Case Studies: Mobile Fundraising and Advocacy Successes

The video has the sound of text messages coming in in the background, and as each message comes in, the man who is torturing the prisoner cannot harm him. The idea was to show the donor that her SMS is making a difference, Oscarson said.

The end of the video then encourages people to “Save lives with an SMS. Send Activist Start and your name to 72900.” Those who opted in then were taken to the mobile site for registration, where they could “log in to see their account, see what kind of donations you want to make, read about what’s going on, etc.,” Oscarson said.

The mobile site was used as a hub for information … and a hub for action. On the mobile site, Amnesty asked people for one-time donations, to sign protests and to share the message via social media. For instance, you could send a text as a signature for a protest. Those text “signatures” then were printed and handed to embassies as physical protest sheets, making for an easy way for supporters to sign petitions.