World Vision

The strongest-ever earthquake to hit Japan triggered a tsunami that moved across the Pacific Ocean. The Associated Press reports that at least 300 people have already died.

Here are early responses from large international-aid charities, grant makers, and other groups:

U.S. nonprofit organizations are seeing a slight increase in donations — a sign they hope is the beginning of economic recovery — but the turnaround hasn’t been strong enough to keep up with higher demand for charitable services, a national report released Monday said. About a third of America’s charities reported an increase in donations during the first nine months of 2010, and they said they expect more good news in the fourth quarter, according to data collected by a coalition called the Nonprofit Research Collaborative.

Despite early projections of a robust holiday season for U.S. retailers, according to a new U.S.- Canada study, more Americans, almost 7 out of 10 (69 percent), say they’ll spend less on holiday presents this year as a result of the current economic climate.

Americans are more likely than their Canadian counterparts to say that, as a result of the economic climate, they will spend less money on holiday gifts (69% vs. 61%) and are now more likely to give charitable gifts as holiday presents (51% vs. 42%).

American charities say they haven’t raised nearly what they need to help Pakistan’s flood victims.

Aid workers report that they are being forced to decide which assistance programs are most urgent, scale back plans to serve more people, and close clinics ahead of schedule because they lack sufficient cash.

Tom Harrison: Many people talk about integrated marketing or multichannel 
marketing, but when you dig deeper you find out they mean direct mail and outbound telemarketing.

Kyla Shawyer: There was a time when Operation Smile was using very few channels to communicate with our donors. We had to acknowledge that people wanted diversity and demanded choices. The more ways we communicated with them, the more likely they were to receive our message and respond.

FundRaising Success: How would you define where the fundraising sector in the United States is in regard to mobile giving?

Jim Killion: Mobile giving is in its infancy, but with the dramatic results achieved by the Red Cross with text-to-give to Haiti relief, it is now on most people's radar. In many ways, mobile giving is where what is now often referred to as "traditional Internet giving" was six or eight years ago. And just as Internet giving has taken off in the last decade, so will mobile giving. But the move to mobile will be much faster than the move to Internet giving.

NASHVILLE, Tenn., November 19, 2009 — Synergy Production Group today announced the 2010 launch of the Hoops of Hope All-Stars Tour to raise funds for projects benefiting AIDS orphans in Africa. Deemed "the world's largest free throw festival," the events will take place across 12 cities throughout the United States, beginning in April through August 2010.

July 30, 2009 —  tweetmyride is a Twitter-driven global charity campaign, created to raise money for 10 charities around the world in the lead up to Vancouver-based Australian, Gavin Romanis, participating in the international mountain bike race, La Ruta de los Conquistadores in Costa Rica from November 11-14, 2009  known as one of the toughest on the planet.

Yesterday, the mother of a sick child Googled the name of a devastating disease. She got thousands of results, but the ones that interested her the most were links to your organization’s Web site; two stories from the national media; a handful of online support groups for patients and their families; a general health Web site with online communities dedicated to the disease; and one site focused exclusively on a heartsick father’s negative experience with an operator on your organization’s support line.

Though many U.S. adults consider today's teens to be selfish and lazy, nearly seven out of ten parents say the current economic climate has made their teens "more aware of the needs of others," according to a new World Vision study. The survey, conducted by Harris Interactive, examines parents' perceptions of their teenagers during the current recession. The study also illustrates that more than half of parents say their teens support charities actively, for example, by volunteering time in a "fasting event" such as World Vision's upcoming 30 Hour Famine happening February 27th and 28th, 2009.