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Non Profits can profit from the Net - BizNet (April, 98) |
The Internet started off as the exclusive domain of research and educational institutes way back in the late 60s. They were the original users of the Internet and the first to realise the potential of the Net as a unique communication medium. The introduction of user friendliness in the form of the World Wide Web was what sparked off the explosive growth of the Internet as a business tool. However, though the commercial use of the Net is on the increase, there are an increasing number of non profit organisations who are getting an online presence to support their offline efforts. With all the Net has to offer non profit organisations, the decision to go online is not a matter of "if", but of "when". And non profits in India are slowly realising that the Net is very crucial for their activities, and can be a positive addition to their operations right from communication to outreach to fundraising - in fact as shown below, non profits can use the Internet in many ways that a business can't.
To start off, a non profit uses the Net just like anyone else
would : to communicate, to gather information and to spread awareness
about the work they do.
Communication:
At the very basic level, the Internet enhances an organisation's
ability to communicate with the rest of the world - be it their
branches in different parts of the country or be it donors and
well-wishers spread all around the world. To date, email remains
the killer application on the Internet, and also the primary way
to communicate over the Net. Email is now a synonym for cheap,
quick, and reliable international connectivity and messaging.
CRY (Child Relief & You) today has its main branches linked
by email, enabling faster, convenient and cheaper communication
as compared to normal courier or fax.
Information gathering / Research:
Being online gives an organisation access to information not
restricted by distance or time. For instance, during working hours
here in India, the US of A is fast asleep. If a non-profit urgently
need some information about a particular bill or law, or maybe
a report related to some campaign abroad, a bit of digging around
on the WWW is all it takes to get the information in hand in a
few minutes.
Spreading Awareness:
Spreading awareness about themselves and their activities is
the primary reason anyone decides to get a homepage or a website.
Creating a homepage is one way to make information about an organisation
available to anyone, anywhere around the world, all the time -
24 hours a day, 7days a week, 365 ¼ days a year. With a little
effort and constant care, finding the homepage among the 130 million
odd homepages on the Net will not be as difficult as the proverbial
finding of a needle in a haystack.
While the uses of the Internet listed above are common to both
commercial as well as non profit organisations, the ones that
follow are the forte of non profit organisations:
Publishing:
Non profits usually have detailed reports, studies, and findings
that have taken months or maybe years of effort that is available
for the asking. The only problem is that many people aren't aware
of the existence of these reports. Putting up an executive summary
or maybe the entire report on the Net - the world's biggest library
- would prevent duplication of effort, and be of use to concerned
people from any corner of the world. Think about the NRI college
kid who could use statistics on child labour in India to give
more substance to an assignment or report. Or maybe a foreign
non profit who can bypass weeks of waiting for the report to arrive
by snail mail (ordinary post).
The Amnesty International Website has a Library section (http://www.amnesty.org/ailib/index.html
) with annual reports, campaign reports, and news releases published
by Amnesty International.
Fundraising:
At last count, there were over 100 million Internet users worldwide.
Using the Internet to facilitate collection of donations is somewhat
like having a donation box easily accessible at every nook and
corner, taking the effort out of making a donation. For starters,
a petition asking for a contribution could be sent out via email.
Or an appeal for donations to a particular cause made on the website
of the non profit. Using the Internet allows the non profit to
capture the donor in the mood of "giving" and allows
him to make his donation within a few seconds, instead of risking
the chance of him forgetting once he puts it off till later. While
talking about cyber-fundraising, we are primarily looking at donations
from abroad for Indian non-profits (like CRY for instance). Options
abound : an online donation can be made using a credit card to
a US branch office of the organisation and the money remit to
India later. In India, a system could be set up where the user
can decide how much money he wants to donate, and click on a button
that will generate an email pledge which will remind him to send
a cheque across to the organisation in case he forgets. Selling
of products of the non profit is another means of fundraising.
The American Red Cross site has a link to the donations section
on virtually every webpage, making it difficult to ignore. They
also offer alternatives for those paranoid about sending their
credit card numbers across the Net - donations by mail or phone,
leaving no room for excuses !
Attract volunteers:
A large percentage of visitors to a non-profit site inevitably
end up asking a question that is music to the ears of the non
profits. The question, "How can I help ?", is either
sent via email or keyed into the guestbook. Any non profit that
could do with volunteers (and God knows all of them could), should
have a section listing out the different ways in which people
can help the cause. Even simple ways like helping convert a text
page to HTML for the site (using a predetermined template).
The Red Cross website (http://www.redcross.org) has a volunteer
link that brings up a simple form urging people to sign-up as
volunteers.
