Ben Rigby, CTO & Co-founder, Sparked.com

If you’re like most people working at a nonprofit, you probably had a “Holy Mobile!” moment in January, 2010, when an outpouring of donations followed the devastating Haiti quake. This, you expected. But what you may not have anticipated was that $41m of these dollars flowed through mobile phones via “premium text messages.” The Red Cross received 4.1 million messages valued at ten dollars each, 95% of which were from first-time donors.

You breathed in... hard. Did you miss mobile? Where did all of these donors come from? Did a fantastic fund-raising opportunity pass you by? How do you jump on the bandwagon?

If any of these thoughts raced through your head last January -- or if any are racing now -- not to worry. Mobile giving is just about five years young. There’s plenty of time to put together a thoughtful mobile fundraising strategy.

Best of all, many of the kinks have been worked out. There’s never been a better time to start a mobile campaign.

The New York Times reports that Barack Obama's campaign has purchased virtual billboards in a video game. That's one way to reach the kids! We wonder if they've read Ben Rigby's new book, Mobilizing Generation 2.0: A Practical Guide to Using Web 2.0 Technologies to Recruit, Organize, and Engage Youth. Well, you can ask him yourself at our next "Meet the Author" (free for our Members).

> Learn More and Register Today!

Ben's book is a great resource for anyone interested in reaching the youth audience. It describes in a clear manner how to leverage new media -- blogs, social-networking sites, photo- and video-sharing sites, mobile phones, wikis, online maps, and virtual worlds -- to reach the youth audience.

Of course, it does beg the question: Does Generation 2.0 have more features than the 1.x release?

Another Meet the Author session is right around the corner!

On October 23rd, we'll have the pleasure of hosting Ben Rigby, author of Mobilizing Generation 2.0: A Practical Guide to Using Web 2.0 Technologies to Recruit, Organize, and Engage Youth for a phone call and online chat. We'll talk about this incredible guide for nonprofits, political campaigns, and other organizers who want to use new media tools effectively.

> Sign up for Meet the Author: Ben Rigby

Check out what a few folks have been saying about the book: