Why Mobile Matters for Fundraisers

“You have to position [mobile] the same way you would social media, e-mail or the Web,” Orkin said.

With that mapped out, ACS’ mobile objects for 2011 are:

• Build the platform and process.
• Integrate and educate in the enterprise.
• Engage consumers/donors.
• Improve mobile fundraising.

The project pipeline includes:

• SMS platform launch — “SMS can scale from a large, national touch to a small, community touch,” Orkin said.
• Relay mobile
• Mobile.cancer.org
• iPhone apps
• Special event SMS
• Mobile giving
• Mobile behavior change

Mobile channels that work
From ACS’ perspective, the most important mobile channels fall into the big four:

1. SMS — excitement, loyalty, participation, immediacy.
2. Mobile Web — information, trust, speed, consumption.
3. Smartphone apps — ease, fun, features, richness, brand intensity.
4. Mobile giving/text-to-give — emotion, impulse, gratification, augmentation.

Those are the big four to explore, starting with the mobile Web. “The mobile Web is huge,” Orkin said. “Until you have a real mobile website, you can’t do any mobile marketing.”

Best practices for building a mobile program
Orkin provided a step-by-step approach for building a mobile program:

• Get started: get informed about mobile, take the pulse of the organization and educate everyone as you investigate.
• Identify goals: income, list size, downloads, conversion, e-mail opens, phone calls, brand awareness, buzz, etc.
• Make the case: drop stats wisely — number of handsets nationwide, number of text messages daily; show cool stuff — videos, text to a big screen, put it in their hands; get traction — cross-cutting relevance, early adopters and enthusiasts. “Find a way you can solve multiple problems, and find people that care about it,” Orkin said.
• Build the plan: include tutorial material, align with organization’s goals, address internal and external communications, provide realistic timelines, check with IT and legal first!
• Launch the campaign.

“People get enamored by that shiny thing and often you get it in the app store,” Orkin said. “To build a program, you have to be systematic, not chase after every shiny thing.”