Withism's from Lori

I’m pretty busy and I’m certain you are too. The tidal wave of information coming at me all day long can be overwhelming and paralyzing. So it has to be something pretty darn engaging and interesting to get me to pause and spend more than the cursory 4 seconds on it.

This past week I received a virtual "annual report" from charity: water, my favorite environmental charity. It arrived at the end of my workday on Friday, January 20 and so I didn’t actually do anything with it until Saturday morning when I usually spend a little time going through my email inbox.

The subject line was compelling, which is the first hurdle to getting me to notice them: Thanks for an incredible 2011

It is important to note that the people at charity: water have already trained me over the last two years since I learned about them that their messages are usually compelling and I can learn something new pretty quickly. So I clicked and opened the email message.

What I love most about this message is how much information is available to update me on their IMPACT from 2011 and how it makes me feel like I was a part of helping them to have that incredible impact.

There are ten bits of information in the email message that are truly an engaging annual report. There were no trees used to send it and in the span of a few minutes I realized why I love this organization all over again. They used previously shared video clips, links to past articles, and short, fact-sharing updates to educate and inspire me.

You can view the entire virtual annual report and pick up some great ideas for your own version of this awesome communication. As you view it, ask yourself, what are we doing to engage & educate our supporters quickly and in a compelling way?

Kudo’s to charity: water for an amazing year. Thank you for letting me know all that was accomplished AND more importantly that there is more to do!