How I Hope the Lance Armstrong Foundation Will Raise Money Using Twitter

Open Letter to the LIVESTRONG Lance Armstrong Foundation by mikeyames The Pursuant Group @mikeyames The Pursuant Group How I hope you will use Twitter to raise hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Dear LIVESTRONG, While preparing a presentation to a group of nonprofit employees on their use of social media with their fundraising efforts, I developed a case study involving you and Lance and your current uses of Twitter. Part of me wanted to find a way to pitch this idea to you and find a way to turn it into revenue for our company. The part of me that went ahead and publicly posted this case study realizes you likely already have this strategy roaming the halls of your office. That part of me also realizes the idea should be free. Your precise execution of the idea has all sorts of potential variations that I have not listed. I am eager to see which variation you might make your own. We will continue to learn from watching and sharing with each other. Watching you with interest, Mikey Ames The Pursuant Group @mikeyames The Pursuant Group

You Can’t Leverage Social Media!

The idea “leveraging social media” is a misnomer

If you are not actively involved in an online community already, you have nothing to leverage.

Donor loyalty is about you being loyal to your donors, until you can operate from that premise – your organization will not use social media effectively.

Quick Case in Point

To the Twitter community, Lance is…

Active

Engaging

Authentic

@mikeyames The Pursuant Group

Quick Case in Point

I even got my own twitter “autograph” from Lance

@mikeyames The Pursuant Group SCOREBOARD!!

Quick Case in Point

Very Responsive followship

Lance crashed his website in 10 minutes from traffic he sent there from twitter

Quick Case in Point

Credibility

No question, to twitter community, that Lance tweets for himself

Quick Case in Point

Lance Armstrong Foundation uses twitter for…

Press releases

Public relations

“ customer service”

NOT exactly an audience well cultivated for solicitation

Quick Case in Point – open letter “advice” to the LIVESTRONG foundation

Shoot short video of Lance making specific impassioned appeal to his twitter audience.

@mikeyames The Pursuant Group Lance has already communicated with his followers in this way. Hundreds of comments poured in within days.

Quick Case in Point – open letter “advice” to the LIVESTRONG foundation

Shoot short video of Lance making specific impassioned appeal to his twitter audience.

Video needs to state a goal, ask for a specific amount, and automatically kick to a donation page with a specific, small gift pre-filled on the form. No “Click to Donate” buttons!

Ask Lance to tweet it out 6 times over 3 days varying the time of day it’s tweeted and the subject line “update” that goes with it…share progress, celebrate benchmarks, express goal, give thanks, etc.

Ask Lance to tweet as normal the rest of the day.

LIVESTRONG twitter admin needs to follow progress and thank individual donors publicly, using twitter.

Headline the next day (prediction)…

Quick Case in Point – open letter “advice” to the LIVESTRONG foundation What won’t be mentioned in the headline -- the months of acquisition and cultivation work Lance Armstrong has done in the preceding months to make this solicitation effective. But… Lance Armstrong isn’t doing acquisition and cultivation. Lance Armstrong is simply in conversation with his followers. (that’s the best kind of cultivation) “ LIVESTRONG Raises Hundreds of Thousands in Three Days Using Just Twitter” @mikeyames The Pursuant Group