Tuesday, October 28, 2008

Self-Sustaining Donations for Not-for-Profits


WOM Connection Engine For Not-for-Profits

From: timtracey

Not-for-Profits can build self-sustaining donations by building a free "Connect-gine" using this patent pending model.


SlideShare Link

Monday, October 20, 2008

"How To Sell Soap"

'Love this illustration of WOM.

A short movie about viral marketing produced
by vm-people, a company based in Berlin, Germany

http://www.vm-people.de



Monday, October 13, 2008

It's the Law!!!

Ignorance of these is no excuse

Thanks to social media expert Dave Evans for throwing the book at me on these inviolable business principles in his recent article.


Metcalfe's law states that the value of a network is proportional to the square of the number of users of the system (n²). First formulated by Robert Metcalfe in regard to Ethernet, Metcalfe's law explains many of the effects of networks such as the Internet, social networking, and the World Wide Web. It is related to the fact that the number of unique connections in a network of a number of nodes (n) can be expressed mathematically as n(n-1)/2, which is proportional to n² asymptotically.

Are you saying "Tim, what are you talking about?"

Bottom line: Just invite your friends and customers to connect with you on YouGottaCall.com. You'll be glad you did.

Reed's law is the assertion of David P. Reed that the utility of large networks, particularly social networks, can scale exponentially with the size of the network. The reason for this is that the number of possible sub-groups of network participants is 2^N - N - 1 \, , where N is the number of participants.

This grows much more rapidly than either
* the number of participants, N, or
* the number of possible pair connections, \frac{N(N-1)}{2} (which follows Metcalfe's law)

so that even if the utility of groups available to be joined is very small on a peer-group basis, eventually the network effect of potential group membership can dominate the overall economics of the system.

In other words, the bigger, the better.

Hey! The article's over. What are you still hanging around for?

Log on and grow your Connection Engine!


"Non-Profits Brace for Fallout"
Survey shows officials expect falling donations, rising need for services

From Hartford Business Journal article by Sean O'Leary

As the financial crisis spreads worldwide and uncertainty and gloom take hold in the region, Greater Hartford’s nonprofits are bracing for the worst.

My Take

Not-for-profit organizations are facing a new funding crisis. They can use new tools to accomplish dual objectives - meeting their budget demands while increasing their profile in the community while, as a bonus, they strengthen relationships with their supporters.

Innovative use of social networking is the right tool for the job.

Friday, October 3, 2008

The Power of Crowdsourcing Consumer Reviews

Link to full article
10/02/08 4:00 AM PT
Customers are increasingly turning to each other, rather than a few experts, to gather information before making a purchase or signing a contract. The concept of crowdsourcing has worked well -- mostly -- for the field of knowledge management. How is it working for customer reviews?

Consumers looking for information about services, products, restaurants or destinations once had to rely on expert reviewers, who would make their site visits, conduct their research, and eventually release their findings to the masses. With the growth of user-generated content, however, everyone is now an expert, or at least an expert consumer. And the opinions of this new class of reviewers are only a mouse click away.


My Take

The companies mentioned in the full article, Yelp and AngiesList are cited for their extensive reviews and ratings of local businesses. Yet consumers are too busy - and too cynical - to believe reviews and ratings. Consumers DO listen to and trust their friends and neighbors, however.

Social media allows sharing of these trusted relationships between connected friends. This trust is the most critical component of the consumer buying decision. It is the richest possible vein of local advertising gold.

The next generation of social media will leverage relationships to connect consumers with the local businesses their friends
trust. It would be a bonus if the process benefited not only consumers and businesses but the entire community as well.