Anthropologize

As a rule, I dislike disclaimers. But I gotta do it this time…

1. This is so overdue I am embarrassed. Please forgive me, I’ve been conducting ethnography on homebrewers non-stop, maybe the next time I see you we can drink beer?

2. This post is powered by Ribena. If you are familiar with the sugar content in this little beverage from heaven, you will understand, I hope, if I ramble and/or use too many exclamation points forthwith.

3. I’m in Australia (see my photo blog). So I’m gonna use words like whilst and forthwith.

OK, getting on with it-

The little workshop called Strategy for Good is taking on a life of its own. AS IT SHOULD! We keep learning so much from the organizations and strategists who participate, and we want to keep growing. For that reason, this blog post will have purposes two:

1. Long belated summary-type thoughts from the workshop.
2. Call for growth and innovation ideas.

Alright. Number 1.

Preparation for the workshop continues to be a challenge for a few reasons. One of these is most assuredly because we’re calling on two of the most do-everything/workaholic industries ever- non-profits and ad folks. Which means that I often ask for commitment, and completed briefs, whilst preparing the workshop, but it’s just not realistic to expect these things to happen. However, this time around, I did in fat get questionnaires back from the organizations in enough time to see that WE HAD A THEME!

Two of the biggest areas that folks need help with, across the board, are fundraising and social media.

Yeah. I’ll say that again.

Fundraising and social media. Kinds sounds like a question and an answer, doesn’t it?

What is awesome, though, is that the brainstorming on Saturday went far beyond the now-tired “how do we “do fundraising” using social media?” It went instead to ideas about how building relationships and fostering engagement, using all of the tools that are relevant to their organizations (websites, events, conversations, etc.), can build a loyal base of supporters… who might just give you money someday.

Examples:

1. Create a digital library and make it available to all kinds of partners as a service (for example, when General Mills calls, have videos ready for their homepage… actually, they shouldn’t even call.)
2. Host contests that allow the organization to reach out into the community (for example, when a t-shirt is your fundraising mechanism, invite design students to compete in creating it).
3. Think about adjacencies and create conversations in the digital space (for example, if you are in youth services, talk to libraries, parks, etc. via twitter… like you’re mingling at a cocktail party.)
4. Create community events (speakers on public policy, chefs using local foods, etc) for your supporters using subjects that matter to you both.

And number 2.

In order to grow, Strategy for Good needs to practice what we preach- so we’ve tuned the tables on ourselves.

We need a website- it’s going to be a blog, but we’d love it to be pretty…

We need a logo- we’re thinking simple- using the S4G concept (and hmmm… see below on where we’re growing)- but we’d love a typographer to make us a font.

We have a vision- it is to foster collaboration between two big industries that usually have some economic hurdles to their connect-ability.

Organizations with social responsibility at their core (non-profit and for-profit)

and Advertising (whatever that actually means).

So if we’re just asking people with different skill sets and viewpoints to work together to make things better… then we think we really are

Collaborate for Good

C4G

And we can see our growth heading into areas like…

Design for Good.

D4G

For example.

Make sense?

Want to help us?

Email us! hello@thinkersandmakers.com