driven website to connect Chicagoland nonprofits and their communities. By
creating a ..... Testimonials from donors! Companies buy gift cards for employers,
...
ChicagoGives The Site of Chicago Philanthropy
907 S. Humphrey Ave. Apt. 1 Oak Park, IL 60304
[email protected] 252-213-0806
JASON RADFORD
2 In 2008, nonprofits received 10% of their funding online. This is expected to explode to over 50% by 2020. While, websites are good for impulse and new donor funding, longterm donor relationships are built on the personal touch. “Ultimately, the success of ChicagoGives will be defined by how well we generate new philanthropy, educate nonprofits and communities, and connect what our community does online with what we do in the real world.” (ChicagoGives Mission Statement)
Table of Contents Vision
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Mission Statement
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Corporate Description
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Market Analysis
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Services
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Development Plan
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Financial Requirements
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Appendix i
Comparable Organizations ………………………………………………10
Appendix ii
Basic Structure for Developers .......…..………………………………....11
Appendix iii List of Services Offered .………………………………………………...13 Appendix iv
Extended Development Plan …………………………………….………17
Appendix x
Five-Year Projected Operating Costs …………………………………...21
Appendix xi
Funding Strategies and Sources …………………………………………22
3 VISION The vision for ChicagoGives is to create a convenient, relevant, and locallydriven website to connect Chicagoland nonprofits and their communities. By creating a near-comprehensive list of nonprofits and engagement opportunities in the Chicagoland area; ChicagoGives hopes to enable anyone to connect with the organizations and causes they most care about in any and all of the ways that they want. Its content will be driven by essential, user-generated information from nonprofits and individuals alike. Its design will enable novel online and offline fundraising activities, syndicated nonprofit news, and full integration with existing local platforms like NPO.net, VolunteerMatch, and nonprofits themselves to publicize the full range of engagement opportunities available including volunteering, employment, and social services. By focusing on locallygenerated content structured for easy navigation through comprehensive engagement opportunities, ChicagoGives will even the technological playing field to facilitate unprecedented connectivity in the Chicago’s social sector, facilitate the demands of the growing group of online donors for information and connection, and break down the offline/online divide.
MISSION STATEMENT The mission of ChicagoGives is to develop and empower the Chicagoland nonprofit and philanthropic community by utilizing the informational advances of the Internet to maximize local giving, connections, and knowledge. ChicagoGives’s primary purpose is to provide a platform for connecting Chicagoland nonprofits and their communities. In order to build these connections, ChicagoGives will pursue the most effective means for creating, facilitating, and maximizing information about local causes and the nonprofits addressing them as well as the opportunities to get involved. The core content of the website will be provided by the nonprofit community, individual users, and featured experts to create authentic and organic information that is controlled by those who depend on it. ChicagoGives will facilitate novel fundraising features, sector and organizational news syndication, and events to cover gaps in online resources as well as integrate with local Internet resources to promote additional opportunities provided by those sites. Ultimately, the success of ChicagoGives will be defined by how well it generates new philanthropy, educates nonprofits and communities, and connects what we do online with what we do in the real world.
4 CORPORATE DESCRIPTION ChicagoGives began as resource to meet online donors’ increasing demands for better information, interorganizational comparability, and connection to nonprofits by providing a localized website that would be driven by nonprofits and individual users and utilize its localization to facilitate connectivity between organizations and donors. While this donation platform will be a central feature of ChicagoGives, the website’s navigable and parsimonious structure along with its comprehensive and customizable content enable it to accomplish much more. As a near-comprehensive list of nonprofits in the Chicagoland area, ChicagoGives can be utilized for a multitude of purposes including finding ideal voluntary opportunities, reading news produced by and about nonprofits, and identifying appropriate services offered by these organizations. The heart of ChicagoGives will always revolve around finding, learning about, and comparing nonprofits; but the possibilities for using this information and connecting to nonprofits will be the key driver for site traffic, organizational growth, and innovation. The success of ChicagoGives will be determined by two things: how many individuals and nonprofits use the website and how well the website informs and connects its users to one another. These will be the central commitments of the leadership. In order to achieve these, the first significant function of the organization will be recruiting nonprofits and users to the website. This will not only require significant outreach, but also a strong commitment to utilizing input from the nonprofit and individual donor community in developing the website to ensure it works for its audience. The second significant function will be designing core features including the online donation system, organizational vetting features, fundraising strategies, and account layouts to facilitate easy access and readability, meet the core demand from online donors, and provide a solid platform for all other features. The final significant function will be innovation itself, continuously focusing on developing novel and effective ways to improve information, engage users, and facilitate offline and online connections among individuals and nonprofits. Accomplishing these three core functions will not only ensure the basic benefit of the website, connecting nonprofits and individual donors online, but instill the drive to further develop this platform for more effective means of connection and education through input from Chicagoland’s social sector. In order to launch the organization, ChicagoGives will require server space, a web designer and outreach coordinator. Due to the relatively small size and traffic on the website initially, ChicagoGives is able to take advantage of low cost web hosting during its startup. A Web Designer will be need to build the website either from the ground up or using open source web development software if available and appropriate. The Outreach Coordinator will be responsible for recruiting nonprofits and users to the website and interacting with initial funders to secure funding and maintain reports. Eventually, the website will likely require its own server and other personnel, namely a Development Director to coordinate funding for and through the website, a Research Coordinator to maintain reports for the organization and its users, and an Executive Director to ensure that the organization is economically sustainable and its core mission and values are met.
