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Amanda Rose at the London Twestival
Photo was taken by @mikebutcher
The Twestival combined online twitter fundraising with a groundswell of offline self organized events in 202 cities around the world on February 12th. This world-wide fundraiser, with a $1 million fundraising goal, brought together the Twitter community for an evening of fun and to raise money and awareness for charity: water.
Last week, I was in San Francisco leading a workshop and helped organized a group of attendees for TwestivalSF. Unfortunately, I was sick, so didn't make to the event. One of the workshop participants kindly brought me bag of scwhag which included a t-shirt and other goodies and told me how wonderful it was!
The event kicked off in New Zealand and traveled around the world. Everyone was watching closely, would they make their $1,000,000 goal? Would Twestival forever change the nature of online fundraising. It has taken few days for Twestival to report on the results. Allison Fine wondered outloud why it was so difficult to find out results and whether it was a strategic decision because they were disappointing. She came to the conclusion of "campaign exhaustion" and "system challenges" which were on target.
Based on the an analysis of previous fundraising campaigns (see "Twitter As Charitable Giving Spreader: A Brief History and Meta Analysis of Fundraising With Twitter"), the first time I heard about Twestival I knew it signaled something different. Almost all the previous fundraising campaigns using Twitter were organized by a single person or organization. Previous fundraising on Twitter was about individuals leveraging their personal networks or a small group working on behalf of a nonprofit, like Tweestgiving.
This was something different because it was a networked fundraiser of a scale we haven't seen before and not controlled by the organization. The first post I wrote was called "Look Out Here Comes Everybody To Raise Money for charity:water on Twitter" with a wink to Clay Shirky's work. In the comments, there was quite a lively discussion from nonprofit professionals raising some cautions and concerns.
This made me curious:
- How did Twestival get started? What is its relationship with charity:water?
- What was the role of the nonprofit, charity:water, in working with Twestival?
- How did the relationship originate?
- How is the event being organized?
- What does this say for nonprofits in an age of connectedness?
I wrote a follow up post titled "Are Fundraising Groundswells A Massive Opportunity or Distraction for Nonprofit Organizations" based on an interview with Ben Matthews, a member of the London founding group. He told me that I really needed to interview Amanda
Rose, the person doing the lion's share of the organizing for Twestival, who agreed to do a reflection interview with me, sharing what worked and what didn't.
Amanda Rose is a Canadian who moved to London from Toronto several years ago with a strong background in events, PR, and marketing. She has co-founded a film and event locations company where she does consulting. She recently completed a MA in Communications Management which is where she started to tap her passion for social media, particularly micro-blogging.
As one of the key people on the Global Twestival team, her role involved a lot of different aspects; setting the strategy, writing the guidebook, mentoring city organizers, establishing teams for sideline projects, administration, working with the charity, securing partnerships, developing website content, and communications. As Amanda notes, "It really became a bit too much for one person, particularly as a volunteer role. I felt responsibility for the charity's brand and overall protection of the volunteers so they could focus on what was important."
Not long after they announced Twestival, it took on a life of its own. Says Amanda, "I knew this was a very exciting project which would not only raise a lot of money but would create awareness and bring communities together. I originally thought that the top 50-60 cities internationally would get involved, but only after a week of announcing it on Twitter there were over 100 cities signed up with new requests every hour. Over a dozen Twestivals were registered in the UK alone. There was a process to become an official city because I wanted to ensure that there were teams established because organizing an event alone can be a daunting prospect."
Amanda shares how she worked closely with the nonprofit,
