archGFX

Mass customization comes to philanthropy

I'm kind of behind the pack on this, I only saw the ad for american express' members project yesterday, and the final round of voting closes on the 5th. It's a brilliant marketing maneuver from american express, as far as making people feel like there's actually some point to choosing one pre-approved-gold-card-mass-mailing over another. I only found out about the deadline via an email campaign from one of the top 5 (it's almost like i'm a real blogger or something):

Donorschoose.org, an amazing nonprofit organization that supports public school teachers and kids, is a finalist in the American Express Members Project. The prize is up to $5 million, and the outcome will be decided by votes of American Express card holders. If we help DonorsChoose.org win, all the proceeds will go to classroom projects in public schools!

This doesn’t require money; just 2 minutes of your time. You could impact hundreds of thousands of public school students by voting now for:

Teachers Ask. You Choose. Students Learn.

Yes, that tag line at the end is the name of the project, not donorschoose.org. Nonetheless, it's not surprising to see why an NFP promoting choice among donors would be popular in a poll among amex cardholders to choose a project to support. It's so circular it destroys otherwise sensible sentences.

Social Entrepreneurship can be a good thing, in that holding people accountable is always a good thing, but it is disconcerting to see NFP's now having to spend considerable time and effort on marketing, and becoming popular with donors.