Last week I went to an NTEN event about how nonprofits can take advantage of Foursquare, a mobile app that is gaining about 100,000 new users a week.

At the event, Naveen Selvadurai, one of the founders of Foursquare explained how their invention was driven by a series of questions: “How can we get better at living in our cities?” And, “How can we turn life into a game?”

For uninitiated, here’s how Foursquare works: get to a location and “check in.” Once the app registers where you are, businesses and nonprofits nearby can alert you to special offers — like a discount for frozen yogurt. Like Meetup, it’s also a way to connect with friends in real time. Depending on the number of times you check in, you can earn “badges” or be anointed “Mayor” of that place – which can come with special privileges and…

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CNN recently reported that women make up roughly 70 percent of all volunteer travelers – or people who spend their vacations volunteering in communities far from home.  Experts tell CNN that women choose volunteer vacations for reasons including both altruism and guilt.  The travelers themselves highlight the “emotional involvement and connection that you will never have when you take a regular holiday.” And the fact that women traveling in volunteer programs feel safer than they would traveling alone.

Volunteer vacations are a way to integrate yourself into a community, give and receive while there, and deepen your understanding of something new while doing so.  These themes resonate with the reasons women support given causes and organizations, and also why they are loyal to certain brands.  Beyond the altruism and guilt cited by CNN, volunteer vacations are in many ways an ideal…

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GreatNonprofits develops “tools that allow people to find, review, and share information about great – and perhaps not yet great – nonprofits.”  They have launched a campaign to highlight nonprofits that help women.  Instead of generating their own list of winners, though, they are asking you to get involved and review organizations or post your organization to be reviewed.

The Women’s Empowerment Campaign 2010 is a collaborative of many led by GreatNonprofits and GuideStar in partnership with Kiva, the Anita Borg Institute for Women and Technology, MADRE, Wider Opportunities for Women, Dress for Success, Women’s Media Center, Women News Network, and Women’s Philanthropy — Women’s Issues.

Voting, reviewing, and other open-source competitions and collaborations online allow organizations like GreatNonprofits to learn about their audience, learn from their audience, and collect awareness on issues with a much wider net than they could alone.  It builds upon the…

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Have you heard of Shoes of Prey?  The custom shoe design site had an explosive experience last week – thanks to a 16-year-old’s YouTube site.  Juicysatr07’s had 450,000 viewers, and combined with a giveaway prize from the company, lured 200,000 to Shoes of Prey’s site, according to PSFK.

How are you adapting to and including new voices in your online marketing?  How do you find the right influencers?

You can learn how to apply every kind of makeup, reorganize your closet, sketch a portrait, and a million other things thanks to the force of young women on YouTube. The tone of the video, the number of YouTube subscribers, and their comments can help you figure out which YouTube lady is the best to help your product, company or organization.  If you have an evening, watch their videos!

Women research their purchases and the…

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Women seek an in-depth understanding of what they choose – whether it’s when they buy a product or take a bite of a pie.  How do they know what they are getting?

Two non-profits organizations are making detailed info available at the snap of a camera-phone.  Consumers simply take an iPhone to the grocery store with the GoodGuide app or the (soon to launch) Citizen’s Market app, and scan item barcodes.  From home they can search deep databases online.  Profiles for the product and company pop up with ratings and descriptions for them.  On Citizens Market, consumers can upload reviews, and companies can join the conversation, too.

GoodGuide helps consumers “find safe, healthy, and green products” with a rating system that accounts for ingredients, production, and the behavior of the company that makes or harvests the products.  They use a combination of science, widely sourced…

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Last Sunday’s New York Times Magazine cover story “Are Your Friends Making Your Fat?,” posed some intriguing ideas for social marketing campaigns.

The crux of the social contagion theory: friends and even friends of friends can have an enormous influence over your health habits and other behaviors. So why not, for example, combat obesity by urging people to diet with their close friends?

Easier said than done. But there are promising applications of this theory in the works, according to reporter Clive Thomson, who describes an effort by researchers at the Schroeder Institute for Tobacco Research and Policy Studies to develop a Facebook app for people trying to quit smoking. The app allows them to publicly post how long they’ve gone without smoking and how much money they’ve saved.

By going public, the theory goes, you’ll inspire and influence others to quit smoking, too.

Going public also creates…

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