Facebook Likes Double the Mark

Sometimes you find the perfect match. That’s how the 500 Likes in 5 Days Facebook campaign started. A few weeks ago a donor approached Firelight asking how a gift could help. We sat down to hear what he really wanted to do and ended up excited about a bigger social media network that brings African grassroots organizations even closer to all the friends of Firelight. The recent boom of Facebook in Africa made Facebook the right way to do it.

We watched each “like” come in as if we were a telethon, shouting out “50 more likes in the last 20 minutes!” When we realized our goal would be met quickly, our donor pushed us to go big and gave us a new goal of 2500. We worried about asking too much, but everyone was really willing to help out. Local companies including Cruzio and colleagues including the National Network of Grantmakers, the Opportunity Collaboration, the Community Foundation of Santa Cruz County and Funders Concerned About AIDS jumped in to help us reach even more people.

We saw people share the post multiple times and encourage their friends to donate by liking the page. Just when our confidence would lull, a new series of comments would show up telling us this was a great idea and that we deserved it. The encouragement from our fans helped us every step of the way.

Our online network is mostly in the US and our African partners are coming up quickly too. Zimbabwe, South Africa, and Malawi are where most of our Facebook friends are located, but we also have a few from each of the countries where we fund grassroots groups.

Access to technology is still a big issue with many of our grantee partners. Some have direct connections at their organizations, but that’s not common. Others have to take a rather long trip into the nearest city to reach a computer so Facebook isn’t a daily connection.

Yesterday, we shared all this news with our donor who listened to our excitement. We’d reached 1,317 new “likes” since we started last Monday. That meant $1,317 to go to African grassroots organizations that help improve the lives of many African children and families.

Our donor was so moved by all the support that instead of $1, he’s given us $2 for every “like” we received last week. And just like that, our donation has doubled!

Thanks to all of you and your tremendous support, Firelight Foundation has received $2,634 with this campaign!

We hope to see our new fans often on Facebook and we encourage all of you to continue to be a part of our work by signing up for our newsletter and following us on Twitter too. We will continue to post and keep you updated on interesting events and happenings with our grantee partners as well as African related events and contests going on here in California. We look forward to hearing your comments!

What a great week, thanks to all of you!

Merci, Asante, Zikomo, Ngiyabonga, THANK YOU!