Twitter Followers can CREATE value. Literally.
I've been following Mike Volpe (@mvolpe) and the HubSpot crew for a while - both because they are a local (Boston-area) firm - and I'm a sucker for East Coast companies that are doing well (because not ALL the interesting action happens in Silicon Valley folks!) - and because they are always pushing the boundaries and delivering solid material to help people improve their marketing capabilities, even if the people benefiting aren't necessarily their clients. Articles, webinars, and more, you should pop on over and take a look at what they have to offer.
Lather on top of that, an added twist appears via the recent Twitter Charity Challenge that Mike issued, whereby he will donate $.50 USD for each new Twitter follower he receives by 12/31/08 to a local nonprofit he co-founded, the Boston Scholars Program.
That's a fantastic twist on social capital, and hey, since I've long been a believe that social networking and the newer meme of social media truly DOES hold value, I'm going to put my own money where my tweets are as well.
My choice goes to... the Grameen Bank
The Motley Fool's Foolanthrophy drive first clued me into the Grameen Bank many years ago, and I've been a happy contributor to their cause year after year.
The Grameen Bank became world-famous with the presentation of the Nobel Peace Prize to the founder, Prof. Muhammad Yunus & Grameen Bankin 2006 for their pioneering work in microcredit. If you are familiar with microcredit via Kiva and others, then you already get the premise behind Grameen. Essentially, donations to Grameen help to fund what SHOULD be an almost endless circulation of lending to help the poorest of the poor to invest in themselves, their families and their communities, raising up the standard of living considerably.
So, I'd love to see what ripples we can collectively make here, by stirring up the follows on Twitter, and extending it out into the Grameen lending pool.
As of this moment, I have 1,276 followers on Twitter, and for every additional follower I have between now and midnight December 31st, 2008 (-5 GMT), as Mike is doing, I'll donate $.50 USD per new follower to Grameen, capped at a maximum of $2500 USD (this is week 3 of my new startup after all - need to be able to keep the doors open!).
At 1776 followers, that would be $250 to Grameen
At 2276 followers, $500 to Grameen and ultimately, to the credit receivers
And so on...
(12/20/08 - update - added embedded chart to check daily status)
It's a great cause, and I hope you'll join me in this experiment. If you happen to be aware of or are pursuing your own experiment along these lines, please comment here or reply to me on twitter, and I'll help to spread the word of those causes as well.
Thanks much, and thanks for your help! Please help to spread the word of this cause, and together we can help stir up the world economy truly from the ground up.
To participate, please Follow @dankeldsen before the clock strikes midnight on 12/31/08.
And while you step in the twitterstream, say hello while you're at it. Twitter - it's made of people!
Multiple tips of the hat to Mike for thinking this idea up in the first place - proving more than once by Mike's actions, REAL change can be affected via marketing and social media. Keep up the good work!
Cheers,
Dan
BTW - other similar experiments I'm aware of are:
@mvolpe = $2,500 max. Starting follower count = 2955.
@corbett3000 = $2,500 max. Staring follower count = 1325. More details here.
@jessieX = $250 max. More details here.
@pmhesse = $2,500 max. More details here.
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