And the Gold Star Goes To…

By: Emily Goodstein, Marketing Consultant

Researchers say that the Millennial generation is defined by those gold star charts to reward success. So, we’re taking that gold star dynamic to a whole new level as we unveil a new kind of gold star…

The highly coveted #GivingTuesday gold star!

During this totally unscientific process, we monitored a whole bunch of organizations before, during and after #GivingTuesday. We’re sharing what these leaders did to inspire you for GT 2018. (Speaking of which…it is November 27, 2018! Mark your calendars now!)

Michael J. Fox Foundation

The team at the Michael J. Fox Foundation get a major gold star for this one. Their #1Day1Million goal was a huge reach. Go big or go home, right? This afternoon update kept the momentum going along with this really touching video from the organization’s founder.

The Nature Conservancy

The Nature Conservancy put some search engine energy behind #GivingTuesday this year. Check out their shout out to our favorite holiday — gold star to TNC for leveraging the power of paid search engine optimization AND a donation match on #GivingTuesday.

Feeding America

We love this lightbox from Feeding America. As soon as we visited feedingamerica.org, this engaging photo popped up and encouraged us to donate. It was already in place on Monday morning — gold star for effective use of a lightbox, Feeding America friends!

BioBus

The folks at BioBus are pro advanced planners! This email came out the week before #GivingTuesday to get us ready for the big day. Gold star to BioBus for getting the party started early.

Toyota

Corporate partnerships abound on #GivingTuesday, and this one from Toyota really stood out. Recipients don’t even need to make their own donation — but a donation is made just by clicking one of the “choose” buttons. This gold star goes to Boys and Girls Clubs of America, Girl Scouts, Special Olympics and the American Red Cross for their expert corporate partnership work during #GivingTuesday.

Save the Children

Could this photo be any more engaging? Save the Children is doing everything right here — to get lots of donations AND one of our #GivingTuesday gold stars. Extra points for the “link in bio” mention since Instagram captions are not (yet) clickable.

Joint Distribution Committee

We don’t know if JDC took a nod from the Discovery Channel’s Shark Week promos here, but their messaging is super powerful. Quick note: this email landed in inboxes on Wednesday. Gold star to JDC for not being shy (and for setting such a good example for the rest of us, too). This also hints at recurring donations – another best practice.

Project on Government Oversight

You may remember Rachel Muir talking about thank you notes that make donors cry during our first #GivingTuesday webinar. Well, this one didn’t make us cry — but it did make us smile (seeing the POGO ED’s photo with handwritten thank you sign, how could you not?). Related: never underestimate the power of a handwritten thank you note. This gold star goes to POGO for getting creative with their thank you email!

There are another gazillion organizations we could have featured in this post — so many best practices and creative ideas pressed into service for #GivingTuesday. What else did you see that really stood out?