This year with the adoption of social media and mobile applications, charities are adding new ways to give and making it easier for people to donate.

I’m going to explain three organizations and the way they are changing online giving. The website Givemn.org, The Salvation Army, and a new Twitter application called Rainmaker.

Givemn.org
Givemn.org is a great example of an organization that uses tools to promote giving in different ways.

Givemn.org acts as a portal for non-profits to easily raise funds on their website through their online payment system, called Razoo.

They recently had the 2nd annual “Give to the Max Day” on November 16th and gave out prizes to individuals or organizations which gave the largest donations that day. They raised over 10 million dollars for Minnesota non-profits and used various social media tools during the day to promote the event, including: live streaming on sites like MinnPost.com, unique Twitter hashtags, blog mentions and Facebook promotions.

The Salvation Army
The Salvation Army also represents a new approach to online giving this year.

The Salvation Army has created a Red Kettle symbol that other organizations can host on their website. This allows for people to give to The Salvation Army through multiple websites, in addition to The Salvation Army’s own website. People will have more options for where, when and through what website they donate, while giving to the same cause. Additionally, this is a great opportunity for organizations to display their association with The Salvation Army. One unique feature of the Red Kettle iPhone application is that it allows users to track their donation progress.

Additionally, people have the option for the mobile “text-to-give” to 85944 to make a $10 donation to the Salvation Army. People will have more options for where, when, and through what medium they donate, while giving to the same cause.

Rainmaker
This application caught my attention this year.

The Rainmaker application allows users to donate money directly through Twitter. If you have a PayPal account, you can simply connect your PayPal account to your Twitter account and tweet to raise money for the charity or cause of your choice.

How it works.
Send out a tweet, with a minimum donation of a dollar, and then add the name of your cause or charity with a hashtag and @rainmakerapp. The Rainmaker application sends a Direct Message and Paypal is charged shortly thereafter.

Example tweet:
I’m donating $20 to #SecondHarvestHoliday @rainmakerapp

Giving to your charity of choice is now easier than ever. With all these new ways to give this year, how are you going to give back?

Today I saw an article in the Minneapolis Star/Tribune titled:  “Med-tech is shy on social media use.”

Among other things it praises a  medical device start-up for its innovative and viral use of  YouTube.  However, it goes on to explain that big medical device and other health care related companies are hesitant to use social media.  The writer points to legal concerns, especially retribution from the FDA as reasons for this.

Indeed, it would be foolish for Medtronic, St. Judes and other medical device companies to rush into the social media wave pool. But guess what?  It’s not foolish at all, providing they take the right approach.

With millions of people tweeting, posting to blogs, commenting on or posting videos to YouTube, chances are excellent that each of these channels are ripe with conversation about medical devices.  Just monitoring and amplifying these conversations hold huge value for an entire organization.  I know; I do this for several health care companies.

From the marketing manager to the CEO, the ability to listen to the unbiased conversation between your company’s staunchest supporters and most stalwart detractors provides insight and direction that no focus group or traditional market research investment ever could.

One need not chime into the conversation.  Remember the old adage: “You become wiser by listening than you do by talking.”   And guess what, no one will even know you’re in the room – not even your lawyers.

Am I off base here?  Is engagement the only real goal for a company with regard to social media?  Or does listening provide enough value on its own? What do you think?

As an online marketing strategist I am always conscious of, yet fascinated with, the effect specific tactics have on one another. Some call it the ripple effect; I prefer to call it integrated marketing.

In theory I think it would be safe to assume that search traffic would ultimately increase as social media traffic increases. Using the SpyderTrap.com site for my mini-study, I consulted our Google Analytics account. Overwhelmingly, website traffic from search was almost always half of our overall traffic, compared to traffic from social media. In other words, as social media traffic increased, search traffic increased proportionately as well. Roughly 40 percent of search traffic was caused by Spyder Trap-related (Brand Name) searches, 56 percent of which were new visits.

Although this finding is neither shocking nor overwhelming, what is interesting is considering the factors that influenced this spike in traffic. What it does is partially answer some questions surrounding: “what role does social media have in online marketing integration?” In my opinion (speaking specifically to search marketing and social media marketing) it plays a major role for the following reasons:

1. Brand Awareness – Social media can be a great source of brand awareness, and social media marketing can drive direct leads. With increased brand awareness comes increased searches, clicks and eventually conversions.

2. Brand Recognition – In a world of competitive rankings, brand recognition is key! People are in general more likely to click on an organic and paid placement when they are aware of the brand and/or URL.

3. Marketing Reach – If done correctly and evident in the results above, social media marketing is a great tactic for attracting new interest in your brand, product, etc. Along with increased reach comes increased search volume, meaning more traffic and more conversions.

4. Loyalty and Quality – I have experienced first hand with clients and our own Spyder Trap site that website traffic associated with social media tends to have a dramatically reduced bounce rate, a drastically higher pages per visit ratio along with an increase in time spent on site. No kidding!

My point is that, much like traditional media, we need to look at online marketing with a holistic approach rather than tactical in order to optimize for every penny spent. We need to understand how social media fits into our marketing mix, not how our marketing mix can fit in social media.

The next question is what does social media integration look like and how should it be deployed? I have a few thoughts of my own, but I’d love to hear from you too. Any thoughts, ideas or examples? Stay tuned. More to come…

Note – Per a request via Twitter from Nathan Eide @nathaneide regarding the Minnesota Wild’s new 3rd jerseys. I think they are very “Minnesotan” and old school which is very cool, but they do remind me a bit of most college and All Star game jerseys. Overall I don’t mind them. Just my take? Any additional thoughts and or feedback on that topic?  

The idea for this post came to me when watching the latest advertising campaign “Lessons Learned” for Price Waterhouse Coopers how life experiences have shaped people’s individual view of business. In thinking about this concept, I thought about the simple life lessons we (well, many of us) are taught at a young age, and how they so innately fit into social media.

1.    “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”

The Golden Rule.  How do you want other people to treat you?  Probably by sharing your content and commenting on your blog, among other things.  My advice? Do the same. Contribute.  Comment on other people’s blogs, even if not directly related to your niche.  Don’t force your message or links on them, because you wouldn’t want them to return the “favor.”

Earn your reputation by being worthwhile, and increase people’s desire to link to you by offering fresh and relevant content.  People value their time, so don’t waste it by simply re-stating what’s out there.

2.    “Give and you shall receive.”

Share. Become a resource for people.  Encourage people to use your content and/or tools to produce something different, or a little more “out of the box.”  Even if it doesn’t help you in the short-term, sharing content with the community by adding value and outbound links will help you in the long-run.

3.    “Be yourself, because everyone else is already taken”

Be real. In social media, as in life, authenticity is key, and it is elemental in building and maintaining relationships.  People can spot a fake, and it has burned many companies in the past.

4.    “Always say please and thank you”

Take some time to remember those that have helped you along the way.  It is easy to get caught up in your successes, but be sure to stay humble, and recognize those that have helped you get to where you are.  Reward inbound links; list blogs that link back to you.  A little humility goes a long way.

Now it’s your turn.  What are some of your valuable life lessons you’ve learned that shape how you approach the business world?