Beth Kanter

Beth Kanter is a consultant, author, influencer. virtual trainer & nonprofit innovator in digital transformation & workplace wellbeing.

Charity:Water Sends Personal Video Thank Yous

Filed Under: Fundraising


Four years ago,  charity:water launched its September birthday fundraiser where it asked its supporters and friends to give up their birthdays and ask for donations instead of gifts.
Every year, the fundraising campaign involved more people and successfully raised more money using social fundraising tactics and channels.   charity:water has helped over a million people get clean water.   This September they are celebrating their 5th birthday and asking people to give up their birthdays for clean water.
charity:water uses creative techniques,  beautiful visuals, and engaging storytelling to power its fundraising.   Just take a glance at their September Birthday Campaign home page.    I also liked how they have effectively used an infographic to explain the campaign.
Even though charity:water has over 200,000 supporters, they have not lost sight of the critical  importance of saying thank you in a personal way to continue to build their network.     These thank yous are not just for big donors.    In conjunction with the campaign, they are sharing personal thank you videos every day to their donors through a special YouTube channel.   The videos feature staff and you can just feel the love they have for people who share the organization’s passion for its mission of getting clean water to people around the world.

I love this video – it is a personal thank you for Semenesh to thank her for giving up her 2nd birthday to join their September Campaign 2011.    If you look at the videos, they don’t have many views and that isn’t the point.   charity:water is successful because they know it is about building relationships over time.    I’m sure that Semenesh might grow up to be a life-long charity:water donor.
Happy Birthday charity:water and thank you for modeling best practices in social fundraising!

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Comments

  1. What a brilliant way to ensure that one-time donors become ongoing supporters- I was also impressed with the infographic Beth mentions in the article. They must have a fabulous, proactive creative team- really engaging, fun and genuine.

  2. Wow. Those videos are not just personalized with a person’s name. The staff took the time to get to know why they gave. If I received one of these powerful videos after giving, I would become a lifelong supporter.

  3. Charity: water once again proves itself to be the master of the nonprofit video story. In this case, they’ve taken storytelling to the next level: personalized fundraiser thank-you videos. What a powerful video for any fundraiser to receive. I firmly believe in the power of personalization, and think this is an important trend to watch in nonprofit fundraising. Awesome!
    –Brandon Hance, Founder & CEO of GoodThreads

  4. Charity:water are outstanding. These personal videos are terrific. Paull Young and his social media team are at the cutting edge of social media and when you add that to charity:water’s business model you get the ideal of Head and Heart coming together. Sharp end innovation co-creating with tens of thousands of donors to deliver clean water to those in need – fantastic!
    – Mark Veyret, PwC

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