Twitter and Facebook Help Boost Fundraising

I can’t believe that the Virgin London Marathon was three weeks ago.  It really has been the most amazing experience for so many different reasons.

I’ve raised a massive £3,157.00 for Macmillan Cancer Support and, while I haven’t reached my target of £5,000, I’m immensely pleased to have raised so much money for such a wonderful charity.

This is the first time that I’ve used social media to help me with my fundraising.  Initially, I wasn’t so sure that Facebook and Twitter really had anything to add to what I was doing.  Yes, I’ve been using Facebook for quite a few years but, other than contacting existing friends, it didn’t obviously offer anything new. …. oh, how wrong I was!

Twitter took me a while to feel comfortable with – shrinking my life into 140 characters or less in each ‘tweet’, initially, was a challenge.  I’m the sort of girl who likes to chatter and I’ve been accused of talking in really, really long sentences..rarely pausing for breath!  But now that I’ve got used to it, Tweeting has become second nature!  My Twitter profile name is ‘Mysitcomlife‘ and this may give you an indication that I like to talk about the funnier aspects of my life.  I use Tweetdeck to keep track of all the people I follow, and who follows me, plus it’s allowed me to keep an eye out for anyone tweeting about the London Marathon.

Talking online about how training has been going, countless injuries, amusing physiotherapy sessions and fundraising progress has brought me into contact with some truly wonderful people.  The biggest surprise is that complete strangers, people I have never met and may never meet, have offered advice, support and encouragement.  These same people have been tremendously generous in sponsoring me too.  Fundraising, as some of you will know if you’ve tried it, is incredibly hard work.  I don’t find it easy to ask people for money and the downturn in the economy hasn’t exactly helped.  I think people liked my story.  I was honest about the highs and lows of training and boy were there some lows.  Every time I felt lonely, suffered an injury or thought that I was ridiculous to attempt running a marathon, my online Twitter and Facebook friends came to the rescue and have continued to donate hundreds of pounds to my fundraising target.

I learned to set up a Fan Page on Facebook and looked on in surprise as I gathered yet more support.  The conversations flowed – the enthusiasm and kindness from people all over the world was tangible.  It has offered a great platform for old friends to mingle with new ones.  Click here to take a peek.

I’m incredibly grateful to everyone who has supported me and helped me to run my first marathon.  I’ve learned that when the going gets tough, there are some very caring, big hearted folk who rally to the call of a good cause – they don’t judge, they don’t question, they hear a cry for help and spring into action.  Twitter and Facebook may seem frivolous and banal to some but I know that the power of social media has helped me to raise a lot of money for Macmillan Cancer Support and people living with cancer today.

If you’re already on Twitter come and say hi and if you have a Facebook account, pop over to Joanna’s Marathon and click ‘Like’.

If you have any questions about using social media to boost your next fundraising project, please feel free to drop me a line or leave a comment below.

In the meantime, I’d like to say a huge thank you to all my Twitter and Facebook friends around the world – you’re a great support crew!