5 MARKET ANALYSIS Trends in online giving and the growing importance of the Internet for finding information about nonprofits and causes demonstrate the need for the unique services provided by ChicagoGives. The success of other websites that facilitate online fundraising and provide information about nonprofits not only further demonstrate the need, but reveal the shortcomings of existing services. Research shows that online donors are generational, active, and demanding more from the organizations through and to which they donate. Lastly, recent developments by leading nonprofit service providers and Internet-oriented foundations demonstrate the need for better Internet-based platforms for nonprofit engagement, development, and connections. Reports from nonprofit research firms and online donor websites reveal the current and expanding prevalence of individuals using the Internet to donate money. Two differing visions have emerged – the “Wired Wealthy” and the “Young and Generous”. According to a joint report issued by Convio, Edge Research, and Sea Change Strategies, wealthy donors are using the internet to actively seek out nonprofit causes. These Wired Wealthy make up roughly one percent of individual donors but 32 percent of nonprofits’ annual individual donations. Their median gift is $4,500 and average $10,896 in donations per year. Of the broader population of individual donors, half preferred giving online and eighty percent reported giving some of their donations through the Internet. Unfortunately, less than half of people thought nonprofits’ websites “were generally well-designed, that charities did enough to connect with them online, or that they were inspired by charity sites.” A panel hosted by fundraising123.org further elucidates the growing prevalence of online donors and need for better Internet-based fundraising resources and strategies. The panel included representatives from the donor website NetworkforGood.org and Kivi Miller, president of Nonprofit Marketing Guide.com and EcoScribe Communications. Citing numerous reports and their own research, the panelist demonstrated that online donors’ average gift is more than three times offline donations ($115 through the nonprofit’s website and $100 through NetworkforGood compared to just $27 in person). From 2008 to 2009, the average size of donations through nonprofits’ websites increased 17 percent and the number of online donations through Network for Good nearly doubled. However, the panel cited the New York Times and their own research that revealed that roughly 65 percent of online donors do not come back to the nonprofit or website. The reason, they argued, was that nonprofits were not connecting with these donors. Online donors, particularly younger donors, are looking to make connections beyond money. While the panel argued that nonprofits need to create better methods of following up with nonprofits, research shows that donors want more than acknowledgement. The panel provided evidence that as little as one third of nonprofits responded to online donors and added them to their mailing lists. The panel suggested that nonprofits need to follow-up promptly and in the same medium in which the person gave their donation. However, according to their own research, younger donors are more likely to get involved in other ways outside of donations including volunteering, fundraising, and peer to peer promotion. Seventy percent of the Wired Wealthy were looking to stay in touch with nonprofits and engage in the nonprofits’ social activities. Only thirty percent were
6 interested in merely donating to the most effective nonprofit. This explains the success and shortcomings of existing online resources and why ChicagoGives is uniquely positioned for success. Creating connections between nonprofits and online donors require breaking down the offline/online divide, providing easily-accessible connection options, and making it easier for nonprofits to stay in contact with donors. In-person connections are only possible in a local environment where donors can find nonprofits within their area. While this is possible through existing websites like Network for Good and Global Giving, their national and global focuses make them more difficult to find many local nonprofits. Network for Good has roughly 196 nonprofits listed in the Chicago area while Guidestar has a little over 20,000 on file. Of those nonprofits listed, 100 percent of their information comes from their Guidestar report. This disconnect exemplifies the dead weight loss that occurs when delocalizing community through the Internet. To bridge this informational and cultural gap between nonprofits and their communities online, ChicagoGives will focus on the Chicagoland area, personally recruiting nonprofits and donors and requiring them to post their own information, hosting and advertising in person events, and enabling nonprofits to advertise their own range of connection options beyond donations to include volunteer opportunities, job openings, newsletters, and services. See Appendix i for a list of comparable websites. By being embedded in the local community, ChicagoGives can not only act as a platform for education and empowerment for nonprofits and donors alike, but also uniquely facilitate the broad array of connections that online donors and nonprofits demand. Research by the Craigslist Foundation has shown that nonprofits want the Internet to be a tool for offline engagement, for sharing their unique narratives of social change, and for making them searchable in a more efficient, reliable, and straightforward way. ChicagoGives’ will bridge the online/offline divide by acting as a platform for a wide range of online and offline engagement opportunities and offering in-person events to build deeper connections within Chicagoland’s social sector. By requiring nonprofits to create their own content on the website, these organizations will be forced tell their own story within the framework of connecting their activities and development strategies with their overall mission and theory of change. Lastly, ChicagoGives is exactly the kind of searchable web space that will embed local nonprofits in an efficient and easily navigable network of information about their causes, other organizations, and opportunities that is light-years beyond Google searches and Network for Good capabilities. Ultimately, ChicagoGives will be driven by matching online donors demand for better information, more opportunities, and deeper connections with nonprofits’ desire for funding, deeper donor involvement, and a meaningful web presence. Building from this core market, ChicagoGives can integrate with other existing resources such as nonprofits’ own websites, Volunteer Match, and NPO.net to create a resource library that can be utilized for volunteers, job seekers, potential members and participants, and nonprofit researchers. By being local, ChicagoGives can not only facilitate these dynamic connections and authentic information, but drive innovation in how nonprofits, individuals, and the causes that the Chicagoland community cares about are addressed on the Internet.
