In the hours, days and weeks following the disastrous earthquake in Haiti on January 12th, through all of the news reports and horrific images, one message came through loud and clear to most Americans: Text HAITI to 90999 to send a $10 donation to the Red Cross. (As a side note: this program is still active, so go make a donation if you haven’t already!)
Within days, the media reported that more than $5 million dollars was raised through this texting campaign, with donations still coming in. It was an incredible show of generosity from the American people. I know; I donated. The ease of donating by text and the low dollar amount makes it pretty hard to do nothing in the face of a tremendous natural disaster.
The Red Cross and other aid organizations certainly deserve kudos for being so quick to jump to using mobile marketing to raise funds. The concept of mobile marketing is generating a lot of buzz, particularly through iPhone aps, but it’s rare to see an effort spread nationwide, across multiple platforms and carriers, even to those users who – dare I say it – don’t have an iPhone or even a smart phone.
Here are a few takeaways that we’re discussing:
As marketers, we have to be aware of changes in the way we communicate. We are texting, using Twitter and reading blogs, but for some reason many people forget it when the get to their desk. Mobile marketing is not going to be appropriate for every organization, but when your goal is to inspire quick action with a large group of people, the Red Cross has clearly shown that it works.
Make sure what you’re selling can stand up to your marketing. Using the newest and coolest method or gadget for your marketing will hurt you more than it will help you if you can’t back it up. No sooner had news outlets become flooded with reports of the text donation campaign than the stories turned to concerns that it would take weeks, if not months, for those donations to reach the Red Cross and Haitians. Luckily, some carriers, including Verizon Wireless (full disclosure – a Pierpont client), decided to advance several million dollars in donations to the Red Cross to speed up the recovery effort.
Know where your audience really is. The Red Cross didn’t launch an iPhone app, which would have been cool but wouldn’t have allowed the maximum number of people to participate. And, it didn’t just advertise the program in one medium, say social media. The Red Cross picked a method that most of the country could participate in – The New York Times reported last year that 85% of adult Americans have cell phones (
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/23/technology/23cell.html), and advertised it broadly to drive participation.
For the latest on the Red Cross’ recovery work visit
http://newsroom.redcross.org/