La necesidad: ¿Cuál es el problema que tratas de solucionar?
1 Behaviour change
If everyone in the world were to live like us, we’d need 3 planets; our lifestyles threaten environmental, social & financial wellbeing, yet mobilising behaviour change is notoriously tough. People are more effectively influenced by their friends than distant organisation’s campaigns, but there are few tools to help people positively & proactively engage others.
2 Fundraising fatigue
In the UK, the model of fundraising for causes through sponsorship is hugely effective & popular, but people are getting tired of being asked for money.
3 Disconnection
By simply donating money to a charity, donors build no connection to the cause & their contribution is short lived. Cash isn’t always the best solution, especially when behaviour change is at the root of the problem.
La solución: ¿Cuál es tu solución? Sé específico.
Our solution is to put a big twist on the traditional model of sponsorship by replacing cash with action, enabling people to actively & directly engage friends in living sustainably. Instead of asking people to donate money when you run a marathon (for example), through The DoNation you ask them to do something – a DoAction.
By making the site social & upbeat, building it on a model that people are already well accustomed to, we can reach far wider audiences than traditional campaigns. People raising sponsorship do the hard ‘campaigning’ and outreach for us – making it far more effective and low cost than if we were to do it ourselves.
We provide information & advice on each DoAction, but Doers make pledges to support a friend, not us. This personal connection means that 84% of Doers feel more committed to their pledge and 80% say they were more honest about it.
The current focus is on environmental actions, but we plan to expand it to incorporate broader social actions too.
El Modelo: Muéstranos a través de un ejemplo específico cómo tu solución hace una diferencia, incluye tus actividades primarias
The DoNation is an online sponsorship platform that works much like JustGiving or VirginMoneyGiving, with the simple difference being that there’s no money involved.
People can use it for all sorts of events or challenges, from marathons and expeditions to knit-a-thons and wedding gift lists. For example, a team from Forum for the Future signed up to a triathlon and created a sponsorship page on The DoNation (http://ow.ly/9qOTO), outlining what they were doing & why they wanted support. They set a target of saving 10,000 kgCO2, and then asked their friends and colleagues to sponsor them, sharing the page via online and offline media channels.
Their friends read about their challenge and browsed the DoActions, which range from eating local seasonal food or cycling to work, to using less plastic packaging or installing solar panels, and chose ones to Do. They answered a few simple questions so that the impact of their pledge can be calculated, currently measured in kgCO2 saved over two months. Their pledges were then published on the sponsorship page, and their carbon savings added to the triathletes’ sponsorship total. This allowed them to see how much they were contributing, helping them to see how all the small actions add up to make a big difference.
Their sponsors received a few reminder emails over the two-month sponsorship period, with helpful info & advice. At the end of the 2 months they returned to the site to confirm how they got on.
Overall, 88 people sponsored them saving almost 15,000 kgCO2.
Sue Armstrong, one of the triathlete’s mothers, sponsored them by starting to cycle to work. As a result, she cycled 480 miles, saved £93 in train fairs, felt happier & fitter, lost ½ stone, and six months later is still cycling to work. She’s even persuaded two colleagues to join her! Three of their sponsors are now also raising sponsorship of their own.
El mercado: ¿Quiénes son tus pares y competidores? Identifica a otros que también estén trabajando para dar respuesta a las necesidades que tú abordas y en qué te diferencias de ellos. ¿Cuáles son los desafíos que estos jugadores podrían representar para tu éxito o crecimiento?
Our competition comes from three main areas outlined below. However, their approaches are so different that they pose only indirect competition, or in fact often offer strong opportunities to collaborate.
1. Sponsorship tools: JustGiving dominates the fundraising arena, but less than 1% of funds raised through it are for environmental charities. This model of fundraising doesn't work so well for environmental causes as health charities because the beneficiaries are less tangible.
2. Environmental campaigns (e.g. 10:10, Do The Green Thing & WWF) tackle the same problem using very different means – none use our model of scalable social action.
3. Employee engagement tools will compete for CSR budgets, although none use the same interactive and socially driven approach as the DoNation.
