Moved

I have just moved my blog to WordPress


http://richardchui.wordpress.com


Why? There is no reason why. Just change for the sake of changing.

How is your "online donation" doing?

Can your nonprofit accept donation online? If so, how was it doing? Great? Not so great? So so? Don't know? Well, I guess online donation is very much like any website in a sense that it is not something that "once you build it, they will come". They demand careful nurturing and promoting, and yes, a lot of hard work.

Jakob Nielsen - the renowned usability expert - has done a research on how to improve online giving to nonprofits and charities. He found that what people most want to know before they decide whether to donate or not are "what are you trying to achieve, and how will you spend my money?". He looked at 23 nonprofit websites. Guess how many have answered the first question on their homepage - 43%. And the second question? 4%

He then looked at what are the biggest "donation turn-offs". The first one is content related - poor writing, confusing terms, etc. It is closely followed by usability problem - poor site design, cluttered pages, unintuitive navigation, etc (well, what do you expect from an usability expert, lol).

The full report costs US$98 and you can find more information here. Not cheap, but it is probably the best US$98 you can spend on your website.

Web 2.0 in 5 minutes

Technology does not bore people, people do...

Facebook Pages Q&A

Q: What is a Facebook Page?
A public profile that you can create for your company, club, and yes, your nonprofit. This is similar to a private profile in many aspects but with some key differences.


Q: How is a Page different from a Group?
Anyone can create a Group. I can go now and create a Group for Oxfam or Red Cross or Community Chest. I don't need to get approval from anyone. Whether people will join my Group or not is a different story.

Theoretically, only authorized personnel can create a Page for a company, organization, etc. When you create a Page, Facebook will ask explicitly if you have the authority to do things on behalf of that particularly entity. But what if you lie? Well....you won't, will you?


Q: What can I do with a Page that I cannot do with a Group?
Many

• You can add applications to your Page just like what you have been doing with your private Facebook profile. E.g. you can add a RSS application to automatically pull in all the posts from your existing blog.
  
• Your Page can be seen by anyone on the Internet and not just the Facebook users (a huge plus). Though only Facebook users can join as fan and interact with your Page.
  
• Facebook provides you with basic usage statistics about your Page. And it is getting better everyday.
  

Q: I already have a website, why do I need to create a Facebook Page?
It is a lot more effective to go to where your target audience is than to ask them to come to you. Why restrict yourself to only one channel? By the way, Facebook now has over 200 million users.


Q: Is it difficult to create a Page?
Nope, not at all. Getting a decent Page up and running will probably take an hour or less provided you have your contents ready (videos, photos, etc). The challenge is, as always, making it known to your target audience - be it your supporters, donors, or volunteers. Invite your friends to become a fan. Put a "Find me on Facebook" badge on your website. Put the link in your email signature, newsletter, brochure...


Q: Any good example of a nonprofit Facebook Page?
I think the one from Red Cross is pretty neat - http://www.facebook.com/redcross. Note that you won't get vanity URL like this. Your URL is more likely in the form of http://www.facebook.com/pages/your-page-name/some-random-number. Facebook only gives out vanity URLs to the big guys and I guess Red Cross is big enough.


Q: That sounds interesting, where can I find out more?
The Facebook site (http://www.facebook.com/advertising/?pages) is always a good place to start.


If you are really interested in creating a Page for your nonprofit, please also check out the Involver site. They have a list of applications (RSS, YouTube, polls, file sharing, etc.) that can add some instant functionalities to your Page.

And let me say this again - creating the Page is easy, attracting and retaining your fans is not. Good luck!

The only two things you need to know

"The first thing you need to know is that individuals have far more power than ever before in history. One person can change an industry. One person can declare war. One person can reinvent science or politics or technology.

The second thing you need to know is that the only thing holding you back from becoming the kind of person who change things is this: lack of faith. Faith that you can do it. Faith that it’s worth doing. Faith that failure won’t destroy you."

Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us

Donor management system

Don't know if any of you are looking for a Donor Management System. In fact, I wonder if this kind of system is being used (or even seriously considered) by any of the nonprofits in Hong Kong at all (or am I being too pessimistic?). But if you are, Idealware has just released a "Consumers Guide to Donor Management Software" which can be downloaded here. And guess how many of these vendors will have a presence in Asia? Mmm....go look it up yourself.

Even in the big commercial enterprises (which I have had the "privilege" of working for for over 15 years), CRM or customer relationship management is very much a lip service than a serious practice. I have been banking with the biggest bank in HK for over 20 years and they have my full financial records. Have they ever sent me anything that is tailored to my financial needs? Mmm...not that I can remember. I have been giving monthly donation to a big charity organization for a long time. Have they done anything to try to engage me besides asking for more donation? Nope. I think I am just another entry in their mailing list - no more, no less.

So what is social networking?

Heard about the term many times but still not sure what it is? Too shy to ask? No worry, here comes Common Craft to the rescue.



Presentations from Common Craft just never fail to impress. Next time when you fire up your Powerpoint to prepare for your next presentation, think again, spare your audience, make it fun.

Creating a richer giving experience with Web 2.0

Found this article buried deep in the ITRC web site. For those who don't know (me included until not long ago), ITRC (Information Technology Resource Center) is a branch under HKCSS (Hong Kong Council of Social Services 香港社會服務聯會). This was presented in a conference held in Oct 2008. It talks about how some of the companies (mostly US) have approched fundraising in the Web 2.0 world.

Again, there is nothing special about the technologies used (does IT matter?), it is how technology is being applied to solve a real life problem. And, of cousre, about the PEOPLE who have taken the initiative to actually do it. Talk is cheap.

Will these concepts work in Hong Kong or China? I don't know. Many of these companies are relying heavily on the services provided by Guidestar. Perhaps, the presence of such an organization is a prerequisite to make it work. Can Wise Giving play this role? Quite possibly. Would someone please give them a call?

Btw, you will have to go to the Chinese section of the site to find the article (don't ask me why). The presentation is in English though. Anyone knows who the presenter is?

Pop!Tech

Tons of interesting materials on this site Pop!Tech. The video and podcasts are short and sweet.

Try this one from Clay Shirky.



You may know him from his book "Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing Without Organizations". Funny guy, don't know that he is such a great speaker.

Didn't have a chance to read his book yet, but it definitely ranks high in my reading list.

Hello World!

Welcome everybody to my first blog. First blog? Yeah, can't imagine. Having read thousands of blog posts for, gosh, I don't know how long, I have finally decided to write my own blog. Why? I don't know. Maybe I want a place to better organize my thoughts and share my ideas with people around the world. Or maybe I just want to see what it is like being a blogger. Well...who cares?

As for the title "Technology for Good". Yep, this is what I have been thinking and reading a lot lately. Nonprofit technology (a.k.a. nptech) is a big thing in the US. There are dozens of companies and organizations formed around nptech, whether it is in advocacy, fundraising, crowdsourcing.... you name it, they've got it. But in Hong Kong, ain't see one yet (of course, I have not seen them all). Maybe it is time for someone to do something about it (any volunteer?).

New technologies are fascinating, and even more so when they are put to good use.