Women Who Tech - Mobile Activism

We will be presenting a session during the Women Who Tech teleconference on Monday March 31 at 5:15 PM on Mobile Activism. We’ll be presenting an introduction to mobile activism, fundraising, and campaigns, discussing some mobile campaigns that worked well, and some that didn’t - and working with session participants to answer questions specific to their mobile programs. Women Who Tech is a great resource (and vibrant google group!). We’re excited to be providing this information to the women’s technology community and building our collective knowledge- our session is full (as are all the sessions!) but you can email info@womenwhotech.com to get on a waiting list.

Catherine is a Women Who Techs (and Rocks…)

My most excellent colleague and partner here at Calder Strategies, Catherine Geanuracos, is an amazing Woman Who Techs. And if you did not already know that, well, here is the testimonial:

Live Earth rallied millions of people across the world to take personal action to help reverse the global climate crisis using a 24-hour music festival on July 7, 2007 with concerts in several cities including New York, London, Sydney, Tokyo, Johannesburg and broadcasted on TV to inspire individuals to answer the call to action. Thanks to Catherine Geanuracos Live Earth will also go down in history as one of the most successful mobile activism campaigns in this decade. Geanuracos spearheaded a clever SMS (Short Messaging Service) campaign that spread across the globe and got millions of personal commitments to make a difference by learning how everyday choices have huge impacts on the environment. Commitments were made via the web and text messages in 178 countries and 35 territories. This past fall, Live Earth released a report stating that since the concerts they have already seen a reduction in CO2 emissions and waste.

Geanuracos’s latest project is YrMomma4Obama.com, a first of its kind multi-platform campaign launched on the ground in Texas two weeks ago with a diverse group of students, political activists, and entertainment professionals to support Barack Obama’s candidacy using the latest social networking, viral, and peer-to-peer marketing.

And of course, Calder Strategies! If you want amazing women who tech to help you with your interactive and mobile campaigns, be in touch with us: info [at] calderstrategies [dot] com.

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.’