Using Social Media for Crowdfunding

Posted November 08, 2012 in Volunteering by Volunteer Forever 0 Comments

By Brittany Edwardes

It looks like you're all set - you have decided on the specifics for your volunteer abroad trip, created your Volunteer Forever profile page, and set up your crowdfunding campaign. The next step is the most important: convincing people who support your cause to donate to it. Because the entire idea of crowdfunding is that it happens virtually, you need to use social media as a major part of your advertising effort.

Using social media isn't hard - you've probably been doing it for at least a couple of years - but there are a few tricks to help you be more effective in your outreach. The two most important things to remember are your issue and your audience. Your challenge is to use social media to connect the two.

Figure Out Your Platforms

Volunteer Forever incorporates three major social media platforms into our website: Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. Although you can (and should!) share your campaign across other platforms, these three are a great starting point (and our website makes it easy). While you don't have to use every platform available in your crowdfunding campaign, be aware that the more diversity of platforms you use, the more exposure (and donations) you'll likely get.

With respect to three main platforms, Facebook offers the most in allowing you to tailor your social media actions to your cause. It's a great idea to consider making a Facebook group or page around your crowdfunding campaign. While both groups and pages have their pros and cons, pages allow you to view social media analytics and figure out just how many people you are managing to reach.

Take a Crash Course in Social Media Management:

Using social media for a defined purpose, such as advertising your crowdfunding campaign, can be a lot different than using social media on a personal, private level. You may want to do a little research into social media management and pull out a few of the many tips and tricks that professional social media managers use to get their brand's name out there. Do a bit of research to figure out when the best time is to create posts (usually during business hours, M-F), what type of media is most popular (pictures and videos), and other kinds of trends in the social media world. Think about things that you find effective in social media, such as polls or contests, and figure out how you can fit these into your own plans. Having a strong social media posting strategy is a great way to enlarge your audience so that you reach as many people as possible.

Build Creative Content and Push it Out Often:

The big word in the social media world right now is content. Having a good variety of content to use is essential for a strong social media campaign. While you could simply post the link to your Volunteer Forever campaign page on all of your platforms, it is much more effective to find different ways of presenting the same information. For example, pictures or videos usually get 20% more views on Facebook than links do. So, get creative and create videos or images that inform people about your cause and have a link to the campaign page where they can donate.

Creating content for your crowdfunding campaign isn't nearly as difficult as it sounds. An image can be something as simple as a picture of you with some well-placed text of even one of those ever-popular fundraising graphs that show how much money has been made and how much money is needed. Making a video can also be very simple- even something similar to a presentation that potential donors can watch to see why they should donate, what you're going to do with their money, and how serious you are about the cause. What's most important is to tell people, in a variety of ways, that you want to volunteer abroad in order to solve a problem and that you need their support to be able to do it. Turn yourself into the cause and demonstrate this in many different kinds of media.

Create a Tumblr Page for your Campaign:
Tumblr is one of the most versatile and user-friendly platforms that I’ve ever used- and it has a great potential as a way for you to reach out to donors that you’ve never met. There are many ways that you could use Tumblr for your Crowdfunding campaign, but it might be easiest to make an issue-based Tumblr page. For example, if you are planning on volunteering abroad for community development in Ecuador, you would want to make your Tumblr full of interesting videos, images, and quotes from articles about the community needs in Ecuador. Your Tumblr account should appeal to a wide audience- which means that it probably won’t be solely about you fundraising to volunteer abroad. However, if you are able to insert yourself into the conversation as an expert on say, community development issues in Ecuador, people are much likely to trust your campaign and thus, donate a dollar or two to your cause.

Hold Google+ Hangouts With People Interested in Your Project:
No matter how great social media becomes at connecting people, there is still nothing like face-to-face communication. Using a video chat tool like Google+ Hangouts or Skype is a great way to jump across time and distance to connect personally with an audience that it would have been hard for you to reach otherwise. Your video chat session could be in the form of a presentation, question and answer session, or even just a chance for people interested in your project to talk face-to-face with you. The point is to be able to explain, face to face, just what you want to accomplish with your volunteer abroad project. If you’re lucky, you might even be able to convince a past volunteer from the project or even a member of staff to help you stress the importance of your project’s cause.

Don't Just Promote- Connect!

Your social media campaign shouldn't just be about convincing your friends to donate money to your cause- it should also work to connect them to the cause through non-promotional updates, interesting facts, and insight into the cause that you are championing. Remember that even if you don't convince someone to donate, you can at least inform them about an issue or problem that they weren’t aware of before. Your social media pages should reflect your interest in the issue for which you are volunteering abroad- not just your desire to travel.

Tags crowdfunding , fundraising , gap year , mission trip , social media , volontourism , volunteer abroad , volunteer for free , volunteer overseas , Volunteer forever