The ThinkTank Nonprofit Report: February 2013

By: Christian Williams, Visibility and Social Enterprise Specialist

In a region of high income inequality, nonprofits’ work is never done. And South Florida, of course, teems with excellent organizations doing their utmost to fill unmet needs. So, let’s check in on what’s happening in South Florida’s nonprofit scene this month.

New Milk Bank Helping to Keep Babies Fed

A mother’s work to get enough donor breast milk to feed her highly allergic son resulted in the opening of a new nonprofit initiative, and a first for South Florida: a human milk depot.

The opening ceremony on February 19th welcomed mothers and their babies as well as pediatric health specialists, to celebrate the opening of a deep freezer unit at The Gathering Place, a local pregnancy and parenting research center in Miami. The freezer will hold breast milk donations from women throughout South Florida, which will be given to mothers or caretakers who, for various reasons, can’t nurse the infants themselves. To learn more about South Florida’s human milk depot, including how you can help, you can visit their website for more information.

Mega-Events Helping Raise Big Cash in One Fell Swoop

In other news, several local organizations are realizing the impact that mega-events can have on fundraising efforts. The Cystic Fibrosis Foundation’s South Florida Chapter is a great example. Every year, the organization plans a weekend of four major events including a black-tie gala and a fishing tournament, the Jeb Bush Classic, which raised over $500,000 last year. These types of fundraising events also provide outside companies with the opportunity to sponsor deserving causes. Other local organizations harnessing the quick money-raising power of mega-events include 211-Broward (for their Nonprofit Academy Awards) and the Make-A-Wish Foundation of Southern Florida.

PhilanthroFest and Catalyst Miami Kick Off Crash Courses in Nonprofit Promotion

Considering the economic challenges facing nonprofits today, it’s not surprising that promotional budgets have suffered as organizations try to prioritize expenditures.

With this in mind, the nonprofit networking conference PhilanthroFest and social-services group Catalyst Miami launched the Nonprofit Community Engagement Institutes, a series of workshops where nonprofits can learn to harness the power of online and offline communication channels to connect with the community.

With sessions led by communications professionals from the for-profit sector as well as several local nonprofit veterans, the first event, held February 8 at the Miami Science Museum, offered lessons in social media management, community development and engagement and raising more funds through effective storytelling.

Coconut Grove Arts Fest and Abrakadoodle Bring Out Kids’ Inner Picassos

Speaking of lessons, we know that budget constraints have severely affected the availability and quality of arts education in our public schools. We also know that exposure to the arts promotes self-directed learning, imagination and creative problem-solving skills in children.

In order to give more of Miami-Dade’s kids a chance to know the joys and benefits of artistic expression, the Coconut Grove Arts Festival and arts-education company Abrakadoodle partnered with The Children’s Trust to help celebrate the festival’s 50th anniversary with “Kids Express at the Fest.”

Every day of the festival, Abrakadoodle staffers held workshops where they taught kids between five and 12 years old to paint, sculpt, draw and design mosaics and collages. The children also learned the creative styles of art-world luminaries such as Henri Matisse, Claude Monet, Frida Kahlo and, of course, Pablo Picasso.

Be it feeding babies, improving nonprofits’ promotional skills or giving more kids access to the arts, there are always plenty of great causes to support – and many dedicated people who do so – in South Florida. And that means I’ll have plenty of great stories to share with you in April. See you then!

What’s Happening In Miami’s Nonprofit Scene? A Lot!

By: Christian Williams, Social Enterprise and Visibility Specialist

Your favorite cause lover is here to let you know about who’s been making waves in South Florida’s nonprofit scene recently!

The University of Miami’s School of Communication earned some brownie points with me when they announced their PhilAdthropy marathon. Advertising and public relations students are preparing to pull a 25-hour all-night marathon to help charities with advertising campaigns. The endeavor provides the students with invaluable experience, and helps nonprofits grow by providing them with promotional materials that they possibly could not afford otherwise. The event is this weekend, February 8-9^th and I’m excited to see the work that the students produce.

I’m also excited to see the organization, Girls Who Code, expand into Miami! The national nonprofit works to close the gender gap in technology and engineering. The year-old organization pairs younger girls with top female engineers and entrepreneurs from the technology industry for 300 hours of mentorship and intensive instruction in robotics, web design and mobile development.

So how about a huge round of applause for UM’s School of Communication and Girls Who Code - thanks for your support and hard work for causes in our local community!

Image Source: Marlena Skrobe/Sun Sentinel

Image Source: The Next Web

Giving Thanks for the Chance to Give Unused Rewards to Causes

This blog post was originally posted on KULA Causes' blog The Currency of Giving on 11/29/12. 

Thanksgiving may be over for another year but the feeling of gratitude, the desire to help others and to give back lives on at KULA and with our partner companies and their customers.

This is evident not in the Thanksgiving Thursday, Black Friday or Cyber Monday shop-a-thons, but in the millions of unused reward points and miles that are being converted by travelers into donations that benefit nonprofits all over the world.

