Fish where the fishes are
I kept hearing this at last week’s Social Networking World Forum. It’s the kind of ego-free advice we should all just take already, and it goes double for fundraisers: Make life easier for your message by using what’s there already.
Top example: Twestival, which I blogged about last month. In hitching their wagon to the team of wild stallions that is Twitter, charity:water fished where the fishes are. They used a powerful tool to tap into a flourishing community. And while it didn’t rake in all the hoped-for cash (preliminary results say $250,000 of the hoped-for $1 million), Twestival got people talking, raised some cash, and raised the bar for like causes and events. Now the bar is Twestival.
Who was that mysterious lone fisherman?
We media types have this bizarre need to create our own party, again and again and again. Always striking out for a new fishing hole. Is this an ego thing? Do we think it reflects poorly on us if we take our new message to a place that’s been bubblin’ over for a while? Use a non-pristine page for a new idea? Pah! Enough already! I’m not calling for a synchronized collective ditch of the urge to invent, but I am suggesting that if Mama Necessity has left the room, maybe we should take the hint and bust our own move.
Use the tools that already work, and use them well enough to make an impact.
Go where the party is, talk where the listeners are, fish where the fishes are.
