This week, the online community of online communities was shaken by the April 16^th announcement by that the online networking company, Ning, would be phasing out its free product. Ning had cornered the market for building online communities in a fast and easy way. It was also free. It was a non-profit’s dream.

But now, if your non-profit has its community data in a free Ning product, Ning has just become a nightmare. This highlights the problem with “free” software. Free is rarely free.

We come to depend on the fact that this software will be available for us tomorrow.  But when your software is hosted and free, your data, your community, your images may not really be yours. Google can rescind Analytics tomorrow, and there is not much we as users could do about it. It’s unlikely, but it’s always a possibility.

I love recommending free and fun tools, but you must always remember the caveat: online software that is free today may be gone tomorrow.

A few days ago, my colleague wrote about the effectiveness and Return on Investment (ROI) of adding social networking links to your site . Are your users clicking them? Are they driving traffic to your site? In reading his post, I could see years of frustration in implementing these kinds of share links. There’s so much to do – figuring out the link styles, getting the right icons, picking the right networks, changing out the networks when one becomes passe and another comes into vogue. It’s enough to make anyone ask, "are you sure you really want this?"

Luckily, the days of this kind of implementation being limited to the domain of the tech-savvy few are over. Thanks to services like AddThis and ShareThis , adding this kind of functionality on your site can be a simple half-hour operation. It’s important to consider the pros and cons of using these kinds of free services (their branding will appear on your site, limited customization and integration, the service getting your data, and the possibility that they could go out of business). But if you can stomach the cons, there’s no reason you can’t easily implement a social networking bar on your site.

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Back in January, I wrote a post lambasting John McCain’s campaign for putting their email list up as collateral.

Now, as the Washington Post reports (h/t The Notion via TechPresident), we learn that Barack Obama considered the same thing: offering their email list as collateral for a loan. While they never actually needed the loan, it would be hypocritical not to be equally disappointed with the Obama camp as I was with McCain’s.

Anyway, most of my thoughts on the issue are laid out in my original post, so go read that if you want more details on why I think that this is bad, but here’s the bottom line for candidates, non-profits, and anyone with an “enter your email” field:

Your email list should not be used as collateral. Mortgaging it is mortgaging your credibility. Using your email list in this way risks ruining email marketing for everyone.

As a Democrat, I’m not terribly writing the “Why we won” posts after an election. That said, it hasn’t even been a week, but a casual browser of the internet can already find more than 300,000 posts about how Barack Obama was elected the forty-fourth President of the United States. This blog isn’t about electoral politics, but rather the use of technology for non-profits, so I’m going to focus on a very small part of the Obama electoral machine and the lessons non-profits can take away: merchandise.

Many non-profit fundraisers cringe at the thought of premiums and merch. “If you get your supports hooked on premiums, they won’t donate without them” is the conventional wisdom, and there’s certainly some truth to it. Merchandise, on the other hand, requires significant outlays to produce and may just sit around your fulfillment house for months (or longer).

Barack Obama’s campaign didn’t see either of these as a barrier. Part of that was due to the volume his campaign could expect – it’s no problem to get a hundred thousand union-made, environmentally-friendly T-shirts made when you’ve got three million donors and sixty-five million (and counting!) voters. That basically puts his supporter base in a tier that few non-profits can match – add in about a million percent name recognition and you’re seeing a consumer base closer to that of Apple or Nike.

Adding to this is the strong brand identity that Obama established – not only with the distinctive logo, but with the general energy of his campaign that made people want to be a part of it – it was cool to be an Obama supporter and show it off in a way that just wasn’t the case with Gore or Kerry, and certainly not with McCain or W. My colleague Eve is going to chime in later this week with a post about the Obama brand, but it seemed to be a big part of what made Obama gear more than just an obligation and into an important part of their fundraising arm.

