Kiva: Money for the Masses through Media

Have you heard of Kiva?

I had not heard about Kiva until 2009, but was so impressed with what I saw.  A professor in a social entrepreneurship class told about this non-profit, with a mission "to connect people through lending to alleviate poverty." To me micro-lending was a revolutionary idea. It was so cool to think that people all over the world could lend just $25 to help someone towards a goal, and then get paid back, when the person has the funds.

 

This video demonstrates how Pedro can get a full loan, and repay a loan. You as a customer, can then choose to give that money to someone else on Kiva, or choose to withdraw that money from your Kiva account.

 

The Easy to Understand 4 Part Loan Process

When you watch the video, you can see how Kiva works as a social network in itself, connecting people in 67 different countries needing micro loans to the Web 2.0 world. There are 894,356 Kiva Lenders, $406,673,200 in Loans, 185 Field Partners, 450 volunteers around the world, and an amazing 98.99% repayment rate. staggering numbers like this make you understand why so many people invest money in Kiva.

 

Kiva gives you the ability to track where your money is going, and track how well the person is doing that you're loaning you. By providing you with pictures, you can SEE where your money goes.

 

The mosaic of faces on the home page tells stories of people like Francess, or Beatrice who need money to support their families. Icons for Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, RSS, and LinkedIn are forefront and center on the web page, and are all active. With 182 thousand likes the Facebook page could definitely be more interactive, however it seems the Kiva puts an emphasis on Twitter. (This seems to be a trend developing for non-profits....)

 

Kiva tweets every few hours, and messages seem to be really encouraging. The tweets show a lot of gratitude for what people have done, and people are interested in updating others about reinvesting in their Kiva account. They have 496,024 followers and 5,182 tweets- a great effort to engage in the groundswell!

• Follow @Kiva coolest social enterprise ever! #givingback #socialbusiness #microfinance
• With $300 she made at a garage sale for Kiva over 4 years ago @thisiscarrie has now made 71 loans! #socialgood
• I've just reinvested in my @Kiva loan. If I can do it, you can do it! :D
 





...Our Evolution to Twitter

It is noticeable that there is no link to a photo sharing site on the Kiva website. Pinterest, and other photo sharing sites are gaining support in the Web 2.0 world, however Kiva has not jumped on this band wagon. These photo sharing sites would be perfect for Kiva, because so much of their work can be photographed through the partners, located in the 67 different countries.

 It is so interesting to me to look at Kiva from this analytic lens because it puts a whole new perspective on this website. While Kiva in itself is a form of social networking, the Kiva organization knows they must utilize social media to facilitate the most money in loans! When I first heard about Kiva I thought about it from the social entrepreneurship perspective, but now that I look at it from a Social Media perspective; it is truly such an inspirational concept!

 

 

Social Media at Local Non-Profits

Timothy VanSlyke explains, "Digital Natives are used to receiving information really fast. They like to parallel process and multi-task. They prefer their graphics before their text rather than the opposite. They prefer random access (like hypertext). They function best when networked. They thrive on instant gratification and frequent rewards. They prefer games to "serious" work."

I work at Girls Inc. of Worcester, a non-profit that caters to girls in grades 5 through 12 that live in the Worcester Area. This age group contains much of the digital natives that VanSlyke explains. I have found it interesting, since beginning my employment, to discuss with the girls the impact of social media, as well understand the social media marketing plan of the organization.

Interestingly, the non-profit is currently revising their social media marketing plan. The national organization recognizes the importance of social media in non-profits. It is understood that social media is "just as important to non-profits as it is for traditional business." It is true that social media in both the non-profit and for-profit industries that social media tools are best used to share and discuss, rather than broadcast.

Something that was interesting, which caught me off guard, is the the girls did not even realize that the very organization they are a part of use the same social media they use at home, like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Flickr. Not only that, they were not openly interested in learning about how the non-profit uses social media safely, and to it's advantage.

If one of the main points of the new social marketing initiative at this non-profit, and something important to all social media in 2013 is pulling information out of the audience and getting full audience involvement, I would think that trying to get the members involved would be the first priority. Contrastingly, this initiative is not one of the priorities of the new social marketing plan.

This is just another example of a non-profit that understands the strengths of social media, yet is not thinking about the people first before the opportunities, strategies, and technologies (Li and Bernoff, Groundswell).

I ask, in this first blog post, how it is possible that as adults we analyze the positives and negatives of social media, and dissect how best to manipulate Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter etc. so these tools can be used to our advantage, yet as digital natives it is difficult to even comprehend the abundance of social media? As digital natives, with forms of social media right in front of them that are easily utilizable, why do the girls have no recognition of the social media used at the non-profit they are participants of?

Lastly, with readily available knowledge about the advantages of social media in both non-profits and for-profits, and proper techniques about how to use the forms of media, why is it still so difficult for non-profit to understand the advantages of the pull system necessary in social media?

Finally, a video that helps us all think about this.