7 SERVICES ChicagoGives will be driven by innovative services that empower nonprofits, individuals, foundations, and nonprofit researchers. Nonprofits will benefit from easy to use access to web space and constituent communications, community-centered knowledge sharing, usage reports, and educational services. ChicagoGives will enable individuals to efficiently find and research their favorite nonprofits and causes, get involved in them in numerous ways, connect with other users, and maximize their impact through unique fundraising strategies and rewards. Foundations will have unprecedented access to the programs they invest in through tracking and communication features as well as customizable fundraising initiatives. Lastly, researchers will be given access to data collected through ChicagoGives to monitor and analyze trends in the nonprofit world and develop best-practices research. Ultimately, the goal of ChicagoGives is create innovative services for these key constituencies to strengthen the social sector by maximizing its efficiency, flexibility, and impact. Nonprofit services will center on a platform that simplifies web design, maximizes their communication with constituents, and provides them with feedback to drive program development. Nonprofits will be able to create their own web profiles using their basic information such as a mission statement and service areas within a search system where they can easily be found. This basic, findable profile system means that any nonprofit of any size and budget can have a web presence without having to know how to design and maintain a website. From this profile, nonprofits can upload their news, events, photos, and postings for volunteers, jobs, or services. In addition, nonprofits will be able to send communications to any subset of other users who have connected with them including supporters, recommenders, and donors. This simplified contact system will encourage nonprofits to do what they typically do not do enough – stay in contact with supporters. The usage statistics generated through profile traffic will be used to generate reports for nonprofits so they can compare the activity on their profile; including the number of visitors, donors, and pages viewed; to other nonprofits in their region, sector, and as a whole. This reporting system, along with the education materials published on the website and the ability to look up comparable nonprofits, will drive improvement and best practices sharing. Individual services will focus on encouraging engagement in the nonprofit community by publicizing diverse opportunities, multiplying the impact of their engagement, and rewarding them. Individuals will be able to find, compare, and get involved in the nonprofits that best match their interests. By facilitating a wide array of opportunities, individuals will be able to choose how they get involved. They will be able to make donations, find events, write recommendations, volunteer, find jobs, and keep up with nonprofits’ news. Individual donors will be able to set up automatic deductions, purchase gift cards, donate non-monetary goods, and recruit other donors. In addition, fundraisers through the website will ensure that individuals will always find a worthy cause with a matching gift or fundraising challenge. ChicagoGives will also create an events page called “Party for a Cause” which will allow individuals to find local events hosted by nonprofits. Individuals will also be able to network online and offline by connecting with other users and organizations to share information, make recommendations, sharing information across social network platforms, and meet up at
8 the nonprofit itself. Lastly, users will be able to keep up with their favorite causes and nonprofits by subscribing to RSS feeds from organizations delivered to their inbox. Many of these activities will be integrated into a reward system whereby the most active users will achieve A-List standing with exclusive offers, events, and recognition. Foundation services will enable funders to publicize their own information, stay in touch with their grantees, and launch unique fundraisers through the website. Funder profiles will contain core information including mission, funding priorities, application deadlines, and outcomes which will enable nonprofits to connect with relevant foundations and make individuals aware of the funder’s impact on the community. In addition, funders will be able to track, communicate with, and fundraise for their grantees using the Funder’s Dashboard. The dashboard will display up to date information on their grantees’; including news, events, recommendations, and financial information. Funders will also be able to contact their grantees through the dashboard whether to share best practices, send out deadline notices, or inform them of upcoming events. Lastly, Funders will be able to design, advertise, launch, and monitor fundraisers through the dashboard. They will be able to designate the scope of eligible organizations, the kinds of fundraiser (i.e. matching grants, tipping point, and competitive challenges), and the advertising strategies. Once the fundraiser is launched, funders will be able to track the donations given and alter the parameters at any point. These services will provide publicity to foundations, easier access to their grantees, and unprecedented fundraising capabilities. Lastly, our research services will enable research institutions to access usage data on ChicagoGives to produce cutting edge research on sector trends and best practices. The usage statistics captured by ChicagoGives will combine traditional web indicators such as page views and unique visitors along with nonprofit specific data such as donations, recommendations, and news subscribers. Combining these statistics will enable researchers to monitor trends in giving, online activity, organizational growth, and social network development. In addition, this usage data can be combined with profile data to identify best practices related to attracting funding, user recommendations, and overall interest. At the bottom of this reporting will be a core commitment to maintaining user privacy and never releasing identifying information without the user’s expressed consent. By working with research institutions, ChicagoGives will be a source for cutting edge, data-driven knowledge about the social sector. ChicagoGives will be built to serve its four core constituencies – nonprofits, individuals, funders, and researchers. Each set of services will be built to maximize each one’s capability to engage with one another at the deepest and most flexible level possible. Each service is offers a way that members of our constituencies can participate and create unique value within the social sector. To see an itemized list of all of the services offered see the appendix “List of Services Offered.”
9 DEVELOPMENT PLAN Growing ChicagoGives from an idea to a fully operational community will require developing a minimally viable website and then building a self-reinforcing community through viral advertising. Once these foundations are set, further strategic initiatives can be developed and deployed to recruit more nonprofits and individual users and eventually foundations and researchers. Ultimately, this site will be successful to the extent that users find it significantly useful and accessible. ChicagoGives will begin with a basic design meant to enable the collection of information and launch of a donation system to drive initial recruitment. In the first stage, ChicagoGives will be a profile system where nonprofits and individuals can post their own information and donations can be made and tracked. Nonprofits and individuals will be recruited through current relationships with Chicago-based organizations including the Southside Arts and Humanities Network and Center for What Works. Further users will be recruited through referrals from these organizations and by targeting associations with large, active memberships such as GreenNet and Local First Chicago. By targeting these organizations, ChicagoGives will reach larger audiences that support our values of localization, nonprofit investment, and technological innovation. As these initial users join, incentive systems and web features will be developed to incentivize viral marketing in conjunction with further in-person recruitment. Users who recruit their other users will be rewarded with money to donate through ChicagoGives. This process will be made easier by integrating with Facebook, Twitter, and E-mail to allow users to virally recruit their friends through existing networks. The recruitment model is a high-powered form of Facebook’s model in which users are monetarily incentivized to recruit others. As nonprofits and individuals create more profiles, the benefits of ChicagoGives for finding and connecting with nonprofits in Chicago grow. Viral and in-person recruitment will develop simultaneously with the development of the website’s second-stage features, in particular, party for a cause, the news syndication system, and donation maximization opportunities such as matching gifts. These new features will further attract users and provide new forms of engagement attracting new markets, including socialites and activists. The more ways individuals can stay involved in the causes and organizations they care about, the more active they will be. The more active they are the more benefits nonprofits will see in using ChicagoGives and the more opportunities nonprofits will create on the website. When the user base is self-sustaining, ChicagoGives will develop features for foundations and researchers and create our own events. The foundation dashboard and research data will drive further community buy-in and provide feedback for web design, nonprofit marketing best practices, and social sector knowledge creation. Launching our own events will enable new forms of engagement, forums for education and collaboration across organizations, and platforms for feedback. These broader supports will increase community buy-in and drive traffic along with new, valuable services and information. This stage does not represent a final stage. Rather, it would be the end of the beginning. If successful, this model could be replicated in communities across the country and a nationwide community of locally-driven websites could be developed to share ideas, innovations, and best practices.
10 FINANCIAL REQUIREMENTS The core investments needed to launch ChicagoGives will be for constructing the website itself and promoting its use. Once these are attained, more resources will need to be committed to further develop and maintain the website and outreach strategies. Lastly, the final stage of development involving hiring full time staff and developing third party platforms will require the most significant investment following on the success of the website in gaining users. In order to ensure stability, a reserve of twenty percent of the total operating cost will be maintained at all times. The first stage of development, anticipated to last six months to a year, will require funding for web design and outreach. Web designers who have provided preliminary assessments predict that the website will initially cost $20,000-$30,000 to design. These numbers are based on very rough estimates and are subject to specification, negotiation, and generosity. An Outreach Coordinator will be needed to recruit users to the website. The amount of time, travel, and work-related expenses will depend on the level of demand cultivated for the project among nonprofits, user groups, and other marketing venues. Given that much of the earliest recruitment will occur through in-person presentations and viral marketing, outreach should be sustainable at $20,000 for the first six months to a year, but will vary directly with the number of engagements, success of viral marketing, and any public appearances. Given the low bandwidth and storage usage of the initial website, the cost of the Website itself should be $9.42 for the first year, pending the rate of users recruited. Lastly, filing the 501(c)(3) may require paid legal support and the full $850 filing fee. These bring the total cost of launching ChicagoGives to between $46,000 and $70,000 for the first year of operation. The second stage of development, occurring in the second and third years, will require the equivalent of a full-time web designer in addition to the Community Outreach Coordinator and an increase in the cost of web hosting. The work equivalent to a full time web designer will be required to develop the new features of the website that will facilitate viral marketing and return users. The estimated cost of these services is roughly $70,000. Depending on the growing interest in the website, the Community Outreach Coordinator may continue at previous costs or move to a full-time cost of up to $60,000. Lastly, as the website gains more traffic and user pages, it will likely exceed the maximum limits of most current web hosts’ low-cost deals. If the website requires its own server during the second stage, it may cost up to $7500 per year. In total then, ChicagoGives will operate on annual budget between $110,000 and $175,000, mostly depending on the cost of the outreach coordinator. The third stage will involve hiring core full-time staff with offices and further expanding the website to include third party platforms. While this inclusion of third parties diversifies funding sources, the annual budget nearly triples. On top of the expenditures from the second stage, three full-time staff will be hired including an Executive Director ($70,000-80,000), Development Director ($50,000-70,000), and a Research Coordinator ($40,000-60,000). To coordinate these staff and provide collective resources to perform their duties, ChicagoGives will acquire office space at an initial annual cost estimated around $43,000 and an annual maintenance cost of roughly $37,000. The annual operating cost of ChicagoGives during stage three will be between $430,000 and $555,000.
11 Appendix i Comparable Nonprofits : http://www.universalgiving.org/ (international donations) Funding: donors, corporate services (optimizing and vetting CSR programs) Vetting: self-research (EIN confirmation, verifying partnerships, identify NPOs via recommendations) www.JustGive.org (all possible donations) Wedding/Gift Registry www.Networkforgood.org Designation: allow you to designate where your money should be spent within org. Fundraising widgets including (sharing features: delicious, facebook, twitter, stumbleupon, etc) www.Impactgiveback.org (only in Minnesota and North Dakota) Good Information Section www.donorschoose.org (new vision of education grantmaking) Project-based giving is excellent! Testimonials from donors! Companies buy gift cards for employers, customers, and clients Trade-in Gift Cards through PlasticJungle.com Does have Donor Match System! www.kiva.org www.GlobalGiving.org www.Ammado.com Has Member Profiles Good integration with blogging, facebook, and RSS features How ChicagoGives is Different: 1. None provide face-to-face opportunities except volunteer listings. 2. None provides for offline networking among donors and NPOs (Ammado has online networking and NetworkforGood mentions some form of network in one place on website, but nowhere else) 3. None are local integrated (Kiva does maintain direct ties to recipients). 4. None provide for donations other than money. 5. None synergize fundraising across organizations or fields (Ammado allows communities have some collaborative fundraisers) 6. Some provide for customizable information about an NPO (DonorsChoose, Kiva, and Ammado). U.S.-based sites take information directly from Guidestar. 7. None has a rating or transparent vetting system – Guidestar is developing one.
12 Appendix ii Basic Structure for Web Designers Overview ChicagoGives, at its core, will be a website connecting Chicagoland individual donors and nonprofits through an Ammado.com-like searchable profile system. Individual users will be able to use the site to find, compare, and donate to the nonprofit organization of their choice. Initially, the site design will consist of a homepage and “About” page, search pages for individuals and nonprofit profiles, a registration page, and the profile pages themselves. Ideally, nonprofit pages would include an on-site donation system; however, for the sake of developing a working website as quickly and cheaply as possible, donations might be initially integrated as a link to the nonprofit’s donation page on their website. More advanced features integrating Web 2.0 capabilities, RSS feeds, a searchable event system, foundation and corporate profile systems, and integration with other Chicago-focused web resources are planned as future work. The goal is to create an information-rich and efficient resource on the Internet for connecting individuals with the local nonprofit of their choice and, from that, building a wide-ranging social network platform for the nonprofit community in Chicago. Basic User Experiences Individual Non-registered Donors: Individual users will come to the homepage where they can find updates about ChicagoGives website and other general information. They will likely search for a specific organization or a type of organization by service area or location. Once they find the organization they’re looking for, they click to that organization’s profile page where they can find a basic summary of what the organization does, its mission, and funding needs and uses. If this is their end goal, they will click the donate button (or link) and provide their donation information. Users looking for particular types of organizations may go back to the previous search page to see other, comparable organizations and evaluate them until they find the one they are most interested in and donate. Users will also be able to become a “Supporter” of the nonprofit in which their contact information is given to the nonprofit and the organization appears on the user’s profile. Eventually, users will also be able to follow links from the nonprofit profile page to nonprofit job postings, volunteer opportunities, service applications, events, and financial information. They will also be able to promote the nonprofit by writing recommendations; integrating with Facebook, Twitter, Digg, Delicious, and other networking applications; and inviting friends to view the nonprofit. Individual Registered Donors: Registered donors will login from the homepage and be able to see their profile information and links to edit that information. Eventually, they will also be able to see links to the nonprofits that they have donated to, their friends, and recommended organizations. They can follow those links to update their donation information or check in on the nonprofits they’ve donated to. They will also be able to send e-mail messages to their friends inviting them to join ChicagoGives or visit a page on ChicagoGives. These users may also follow the same search procedures as nonregistered users above to find nonprofits. Eventually, they will also be able to find local
13 fundraising events, subscribe to RSS news feeds from the nonprofits they’re following, and maintain their own recommendations for nonprofits and view others’. Nonprofit User: A nonprofit will log in from the home page and be sent to their profile page where they can view and edit their organizational information, export donor and supporter contact information (if the donation system is embedded within ChicagoGives), update their news/announcements, and eventually their events listings, recommendations, supporters (i.e. Friends in a Facebook style) which will be organized into tabs within the profile (again in a Facebook-style Wall, Info, Photos, etc.). These nonprofit users will also be able to search for other nonprofits in the same way as users (whether for other ways of marketing on ChicagoGives, finding potential collaborators, or becoming supporters themselves).
14 Appendix iii List of Services Internet Services 1) Free web space for the Chicagoland community: Nonprofits no longer have to have their own websites to have a detailed and thoroughly informational presence on the Internet. While ChicagoGives cannot provide all of the functionalities and independence of a website, nonprofits and individuals alike will be able to publish a range of relevant information without having to know web design. 2) Customized-Content: Website structure (like igoogle or Facebook?) with NPOgenerated content a) Connection to Applications: application for services, volunteering, employment. 3) Auto-updating Content: Updates on a NPO’s website are automatically updated on ChicagoGives. 4) Retro-fit Content: Enabling content generated on ChicagoGives to be implanted in NPO’s website (easy way to build a Webpage) Fundraising Services I. Creating New Donors 1. Gift Cards: Gift Card for donations on site (holiday gifts) 2. Alternate Donations: opportunity to give something other than money 3. How To’s: Do’s and Don’ts of donating food, how to claim donations on taxes, how to evaluate a good organization. 4. Free Rice Model: Fun activities that generate donations as you participate in them. 5. Passive Accumulation: percentage of spending on gift cards, online buying collects on ChicagoGives to be distributed by user to NPO. 6. Pyramid Model: reward users for getting donations from other users and recruiting new users. 7. Peer-to-Peer Fundraising: Individual profiles contain NPOs that user supports with their reasons why to build funding and connections. Integrates with individual sites – blogs, facebook, twitter, II. Making Philanthropy Easier 1. Accounting: Track individual purchases to be printed off for tax deductions. (set up for business and individual deductions). 2. Vetting Systems: several organizations are creating more thorough rating systems that might be implementable in ChicagoGives. In addition, nonprofits could be tagged by funders as their picks (i.e. “This organization is a ShoreBank Pick”). ChicagoGives could also make recommendations. Individual users themselves may will be able to write short recommendations for their favorite nonprofits. 3. Automatic Deductions: (set up automatic deduction for donations). 4. RSS: methods for letting users keep up with news and events going on from the nonprofits/sector/location of their choice. 5. Donation Recommendations: (i.e. Amazon model) Generate recommended organizations for a user based on similarities among the organizations a user donates to, follows, or otherwise engages with through the website.
