Text Messaging in the Chronicle of Philanthropy

In our workshop at the Nonprofit Technology Conference in New Orleans on mobile fundraising, our fabulous colleague Dane Grams from the Human Rights Campaign discussed the organization’s mobile efforts and how HRC is building an integrated advocacy and fundraising mobile program. Nicole Wallace from the Chronicle of Philanthropy was in attendance, and since she has a knack for a good story, wrote about it promptly:

Text messaging has some real advantages over e-mail as a form of communication…So far at least, mobile phones aren’t overrun with spam.. and while many people have multiple e-mail addresses — some of which they check infrequently — most only have one mobile number.

“We wanted to call on our most active supporters to act on a moment’s notice,” said Mr. Grams. “Most people have a single cellphone, and it’s always with them.”The organization sent advocacy messages encouraging members of the network to call their representatives in Congress to ask them to support the Matthew Shepard Act, which would strengthen federal hate-crime laws. People who responded to the alert would first hear a message that suggested key points they should make in their conversations with Congressional staff members, and then they were connected to their representative’s office…

The Human Rights Campaign’s mobile network recently crossed the 10,000 subscriber threshold, and Mr. Grams said that has changed the way the organization thinks about cellphone campaigns.“Nobody paid attention to this program before, and now people are starting to pay attention to it at HRC,” he said. “People are thinking about everything we do, every action we take, every program we run, how can we incorporate mobile.”

“Nobody paid attention to this program before, and now people are starting to pay attention to it at HRC,” he said. “People are thinking about everything we do, every action we take, every program we run, how can we incorporate mobile.”

The full article is here. Dane brought the point home very effectively that mobile programs - especially fundraising programs - make sense only if they are fully integrated into the communications and advocacy strategies of the organization and there is a commitment and organizational support to experiment with the powerful mobile medium to achieve long-term returns. It’s clear that HRC is doing ‘mobile right.’