So what lessons can non-profits take from the Obama campaign if they aren’t as big or cool as Obama? Four do’s and one big don’t, and how your non-profit can learn from their example, below the fold…

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Apologies to our readers for the lack of activity on the Beaconfire Wire lately – the whole staff has been busy with a variety of exciting projects, some of which we hope to announce later this week. Unfortunately, our work on behalf of our clients has kept us too busy to blog, but here are a few things to check out on election day that I wish he had time to blog about in depth:

• Google has a bevy of cool tools to help voters – there’s a map to help you find your polling place, indexed audio of ads and speeches, so you can find what candidates have said about your key issues, and, as the polls close, live results.
• Twitter is featuring an election update page that moves really fast, but is nonetheless cool. Though the candidate statuses on top make me wonder if one candidate might be more connected to Twitter than the other…
  
• When you log into Facebook, you’ll note that it’s asking you if you’ve voted yet – there’s a running tally of people who both voted and checked their Facebook today, and while it’s lower than expected, that’s probably a good thing because it means that people are getting out the vote rather than visiting Facebook.
  
  Facebook also features an “election central” page, which isn’t as useful as Google’s, but does hawk their gifts. This made me laugh a little bit – first of all, how can a virtual gift be sold out, second, it’s probably not a good sign for McCain:
  
• TechPresident is going to be the place to be throughout the day, particularly after 4 PM Eastern when they start liveblogging. I’ve found TechPresident to be one the best blogs in the business for those of us interested in technology and politics, and their cross-partisanship gave me a look at McCain’s operation.
• My favorite electoral vote calculator is Daily Kos’s scoreboard. For now,it’s just in prediction mode, but it’s supposed to start getting a feed of AP data tonight as polls close. It also shows off downticket races that won’t get as much play on TV.

Look for more on the Beaconfire Wire later this week and month, as we resume our regular posting schedule. For today, though, do what you can to Get Out the Vote!

With news of Obama’s $150 million month still fresh on my mind, I saw an email from him appear in my inbox with the subject line “You Decide.” Skimming the email, I hoped that it would lead me to a donation form that asked me to determine which states my contributions to go to. Sadly, my hopes were dashed – it was just another standard donation form.

This makes sense – in general, restricted giving is dangerous, as your supporters aren’t always the best judges of how you should spend your campaign resources (as any field organizer will tell you if asked about yard signs). But look at the place where Senator Obama is at:

• Ahead in the polls by about 6 points nationally
• Winning enough states by 8 or more to get to 270 EVs without even considering battlegrounds
• Flush with cash, to the point that he’s running TV ads 3 to 1 in states where he’s competing with McCain, and running unopposed in other states
• Expanding the map to states that no one considered remotely near the table a year ago
• Running out of time to place more TV buys

This is no reason to be overconfident – as a Democrat, I’m quite used to playing Charlie Brown to the electorate’s Lucy. But it is a reason to consider bold new ways to involve your contributors: why not just let them pick the states to target their fundraising?

First, consider that this one fundraising campaign is a drop in the bucket – you’ve got plenty of other appeals, not to mention big dollar fundraisers and merch. Plus the value of money is dropping daily – a dollar given today is worth much less than that same dollar in May, since he’s pretty much hit the saturation point with TV anyway and has started expanding to XBox Live and iPhones.

Second, there’s no reason the campaign has to get too specific. Don’t let donors determine exactly what the contribution is for, but maybe just the state or general expense area. With so many states in play, it’s unlikely that more than a token amount of money will go to states where it’s completely wasted, since even Massachusetts and DC have field expenses that could be reallocated later.

But more than anything, it gives donors a sense of ownership in the campaign. They’ve seen countless presentations by David Plouffe with his charts and maps showing the plan for victory, so why not let your most dedicated supporters direct their contributions to make it possible – I’d be willing to bet that the results would look a lot like the maps that the campaign is looking at.

Non-profits lucky enough to find themselves the recipient of similar windfalls should also consider relinquishing control to donors. As long as you make the choices such that almost anything is good, and set up disclaimers to allow you to shift unallocated dollars to general revenue, the benefits of increased giving that always come from restricted dollars should outweigh the headache to your accounting department. And while you’ll still have to do much of your fundraising as unrestricted so that it can be used to pay for less photogenic programs, like administrative costs, a few “donors choice” restricted fundraisers a year can do wonders for your net revenue.

For Barack Obama’s campaign today, a restricted gift isn’t really restricted – there’s almost no bad place to spend his money. Telling the donors, “You decide” and meaning it would keep up the tidal fundraising that’s been a sign of the massive grassroots support he’s enjoyed so far – and might do the same for your non-profit.

According to Roll Call (subscription req’d), the Senate recently revised their rules to allow Members to make use of YouTube, Flickr, Twitter, and other free web applications on their sites, as long as they otherwise comply with franking rules:

Senators can now legally post YouTube videos on their Web sites, thanks to a long-awaited update to the chamber’s rules.

