Mobile Charity Moves The Masses; Conference Roundup & Barcode Cancer Campaign Update » mobilegroove

In brief: A look at the key takeaways from a recent AIME conference dedicated to empowering the charitable sector with mobile and an update of last week’s mobile campaign raising awareness about prostrate cancer in men and powered by mobile barcodes.

Regular readers will recall that MSG was a media sponsor of a full-day seminar entitled Empowering the Charitable Sector with Interactive Technology and organized by AIME. The tremendous industry response to the event has now led to the formation of a Charity and Interactive Tech Special Interest Group, spearheaded by AIME, to help drive further improvements in the value chain and encourage more charitable organizations to tap into this rich seam of revenue and communications. A round of thanks to Andrew Darling, AIME Event Chairman and Director of Communications, for organizing this excellent event and for providing MSG with the following learnings and observations.

AIME EVENT RECAP

Mobile is with us when it matters: at the point of inspiration. A personal outreach or call to action delivered to us on our personal device allowing us to get involved using technologies we understand intuitively (such as text or barcode scanning) drives positive results.

This is one reason why most of the AIME seminar sessions were focused on mobile and the perfect fit with fund-raising. Robert Thurner, commercial director of mobile agency Incentivated, highlighted several case studies from Save the Children, Marie Curie and British Heart Foundation.

In addition, Keith Brown (paythru), Rory Maguire (3UK), Roger Craven (Vir2), Jim Manis (Mobile Giving Foundation USA) and Simone Schmidlkofer (Cause2Connect) all focused their presentations on the mechanics of how mobile text donations via short codes work and – more importantly – how they could be improved from a user perspective.

The final panel session, chaired by Mike Short, honorary chairman of the MDA and VP at O2 Group, continued on this theme and the need for value chain improvements. Mike’s expert knowledge and questioning in this area brought out the best of the panel, which included Rob Weisz (MIT), Rory Maguire (3UK), Paul Whiteing (PhonePayPlus) and Rupert Daniels (Join 1Goal Org charity).

NEW INTEREST GROUP

Building on the positive momentum of this event AIME will push new initiatives, workshops and further seminars sharply focus on mobile charity and the requirements of stakeholders (value chain companies and real people) moving forward. Specifically, AIME is coordinating a Special Interest Group to assist in creating greater understanding of the space and a roadmap to navigate it.

To find out more or get involved, please email either Andrew (andrew@aimelink.org) or Zoe Patterson (zoe@aimelink.org) for more information.

Also: more in-depth editorial, photos, podcasts and video interviews will be published shortly over the next weeks on the AIME website. Meantime, here are some excellent speaker presentations to get you thinking…

MOBILE RAISES CANCER AWARENESS

While AIME obviously boosts awareness – particularly in the U.K. — of the new role of mobile companies in mobile charity, The Mobile Movement - a mobile ecosystem initiative providing non-profit organizations with a mobile platform and applications to extend their reach- continues to chalk up impressive progress. (press release and post)

Interestingly, campaigns that harness 2D barcodes to get out the message and inspire people to action are proving to be hugely effective. Even more so if they are linked to live events.

This is the key learning from last week’s One Million Voices Against Prostrate Cancer, a campaign that successfully extended the reach of Ed Randall’s Bat for the Cure, a non-profit dedicated to raising awareness about prostrate cancer, to mobile in a big way.

The outdoor, in-stadium campaign was supported by a partnership of mobile companies. NeoMedia, a mobile barcode technology developer, created the campaign’s mobile barcode, and Neustar, a company known for innovative solutions and directory services, supplied the mobile barcode management, thus serving as a clearing house for mobile communications and IP that securely processed all of the campaign’s mobile barcode transactions. Renu Mobile, a company MSG profiled here, supplied short code call-to-action and website build.

BARCODE OUTDOOR CALL TO ACTION

In a nutshell, the campaign – which launched at minor league baseball parks across the U.S. — allowed people (baseball fans and so a predominantly male audience in the first place) to download an app by scanning the barcode below.

The app allowed users to interact with the non-profit in a variety of ways. They could view video content, navigate to the donations area and make a donation, and follow the cause via a live Twitter feed from @batforthecure. More importantly, the app let users add their names, addresses and emails to a petition demanding sweeping policy changes and governmental action in the U.S. to promote prostrate cancer awareness, detection, treatment and ongoing research. This last campaign also lays the foundation for a larger push in September 2011, when the non-profit will focus its efforts on promoting an awareness month. (By way of background, prostrate cancer strikes 1 out of 6 men in the U.S. Early detection can extend the lives of millions of men.)

According to Carol Glennon, Renu Mobile CEO, the next step is to deliver more applications that can be triggered by scanning the 2D barcode, including a look-up for clinics where the PSA blood tests can be taken, and “many other innovations that break down the barriers so that after a man is educated, he or his friends and family can easily act.”

I caught up with Carol today on Skype to chat about the future for this and similar mobile barcode campaigns to raise awareness of charity causes. Her takeaway: harnessing no-brainer barcode technology brings down the barrier to participation significantly.

But it may be the context that really clinches it. “People at these events don’t have laptops; they have their mobile phones. They are outside and open to using some of their free minutes to interact with a campaign that speaks to their interests.”

MY TAKE:

Ed Randall’s Bat for the Cure is sharply focused on raising awareness about prostrate cancer through national campaigns and fundraisers at baseball-oriented events around the U.S. Adding barcodes to the mix allows people an easy, no-brainer way to navigate to the mobile website and get involved. Combine this approach with additional features, such as a shortcut to make donations or a site to “sign” a petition, and non-profits can definitely wring even more value from their mobile charity strategies. What’s needed now? This industry (through campaigns like this one) has shown that it has education and awareness “covered.” However, non-profit campaigns would also benefit from sharing and allowing us ways to use our mobile to spread the message for them. Fortunately, I know of mobile barcode campaigns in the pipeline that will allow just this. Even better: campaigns coming online soon will allow people to scan health-related products for helpful information they can share with their peers. It is encouraging that mobile barcodes can power much more than mobile marketing and trigger purchases. (Although that is a big part of it.) As barcodes become a de facto interface to a range of digital content and destinations, they will also provide the bridge for us to share what we find (information, products, places to get treatment) with others who share our need.

Disclaimer: MSG is aligned with the mission and goals of The Mobile Movement and Peggy Anne Salz sits on the Advisory Board.

This entry was posted on Monday, June 28th, 2010 at 5:26 pm and is filed under Barcodes, Mobile Social Media. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.