This was a record year for the Hill Country Ride for AIDS, held last Saturday, April 26, in Austin, TX. In a soft economy, we raised more money than ever before by Ride date--$575,000--beating our amount raised as of Ride day last year by $60K. We had 20% more riders than last year. It was a record year for the number of teams and the amount of money raised by teams. I'm pleased to say that Team Convio turned in a very respectable $14,000. And  I raised $7000 individually, surpassing my initial fundraising goal by over $2000! All of my fundraising--and almost all of the Ride's--takes place online, using Convio's TeamRaiser component, which enables individual participants to maintain their own web pages and donations, as well as to roll those up into a larger team's fundraising totals.

What follows for those of you who are interested is my journal entry for the weekend:

**********************************************
It's Sunday morning, and I am basking in the memory of what is always the best day of the year for me--albeit with sore muscles and the sun still burning on my face!

The 9th annual Hill Country Ride for AIDS began Friday night with registration, packet pickup, and pasta dinner followed by an hour of opening ceremonies. It was a joyous time to greet fellow riders ("You look so different with your street clothes on!"), connect with crew from last year, and to remember why we ride. I sat with my team, Team Convio, through the evening. We heard a moving testimonial from a young woman who lost her "step father" to AIDS.

Back home after packing my gear and getting my bike ready for the following day, I retired early at 10 p.m. for the day ahead. I went to sleep to the sound of a thunderstorm and hail, wondering what the next day's weather would bring. But when I woke up, the rain had cooled the temperature down and cleared out the humidity. It was a beautiful clear spring morning!

I got an on-time start from the house at 6:30 a.m., arriving at 7:15 at Krause Springs, some 35 miles west of Austin, where we would start and finish the Ride. The morning was perfect for riding. Our team of 10 members was resplendent in our gold, white and purple Team Convio jerseys as we gathered at the starting line for a final team picture.

Riding out into the spring morning, the cluster of 480 riders quickly thinned into singles and pairs and small clusters. I rode for most of the morning with my boss and his wife. The scenery was beautiful: the Texas wildflowers were still in bloom in subtle shades of yellow, blue, red, and cream. I pulled into the lunch pit stop by 12:00 and 31 miles, earlier than usual since I had not elected to do the extra 20-mile extension this year.

Only 12 miles to go after lunch, but what a 12 miles! At 6 miles out, we encountered "The Hill." This was our steepest climb of the day, and the Ride had posted volunteers to run alongside us as we cranked up the last hundred yards of the hill. I was grateful for all my training that enabled me to grind it out without getting off my bike, but my heart rate was 170 by the time I crested the hill! We stopped for a well-deserved rest at the top to enjoy the incredible vista before us and to cool down on popsicles at the hilltop pit stop before riding into camp.

It was mostly downhill the final distance. At 5 miles out, we encountered a new feature of the Ride: the 2-mile "Ride of Silence." I rode through it solo, remembering the names of many friends and acquaintances lost to AIDS. I coasted into the finish line to the shouts and cheers of the many people lining the road. It was truly a triumphant moment--and I was beat!

By finishing early this year, I was able to take advantage of some of the recreational amenities of the camp: a wonderful swim in the natural springs pool, complete with a pounding waterfall to soothe tired muscles, then a relaxing chair massage in a quiet grove of trees.

A shower and change of clothes later, I felt human again as I walked down the hill to the ampitheatre for the Remembrance Ceremony. This is always the most solemn event of the Ride, a time to remember why we ride and to hear a list of names read of people who have passed away from AIDS. The list grows longer each year as the Ride grows and more people want to remember friends and loved ones.

After the ceremony, we ascended the hill to gather for a Mexican dinner under a big tent. The silence broken, over 800 people--riders, crew, friends, and family--gathered to enjoy one last meal and to hear the final totals for the Ride. This was a record year, with more riders (480) registered than ever before, and more money raised than ever before--$575,000.

What an awesome day!

Recently, I heard Eve Smith from Easter Seals tell a story of what she characterized as a failed social networking experiment they made. The most important lesson learned, according to Eve, was that they needed to cultivate their “Influencers” if they wanted to have success in social networking. When I asked Eve how she defined an “Influencer” she answered that it was anyone who had a personal connection to the particular cause, in this case Autism. I thought that answer made sense in the case of Easter Seals and the particular campaign they were running, but it did not seem to be general enough for other organizations to take the concept and run with it.

I started thinking about the idea of an “Influencer” and how to define it in a general way, but nothing seems to be just right. The defining characteristics of an influential person seem like they would change given the context. Just as in Eve’s case, the Influencer was not really the most connected person, but the person who had a personal connection with the cause and therefore acted the most passionately. Then it struck me, the best way to identify the I nfluencer is to let them identify themselves. And the beauty part, eh? (Thank you, Bob and Doug McKenzie) Social networks are perfectly built to let Influencers run rampant and identify themselves via their actions.