Until now, any Senator who embedded a YouTube video or linked to a Flickr album was in violation of outdated rules that required them to keep within the senate.gov domain. Some posted such links anyway, and few were reprimanded.

But last week, the Senate Rules and Administration Committee voted to allow Senators to use third-party sites.

This is pretty much indisputably a good thing. Not only does it allow Senators to bring their websites into the 21st century, but many of these tools foster interactions between citizens and their representatives in Washington. In addition, Congress’s ability to use technology is directly related to their ability to understand and regulate it wisely.

No movement yet on the House side, but hopefully we’ll see some changes there with the next Congress once they see how effectively their Senate colleagues make use of user-generated content tools.

In the meantime, I’d like to suggest that Senators celebrate their new freedom by embedding this video on their homepages:

It seems like good news has been a little hard to come by recently so I was particularly happy this morning when I learned that Sir Tim Berners-Lee, the true inventor of the Web, has announced the creation of The World Wide Web Foundation. 

The Web Foundation will focus its programs around research, technology and social development, with a particular emphasis on global collaboration and outreach to underserved populations.  Currently, only about 20 percent of people access the Web. 

The Knight Foundation has provided a $5 million dollar grant to get the Web Foundation started on its path of connecting humanity via technology. 

On a recent trip to my mailbox, I was shocked to see a direct mail solicitation from Barack Obama’s campaign. I wasn’t shocked because they included me in their prospect pool, since I’ve donated before. I wasn’t shocked because they had my home address, since I gave them that. And I wasn’t shocked because he was asking for money – even with his fundraising prowess, Presidential campaigns are expensive. No, I was shocked because I realized that this was the first piece of snail mail I’ve ever received from Obama.

It made me think about how small a part direct mail seems to have played in his meteoric fundraising campaign. I’ve been donating online since February, but even the thank you’s for my online donations came in via email, with no supplemental thank you/re-ask message arriving in the mail. How is it that Obama for America could shatter all fundraising records with small donations, without making direct mail a central part of their strategy? And what could this mean for the future of non-profit fundraising?

My thoughts on these, and other questions, below the fold…

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Anyone who’s worked for Congress has stories about the goofy and sometimes contradictory rules imposed by the various ethics committees and rules. These rules are almost universally outdated, a result of governing bodies that have the unenviable role of policing themselves, and inertia is a powerful force in keeping things from being changed.

The latest casualty of these archaic rules is the twitter feed of Representative John Culberson, a Republican(?!). Culbertson won some notoriety as he suggested that a letter sent by the Committee on House Administration (pdf) implied that,

They want to require prior approval of all posts to any public social media/internet/www site by any member of Congress!!!

Now, while few Members of Congress generally express themselves with three exclamation points, this is really his Twitter feed – in his capacity as “Most Connected Congressman,” Culbertson uses an impressive array of interactive web tools, to communicate (h/t for most of the info in the previous paragraphs to Personal Democracy Forum and the Sunlight Foundation, who’ve been providing continuing coverage of this issue).

For my part, I think that it’s time we modernized the rules that govern Congressional use of the internet, for reasons I’ll go into below the fold…

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More consolidation in the nonprofit software market today. Blackbaud bought Kintera for a staggering $46 Million in cash. It will be interesting to learn more about their short and long term plans for the software. But this could beef up Blackbaud’s offerings in the e-CRM space and provide more financial backing for further development of the Kintera suite.  You can read more at MSN & Yahoo:

While most of the discussion of video used by the Presidential campaigns this cycle has focused on Obama and Clinton’s effective use of video to share speeches and ads with users (see this post on how Obama uses YouTube to bypass the culture of sound bytes while this post discusses how both he and Clinton make good use of their raw footage), there’s also been an undercurrent of parody videos that’s designerd to be forwarded, even if it’s less influential.

Prompting this post was a video combining two of the more well-known (at least online) figures in the battle for the Democratic nomination: Mike Gravel and Obama Girl. While one is an pre-packaged phenomenon nearly universally loathed by Democrats and Republicans alike (see this study – 51% of Democrats were irritated by the videos while 41% were embarrassed) and the other is a former senator who shared the stage for several early debates, they actually have a lot in common.

