Inspiring Giving In A Digital World
Phew! I don’t know about you, but I’m a bit exhausted and I didn’t even move an inch.
The tradition of Black Friday retail sales following American Thanksgiving has morphed to now include Cyber Monday for online sales and then Giving Tuesday for charitable giving and volunteerism.
Was your email inbox filling up last week with messages from every retail outlet you’ve ever purchased from, any cause you’ve followed on social media or charity that you’ve donated to? Mine sure was. It was a bit mentally taxing, seeing all of that information coming at me for a few days in a row!
When it comes to Giving Tuesday, results in Canada are still being tabulated, but American figures published by Money Magazine indicated close to $2 Billion in donations were made on-and off-line on Tuesday, Dec 3.
That’s amazing, isn’t it? Even in tough times and amid tons of messages vying for their attention, people give. And they give a lot!
Time will tell whether Giving Tuesday will continue to hold its own… or grow over time.
Or whether good old-fashioned person to person, face to face fundraising will still make the biggest, most consistent difference for charities that rely on donations to enhance and expand their impact. (I have a lot of faith in the latter, especially here at Bethany.)
Ultimately, donors want to feel connected to the causes they care about and they want to know that they’re making a difference. That’s hard to do in the rapid-fire pace and ‘choice overwhelm’ of today’s digital world, especially from Black Friday through Giving Tuesday each year.
Ultimately, here at the Foundation, we need to do both — have a presence for our cause in the digital world but grow real ‘3-dimensional’ relationships with the people who care about Bethany and are willing to show their belief in us by donating.
So, thanks for liking and sharing Bethany’s Giving Tuesday online messages last week and, as always, for helping us build real and lasting connections with the people in our communities that care about the work you do.Have a great week!
— Gail
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