[Foundation-l] Rethinking fundraising (2): Storytelling

[Cormac Lawler]

On 10/7/07, Delirium <delirium at hackish.org> wrote:
>
> Erik Moeller wrote:
> > On 10/6/07, Jeandré du Toit <jackdt at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >> I personally don't like the point pushing that is marketing generally,
> >> and mawkish ads specifically; preferring neutral, factual information.
> >> Will this storytelling approach with symbolic media not put off the
> >> people who previously responded to the simple, marketese free "If you
> >> think Wikimedia's projects are worthwhile, please donate so we can buy
> >> infrastructure to keep it going."? Will storytelling bring in more
> >> donations, and if so what does it say about the NPOV educational
> >> information provided?
> >>
> >
> > This is a very typical, and very wrong, attitude in non-profits. Andy
> > Goodman examines that point at length in his lecture, which is really
> > worth watching:
> >
> > http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-289257716014946841
> >
> > The gist of it is that the story does not _replace_ the factual
> > information. It provides a hook for getting people who _aren't_ part
> > of your world to start caring about it. And once they care, they
> > should find out all the factual information they want
> >
> > If you only do storytelling and don't provide key facts & figures,
> > you're failing just as much as if you're only providing the facts &
> > figures, but no lead that makes people care about them.
> >
>
>
> I agree some effort to pull in other people is worthwhile, but I agree
> with Jeandré that we ought not to come off as excessively PR-ish. I know
> I've stopped contributing to other nonprofits who've taken such a tone
> with their advertising (and organizational style generally), and would
> be turned off from contributing to Wikimedia were its communications to
> start looking like they came from an ad agency rather than from normal
> people.
>
> -Mark



Mark's and Jeandre's fears are completely understandable - and if we are to
incorporate these kinds of story-telling initiatives in our fundraising,
we need to be careful not to alienate people who are donating to our honest
work in 'making knowledge free' (or however we want to put it). But I think
the key to this is to build these stories from our collective experience as
a community - and to have the community involved in the identification and
sustaining of these stories. Listen to Andy Goodman's story about the
nomadic Native American tribe which carries around a "sacred bundle" of
objects, all of which have a story to tell about their community's culture,
identity, history, and values. This, I think is a powerful insight into how
a community can stick together through thick and thin, riding out difficult
times and circumstances - the mark of a strong community/culture.

Think: does Wikimedia have a similar set of stories about where it's come
from, how it works, and how it's making a difference in the world?
Absolutely. Can every community member tell these stories in such a way so
that a complete newcomer would understand_and_see them? Probably not. Does
every person who accesses our sites know anything about these stories, or
even that Wikimedia exists? A small percentage do - the former, smaller.

What stories give to a cause is a sense of cohesion amongst the community
around the cause, as well as a deeper understanding and empathy toward the
cause amongst the wider population. Erik said it right - it's about creating
an emotional connection with the work we do. So that people, when asked
about Wikip/media, say: "Oh yeah, they're the people who are making
knowledge free", rather than "Oh yeah, I used that when I was writing an
essay once".

Cheers,

Cormac