The Babysling Project proposes a cause marketing campaign to sell custom African babyslings. It has two goals: open a new revenue source for GiveADay and create a sustainable "training village" for local textile designers and sewers in Africa. Each step of designing, making, and distributing the babyslings will have an interactive narrative told through video clips and QR codes, engaging donors and promoting the organization. Partners identified include a mobile technology firm, media strategy non-profit, and fashion specialist with African networks, while the MasterCard Foundation would handle financial transactions and marketing.

1. THE BABYSLING PROJECT
a proposal for a GiveADay cause marketing project
Tuesday, January 25, 2011

2. CONCEPT
custom handmade African babyslings, designed in
Africa by African women, are focus of mobile phone
cause marketing campaign with two goals:
open new revenue source for GiveADay by
personalizing moms-helping-moms
relationship
create artisan ‘training village’ to ensure
project is sustainable for local textile
designer/sewers
Tuesday, January 25, 2011

3. RATIONALE
‘close the loop’ with donors by co-creating an
interactive narrative amongst donors/designers/
distributors that’s entirely personalized
Tuesday, January 25, 2011

4. HOW D’YOU DO THAT?
Easily and inexpensively: each step along the value
chain—from conception of the one-of-a-kind
babysling through to the personal thank-you from the
designers in Africa—is narrated by a video clip
interactively showing provenance
every step of the process will have a narrative
attached, describing where/when/how:
provenance
that narrative will be activated by a QR code on
the babysling...swipe your mobile: see the story
Tuesday, January 25, 2011

5. ENGAGING STORY
= DONORVALUE
If each process along the value chain—from design
concept to donor thank-you—is an interactive story,
we have created a sustainable ‘brand story’ for
GiveADay...and incited initial ‘early adopters’ to
spread our ‘moms-helping-moms’ story
the entire process is also an educational platform for
HIV/AIDS awareness in Africa: every piece of
narrative is branded GiveADay
Tuesday, January 25, 2011

6. CONVERSATIONSTARTERS
who are our medical partners in Zimbabwe?
what connections can we build on to advocate for
GiveADay while selling GiveADay-branded babyslings?
what does our media campaign look like to support
the project?
what other strategic partners can we ID?
Tuesday, January 25, 2011

7. WHAT’S THIS LOOK LIKE?
St. Marys, Ontario is home to May Garcia, a Spanish
fashion specialist based for 20 years in Zimbabwe.
May has a network of design/textile worker/
distribution contacts across SW Africa and all over
Western Europe
Her concept? Use the untapped creative capital of
African textile design/build workers to build a
business which ‘tithes back’ a portion of profits to
fund a ‘creative village’: make the process local and
sustainable
Tuesday, January 25, 2011

8. WHO ARE THE PARTNERS?
COMSolve Inc of Toronto is a cutting-edge mobile
technology firm guided by deep social values (Ofir
Smadja CEO)
THINKstate of Stratford is a non-profit media
strategy/cause marketing firm (Brendan Howley
ExecDir)
May Garcia and her African/European network...
Tuesday, January 25, 2011

9. ...AND THE MONEY
The MasterCard Foundation is our financial services
partner
they handle the transactions and
supply marketing communications clout
Tuesday, January 25, 2011

10. THANKYOU.
Tuesday, January 25, 2011

11. the power of thank-you
for a truly amazing donor thank you piece we can adapt (from
donorpowerblog.com) for GAD/babysling project
40 thank-you notes = one grateful donor
A whole bunch of kids in South Carolina think I'm cool.
These kids are impressed with me because I donated the money to buy a microphone for some music classes so they can record
their singing. I did this through an organization called http://www.donorschoose.org/, which won a coveted Donor Power
Award in March.
My gift was some weeks ago, so it wasn't much on my mind when I received a thick packet from Donors Choose: hand-drawn
thank you cards from the kids. About 40 letters, most with drawings -- sweet, funny, heartfelt, real. (Logan hopes I didn't go
bankrupt.)
They also pointed me to where on the web I can hear their recording of "Hot Cross Buns," made with "my" microphone. If
you'd like to hear them too, http://www.myteacherpages.com/webpages/JRoberts1/files/Taylor's%20Hot%20Cross
%20Buns.wav
In terms of emotional ROI, I'd say that gift was among the best charitable donations I've ever made.
We spend a lot effort "marketing" what we do.
But all that fades to insignificance compared to the gratitude of 40 kids. That’s the donor power revolution living out in full color!
Can you create a powerful experience like that for your donors?
Tuesday, January 25, 2011