15 III. Maximizing Funding Potential 1. Matching Gifts for Fields: (e.g. Chicago Community Trust will match anything in developmental disabilities) 2. Sponsorship/Campaign Spotlights: Feature specific organizations, campaigns 3. Fundraising Challenges: NPO that raises the most (as a proportion of its budget?) gets “X” 4. Donor’s Picks: Prominent donors certify organizations as what they suggest/who they believe in. Tied to matching gifts. Creating Offline Activity I. Events: 1. “Party for a Cause”: List of fundraising events on ChicagoGives so users can find fun events with a social impact. Events listed by registered nonprofits. 2. Fundraising Events: ChicagoGives hosts or co-sponsors fundraising events (e.g. $100/ticket and all money is to be donated at event). Meet programs/leadership/participants, learn about field, network. 3. Activism Expos: Host or co-sponsor forums focused geographically (i.e. by neighborhood or city), by field, or by service to share information, network, and connect. 4. Featured Events: Feature high profile events in the city on the front page (e.g. Green Fest, Global Activism Expo, etc.) 5. Nonprofit Training Events: see Nonprofit Services. II. Maximize Opportunities and Customization: 1. Nonprofit Connection Opportunities: Enable nonprofits to, at minimum, link their ChicagoGives profile to all possible offline connections like their job postings, volunteer opportunities, events, membership, and services. It will be up to them which opportunities and how many they want to publicize. 2. Opportunity Redundancy: Enable users to find or hear about opportunities in multiple, customizable ways. For example, allow users to create an RSS digest of matched gifts in the developmental disability field or volunteer opportunities that require knowledge of Raiser’s Edge. Let them get a weekly newsletter of all events on Party for a Cause within their neighborhood. Nonprofit Services I. Contact 1. With Donors: a) Automated responses to Donors: Set up NPO-designed response to donors (i.e. automated e-mail written by NPO) b) Donor Information: NPO gets contact information for individual donors (information the donors provide. Anonymity is an option). 2. General Audience: a) Mailing List: Provide mailing lists to NPOs of people donating to, following, or RSSing any of their content (for all users who opt-in). b) Automated contact system through RSS. Can maintain contact via news and announcements that are automatically sent in an RSS digest to users. 3. ChicagoGives Contact (alongside data reports)
16 a) Newsletter: highlighting new features, new research and outcomes for ChicagoGives, and upcoming events. b) Feedback: i. Webform: feedback for troubleshooting, general inquiries, etc. ii. Strategic Planning Sessions: Hosted open forums to discuss strategies, current issues, and other feedback regarding the website II. Data: 1. Donor Reporting: a. Field: Report summarized statistics about giving in a field to NPO b. Organization Report: total given, activity (page views, donations), demographics 2. Usage Statistics: a. Field: average number of visitors, time spent on profiles, number of pages viewed. b. Organizational Report: number of visitors, demographics, entry and exit links, pages viewed, and outcomes (donations, forms filled out, recommendations, etc.) III. Education: 1. How-to: Training on how to take full advantage of and market your organization on ChicagoGives. 2. Best Practices: special training based on data gathered through activity on ChicagoGives. Individual Services I. Profiles: Individuals can create their own profiles with customizable privacy settings Contact Information Personal Philosophy: What they think is important in choosing a nonprofit or cause to get involved in. Recommendations: list of organizations they recommend and a summary of why they recommend them. Organizational Network: list of organizations they’re involved with Social Networking: features for connecting with friends on ChicagoGives. II. Social Network Integration: 1. Updates: enable cross-posting activity on ChicagoGives into Twitter, Facebook, Google Buzz, StumbleUpon, etc. (Status update: “Jason just donated money to Women Employed www.tinyurl/ChicagoGives.womenemployed”) 2. Cause Integration: Integrate ChicagoGives information and donation features into a cause page or donation link on Facebook III. Engagement 1. A-List: Individuals who most utilize ChicagoGives, whether through donations, recommendations, user recruitment, or other activities; can be given special recognition and access to special opportunities. For example, users who donate over $5,000 dollars, make over 50 recommendations, or recruit over 50 new users will be officially recognized, invited to special events sponsored by ChicagoGives, and given a $100 bonus to donate to the nonprofit of their choice.
17 Funder Services: I. Foundation Dashboard: the foundation dashboard will act both as a profile for foundations and corporate giving departments and an information management center from which they can stay in touch with the programs they invest in and independently manage their fundraising strategies. 1. Profile Information: Overview information about the funder including their mission, funding priorities, list of programs funded, contact information, funding schedule, and investment philosophy. 2. Investment Contact: a. Database Synchronization: Funders will be able to synchronize their databases with ChicagoGives to maintain a dashboard which displays the activities of the nonprofits they donate to. b. Tracking: The dashboard will show news, events, user recommendations, and other updated activity for the funder’s nonprofits. c. Communication: Funders will also be able to send out messages to their nonprofits from the dashboard whether for deadline notices, event announcements, or best practice sharing. 3. Fundraiser Management: Funders will be able to independently design, launch, advertise, and track fundraising initiatives that take place through ChicagoGives. a. Design: Funders will select the kind of fundraising initiative they want from standardized fundraising strategies including matching grants, tipping point, and competitive challenges. They will then select the scope of eligible organizations (all of their programs, all programs in a certain industry, or neighborhood; etc.). [Note: Standard strategies will continuously be further developed in consultation with such funders.] b. Advertising: Funders can then select which advertisement venues they want to use, including displaying an announcement on the organization’s profile page, the ChicagoGives homepage (for a price), RSS news feeds, or directly to the nonprofits’ online supporters (pending nonprofit approval). Other materials may be developed for advertisement outside of ChicagoGives. c. Launch: Funder clicks “Launch” to activate the fundraiser and advertisements. d. Tracking: the funder can track the amount of donations given in as close to real time as possible and may change the parameters of the fundraiser and advertisements at will. Other Possible Services: I. Project-based Donation Model: Like DonorsChoose.org and Kiva.org, format donations as directed towards specific projects rather than organizations (fundamentally different approach than organization-based donations like JustGive.org or UniversalGiving.org). II. Seed Funding Section: Modeled on Kickstarter and ThePoint.com III. App Developer Portal: A section of the website offering tools for developers to create applications for ChicagoGives on smart phones.
