Derrick Feldmann, author of Social Movements for Good, recently challenged attendees at the Peer-to-Peer Professional Forum’s annual conference to do more than simply ask for their supporters to belong.
He challenged them to engage them in a journey to become a part of something much larger — to inspire them to become true believers who see their participation in P2P campaigns as part of a larger movement for good.
Whether your organization is working to cure a disease, improve the environment, or feed the homeless, the message is clear: we have an opportunity to do much more than simply raise money. We have an opportunity to use our fundraising efforts to make a difference.
The Peer-to-Peer Professional Forum recently sat down with Feldmann to learn more about how P2P fundraisers can help build movements.
Here’s some of what he had to say:
P2P Forum: Define a social movement and how is that different than the way charities and organizations work on behalf of a cause?
Feldmann: There isn’t a cause leader in the world who doesn’t want to lead a movement. Social movements for good happen when you have a very big collective of people who support and work together in the interest of the larger whole. The collective supports the needs of the collective.
The entity is not the movement. The movement is the people. The people involved have to believe that they are working toward something better together. The entity or, in this case the nonprofit, is really the infrastructure that keeps the movement going.
How does something become a movement?
We’ve found that there are three stages of movement that an individual goes through.
They start with belonging — and this is how a lot of people become involved in peer-to-peer campaigns. This is where I can say, ‘Pledge to me because I am trying to raise money by running in this race’. I’m asking my friends to belong to my movement. It doesn’t necessarily mean that they’re making a deep or a long-term commitment. It does mean that they’re belonging for that moment.
It’s very simple to belong to something where you have friends. That friendship and that relationship make that belonging so much more natural. But when we truly believe in a cause and you want to go out on your own and find and tell, that’s a different case. The person moved away from belonging to it and is saying that this is exactly what I care about it. This person has moved from belonging to believing.
The third phase is owning the movement. They own and self organize.
How do nonprofits get their supporters to move beyond belonging?
We have to move from assuming that just because someone is participating, or belonging, that they are a believer, because it’s not true for everyone.
Most peer-to-peer campaigns, for instance, are based on the owners of the movement going out and trying to get more belongers. Often, they get stuck in a cycle where they are pulling the lever each year and getting their supporters to attract more belongers.
To get them from belonger to believer often involves getting them to internalize the real reason why this issue is top of mind for them. When we see that connection really falter at times is when the organization has not really established their true peer-to-peer model. If you have a very shortsighted peer-to-peer model where they just say they want to have people join us and give to us, there’s an assumption that because we got them to give on a small level, we ultimately will be able to over time get them to give on a bigger level. But organizations don’t always take the time to plan it and figure out how to get them to that next level.
When you look at groups like Pencils of Promise that really have high engagement with millennials, they create a very very intentional strategy that takes them from belonging to a campaign, to believing and ultimately owning it.
What are these organizations doing to create right kinds of conditions for that progression to happen?
True movements are often started and led by those who are able to inspire those who are participating to feel as though they have the power to make a difference. Their message is that without you, the movement wouldn’t be possible.
Along the way, almost all of the movements we’ve studied have also presented participants with an opportunity to bring others along. It provides an opportunity for that person to escalate their involvement in the movement not just because they want to share something. but to escalate the feeling that they are doing something more. Always presenting the opportunity.
Providing the person with the idea that they are powerful and giving them consistent opportunities to help them link others, made it much more substantial than saying, ‘Hey, it’s peer-to-peer fundraising season again. Here’s another opportunity to gather your friends and get involved’.
The most successful campaigns move beyond that message and say ‘Here is your opportunity to share what you believe in.’
When you feel like you belong and own part of a movement and you’re given an opportunity to go further, it’s much bigger than just raising money.
— Peter Panepento