That’s right! By having a community of your own that you nurture and cultivate, you have the breeding ground you need to find and cultivate Influencers. Now, you may have community members who were born Influencers, much like the way my daughter seems to be a born litigator (she negotiates just about everything from getting out of bed in the morning to getting into bed in the evening) and you may also have community members who have the potential to be Influencers, if they only had a little help and training. The former should jump out at you just by the fact that they post a lot, and offer a lot of good material. The latter will blossom before your eyes.

Now, you’ll also treat these members differently. For the existing Influencers, you’ll want to ask two things of them:

1. Please educate and inspire the other community members
2. Please spend time in social networks external to this one, educate and inspire other community members there, and drive those people back to our community if you can

For the Influencers-In-The-Rough, you’ll want to provide as much education and encouragement as you can. If you provide the knowledge, and teach them how to convey the message, one day they’ll be ready to act as Influencers.

You’ll also need to reward each of these groups for the progress they make. The reward will depend on the individual. It may simply be recognition, or it may be added privileges in the community (such as their own blog), or it may be more materialistic. Give them some options and let them choose what they want.

Below is a picture that attempts to capture all of this.

I’d like to hear your comments on the thoughts, and specifically how to refine the graphic to be more meaningful.

Walkathon/event fundraisers excepted, peer-to-peer is clearly not yet a major component of most online fundraising strategies - despite my enthusiasm.  I've got some ideas about why,  but would love to hear your thoughts on how best to realize its potential (I've got a party to plan).

This morning I attend a session on "Attracting and Cultivating the Next Generation of Philanthropists" at the Association of Fundraising Professionals International Conference in San Diego. An interesting generational divide was apparent in the session.

As Sue Acri of Ketchum spoke about the generational attributes of the new generation of philanthropists, the conversation quickly turned to using Facebook and MySpace to engage with constituents. That's when one of the "Baby Boomers" said, "Facebook, MySpace and those things are nice, but how do we bring them into a real relationship?"

To which one of the "Gen Y" members in the room stated. "That is a real relationship."

Another "GenYer" added that these young philanthropists "want to participate, but not in traditional ways. We'll start our own organization if we don't like the way you run yours," he added.  In a follow-up question to this young man he said that he and his peers want to engage in various channels, not just the Internet, but since that is the "best and most efficient way to communicate, I assume that if you can't do that well, you're too bureaucratic for me."

After some time, Sue helped people understand that these channels need to be part of a strategy. Creating a Facebook site to say you have one will not pass the transparency and authenticity test for the next generation - a site is not a strategy.

Another person questioned the amount of resources needed and ROI on regular updates to the Web site or tying to keep a Facebook and MySpace presence real. An older gentleman in the back commented that he was glad he didn't have to show an ROI on his annual report. All interesting perspectives based on generational differences and technological sophistication.

As the session was coming to a close a young women in the back of the room, stood up and said, "These are the same questions about Facebook and MySpace that we asked about the Web several years ago. It ain't going away. We have to meet this audience's expectations if we want to engage them."

As I listened, it appears that the research completed with our partners Sea Change Strategies and Edge Research into the expectations of major donors online and today's insight into the expectations of the next generation of donors is closely linked. Nonprofits still have a great deal of opportunity to engage the next generation and major donors through the Internet - "it ain't going away."

It seems we that what we have here, might just be a "failure to communicate." Is that failure a generational gap or a technical gap? What do you think? I welcome your perspective.

I first became familiar with eCRM, not as an employee of a SaaS company (Convio, which is where I work today), but as an end user of Convio's eCRM software.

A charity bike ride I had helped to start in Austin, Texas, in 2000--Hill Country Ride for AIDS--had stumbled along in its first couple of years with around 100 riders and $100,000 revenue for its annual charity ride. When we first encountered online marketing, we were primarily excited about its ability to accept online donations for our event. That first year of using eCRM, we almost doubled our ridership and income!

Over the last six years, our sophistication as a fundraising organization has grown as the functionality of eCRM has dramatically increased. We have delved deeply into the fundraising functionality for teams and individuals through online mail campaigns, team and individual web pages, individual fundraising events like house parties, and viral marketing through social networking pages. This year we are anticipating around 500 riders and we expect to pass our raised income of $550,000 from last year!

That's a pretty impressive rate of growth over the past 8 years. I attribute much of that growth to our ability to promote our ride through online marketing and fundraising. Feel free to stop by my page and make a contribution! :)

Do we have an answer to the age old question - "can money buy happiness?"

Maybe not, but researchers from Harvard Business School and the Department of Psychology at the University of British Columbia, say their research suggests that how people spend their money may be at least as important as how much money they earn.

The study, published this week in the journal Science, was featured in an article in the Monday, March 21 edition of The Boston Globe. The article and study, Money makes you happy - if you spend it on others, suggests that money, spent on other people can make you happier.  

It is a fascinating article. The people who reported the highest level of happiness were those that were giving money to people or causes in need, regardless of income. 

