Social Media's Role in Raising Funds

The meteoric rise of the proliferation of online fund raising websites is due largely to the phenomenal influence that social media has had on society. In other words, raising cash for programs and projects across the world has been enhanced by the rise of social media platforms.

It's not hard to understand why this has been. while we may think that platforms such as Facebook and Twitter were the catalysts for such change, social media online has been in existence for well over twenty years.

Think about hotmail. Hotmail was free email that was spread by one person telling another person to another and to their best friends. I don't recall much advertising, and if there was, I didn't see it. Instead, it was one of the more memorable versions of word of mouth. Essentially that's how it grew. Another company that grew this way was Google. I recall remarking at the time that Google just didn't advertise itself. It let its product do the talking. And it spread like proverbial wildfire.

Fast forward a dozen years or so to Myspace and Facebook, two platforms with very different target audiences and client bases. Myspace seemed to have a rougher, grittier edge to it and was marketed to the under 30 crowd. Users could paste relevant material on their pages, and occasionally things went "viral." Facebook on the other hand, while originally geared to the college age crowd, quickly saw a need in the over 30 crowd. Here grandparents could connect with people they hadn't seen in decades. Material was easy to pass on to other people. The "connections" that Facebook provides is unbelievably explosive. While the interface can seem confusing to many at first, people figure it out and are able to learn the application quickly. There are millions of happy and satisfied customers on Facebook and there's no sign that its popularity is slowing down.

Twitter is another social platform that has had phenomenal success. For many years after going live it had a hard time trying to find ways of monetizing the platform. Its popularity was never in question but for the owners, the question was how to make something so popular make money. Millions of dollars was thrown at Twitter and finally they landed on a viable solution.