- Image by emdot via Flickr
The Obama Model Web 2.0 – Social activism, bordering on a movement, is a whole new concept. Well, maybe it’s a rebirth and reconfiguration of a Web.1 concept. (According to Humanity.org, these are the top 10 Social Activist Sites: The World Revolution, Ashoka, Changemakers, Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF), International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, Earth Fund, Afribike, Grupa hajdeda da…, The National Gay and Lesbian Task Force (NGLTF), and Youth Against Aids (YAA) ). But it does use a whole new set of social media tools that did not exist until recently.
Or maybe it’s another transformation of an even older concept, corporate social responsibility or CSR. Two prime examples are ice cream maker Ben & Jerry’s, which not only promotes support sustainable and safe and environmentally friendly methods of food production but seeks and supports nonviolent ways to achieve peace and justice as well. Another vendor, Whole Foods Markets, goes to the ends of the earth, literally, to find delicious and unusual products. Whole Foods then partners with local farmers and producers, even including direct micro-credit loans to their vendors, in order to bring quality to their customers, and, at the same time, lift up emerging economies. It has been a powerful formula.
But now there is a new model on the web, inspired by the Obama’s extremely media savvy campaign. It is a model where activism is not rooted in a bricks and mortar organization but driven, primarily, by viral marketing on the web and the formation of a communities of interest. Or are they movements?
Whatever you call them, you can use the same model.
As set by Tim Leberecht in Obama Inc. – Web activism for profit:
A recent example of this kind of Obama Inc. start-up, San Francisco-based firm Virgance, was featured in the Economist this week, and the article indicates that social impact in an activism 2.0 world is shifting from a welcome side benefit to an integral component in the business models of Internet entrepreneurs. The new kids on the web have internalized the lessons from the Obama campaign, and now they want to make a difference, too – and money. The Economist describes Virgance’s model as “for-profit-activism.” Named after a plot device in Star Wars, the company aims to support social causes through a multi-pronged campaign platform that resembles the way Obama for America mobilized its supporters, and it typically consists of four core elements:
1. A web-empowered volunteer network
2. A presence on Facebook
3. A team of paid bloggers to promote the campaigns
4. YouTube viral videos
Among the first Virgance-supported campaigns are 1BOG (“one block off the grid” – aiming to convince homeowners to switch to solar energy), Carrotmobs (public contests that incentivize retailers to become green), and Lend Me Some Sugar (based on the Facebook application that gives users virtual sugar cubes for donations to a cause of their choice).
Virgance is not the first for-profit-do-gooder of course; there have been plenty of others whose business model combines bottom line thinking with social value: the Economist, for example, puts Virgance in a line with Project RED. But Virgance is more like Facebook Causes. It adopts the forces of “Here Comes Everybody” and builds its entire business on a social web platform, embracing the principles of open-source, mass collaboration, and transparency: “If a for-profit company did the type of work that non-profits often do, but did it more efficiently, would people trust it the same way they trust non-profits?” the Virgance web site describes the company’s ambitious mission. ”What if everything the company did was completely transparent? What if it was open source? If we can create this kind of company, and succeed, how many other companies would follow our example? Along the way, could we change the face of the business world itself?”
Does that language sound familiar? The Obamapreneurs are adept at turning their campaigns into movements. Clearly, the Obamanization of business – both in terms of substance and style – has arrived in reality, and we will see more Obama Inc.’s in 2009.
On February 27-28, IESE Business School will gather entrepreneurs, scientists, foundations, and corporations at its annual student-run Doing Good and Doing Well conference in Barcelona. It’ll be interesting to see how the Obama gem will make its way into the more old-school world of CSR (corporate social responsibility).”
If you have set up something like this or thought about it or want to or know someone who has…. write us. Share. We can all master this with the help of each other.
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=25746325-9155-46db-ba15-0deffead0eb1)