18 Appendix iv Extended Development Plan Growing ChicagoGives from an idea to a fully operational community will require a three stage process – mobilizing basic support and developing a minimally viable website; implement the website and recruiting users; and institutionalizing the organization and website. Basic support will come in identifying potential staff, board members, and donors; as well as core marketing constituencies. Once the basic structure of the website is set strategic initiatives can be developed and deployed to recruit nonprofits and individual users both directly and virally. At the final stage, ChicagoGives will be self-sustaining to the extent that users find it advantageous and accessible. Maintaining a significant presence will require investment in novel services and good content. At its most basic, ChicagoGives will begin simply as a searchable profile system housing nonprofit program information that is tied to online donation features. While this minimally viable system is being developed, the core audiences are potential staff and donors and organizations whose membership offers efficient and effective recruitment opportunities. The former audiences will comprise those who support and accomplish ChicagoGives’ initial development and launch. The profiles for these potential staff and donors are as follows: 1. Internet Futurists: People/organizations interested in the direction of the Internet who are engaged by the idea of using the Internet as a support for local activity rather than universal sites like NetworkforGood or Guidestar. 2. “Buy Local” Activists: People/organizations who are interested in localizing economies as a way of building community and creating healthier economies. 3. Entrepreneurial Philanthropists: People/organizations who are interested in developing small, entrepreneurial nonprofits and overcoming the challenges that small nonprofits in historically marginalized communities face. 4. Business Entrepreneurs: People/organizations who are interested in creating and bringing to market innovative ideas that reshape society. Getting in touch with people and organizations which fit these profiles will be crucial for recruiting the future staff, donors, and board members who will constitute the organization itself. Talking with the latter two, individual users and nonprofits, will be essential for laying the groundwork for initial launch and gaining feedback about the level of interest and design for the website. These conversations will help ensure that the website is designed to best suit the needs and interests of its core users. Once a minimally viable version of the website is online, ChicagoGives enters its second stage. The organizations and individuals who contributed to early discussions will be recruited as its first users. The sales pitch must get over three problems: experimentalism, vision, and buy-in. Initial users and nonprofits must be willing to put their information into the website as an experiment in launching the idea. There must also be the vision that the website will grow much larger and thus, in the near future, will begin to pay off. Lastly, these initial users must buy-in to the idea that this will work to the point that they act as recruiters for other users and organizations. In addition to these,
19 we can offer to “subsidize” these individuals’ participation by offering to create their profiles ourselves if they consent in order to reduce users’ unwillingness to spend additional time putting their information online. The keys to this vector of marketing are selling it to initial users so that they create content for others’ to view, let their friends and colleagues know, and encourage viral participation. Ideally, the first viral outreach can be matched with ChicagoGives informational events and incentive funds from donors in Chicago which reward users and nonprofits who join early and recruit others to join. Additionally, once the minimally viable website is online, user recruitment will become a central activity and representatives of the organization will solicit and accept invitations to speak to nonprofits and user-rich groups about the website. Associational groups like GreenNet, Net Impact, the Southside Arts and Humanities Network, and Local First Chicago whose memberships encompass a wide-range of organizations and potential users will be primary outreach platforms. Concurrently, the viral, word-of-mouth recruitment would be enabled through the website as new users would be able to invite their friends and nonprofits. Ideally, this recruitment would be matched with funding to reward those who recruit new users. For example, we can recruit a foundation to give users who recruit new users $5/person which the user can then donate to the nonprofit of their choice through ChicagoGives. The extent to which donations start building on the website will largely determine how well new sales pitches go with other nonprofits and users. While this wave of recruitment is occurring, sustainable funding will be solicited from the key donors identified earlier. The extent to which funding is secured will determine the rate at which new features for the website can be developed and the website itself maintained. These new features will be built into the website to continue to encourage user and nonprofit registration. The design goals here will be polishing the donation system, including nonprofits’ opportunity list (jobs, volunteer, services), and party for a cause. Newsletters will be sent out to all users advertising these new features as they become available, celebrating milestones (1,000 users!), and encouraging viral recruitment. This will prompt users to return to the site, start utilizing new features, keep track of ChicagoGives’ development, and spread the idea to their friends and any nonprofits with which they are involved. This wave of recruitment should create a momentum for the website where more potential users hear about the website per day and are increasingly likely to find it useful as it becomes more comprehensive, more visible, and more sophisticated. This momentum should be relatively self-sustaining. As the website builds momentum, the next phase of deployment will involve integration with social networks to further propel viral marketing, more sophisticated fundraising strategies to expand donor opportunities and demonstrate the website’s usefulness. As the momentum continues to bring in new users, the website’s services will continue to be developed and implemented. In its third stage, the website will be considered relatively sustainable and the focus will shift to developing the third party platforms and hiring full-time staff. ChicagoGives can be considered relatively sustainable if the website appears to succeed according to its number of users, amount of activity, level of user satisfaction, buy-in from funders, and relative popularity. At this point, ChicagoGives can invest in developing features for foundations and researchers to build further content, community buy-in, and utilization as well as create new valuable products from the information being
