nfptweetup

Next up in our series of guest posts is Paul de Gregorio, as he shares what inspired him about our latest event – and more importantly why he is now just points away from a Wookie!

I went to another fantastic NFPtweetup last night. Run and organised by the lovely people at beautiful world it’s an event that continues to motivate and inspire me. I just love the fact that third sector people of all types (from coders through to direct marketers) get together once a quarter, to learn, share, chat, drink and think together in such a relaxed and informal way.

What really inspired me last night was James Sadri from Greenpeace UK’s presentation on the recent Volkswagen campaign; you just have to check it out if you’re not aware of it.

 

The campaign objective is for VW to turn away from the Dark Side by dropping their opposition of key environmental laws.

James’ presentation was brilliant, a perfect NFPtweetup presentation because he delivered it with a smile, shared lots with us all and was so obviously in love with and passionate about his job.

But what really got me thinking was a fantastic aspect of the campaign that was created to incentivise people to spread the word and get others to sign up.

In the hope that you might win a limited edition T-shirt, those who sign up to the campaign can embark on Jedi training. Basically you sign up, you register, and you’re given a personal page and URL. Then of course you are asked to spread the word into your own social networks. Greenpeace want to harness the power of your referral to get your friends and contacts to sign up and spread the word, you know the theory here.

But you get given points, one for every view of your personal page and five for every person who signs up to the campaign from your page. The more points you are given, the further along the Jedi training path you go. Starting as an Ewok the goal is to unlock the T-Shirt once you have accumulated 1,500 points. Genius.

James went on to describe the lengths that people have gone to in order to further their path to the T-Shirt. My favourite was the guy who set up a blog claiming to know how to hack the page and get the T-Shirt, when you click on the link for the way to do it; you of course end up on his personal page and give him an extra point!

So I had to give it a go. I got home, registered and set up my own page. So far I’ve progressed from Ewok to Princess Leia and just unlocked Jedi Mind Tricks next stop is to unlock the Wookie at 100 points. Have a look here to see what I’m on about.  (And yes, that was a shameless attempt to get another page view.)

I loved pretty much everything about the campaign, but think that this idea is brilliant. We can argue if all traffic is good traffic, but in this case putting the message in front of many people as possible seems like a decent outcome.

On a personal level it’s reminded me of how brilliant Greenpeace can be, and reminded me to set up that Direct Debit I keep on thinking about.

 

Originally posted on Paul’s blog.

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With NFPtweetup just around the corner, I thought a great success story might inspire people to get in the digital mood and get out their tweeting thumbs. A lot of people talk about social media in terms of ROI and fundraising, but sometimes it’s worth something that you can’t put a price on.

Four days, 2.1 million signatures, 192 countries and 10 territories: Social media fights Ugandan anti-gay legislation

A social media movement has made history for Ugandan citizens, an international community of LGBT supporters and human rights activists across the world. Millions took to their keyboards and touchpads following news last week that Parliament in the Pearl of Africa were trying to re-introduce an ‘Anti-Homosexuality bill‘ which could sentence ‘offenders’ to death. Upon hearing the proposal, the global neighbourhood pulled themselves together through various social media channels and collected more than 2.1 million signatures in firm opposition to the Ugandan Parliament.

The bill was met with two powerful adversaries, AllOut, an organisation defending LGBT rights, and Avaaz, a political activism website who both set up powerful and wide-spreading campaigns through social media and other online channels. The weight behind the combined movements managed to successfully force out the genuinely threatening proposed law just four days after they launched.

Bishop Christopher Senyonjo in Uganda highlighted the importance of campaigning across the world.
“International pressure is necessary, these are issues of justice and love for other human beings … Personally, it means a lot to me to know that my brothers and sisters in the USA and Europe and other countries in Africa are in solidarity with us in opposing this bill.”