When media has become so fixated on how much North Americans have shelled out during the four-day Thanksgiving period at brick-and-mortar outlets or online, it feels great to be contrarian and focus on how these consumers are using their points or miles to help others. It also feels great to know that we have a developed a very powerful giving engine that creates meaningful brand loyalty by connecting those consumers with the companies and causes they truly care about – all year round.

So while North Americans gave thanks then dashed out to shop last week, we continue to be grateful every day for the travelers who donate their miles and for our partners, like JetBlue and Milepoint that support the more than 2.5 millions causes available through the our CLM™ platform.

And instead of pictures of stampeding shoppers, we’ll close out with images that inspire us to be grateful.

Donated tweets? How ordinary people can make an extraordinary difference for your nonprofit

By: Christian Williams, Social Media Specialist

From diseases and disorders like AIDS and autism to public issues such as homelessness and LGBT rights, everyone has at least one cause that affects them in some way. But what if someone can’t afford to support a cause they care about financially? How can you get them to participate in a way that still has meaning and impact?

Sree Sreenivasan, a technology blogger for CNET, had a good idea, one that capitalized on his influence on social media to make a difference for a few special nonprofits. Sreenivasan had his more than 30,000 Twitter followers use Facebook to nominate deserving organizations for pro-bono Twitter publicity. He announced that when he hit the 6,000 tweet mark, he would follow by tweeting about a number of the different organizations that were chosen. The campaign could have taken place solely on Twitter, but using Facebook allowed Sree to bypass Twitter’s 140-character limit.

The Facebook-Twitter publicity combo might have not generated much money for the organizations, but it did generate awareness among thousands of Twitter users that could translate into dollars later on. Don’t forget, awareness is always the first step in fundraising and this type of social media marketing can be used to promote your business or group as well. The key to success is in finding someone influential on Twitter that is passionate about YOUR organization and its mission and values.

I personally like staying engaged in my community through organizations whose missions mean a lot to me. One that I am always talking about is Autism Speaks (my little sister has autism), and my Twitter followers are influenced by the passion and knowledge I have for the New York-based nonprofit. If I can motivate or inspire just one person to click a link to their website, I have already been of service to their promotional efforts without them having to spend a single penny. It also makes me feel great!

We don’t all have 30,000 followers like Sreenivasan does. However, regardless of the number of followers, exposure among the public is key. And there’s always the possibility that someone out there in the Twitterverse is a millionaire that has been looking for an organization just like yours to support. 

10 Years Later: A Look At The Impact of 9/11 On Nonprofits And Giving

As most of the country spent yesterday, September 11, remembering and reflecting on the day of immense tragedy that took place 10 years ago, we also recounted that day, and how its events changed the course of our lives, businesses, outlook and, well, the world.

If you think about it, the period of 2001 to 2011 could go down in history as the “decade of disasters.”

Beginning with 9/11, threats of WMD, two (many will argue unnecessary) wars, a deep and still lingering recession bookended with a spate of natural disasters both at home and in every corner of the globe, and not least an extremely noxious political climate that threatens to divide the country: It's hardly surprising that society's capacity to empathize and to give often to charitable causes has diminished.

It's The Economy Stupid

Of course, it's important to remember the first victims of the “disaster decade,” even if a myriad of other events have shared the spotlight since, but a still-weak economy remains a sewer-sized drain on America's almost empty wallets and has undoubtedly affected the bottom line of every nonprofit organization.

Data released last year (the most recent figures we have available) revealed that charitable giving dropped by a hefty 11 percent compared to 2009. At that time, nearly two-thirds of those surveyed in a Harris Interactive poll said they would be giving less than they were 12 months ago.

Worse still, the number of respondents who said they would be giving nothing as of last September doubled to 12 percent.

In the year since that report, the private sector has added a million new jobs (1.6 million from September '10 to August '11; 1.7 million from August '10 to August '11 - both figures seasonally adjusted from US Department of Labor: Bureau of Labor Statistics).

That may sound encouraging, but when you consider that at the height of the 2008 recession, American payrolls were contracting by some 800,000 jobs per month, it’s clear there is a very long way to go - in terms of job creation and rebuilding a society of Americans who have the capacity to give.

Today, some 14 million of our friends, families, and strangers remain out of work and the jobless predicament remains dire.

Perhaps we should look close to home and at our own neighbors to reignite our sense of empathy? Perhaps we should re-start our giving mindset by helping our fellow Americans - those 14 million who are jobless and in many cases homeless. Their lives, after all, could have been ours. Perhaps 9/11 should be renamed Our National Day of Service, where Americans help fellow Americans - in any way they can.

Because charity begins right at home - around the corner, up the stairs, or across the street. Perhaps then we can start to look outward again and start helping those organizations that rely on us to support their worthwhile causes and those in need.

Join us on I will to make your commitment to helping others in any way you can.