Campaign:
Till the advent of cyberspace there were three ways of spreading
a message fast : telephone, telegram, and tell-a-girl. Now email
precedes those three. Chances are you would have already received
at least a couple of campaign messages forwarded via email to
you by well meaning friends. For instance, during the formation
of the Jammu and Kashmir newsgroup about two years ago, Indians
around the globe forwarded requests to other Indians to lobby
for the newsgroup to fall under the India hierarchy (soc.culture.indian.jammu-kashmir).
Recently, there was the Voice of India campaign by CRY
that elicited over 10,000 emails supporting compulsory education
for children, which were later sent to the President of India.
On the other hand, one fake email campaign that still does the
round of the email boxes around the world is actually just a junk
chain-letter that promises a cent being donated by AOL to the
cancer society for every person the email is forwarded to. So
you end up with sympathetic (but gullible) people sending the
email across to everyone they know…
Build a database:
A database of email addresses can be created from visitors to
the site, volunteers, donors, members and supporters. This would
primarily help the non profit to send solicitations, requests
for help and support. Building a profile of people on the mailing
list would help the non profit get sponsors or advertisers for
their mailing list and earn additional revenue. The database could
also be used to keep interested visitors informed about new features
on the site, new products for sale, and new projects taken up
by the non profit.
The CRY website offers electronic cards that can be emailed
for free from the site. For each card sent, the recipient and
the sender are added to an email database, and informed when new
cards are added, enticing them to return to the site for more
free cards.
Newsletters:
With a bit of effort, the existing direct mailing list can be
split up into the haves and the have-nots : of email access. The
former can be removed from the snail mail list, saving money on
printing, paper and postal charges, and have the newsletter emailed
to them instead. If the email newsletter is too large it would
make sense to just send summaries of the sections via email with
hyperlinks to the entire newsletter online. This would encourage
repeat visits that may translate into a stopover at another section,
maybe even leading to an impromptu donation in some cases !
Virtual community:
Building a virtual community on the Internet is the dream of
any content or service based site. To build a virtual life in
cyberspace around a particular site takes a lot of time, effort
and nurturing. A non profit could easily build a virtual community,
grouping people by geographical location. This group could log
on at a pre-determined time every week using the site's web based
chat to brainstorm, discuss activities like upcoming events of
the non profit, or maybe even work out plans to spread awareness
about the organisation or enlist new volunteers. Once this catches
on, the non profit organisation could allot a webpage to each
of these new virtual communities to showcase the work they are
doing in each of their groups.
The Internet has been touted as the killer medium of the century, and rightly so. We in India are relatively young as far as the Internet goes, but we are growing fast. With the average Internet user being relatively young, they form the perfect target audience for a non profit - as the active volunteers and supporters of today and the donors of tomorrow. Like anyone contemplating a web presence, the indicators all point to now being the right time to make a start.
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National Job Development Centre (NJDC) is the vocational training and rehabilitation unit of the Spastics Society of India, works with people with disabilities, now has a homepage on the Net. According to Meenakshi Balasubramanian, director of NJDC, the main reason they put up the homepage was to spread awareness about their unique training courses for the disabled. The homepage, on the Net since January 1998, serves as a source of information - talking about the activities and the success stories of the NJDC. As an incentive to attract visitors back, there are free cards that can be sent online. The only attempt towards cyber-fundraising is in the form of an online order form for their products and services, with the confirmation and payment done offline.
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CRY first got it's presence on the WWW when different well meaning volunteers offered to put up homepages for the organisation. CRY ended up with multiple homepages, that differed since each volunteer created the pages as he saw fit. In January 1997, India On Line developed and launched an official site (http://cry.inindia.com) working closely with CRY. What the site offered the surfer was an online newsletter, cards that could be emailed for free, and window shopping in the form of a product catalogue (but orders placed offline). In one year, a little less than 5,000 cards had been emailed from the site.
Happy with the response to the website, the CRY site was revamped
and relaunched on Anti Child Labour Day 98 (April 30th).
The site graduated to a domain - cry.org - and now serves as a
consolidated one-stop site on CRY, linking activities in India
and other CRY homepages of the US chapters. CRY products will
soon be available for online orders. Those availing the free e-cards
now have an email reminder service that automatically informs
them of an upcoming birthday or festival, helping them send cards
in time. Cards will be regularly added to the online collection.
Other useful features include a searchable database of CRY offices,
an option for people to sign up as volunteer online, and regular
email newsletters sent to supporters. The near future will see
online communities being built by people all around the country
- developing a strong network.
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The first question that comes to mind inevitably is : "Can we afford going online ?" True, funds are not the easiest thing to come across so the question of "How much will it cost us ?" is justified. Take a look :
One time costs
Annual recurring costs (250 hours)
Sponsored Web Space : Web designers are more than willing to offer some space on their servers for non profit organisations.
However, to put these price tags in their proper context, compare
these costs with the amount saved on faxes, STD calls, and time
delays (due to the postal system). |