On 13th May, Avaaz posted this on their site: ‘Over 1.6 million of us signed the petition opposing the anti-gay bill, tens of thousands of us called our heads of state, and we helped make the attack on gay rights in Uganda a major international news story — and it worked.’ Similar triumph was felt from the AllOut team. ‘Over 500,000 around the world signed the petition to stop Uganda’s Anti-Homosexuality bill. The international outcry was heard and Ugandan Parliament has adjourned for this session – but the fight isn’t over yet’

The success is testament not only to the power of the human spirit but also a well run campaign on a wholly suitable medium; an instantly updatable, global and straightforward mode of communication which people are already engaged with. AllOut co-founder Andre Banks attributes around 60% of their website traffic over those crucial days to Facebook and Twitter. This doesn’t even account for the huge amount of news and buzz offline or on other websites that was created thanks to the high public profile it was allowed through Facebook and Twitter. Social media has always been quite a successful medium for lobbyists and campaigners, but events this week have really shown how quick and impactful it can be in the face of injustice.

Personally, I noticed the AllOut campaign through my Twitter feed, and signed my name and email address to the bill so instantly and easily that I could’ve easily forgotten all about it had I actually ticked the ‘opt out’ box for notification emails (they’ve got me there). Having never engaged with the organisation before, I’m almost sure that I wouldn’t have had the chance to put my name to a campaign that I’m more than happy to support without hearing about how simple it was to get involved through social media. I don’t think it’s that people wouldn’t have cared about the campaign had it not been so accessible, it’s that even if they had had the opportunity to happen upon the news elsewhere, there are so many injustices that need changing, that a small clicktivist (although I’m hesitant to use that term as it’s loaded with negative connotations) task allows people to feel like they’ve really contributed – without getting lost in the ocean of tricky asks and long emotive copy that many of these equally (for the most part) worthwhile campaigns are inhabiting.

Lucy J – beautiful world.

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Following Howard Lake’s guest post yesterday, NFPtweetup newcomer Becky Coleman shares her experience:

I’m a relative newcomer to the world of social media; at easyfundraising we started using Facebook and Twitter to communicate with and about our members and causes just over a year ago. It’s been a steep and incredibly rewarding learning curve but I’m aware of the vast potential to do even more.

So being a bit of a newbie and keen to know more, I jumped at the chance to venture down to the big smoke and pick the brains of the terrifically talented social people who organise and attend the #NFPtweetup.

I first heard about the #NFPtweetup last year from Graham Richards and was lucky enough to get a ticket to the first event of 2011, being held at Amnesty International’s HQ in Shoreditch. I had a few specific aims in mind:

1. Get there without getting lost

Didn’t get off to a great start with this one but fortune smiled on me and the first person I asked for directions turned out to be the lovely Lucy from tweetup organisers, beautiful world, who kindly escorted me to Amnesty International – and without laughing at my poor map reading skills either.

2. Make some new friends – and meet some old ones

This turned out much better than aim number one. Within minutes of arriving, I met Janet Stollery of Calvert Trust – a meeting I know I found incredibly useful and I hope she did too.

A brief glance at the name stickers we all wore allowed me to put more faces to names and I was pleased to meet my long-standing ‘virtual’ friend Howard Lake of UK Fundraising in the flesh. I’m happy to report he is every bit as nice in real life!

I was also pleased to make the acquaintance of @ycharity, @chasecare, @thenspcc to name just a few.

3. Learn

The evening was split into two speakers, Jonathan Waddingham from Just Giving and Fiona Mclaren from Amnesty International UK, plus three break-out groups for further discussion and finally a panel debate.

Jon’s talk focussed on donation apps and how fundraisers can make best use of them, while Fiona showed us how Amnesty engaged their supporters to play a part in the Egyptian Crisis.

Both speakers were fantastic and for me I think the most interesting fact of the evening came from Fiona – during the Egyptian Crisis, for the first time, Amnesty recorded more referrals to its site from social media platforms than anywhere else.

