Social Networking pushes Social Change
May 30th, 2007 by admin
Newsflash – Facebook.com has exploded.
Hundreds of thousands of people log in and connect with their networks almost daily on Facebook and this has resulted in a highly developed, tight knit community with a goal – to reconnect and share experiences.
We share interests and hobbies and find classmates from grade school or overnight camp, and find out who married their high school sweethearts or who decided to move to California for a career. That is the social part of social networking.
Networking for Dollars
With the release of “Causes” on Facebook, we now can implement change by leveraging the power of “word of mouth”. We, as a social NETWORK can invite our friends to the causes that interest us, create interest in new causes and overall, integrate a “charitable” aspect to our groups and extend their interactivity.
We are not readily exposed to people’s current alliances and affiliations. We give when:
- Charities call….
- Funerals
- We get persuasive direct mail
- A friend or family gets sick.
It just isn’t like that anymore. By launching Causes on Facebook, a new door has opened to make charitable organizations an affordable outlet and access to a huge audience that can influence their friends to push social change.
This is the networking part in social networking. Knowing your friends involvements and alliances encourages you to get involved. Perhaps the organizations will grow in popularity and fundraising dollars by leveraging the “word of mouth” aspect of Facebook, but ultimately, won’t everyone want to keep up with the “Joneses”?
Facebook is forcing social change.
The Flip Side
Alternatively, anyone can set up a charity. How do you know who you are giving your money to? Once again, we need to protect our privacy and our identities.
Is this going to become another popular alternative for fundraising?
At this point, Facebook Causes is only open to U.S. organizations but what will happen when Canada is able to participate?
Oh! Canada…
When we look at Canadahelps.org with their 1% commission, how will they compete against a FREE service? Overall, it will be interesting to see how will this impact the fundraising industry in Canada – when and if the service is made available to Canadians.