20 gathered on the website. Concurrently, ChicagoGives will begin institutionalizing its core functions by hiring full-time staff. The foundation dashboard will allow foundations and corporate giving departments to connect with the programs they fund by observing, communicating, collaborating, and fundraising with them. The dashboard will enable foundations to keep abreast of their programs’ activity on ChicagoGives allowing them to conveniently stay in touch with the programs they support. ChicagoGives will also enable foundations to communicate directly with their nonprofits on the website whether to share best practices, send out deadline notices, or inform them of upcoming events. Lastly, foundations will be able to independently design, launch, advertise, and monitor their own fundraisers through the dashboard. By integrating large funders and the programs they support through observation, communication, and fundraising design; ChicagoGives will further expand its utility in creating a more connected and reflexive social sector and encourage innovative fundraising that will drive user giving and engagement. The other third party that will be most interested will be nonprofit researchers who may use data gathered by the website to monitor trends, develop best practices, and create data-driven consulting services for specific organizations. By developing backend data collection and reporting procedures, ChicagoGives will inform nonprofits of their usage data; including donation, traffic, and networking statistics; enabling them to monitor their own outcomes on the website and compare them with industry-level and site-wide statistics. In addition, large nonprofit research institutions will be able to obtain bulk statistics about where donations are going, what features drive fundraising, how social networks are evolving, and what informational content is being created. This will help drive better best practices, social scientific research in the nonprofit sector, and better consulting services for nonprofits. At the bottom of this reporting will be a core commitment to maintaining user privacy and never releasing identifying information without the user’s expressed consent. While these new features are being developed, ChicagoGives will focus on hiring staff in order to commit the resources needed to develop and sustain the organization’s core functions within its growing complexity. A Director of Development will be hired to developing fundraising strategies through and for the website and thus drive innovations to engage users and recruit new users to the website. A full-time Community Outreach Director will engage the community in events hosted or sponsored by ChicagoGives, encourage and maintain feedback from users to drive web design, and be the point person for recruiting new individuals, nonprofits, foundations, and researchers. A research coordinator will be hired to help design and maintain the reports sent to nonprofits, work with external researchers to develop relevant data sets, and produce reports for ChicagoGives own outcome measurement and quality improvement. Once these hires are complete and the new third party platforms developed, stage three will be complete. ChicagoGives will have regularized website design, feedback, funding, and recruitment strategies that will drive the organization indefinitely. Stage four, should this point be reached, will be replication of the website in communities across the U.S. and world where applicable. The goals of replication will be to create self-sustaining local websites like ChicagoGives that are formally linked together as members of an association, tentatively called The Giving Network Association. Rather than creating a national organization to run these website, recruiting
21 members of other communities to create their own websites will ensure the same kind of community involvement and responsiveness that will make ChicagoGives successful. These websites will maintain their local embedding by being forced to find their own local funding, recruiting their own users, and developing locally-appropriate web features. Through the association, representatives from these organizations will be able to meet regularly to discuss their experiences, share best practices, and facilitate innovation throughout the field. Ultimately, ChicagoGives, as a brand, should come to be known as a fundamental part of what it means to be a nonprofit in Chicago, one that is more fundamental than having a website itself.
22 Appendix x Five-Year Projected Operating Costs
Launch Stage (6 Months - Year) Low Est. High Est. Personnel Outreach Director $20,000 $20,000 Web Developer $20,000 $40,000
Second Stage (2nd-3rd Year) Low Est. High Est. Personnel Outreach Director $20,000 $60,000 Web Developer $70,000 $70,000
Infrastructure Web Hosting
Free*
Free*
Infrastructure Web Hosting
501(c)(3) Application Filing Fee Legal Fees
$850 $700
$850 $700
$5,000
$10,000
$46,550
$71,550
Reserve Funds Total
Reserve Funds
* Free webhosting is limited to 50GB storage ($.10/GB above)
Total
Free*
$7,500
$20,000
$30,000
$110,000
$177,500
23
Third Stage (4th-5th Year) Low Est. High Est. Personnel Executive Director Outreach Director Web Developer Development Director Data Analyst Personnel Subtotal
$70,000 $50,000 $70,000 $50,000 $40,000 $280,000
$80,000 $70,000 $70,000 $70,000 $60,000 $350,000
Infrastructure Rent Utilities Supplies Office Subtotal
$30,800 $4,800 $2,005 $37,605
$35,000 $4,800 $8,000 $47,800
Web Hosting
$7,500
$10,000
Reserve Funds
70,000
100,000
$432,710
$555,600
Total
Appendix xi Funding Strategies and Sources: I. Startup Funding Models: 1. Seed Grants 2. Fiscal Sponsorship 3. Internet-based Funding II. Long-Term Models 1. Traditional Model: continuously seek funding from independent and institutional donors. 2. Fiscal Sponsorship: Chicago Global Donors Network model. Become a part of an existing nonprofit to incubate the organization and eventually split when sustainable. 3. NPR Advertising Model: attract large donors through online advertisement (“acknowledgement”) 4. Usage Tax Model: taking 1% (or what is suitable based on sustainability) of all donations given through the website over $50 to fund ChicagoGives. 5. Commoditization: Charging users for general and/or specific services a. Nonprofits pay a minimal or sliding-scale fee to create a profile. b. Foundations pay a fee to create a profile and use the dashboard c. Recruitment Platform: Nonprofits and Foundations can access a pool of users who opt in to being contacted for jobs and RFPs. d. Consulting Services: Users can solicit consulting services to help maximize their impact on ChicagoGives. III. Potential Donor Profiles: 1. Internet Futurists: People/organizations interested in the direction of the Internet who are engaged by the idea of using the Internet as a support for local activity rather than universal sites like NetworkforGood or Guidestar. 2. Business Entrepreneurs: People/organizations who are interested in creating and bringing to market innovative ideas that reshape society. 3. Social Justice Philanthropist: People/organizations who are interested in developing small, entrepreneurial nonprofits and overcoming the challenges that small nonprofits in historically marginalized communities face. 4. “Buy Local” Activists: People/organizations who are interested in localizing economies as a way of building community and creating healthier economies.