I was torn between the three break- out groups and would happily have attended all of them but plumped for Rachel Beer discussing developments in the social world – which ended up ranging from the new updates to Facebook to how choosing an engaging Twitter avatar is not as easy as it seems!

Lastly the panel debate – the main focus was whether fundraising via social platforms could be classed as ‘slacktivism’, the general consensus being ‘no – any action taken by a fundraiser or supporter is valid and useful in its right’.

4. Be inspired

Well the event certainly succeeded on this point too. It was hugely enjoyable as well as being massively stimulating and I’ve taken so many ideas away with me that will enable us to help our causes do and raise more.

Throughout the evening, live streaming of tweets tagged #NFPtweetup kept the discussion lively but this one from Chance UK really stood out for me. Well said.

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Following yesterday’s agenda, you might have noticed Wednesday’s NFPtweetup is all about integrated campaigning and fundraising.

We’ll hear from Adrian Cockle, and learn how WWF-UK turned a tweet into a roar. We’ll also hear from Fiona McLaren and see how Amnesty International UK responded online to the protests in Egypt in recent weeks – including crisis mode stats (!)

Later in the evening, the panel debate will begin to explore some of the questions below – as well as bring the discussion to the floor:

• The challenges and opportunities of integrating campaigning and fundraising
• Has social media/the social web fundamentally changed campaigning and activism? Does their existence make charities’ jobs easier or have they encouraged ‘slactivism’ and made it harder to generate meaningful/long-term engagement?
• Do donors/fundraisers and campaigners have different preferences and demographics?  Should we expect supporters that donate to become activists or campaigners or vice versa?

If there is something you’d like us to explore further, please let us know: comment below, tweet @NFPtweetup, or wave at the person with the microphone tomorrow night!

See you tomorrow,

Teri

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Despite being in full NFPtweetup mode for at least two weeks,  I’m still slightly in shock that the next event is just two days away… and tweeted as much just for good measure.

This Wednesday will be NFPtweetup’s tenth event (!) and will focus on integrated campaigning and fundraising.

Agenda for the night is as follows:

• 17:30 – 18:15  Arriving/registering/networking, drinks and nibbles
• 18:15 – 18:20  Introduction
• 18:20 – 18:45  Adrian Cockle, Head of Online, WWF UK: Tweeting and roaring: joined up campaigning
• 18:45 – 19:10  Fiona McLaren, Online Communities Editor, Amnesty International UK: Examining online activity and social media during the recent protests in Egypt
• 19:10 – 19:50  Break out groups
• 19:50 – 20:20  Panel debate: integrated campaigning and fundraising, including Adrian Cockle, Fiona McLaren, Kate Turner, Head of Communications and Campaigns at Merlin, Jonathan Waddingham, Product Manager at JustGiving and Rachel Beer, founding partner at beautiful world
• 20:20 – 20:30 Wrap up (and off to Bar Music Hall for those who would like to join)

We’ll also have a few NFPtweetup goodies, courtesy of Pixel Philosophy who are co-sponsoring this event. To all those people who were too polite to take mugs last time – these are for you!

Almost counting down the hours now…

See you Wednesday,

Teri

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So charity tickets have all gone! I think the first 50 tickets went in under 40 minutes… surely that’s got to another NFPtweetup record?

The NFPtweetup team is now doing everything we can to make the next event just as fun and as memorable as the last, but in the mean time I thought we’d share a little sneak preview. Big thanks in advance to Amnesty International UK for allowing us to use its venue for the evening.

To all those who suggested NFPtweetup needed a bigger boat, it looks like we’ve got one…

If anyone missed break out groups at our birthday event, fear not. You might even get your own seat!

Discussing all important seating plans… and where to put refreshments, of course.

If you didn’t manage to get a ticket do let us know and we can add you to the waiting list. If you can no longer make it, please let us know so we can allocate your ticket to someone else – thanks! Just email NFPtweetup at hellobeautifulworld dot com, or tweet @NFPtweetup.

Can’t wait to see you there,

Teri

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