So tell your volunteers, advocates, and other supporters it's time to be happy - give. We can all make the world a happier place.

According to the article one of the researchers, Elizabeth W. Dunn, wrote up the study, close to Christmastime. She "decided that instead of giving her family things, she would get them gift certificates to a website that allows people to choose various philanthropic projects to support.

"I've never gotten more positive responses to any gift I've given my family," she said. "I was giving them the gift of giving."

Shout out to Watt Hamlett, one of Convio's fine Solutions Engineers, who shared the article with me.

On the heels of a very different technology extravaganza, South by Southwest Interactive, I wanted to take a few minutes to do some sidelines commentary on the good Web accessibility work of a team of three Convians and our partner at Causeway Interactive.

Two weeks ago, Team ConAIR won the 2008 Accessibility Internet Rally (aka AIR Interactive) competition. AIR is an annual challenge to design and build new, highly accessible websites for Austin-area artists and musicians. The team created a new site for local duo Byrd and Street, which is worth exploring because it is both a) innovative in its accessibility, and b) generally groovy.

(Warning: Web Accessibility and AIR mavens among you can skip the background and head right on down to “what’s cool.”)

First, the challenge: The team was tasked with creating a new browsing experience for all visitors to Byrdandstreet.com – from users with disabilities, like vision, auditory, cognitive or motor impairments, to users accessing the site from slow Internet connections, or old browsers, or small monitors. The goal is a compelling online experience that’s flexible enough to accommodate everyone’s browsing needs.

As those of you who’ve tried this before know, it’s no easy task.

The approach: Team ConAIR team met with the Byrd & Street duo – musicians and artists who were ready to start publishing more of their songs and visual art online – to learn about what their ideal site should be and do, who their visitors are, their future plans. Then, the team sat down and developed an information architecture, visual design, and implementation plan, and started coding.

So, what’s cool: 

• Accessibility and good design are one and the same. If there was ever a doubt, Byrd & Street’s new design just goes to show that accessibility, usability, and enjoy-ability are not contradictory terms. It's visually compelling, clean, and moves the Byrd & Street brand in a new direction.
  
  
• There’s multi-media everyone can enjoy. Visitors can choose their sensory mode, either listening to songs or reading lyrics, or listen to descriptions of artist drawings instead of looking at them.
  
  
• The control is in the hands (or feet, or keyboard) of the users. Whatever your browsing needs are, you can “customize view” to display the site in a way that works for you. Want a larger text size, or a font that’s easier to read? Want to turn off visual styles and have your screen-reader (which is reading the page aloud to you) skip the navigation and get straight to the content? This is all built into the basic structure of the site.
  
  
• It’s navigable, readable, adaptable, and easy to use. And for the geeks among us, it’s XHTML Strict 1.0 that validates, and completely separates structure from presentation. This baby reads as well with styles disabled as it does in its full graphic glory – and offers some great alternatives for assistive technologies that the standard visitor would never encounter.

Check out Byrd & Street’s new site for yourself, and give a virtual huzzah for Team ConAIR on a job accessibly done.

Welcome to Connection Café, a blog created from the hearts and minds of the employees of Convio. Our vision for this blog is to aggregate the latest trends, ideas and best practices for nonprofits online. Through discussions about online communication tactics, the latest in Web 2.0 strategies and integration of offline and online campaigns, we hope to share insight and create an open and honest dialogue in the nonprofit technology world.  

Unlike other corporate blogs you may have looked at, you won’t find information or sales pitches about our latest product and service offerings here. Instead, we are venturing out and doing something different - we’ll be writing about the issues you care about and the topics that can help you succeed online. From time to time that means our products and technologies and how clients are using them to get results will be part of the discussion, but we don’t want it to be a sales pitch, so let us know if we cross that line.

Connection Café will discuss how the Internet is fundamentally changing the way people connect with causes, forcing nonprofits to rethink the traditional models for communication, advocacy and fundraising. We want to share our internal resources and expertise with you, as well as information from our Fusion Partners and point you to other online sources that are having the same, or better, discussions. Bottom line, we want to keep you better connected and engaged with the people, ideas and technology that are driving the industry.

Over the past eight years, we’ve kept you connected with our Convio Connection newsletter, presence at industry events and our online client community. Now I’m inviting you - the nonprofit Executive Director, the weekend volunteer, the marketing/communications expert – to connect with us once again by being a part of our online discussion.

So, when we think we have something valuable to share, you’ll see it here. And while it may be natural for us to draw from past work experience, this blog is not about Convio as a company but rather the people, ideas and technology that are fueling the industry we serve. If you see us veering off that path or becoming too Convio-centric, send a note or post a comment to let us know. You have my word that we’ll listen to what you have to say.

I hope that each person who reads this blog will find something beneficial in the editorials, news and multimedia content we produce.  We also want to read your comments, get your suggestions and do our best to answer your questions – or find someone to answer them.  I encourage you to reach out and give us feedback from time to time on what we’re doing well and what we can improve on.

 -Gene, CEO