Both trade not on serious policy issues or even trivial gaffes, but on being different enough to break out from pack. Both also make use of pop culture as a segue to promote their own videos – while Gravel’s is often several decades removed (see this video), Obama Girl draws source material from other YouTube celebs.

Their latest video was a collaboration between the two – check it out:

Now, I don’t see videos like this really moving votes. Unlike relatively clever parodies done by the major campaigns (one of Hillary’s best videos pokes fun at herself, Bill and Tom Vilsack), Gravel’s videos are mostly just a way to get attention for a campaign that otherwise would have been forgotten, while Obama Girl is mostly there to sell stuff on her website.

But despite their similarities, I’m far more amicable to Gravel than to Obama Girl. It’s probably not because he’s a candidate – I don’t watch a ton of candidate videos, particularly from the minor candidates. Instead, it’s probably that they’re just plain fun to watch. As I commented to a colleague today, I really like Senator Gravel because he’ll do his own parodies. Whether it’s dumping a rock in the pond, remaking schoolhouse rock, or telling Obama that the election is now down to the two of them, he gets his message out while being entertaining.

Obama Girl, on the other hand, is a joke that may have been funny when she first came out, but now is just sorta creepy. She’s too slick, and her videos just try too hard, plus it’s the same basic premise every time – we get it: you have a crush on Obama. Her videos seem so commercial, while Gravel’s feel so grassrootsy. Plus she pushes the sex angle way too far for my taste – it’s just not something I’d really pass around the office.

So as the nomination contest wraps up, we’ll hopefully see a lot more user-generated parody video this election. While it may not be as vital as Obama’s full-length speeches or the DSCC’s web ads, it’s an important element to get the rank and file engaged and talking about the election. Plus it’s just fun to send around on a Friday afternoon.

Some of my favorite Gravel Ads below the fold, and to see more of Beaconfire staff favorite videos, check out this post.

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I was perusing the Presidential candidates’ blogs a couple weeks back, looking to see where they were headed in my old stomping grounds in Wisconsin, when I came across this item, at the bottom of a post about a supporter-created video:

You can create your own video ‘mashups’ too — feel free to download high resolution footage from our resource library today

Though I was annoyed that they put mashups in quotes (putting web 2.0 terms in quote marks, as if you’re not quite sure it’s a term yet, is almost up there with saying "online blogs"), I was fascinated by how open they were to releasing raw video footage to their supporters.

Looking around the internets, it looks like Obama’s campaign isn’t alone in releasing semi-raw video footage to supporters, but it’s a practice that hasn’t trickled down to non-profits yet. Below the jump, I explore the how this has paid off for some candidates, and why NPOs should join them.

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Today’s election day in Wisconsin, where most of my Facebook network resides. I’ve been watching my mini-feed in fascination as various friends update their status with who they’re voting for. Could Facebook be the secret weapon that’s turning out the youth and creative class vote this year?

In particular, watching status updates come in today show that in some ways, Facebook’s core functionality is more effective in reaching other users than any application: it’s word of mouth, plain and simple, except that it’s delivered to networks of people at a reach and speed that no mere "I voted" sticker can manage. To say nothing of the fact that few of said stickers indicate for whom you voted, an endorsement that can have more meaning for young people than all the Kennedy’s in Massachusetts.

Just looking at my own feed today, here are some of the status updates I saw (names blurred out for privacy reasons):

Could Facebook, because of it’s natural ability to broadcast messages, addictive nature, and near ubiquity be a stronger mover of votes than offline social affiliations, like unions or churches? Based on the results we’ve seen from youth turnout this year, along with the growth potential as these networks age, more members of the creative class already post-college begin adopting it, and the number of people attending college increases, I’m betting that that’s the trend we’re going to see in this election and the ones that follow.

And it’s a trend that that I, for one, welcome.

Google ads are just the latest front in the escalating online war fought between the campaigns this election season. While adwords were still maturing last cycle, I thought it would be interesting to take a look at how they’ve evolved in an era of search engine marketing consultants and near ubiquity of online advertising.

