April 14, 2009
At the Cancer Research Institute, we receive phone calls or emails every day from people eager to help raise awareness of our mission. Most have already made a donation and they want to do something more. The Internet has opened up a variety of ways for people who are passionate about our mission to pitch in and help. And, even better, each of the following helpful actions generates awareness and/or financial support for our organization at no cost to you.
Spread the Word
- Review CRI on Charity Navigator
- Blog about CRI
- Tell three friends about CRI
Raise Some Cash
- Give Your Opinion on Epinions.com
- Involve Your Employer
- Get in the Game: Play Online for Charity
- Have a Virtual Garage Sale on eBay
- Search Online…for Anything at All
- Shop Online (Mother’s Day is just around the corner!)
Join In the Conversation
- Share Your Story
SPREAD THE WORD
- Review CRI on Charity Navigator
Charity Navigator is a leading source of information on charity activity. Donors look to it, and similar charity monitoring organizations, to help them make informed giving decisions. Charity Navigator rates charities based on criteria which include the percentage of money spent on overhead versus what actually goes to the stated program, the overall financial health of an organization, and operational and financial transparency. The Cancer Research Institute holds the highest rating—four out of four stars—a key factor in driving new donors to CRI, including those who have traditionally given to other cancer charities.
Donors who visit an organization’s report page have an opportunity to leave a comment about the charity. Each time a charity is reviewed it appears on the Charity Navigator homepage, where your comments can be viewed by other donors. By leaving a comment about CRI, you are helping a donor decide to commit to CRI, that is if he or she can relate to the reasons why you support the Institute.
You must first register a free account with Charity Navigator to leave a comment. If you are a donor, then please share why you give to CRI. Scientists, tell your stories, too: let prospective donors know why CRI funding is important to your research.
To participate, follow the link to our Charity Navigator page and click the "Comments" tab to share your thoughts: http://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=search.summary&orgid=3417
- Blog About CRI
Do you blog? Do you read blogs about cancer? If you do, you can help CRI by writing about us and (this is the crucial part) linking to our Web site.
If you publish your own blog, consider publishing an entry on why you donate to the Cancer Research Institute—what is your inspiration for supporting us, why do you believe research is important, what about harnessing the immune system to fight cancer appeals to you? Be sure to link to our Web site’s homepage (http://www.cancerresearch.org) or to any other page on our site that interests you. Online search engines like Google look for these kinds of links, and the more quality links to our site out there, the stronger our standing in search results.
If you subscribe to blogs about cancer, then consider including the Cancer Research Institute (again, with a hyperlink to our homepage) in your signature line so that it shows up every time you leave a comment. Alternatively, when the topic is appropriate to CRI’s mission, don’t be bashful about putting our name out there (with a hyperlink to our homepage) when responding to the post.
You may find it helpful when writing your comments to refer to our CRI Fact Sheet for some key messages about our mission and programs.
- Tell Three Friends About CRI
We live in a communications-saturated society, and getting messages through to the intended recipients can be a competitive and costly venture. Getting the word out without breaking the bank is a challenge for organizations that rely on public support to continue their work but find it difficult to justify expensive advertising buys.
Word of mouth is the best (and most affordable) kind of advertising, especially for non-profits that rely on public trust. When a friend tells you about something, you’re more likely to listen and take interest than if you get a phone call or read an ad or email about the same thing.
So forward this page on to a few friends. If they forward to three of their friends, and then those three friends forward to three of their friends…well, you get the picture. Use our convenient SHARE button below to let your friends and other social contacts know about the Cancer Research Institute.
RAISE SOME CASH
- Give Your Opinion on Epinions.com
If you’ve got something to say about a new gadget, appliance, movie, book, travel package, or just about any other product or service you can imagine, then you can turn your opinion into money for the Cancer Research Institute simply by sharing it with others on Epionions.com.
The online consumer reviews platform has selected the Cancer Research Institute as one of three charities to benefit from its Write for the Good of a Charity promotion. The company will donate $1, shared evenly among the three charities, for every helpful product review that is written on the site by consumers like you during the month of April.
CRI was one of 19 charities nominated for the honor, and was selected in a vote by the Epinions.com community of reviewers. Autism Speaks and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children are the other two beneficiaries.
To participate, create your free account at Epinions.com and start reviewing any of the products listed on the site. Remember, your reviews must be rated as ‘helpful’ in order to qualify. Be sure to check out the promotion rules before you start.
- Involve Your Employer
Does your employer’s company offer payroll deduction campaigns for charity? Does the company hold special events or promotions to benefit charity? Does it match gifts employees make to charitable organizations? There are a number of ways you can help leverage your support of CRI simply by helping us contact the right people at your company.
Payroll Deduction
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If your company does not already participate in a workplace giving program like Community Health Charities, you can help us take the first steps towards establishing one by letting us know a few things about your company, including: the company name, address of the headquarters, name and contact information of the chief executive officer and of the chief human resources officer, and the number of employees at the company. Email us to let us know if you think your company might be a good candidate for payroll deduction.
