Ever since Barak Obama managed to raise $6.9 million out of $25 million through small donations on the web, 92% of which were $100 or less, many involved in the non-profit world started to understand the potential of crowd sourcing small “micro-donations” instead of, or in addition to, the traditional approach of getting small numbers of large donations. Micro-donations are generally under $10 per person, with the idea being to crowdsource very large numbers of donors. A good example of an organization that maximizes the potential of micro-donations is Kiva. Kiva’s fund-raising activity takes place almost exclusively on the web, where it allows donors to make small donations to finance small businesses in developing countries. Kiva uses the web and social media brilliantly (their email newsletter is one of the best I’ve seen), and their emphasis on the fact that donations are “person-to-person,” and the transparent nature of their enterprise succinctly represents the personal culture that users of social media expect and appreciate.

round-up simplifies micro-donations

A new initiative in micro-donations came to Israel in 2008 in the form of round-up, or “Igul Letova” in Hebrew. round-up is a non-profit that enables people to give micro-donations to non-profits of their choice by rounding up purchases on credit cards or by rounding down salaries. The option to give automatically every month by rounding down one’s salary was recently added by the organization.

I interviewed Vered Shavit Mazor, Manager at round-up, to learn more about their initiative.

Me: How can people join the new employee salary round-up option?

Vered: This is being implemented in companies that are characterized by an ongoing connection (like computerized payment or collection) with a large user base. Until September of this year, the only option for rounding up was available credit card companies. In September, we introduced the option for companies that use Hilan Tech to manage their salaries to offer round-up to their employees. Hilan Tech developed a unique module for their system which enables direct donation from an employee’s salary slip. Amdocs and Matrix are already offering their employees to round-up.

The way the rounding up works is as follows: an employee chooses to donate a small amount on a monthly basis by rounding down their salary to the nearest 5 NIS, 10 NIS or 20 NIS, which would yield an average monthly donation of NIS 2.5, NIS 5 or NIS 10 accordingly. The employee chooses which cause or category of causes will receive their donation. In the event that the company is interested in doing so, the module can also enable the employer to match the employee’s donation, for the same cause.

Me: How does the employee choose the cause they are donating to?

Vered: Employees can choose to donate to a minimum of one or a maximum of three causes from the list of eligible causes compiled by round-up. The donations can be made to general categories of non-profits, like health or education, and/or to specific designated NPOs. The employee’s donation will be divided equally between the selected causes. In the event that a general category is chosen, the donation will be divided equally between all the NPOs in that category.

The amount of the donation will appear on the salary slip as a debit line and the cause/s for the donation and the amounts transferred that month shall also be presented. If the employer matched the donation, an additional line item will appear on the salary slip noting the employer’s donation. round-up transfers the monies in full according to the specifications of the donors, based on a report received from the employer via Hilan Tech.

Me: What does a company need to do to join?

Vered: The implementation of round-up is via the salary accountant and/or the human resources department, and based on the Hilan Tech salary system which has been configured to handle the matter in a simple and effective way.

Me: How did round-up select the organizations that receive the donations?

Vered: A public committee founded by round-up and headed by President of the Supreme Court (ret.) Judge Meir Shamgar prepared a list of categories and foundations that can be selected by donors. All the causes in the list successfully passed the “Seal of Transparency” test of Midot, an organization that rates and screens non-profit organizations.

The list of eligible causes currently includes over 40 foundations in the following categories: health, education, children and youth at risk, welfare and employment, women in distress, culture and recreation, communities in need and new immigrants, quality of the environment, tolerance and human rights, and people with disabilities.

Me: What’s the big vision behind round-up?

Vered: Several shekels from many employees can total tens of hundreds of millions of shekels per year for advancing social causes.

Me: Thanks Vered!

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While round-up doesn’t specifically use the web or social media to crowdsource their donations, the approach to micro-donations via credit cards or salary slips is simple and therefore effective. Additional details about round-up can be found on the website: www.round-up.org.il.

Talk to people. But I mean really talk to them.

Building a web presence is a lot like building your offline reputation; it’s a long term effort. Reaching your online publicity and traffic goals involves understanding the user perspective – give them things they want, and they will remember you for it. Give them what you want, and you will quickly be relegated to the trash heap of me-me-me companies out there.

Recognizing that what your organization wants to say may not be the same thing as what your users and customers want to hear is sometimes a difficult, but nonetheless critical, step on the path to a truly successful website and web presence. What this means practically is that you need to move your focus to creating and sharing content that is helpful and valuable, and not necessarily directly related to your products, mission, services, or any of the other things you want to promote through your website. Offer people good content that is related to your industry or skill set, and start to enjoy the fact that they come back for more. While seemingly counter-intuitive, this is actually a great way to promote your organization since it helps you build lasting, stable relationships with prospects and clients.

This point is especially important for non-profits, who rely strongly on values of goodwill and public service. Since the people behind non-profits often feel like their organization is their baby, they cannot help but talk about themselves. While people do want to know that your non-profit is a success, it gets tiresome hearing repeated stories about gala fundraisers and the hundreds of children you have helped. Instead, get up-close and personal and transform your stories from statistics to actual people. Interview your staff and the people you help. Also, talk about your field or industry. For example, if your non-profit is related to education, discuss developments in the world of education. Show people that you are an expert, and give those passionate about your field a reason to stay in their relationship with you.

Great content builds your organization, even (especially) if it’s not all about you.

This post is co-written by Miriam Schwab and David Danielson, our intern

Picture credit: The Conversation by polandeze on flickr

I’ve been working on a new venture aimed at helping non-profits develop their knowledge and skills in the social media field. My partner in this venture, Lisa Barkan from Digital Shtick (www.digitalshtick.com), has extensive marketing experience in the non-profit world. The venture, called amuta 2.0 (http://amuta20.com), will be launching on August 31 in Jerusalem with a networking breakfast event featuring Jeff Pulver, an internationally renowned social media expert (http://pulverblog.pulver.com/), and a panel of key representatives from some of Israel’s most innovative non-profits. Jeff will be speaking about “New Trends in Social Media in the post-facebook era,” and the panelists will discuss how they use social media to promote their non-profit and achieve their goals.

While the event will focus on the use of social media by non-profits, businesses are also encouraged to attend, since the tools and strategies we will be discussing could be equally applied by them as well. We already have a number of businesses who have registered to attend.

More information about the event, including the complete agenda, venue, and costs can be found at http://amuta20.com/events/.

You can register here: http://amuta20.com/register/.