First, the ground rules: last month, Google posted on their policy blog about their guidelines for political ads:

• Editorial Guidelines. Like all AdWords ads, political ads must follow our editorial and content policies (including our trademark policies)…

• Fairness. We permit political advertisements regardless of the political views they represent, and apply our policies equally…
• No attacks on an individual’s personal life. Stating disagreement with or campaigning against a candidate[...] is generally permissible. However, political ads must not include accusations or attacks relating to an individual’s personal life, nor can they advocate against a protected group.
• Donations. If you’re soliciting political donations, your ad’s landing page must clearly state that the donations are non-tax-deductible.
• No misleading ads. As with all AdWords advertisements, political ads should not mislead users.

These policies seem remarkable even-minded and fair, as people have come to expect from Google. With these guidelines in mind, follow me below the fold for an analysis of the search engine marketing strategies of the 2008 presidential campaigns…

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Editor’s note: Each week, we do a survey of Beaconfire staff to get impressions on a variety of non-profit technology issues. All opinions expressed here are solely those of their authors. This week, in honor of super Tuesday, we asked: What lessons should non-profits take from the online Presidential campaign in 2008?

Michael, Principal Consultant: #1 lesson so far: Take your message and actions to the where the people are, everywhere they are. Socnets aren’t just hip – they are essential seeding grounds for support.

#2 lesson: Social media matters. Social media done well is the killer app for influencing decision to engage.

#3 lesson: Build the network, inspire the network and then the money will follow.

John Brian, Marketing Consultant: Direct mail folks, take notice: the dominance of online campaign fundraising is here (which means it’s still a couple years out for the non-profit sector, but still…). Obama and Clinton both had record-shattering months in January, with Obama raising $28 million out of $32 million online. And in the last 36 hours, Clinton’s brought in another $4 million online while Obama’s supporters have delivered $7.5 million more. Direct mail just can’t work fast enough to respond to events with the speed that email and social network fundraising – by the time something is written, designed, approved, printed, mailed, opened, responded to, mailed back and deposited, the next round of events will have come and gone. Plus these donations have come in virtually cost free.

The biggest surprise was that it looks like The Producers was right: you can make more money with a flop than with a hit. The day after he won Iowa, Barack Obama brought in quite the haul online. But it was eclipsed by the contributions he received after he lost New Hampshire. Makes me wonder if non-profit advocacy groups should make a pitch to their members after they lose a vote about "Don’t let this happen again." Of course, this could encourage development departments to ask their legislative folks not to work too hard….

Jennifer, Project Manager: A best practice in web design is to know thy audience and help them see themselves in your web site. For any public-serving or customer-centric organization, the logical strategy to match this design principle is to focus not on what your constituents can do for you but on what you do and can do for your constituents.

The presidential campaign sites tend to be all about me, the candidate. Branding and helping voters get to know them is important, but at the end of the day they are campaigning to serve the public and should speak to the people and the issues that they care about. All the sites address the issues in one way or another. Clinton’s site is particularly effective in helping visitors know her position on the issues by scanning the labels without even having to click through. Most of the campaign sites also have clear calls to action and community features to get people involved, but you have to dig below the surface to get a sense of whose interests they are campaigning for. There are a few exceptions. The Ron Paul campaign site includes a People label in the top level navigation, but it focuses too narrowly on niche audiences (gun owners, home schoolers, students and veterans). Fred Thompson’s site is another example of highlighting very niche coalitions — lawyers, veterans, students, young professionals –  that only represent pieces of the Republican base.  McCain’s site has a great top level navigation label – Undecided? – but the landing page could do a better job, for example, of swaying the left-of-center undecided voter. By contrast, Obama’s site is noteworthy for its “People” navigation which does a good job of representing the core Democratic constituency. As he continues to campaign for the Democratic nomination and gets closer to the general election, he might want to round it out with any key audiences who can’t see themselves in his list.

Kate, Administrative Assistant: This may be pretty basic, but for me, what stood out the most were the websites with an immediate and clear call to action. This worked best when the website was easy to navigate, and we were easily able to find the additional information we sought. For example: “Make History! [by giving me money! Press this Donate button!]” It easily gives me the option to say, “Oh, that’s a great idea; I’ll give you money now,” or “Hmm, I see what you’re after, but let me click on these well-organized tabs to see if I agree with your positions on the issues that are important to me.” And, another seeming no-brainer, but one that wasn’t necessarily followed by all candidates, is that the effective sites didn’t lead us away from the homepage with their links. We were kept within reach of the reminder to give them money.

