Birthday Challenge Wrapup

As many of you know, I decided to run a Donors Choose Birthday Challenge during the month of August as a way for people to give me a birthday present that mattered to me. We took the widget down yesterday as the month of August is over and we are headed Back To School.

But before leaving the birthday challenge in the memory bank I wanted to do a wrap up and a thank you.

The details of my birthday challenge are here. We raised $3,327 from 39 donors, including my parents. Thank you mom and dad. They've been struggling to give me presents for years and I think they liked this idea even better than I did.

We also ran the top performing birthday challenge of the month as measured by both donations and donors. And we got August to be the second best birthday challenge month of the year so far. A total of $13,070 was raised by various birthday challenges in August. The only month that did better so far this month was May when Stephen Colbert raised over $8000 for his birthday.

I'm pretty impressed with this community that we can do >40% of what the Colbert Nation can do.

So thank all of you who participated in the birthday challenge. We did a good thing. And if you want to do a birthday challenge of your own, click here and set one up. It's a great thing to do.

#Random Posts

Comments (Archived):

  1. Vladimir Vukicevic

    The power of giving has only just begun to be manifested on the Internet. The web has reduced transaction friction to a nearly nonexistent level and because of this we will see giving-based systems gain a bigger foothold.

    1. fredwilson

      Totally agree

  2. ShanaC

    I’m curious as to how that >40% number work. Population makeup, ect… In theory, there should be a lot more Colbert Nation readers than Fred Wilson readers (no offense). So what is causing those numbers? Are your readers wealthier per capita, so when they give they are likely to give more? Or are they more likely to give to an internet based charity? Lots of interesting questions about that number.

    1. kidmercury

      IMHO it’s a passion thing. smaller communities are more passionate and more close knit, and so you will be able to get a larger share of customer wallet, even if you are getting fewer customers. though i think the audience here is currently of a higher wealth bracket, which probably helps explain things as well.my $.02 fwiw

      1. fredwilson

        I agree with the kid on this one

    2. fredwilson

      I think the conversion from blog to donors choose is easier than TV to donors choose

      1. ShanaC

        Beyond that Donor’s Choose is an awesome organization, the only reason I bring it up is that even though I can’t say I understand fully what I see, it is actual analytics in hard cash numbers about something that is technically an ad on a blog. We have a given period of time, I hope that somewhere you have the clickthrough and how many people saw the ad, as well as how much money was given. Most of the time you see it as ad to product or service. This is one of the few times that was mentioned you can see the money.Granted it is selfless money, but still. Might as well take the opportunity to figure out what’s what and why with their permission. They probably could use that information for targeted blog raising.

        1. fredwilson

          Donors choose is amazing. The more you learn about it the better it gets

          1. harpos_blues

            Fred,I agree with you wholeheartedly. As I mentioned in an earlier post, Donors Choose passed my technical evaluation last month with ease, so I gave it a very strong recommendation to my client(s). The client is conducting an internal review for business/legal/tax implications (if any). The artists managed by the client absolutely *LOVED* Donors Choose, as several of them have parents who are/were school teachers; these artists also work as music educators.Donors Choose is just a fantastic idea all the way around.

          2. fredwilson

            Thank you for your support!

          3. fredwilson

            Thank you for your support!

      2. harpos_blues

        I don’t watch The Colbert Report, but it would be interesting to discover how many resources/time/effort was devoted to promoting the Donors Choose project. For instance:• Does/did Colbert mention Donor’s on-air? If so, does he do so consistently?• Is the associated Donors Choose URL included in each televised episode, or web clip?• Is the Donors Choose widget included on the Colbert report web site? What about other marketing collateral?• Is/was Donors Choose cross-promoted with any other of Colbert’s philanthropic efforts?These are some of the “business” considerations that would be important for an artist/performer participation with Donors Choose.

  3. Keenan

    I thought it was pretty selfless and giving. Well done Fred.

  4. Dave Pinsen

    I bet you could easily double your take next year by combining it with some sort of in-person get together. Have everyone who donated, say, $50 or more online print out their receipt and bring it with them as their admissions ticket to the Fred Wilson Birthday Challenge happy hour at the Union Square Pub. If you use the same charity next year, have one or two of the teachers associated with it show up as well, and explain how they used the funds (I went to a couple of Spirit of America events where they did something similar). A lot of aspiring entrepreneurs and others would shell out for the chance to meet you. A lot of your blog commenters would probably also welcome a chance to meet each other.

    1. fredwilson

      That’s a fantastic idea dave. Consider it done

  5. daryn

    That’s great.I was happily surprised to get a birthday card in the mail from DonorsChoose yesterday, along with a $30 giving card. I’ll be putting it toward my own birthday present! 🙂

    1. fredwilson

      Sweeeet