Special Events
Companies often hold special events or promotions to raise awareness or funds for charity. For instance, in 2007, BCG Partners selected the Cancer Research Institute as one of the beneficiaries of its annual Charity Day celebrity fundraiser, during which all commissions made that day on the trading of financial vehicles were donated to the selected charities. Similarly, CIBC World Markets Miracle Day has raised nearly a quarter-million dollars for CRI. If your company is planning to hold a charity fundraiser, you can nominate CRI to be a beneficiary (see #4 above for another example). Email us at info@cancerresearch.org to let us know about your company’s event. We will gladly supply you with any materials you might need for the nomination process.
Matching Gifts
If you’ve recently made a gift to CRI, did you remember to check whether your employer matches your gift? You may be able to double or even triple the value of your contribution simply by going online and searching our Matching Gift Finder for your company name. If you know your company matches gifts, but it’s not listed in the Finder, please let us know by emailing donations@cancerresearch.org.
- Get in the Game: Conquer the World to Help Conquer Cancer
If you like to play games of strategy like Risk, and if you like computer games, then you should check out the GoCrossCampus Tournament of Charities. In the Tournament, five charities, including the Cancer Research Institute, have been pitted against one another as each strives to conquer one another’s territory. For every player that enters the game, GoCrossCampus will donate $0.10 to the winning charity.
The game is free and fun to play, and requires only a few minutes each day for you to log on to the site, check your team commander’s battle plan, and make your move.
The more people that join the Cancer Research Institute team, the more likely it will be that our team wins and the larger the donation will be. The game is already in progress, and we’re in first place, but we need more friends to join in and lend their support to guarantee a win for CRI. So, get in the game and have some fun, all for a good cause.
- Have a Virtual Garage Sale on eBay
It’s time for spring cleaning! There’s no better time than now to hold a virtual garage sale to benefit the Cancer Research Institute by listing your items on eBay. When you list your item, you can now select the Cancer Research Institute to receive a portion, up to 100%, of the final sale price by selecting us as your beneficiary in the eBay Giving Works program. For more details, go to eBay’s Giving Works page for sellers to learn how you can start raising money for CRI.
- Search Online…for Anything at All
How many times do you go online to search for something? If you’re like most inquisitive people with access to a computer, you probably search from five to twenty-five times a day, or more. GoodSearch.com has created a Yahoo!-based search engine that turns your searches into a donation by generating advertising revenue to benefit a charity of your choice. With Yahoo!’s search engine processing more than 2 billion searches per month, that’s quite an opportunity to give. With GoodSearch.com, you can search as you normally would while generating a donation for CRI.
Simply go to GoodSearch.com and start searching. CRI should already be selected as your beneficiary charity if you clicked on the link provided here; otherwise, be sure to select us before you start your search.
On that page, you can also download the GoodSearch toolbar or make GoodSearch your homepage. Happy searching!
PS: We’d like to thank GoodSearch.com for selecting CRI as its Charity of the Day on March 26th.
- Shop Online
Wait a minute! We said these helpful actions wouldn’t cost you anything, right? Well, the donation portion of this action comes from the retailer, not you. The idea is that you would use this to shop online for items or services you would plan to purchase online anyway.
Most of us have gotten used to making purchases online—Amazon.com for books (or e-books for you Kindle users), Expedia.com for plane tickets and hotel reservations, Dell, Wal-Mart, Apple—just about every major retailer now provides their customers the convenience of online shopping.
Like GoodSearch (see #7 above), GoodShop.com offers an opportunity for you to shop online with your favorite retailers just as you normally would while also generating a donation to benefit a charity that you select. You don’t need to do anything else.
For example, let’s say you want to send flowers to your mother for Mother’s Day (May 10th this year). Go to GoodShop.com and click the logo for 1-800-Flowers. When you complete your sale, 7% of the final sale price will go to CRI. Look out for special offers, too, like their 10% discount code.
JOIN IN THE CONVERSATION
- Share Your Story
Are you a person with cancer who has a story of survival to share, or do you know someone with cancer who has inspired you to support our mission? If so, we’d like to hear from you. We might feature your story, photos, or videos in one of our upcoming e-newsletters.
Examples of courage as told in the stories of those who are battling cancer and the loved ones who support them through the ordeal can offer tremendous hope to others facing the same challenges. Your story might help someone to find the strength to continue fighting and remind them never to give up hope.
If you’d like to share your story, please email us at enews@cancerresearch.org with a brief summary of your story. Please be sure to let us know if immunotherapies like cancer vaccines, monoclonal antibodies, or other immune modulators were used in the course of treatment. Also let us know whether you have any photos or videos to share, as well as your full contact information, including telephone number and mailing address. If your story is selected for possible publication, a member of our staff will contact you for more information.
Have you got creative ideas of raising awareness and support for the Cancer Research Institute? Let us know by emailing us at enews@cancerresearch.org.