Beaconfire doesn’t work on political candidates’ sites directly, but a variety of our clients are involved with this election, including NPCA (who has their very own Presidential candidate!), AFSCME, and NARAL Pro Choice America. Be sure to join us next week when we ask Beaconfire staff what they think about marketing causes to minors.

Last month, I posted on a few online tools that people can use to get involved politically. One tool I didn’t review in depth, but could have, was the official Facebook US Politics application, co-sponsored by Facebook and ABC News.

The application has become about as ubiquitous as any Facebook app not installed by default can hope to be – more than a quarter of my friends have it, and during the weeks leading up to the New Hampshire primary, I saw more updates by it than any other module.

While the module had a lot of promise, and showed off some cool features early, in my opinion it failed to live up to its potential for a simple reason: on the most politically engaged social network in history, the US Politics application is neither social nor network-y.

Why do I say this? Follow me below the fold…

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Remember when your email address, when given to a campaign or non-profit, was considered private? Even groups that engage in list swaps with their snail mail lists wouldn’t think of doing the same with their email – the most they might consider is sending an appeal pitching a colleague or ally, but the list remains firmly in their hands.

Unfortunately, one political campaign has gone a step worse than a swap: they’ve put your email address up for grabs by the repo man. According to an article in the politico:

When John McCain’s presidential campaign all but went broke, it borrowed money from its bank using its fundraising list as collateral.

Problem: McCain’s own privacy policy promises donors he won’t sell their information.

That seems to put the Republican senator’s campaign in a pickle; either it pledged to its bank proceeds from something it can’t sell, or it offered to violate its own promise to donors.[h/t: Daily Kos]

The McCain privacy policy is pretty clear here, and it’s not too different from what most organizations have:

We will not sell your personal information. John McCain 2008, will not sell your information to third parties or any commercial entities.

Will this make McCain an accessory to spam? I discuss what value these addresses could have, and why this kind of practice is extremely dangerous, below the fold…

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Elections are taxing. On the candidates, who end up saying goofy stuff, on the voters, who get figuratively buried in direct mail and robocalls, and on the campaign staff, who are so busy working on the campaign up to the election that they often forget that they’ll be unemployed starting the day after. But this year, it could be our email boxes that are strained to the point of breaking.

I’m subscribed to the list of all three major Democratic candidates. Since the new year began, I’ve received no less than 4 messages from Hillary Clinton’s campaign. Barack Obama, and his surrogates have sent me 3 messages. But the king of bacn award goes to the Edwards camp, who sent me 9 messages since the 1^st, including 3 on the 6^th. They also sent me 20 messages in the month of December, compared to 9 for Clinton and 14 for Obama.

Where’s the point of diminishing returns? At what point does one more message break the camel’s back (or at least Gmail’s server)? I explore this question below the fold…

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With the Iowa Caucuses today, I thought it might be good to do a quick roundup of interesting tools that the Presidential Candidates have put together to get out the vote. As happened in 2004, many of these tools will probably trickle into the non-profit sector over the coming year, as we see what works and what doesn’t.

First, I’ve got to say that I love Mitt Romney’s Varitalk. I remember when Snakes on a Plane used this same technology to put together calls from Samuel L. Jackson – my office spent several good hours sending calls to each other. Now you can have robo-Mitt call your friends, address them by name and holiday of choice, and tell them why he’s right for their most important issue, along with a reminder to vote in their own state. It also shows on caller ID as being from a phone number of your choice, and Mitt mentions that it comes from you.

Of course, there’s potential for abuse in applications like this, but that’s going to be true in any voter-generated content application – it’s really no more risky than a simple "Tell a Friend" form. I did find it odd, though, that there was such a limited selection of names Mitt could say. While I’m not surprised that "John Brian" wasn’t in his repertoire, I was saddened that he couldn’t call "Marissa" or "Taylor" by name, and I guess referring to the other guys in the field as "my opponent" has left him unable to say "Rudy" or "Duncan." Seems pretty closed-minded for a guy named "Mitt" who named his son "Tagg" (neither of which he can say, incidentally). But I did appreciate the option to make a contribution and get a real call, or at least a better robo-call (I didn’t make a donation to find out – I’m pretty sure I need my $25 more than Mitt).

Two more big things that impressed me, and a bunch more that I don’t have room to review in depth, below the fold…

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