Charity: Water Spreads its Message Online.

Charity: Water is a not-for-profit organization dedicated to bringing clean, accessible drinking water to developing countries. Its campaign thrives off the use of various social media platforms. To learn more about Charity: Water, Sheree has an in-depth discussion about it.

 The charity itself is the online campaign. The majority if its fundraising comes through donations made through various social media platforms. I looked into how Charity: Water makes use of its Vimeo account to generate awareness and raise funds.

Oddly enough, the Vimeo page for Charity: Water isn’t linked from its website. I only found out about it because I Googled the organization. The charity makes really good use of the site’s video features. They have a library of 87 videos that highlight different aspects of the campaign. I particularly liked this video, it is in promotion of their Unshaken fundraiser which is to help Haiti get clean water:


Unshaken - 30 second spot from charity: water on Vimeo.

What’s very smart about all of their videos and other media is that they link the user to the Charity: Water website. This is the primary outlet for people who would want to make a donation after seeing something on Vimeo as it does not provide a donation function. However, I worry that people won't take the time to go to another site.

The visible community on the Vimeo page is surprisingly small compared to the view counts videos have. The Charity: Water group only has 17 members and has gaps in activity for as long as three months. This is problematic because it could cause people to believe that the charity has disband or isn’t making use of Vimeo anymore. It also features a discussion thread that is not being used at all. I think that this message board would be an easy way to share stories and fundraising efforts.

Only 204 people subscribe to Charity: Water’s activity on Vimeo. For an organization that raises upwards of $500,000 in a given month, that number seems far too low to be worthwhile. While the video’s provide an excellent educational outlet, the design of Vimeo makes it a one-way communication process. Users have no way to comment or engage with the charity on this site.

I think it would be smarter for Charity: Water to fully invest its fundraising initiatives on every site that it is on. The Vimeo account seems to be around only as supplemental or for backgrounder. I think it would be much smarter to have the user be able to directly donate after watching a video rather than having to link to another site to be able to give.

While problematic, the Vimeo account of Charity: Water is good resource. It definitely made me want to look more into its campaign. The videos of events and results of donations are actually quite moving. If you want to learn more about how Charity: Water uses other social media sites to fundraise, see what Kately thought about their use of Twitter. Also see what Deb thinks about their website. Make sure to check out what Amanda has to say about how they blog. Kelly shares her insights about Charity: Water's campaign efforts on Facebook.