a Heart’ youth campaign in February 2010.
Current limitations
While the potential for text campaigns is there, Andrew described a number of limitations including:
- The awkwardness of text messaging (including character limits).
- The rules and regulations around what can be said. For example, allowable text message responses are standardized with little room for customization.
- Current options available for sending graphics.
- Caps on total amounts: an individual can donate a maximum of $30/mo by text.
- Limited ability to capture donor data: phone numbers only.
The lowdown
Despite the limitations, CANFAR’s experience to date with this technology was significant enough to continue building future campaigns. Like any new channel, there is much to learn and fine tune and other nonprofits will benefit from the learning experiences of pioneers like CANFAR.
Following Andrew’s presentation, the group discussed the potential for text campaigns and the nuances/challenges inherent in their respective organizations. Some point of consideration from the Q&A/discussion:
- Why get on board this early? The earlier your organization learns lessons, the stronger your position will be when this channel becomes more commonplace.
- Like the early days of the internet, now is the time to secure keywords, short codes and vanity short codes for your organization.
- Set reasonable expectations: in the short term, realize that your efforts and funds will be an investment in text-to-donate technology.
- Because these campaigns limit data capture to phone numbers only, find a way to get your audience over to apps and mobile web sites where you can capture more detailed information.
- Perhaps mobile giving is more suited to some agencies (such as disaster relief) than others (such as health organizations). Or is it just a matter of finding creative ways to suggest urgency?
These are just top-level notes from a very rich presentation by Andrew. If you have something to add, correct/clarify or just want to continue the discussion, please do so in the comments!
Related resources
Both before and after the event, folks shared some related articles/links with me. I pass them on here:
How Texting is Changing Philanthropy
Texting for Charitable Dollars: The Definitive Guide to Mobile Fundraising
Mobile Giving: The Haiti Cataclysm
A couple of organizations worth following on Twitter re: tech and nonprofits: @nptechblogs @mobileactive
