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| Path: Main Street : NewsWeek : Archive : Cover Stories : Article |
This is an archive of CharityVillage NewsWeek. To find a word on the page,
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Tsunami relief effort a watershed moment in online giving?
February 21, 2005
By Maggie Leithead
Canadians donated record amounts to aid and development agencies in the wake of December's earthquake and tsunami. Tens of thousands of people also turned to the internet to make their donations for the first time.
In the first three and a half days after the disaster, Canadians donated $20 million to the Canadian Red Cross, CARE Canada, Oxfam Canada , UNICEF Canada, and World Vision. Of that amount, an astonishing $12 million (60%) came in over the internet.
By the end of January, as cheques wended their way through the mail and people continued to donate via other methods, the proportion of gifts shifted somewhat away from the web. Nevertheless, online giving still made up between 30% and 50% of most aid organizations' totals, an unprecedented volume, even by emergency-relief standards.
Organization Tsunami Relief
Total RaisedTotal Raised Online
Canadian Red Cross $138.3 million $42.9 million (31%) Oxfam Canada $8 million $3.2 million (40%) UNICEF Canada $16 million $5.5 million (34%) MSF Canada $6 million $3.5 million (58%) Suzanne Charest of the Canadian Red Cross has noticed a gradual shift in the past few years toward more online giving. "People seem to have more trust and comfort in giving online than they used to," she said. Charest noted, however, that the online response to the tsunami was well beyond the normal growth in online giving. "In the very early days after the [tsunami] disaster," she said, "online donations accounted for 50% of all gifts." That proportion far surpassed online donations in the wake of the September 11th attacks, the previous high mark for online donations to the Red Cross.
The Red Cross was not alone in experiencing a surge of traffic and donations through its website. During the height of the response, single-day traffic to UNICEF's website tripled normal weekly volumes. More than 500,000 people visited World Vision's website, and approximately 30,000 of them made a donation online. Many others used the website to read information about the emergency and look for other ways to make a gift or lend a hand.
The teams at Strategic Profits Inc. and helpforcharities.com, which process donations for the Canadian Red Cross, Oxfam Canada, and CARE Canada among others, went on red alert on Boxing Day. According to CEO Catherine Clarke, "all the campaigns we have done throughout the last seven years together don't match the unprecedented volume of donors coming online to donate. In the beginning we would have 100,000 people donating at the same time." In total, Clarke's companies processed 375,000 online donations worth $51 million for Canadian aid agencies responding to the crisis.
Donations helped by intensity of media coverage
At Oxfam Canada, online giving surpassed all other methods of donating, accounting for 40% of the $8 million brought in after the disaster. Marketing Coordinator Roger Musselman notes that the organization didn't launch any advertising or special mailings, but focused on media relations and making sure that their web address and toll-free phone number were listed on as many news programs and newspapers as possible.
MSF Canada (Doctors Without Borders) also brought in more money online than through any other fundraising method in the wake of the disaster. Like Oxfam, MSF didn't buy any advertising to promote giving but "floated on the media coverage" with great success, according to Tommi Laulajainen, director of communications with the organization.
MSF Canada garnered significant media coverage when the organization announced that it would cut off accepting earmarked funds for tsunami relief by January 4, 2005, just nine days after the disaster occurred. Laulajainen explained that the brevity of their fundraising campaign was a result of the organization's focus on emergency response, rather than long-term development. "We knew how much we needed to raise for our work in the region, and when we met that goal, we started encouraging people to give to our emergency fund and other less publicized humanitarian stories."
Other organizations also saw increases in giving to their broader programs during the relief effort. At World Vision, eMarketing Manager Adam Hadley noted that his organization saw a significant growth in child sponsorship after the disaster. "Interestingly, it was not just in tsunami-affected sites," he said, but in all areas around the world where the organization works.
New donors and new online donors were common
Many organizations haven't had time to sift through their giving data in detail yet. At a first glance though, most are noting a strong growth in the number of first-time donors to the organization, as well as donors who made a gift online for the first time. For those fundraisers who have had a chance to catch their breath and look more closely at their results, all have found that online gifts were, on average, higher than gifts received over the phone, by mail, or in person.
As expected, there were some downsides to so many first-time online donors making gifts in such a short period of time. Some organizations experienced slow server speeds. Others had to deal with a spike in tech support requests. For instance, according to Oxfam's Musselman, many new donors "didn't know what to do with PDF versions of their charitable tax receipts," so Oxfam staff had to offer quite a bit of technology hand-holding.
Savvy organizations maximized opportunities
In addition to helping individual donors who were new to online giving, other organizations used their online tools to mobilize their corporate supporters. Many of the Red Cross's corporate donors wanted to make donations and encourage their employees to do the same. In conjunction with several companies, the Red Cross sent out e-mail messages to employees, asking them to give through a special Red Cross web page so that their gifts could be matched by the company. World Vision also set up similar matching gift programs for corporate donors through their site.
For UNICEF Canada, their online giving form was also an important way to start an ongoing relationship with new donors. Online donors were encouraged, after making their gift, to subscribe for news about future UNICEF initiatives. According to UNICEF's Nicole Ireland, "before Boxing Day we had had about 8,000 names on our list. Today we have more than 29,000 e-mail addresses." That's a pretty nice opportunity to continue a conversation with donors after the media spotlight has faded.
Next steps critical in solidifying support
For the organizations that brought in so many new donors and new gifts - both online and through traditional channels - the next test will come in their ability to thank donors and put their gifts into action effectively. Most online donors have already received a thank-you e-mail and electronic copy of their donation receipt. All major aid organizations continue to update their websites with stories and photographs of their relief efforts in the affected region.
Moving forward, most organizations that CharityVillage.com spoke with are working on strategies to convert these new donors into ongoing supporters. Many are coordinating new outbound communications that focus on what the organization is doing in the wake of the disaster, as well as their other ongoing development and aid programs.
Other organizations are asking themselves questions to improve their fundraising and communications systems to handle the next disaster more effectively. Did they help people make a donation as quickly as possible? Was the user-experience on their website enjoyable? Were they proactive enough with existing supporters? Did they use other online media opportunities effectively with ads or news stories? Are they stewarding new donors effectively?
CharityVillage.com plans to check in with these organizations later this year to see what, if any, longer term results have come from this unprecedented outpouring of generosity. We'll keep you posted.
Maggie Leithead is president and COO of CharityVillage.com. Reach her at maggie@charityvillage.com.
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