Daily Challenge breaks a record, reminds us not everything has to happen online

Posted by Andrew Lane in niche in the news, random ramblings on April 6th, 2009 | View Comments

If you’re networked in Toronto and you didn’t hear about Daily Challenge’s Pay it Backwards Day this past weekend, then there’s a possibility that your Facebook and Tweetdeck have experienced a major fail. Plastering every possible social network with information on how to get involved for weeks on end, the #PIBTO team achieved their goal on Saturday by setting an official world record for acts of kindness at the Second Cup at John and Richmond. But in the process of using all tools social and digital to promote the event, in the end, they showed something we often forget these days – digital media can’t do everything.

Take a look:

Clearly a lot of amazing “Do-Gooders” deserve to be commended for getting involved this past weekend. But their physical presence in downtown Toronto on a chilly and overcast Saturday afternoon taught a great lesson. While online media have gotten all the praise lately for their ability to facilitate conversation, we still need the “offline world” (read: the real world) in many cases to facilitate action. Second Cup donated all of the proceeds of the more than 600 coffees bought that day to SickKids. Flow 93.5 brought down a tent to play live music. Celebrities from Michael Landsberg to the Raptor girls showed up. The media showed up. None of this happens in the online world. None of this happens unless real people get motivated and get together to make something that they care about happen in the real world.

So sure DailyChallenge.org is a website. And sure they used Twitter, Facebook and every other digital trick in the book to raise awareness about their event. But they also understand the power of truly connecting people face to face – and that’s something that social media can facilitate, but can never make real.

So congrats, Pay it Backwards TO on your world record – and thanks for reminding us that while social and digital media are amazing tools, they’ll never be as powerful real actually getting together to make something happen.

Post to Twitter Tweet this! Or... Post to Facebook Facebook it!

  • Great blog post Andrew and not just cause your talking about our event. ;)

    You really get what we are trying to do with DailyChallenge.org! We want to utilize the Internet to inspire people to take action offline and to create meaningful relationships in the real world.

    We have a long way to go with our social project and realize that the success of Daily Challenge and many other socially conscious movements is directly correlated to reaching a critical mass of participants (ie users).

    It was great that 600+ people came out to pibTO and helped break a world record for acts of coffee kindness and raise funds for SickKids, but imagine what would have happened if 100,000 or 1,000,000 Do Gooders participated in such an event? Or even better what would happen if 1 million people picked up three pieces of trash? We could literally clean up an entire city in a single day!

    Together, we CAN do ANYTHING! That point is what gets my juices pumping more than anything else in this world!

    Social Media for me is the ultimate tool to unite and mobilize intelligent and passionate people all over the world and transform them into agents of change.

    Just my thoughts on the matter, would love to hear some more opinions.
  • This is a great post. It really focuses on one of the foundations of Daily Challenge: creating an "online and offline" community.

    Social Media enables us to connect with individuals from all over the place, however its up to us to take that relationship to a personal and tangible level. This takes more effort than just adding/following someone.

    In my opinion for this to happen, there must be great value in the relationship. pibTO was successful for 2 reasons:

    1. The event provided tangible value. People really felt happy once they stood in that line, and they really connected to other excited do gooders standing around. Also they knew that their participation contributes to a greater cause (Sick Kids Foundation) and they really enjoyed that. This wasn't another charity event to them, this was something that they could call their own.

    2. A group of very talented people worked extremely hard to create this value! (the venue, the bibs, the photos and videos, the performers, the SM team, the entertainers, the celebs, the challenge cards)
  • Thanks for breaking it down, Afshin, and congrats again on the amazing success of pibTO!
  • Jason Hastings
    Nice point on mobilization. Social marketing is the equalizer that social and political organizations have been waiting for. If really passionate organizers work hard enough they can have as much mindshare as major corporations. The buzz led to earned media and a really well attended event. Now if we could only use it to get Canadians to vote...
  • And great point about social media as an equalizer, Jason! Though getting people to vote might take more than social media. To many of the earlier points, social media can only activate and mobilize when people are passionate about the issue/event. That's problem #1 with the Canadian electoral process, if you ask me.
  • The average person needs to realize that social media tools like Twitter aren't inherently anti-social or evil. They're just accelerators for whatever you use them for.

    If you follow a bunch of anti-social people, you'll tell people that Twitter is anti-social. Same goes for following boring or negative people.

    BUT - if you follow positive, socially active, and interesting people (like all the fine folks above, and everyone involved in #pibTO)...you'll end up telling everyone how amazing these tools are!
  • Great point Andrew! This is critical to me, that what so many people that come from a traditional media/marketing/PR background do not understand is that part of the reason that people meet online is that they want to meet great people in real life!

    People want to meet each other around their shared passions and then take action, which is its own reward and which creates a new incentive to take another action.

    How does Brand fit into this? Well, Brand can hope to enable and get some of the afterglow to rub off on it. Otherwise, it is probably just getting in the way.
  • More great thoughts everyone!

    Bretton - completely agree about the "accelerators"
    Erin - your 2 cents are always appreciated!
    Mark - I think that the way brands get involved is similarly to how Second Cup, the Raptors and Flow all did their brands a service by being involved. Esp. Second Cup by donating all proceeds to Sick Kids!
  • Andrew, you were missed on Saturday. Your smiling face is always a great addition to any socmed meetup!

    I think our close friend Rachel said it best at a recent event - people may say that social media is making us anti-social, but we can argue the opposite. Social media, and Twitter specifically, has introduced me to a fabulous group of people in Toronto and around the world who I am now proud to call friends. Events like #pibTO and all the other great events around Toronto are testament to the fact that Twitter is just an enabler, and that it's the relationships that form as a result of the tool that matter.

    Cheers!
  • It's always important to remember that social media is a tool, not a solution. By leveraging the tool effectively, one has the ability to make things happen - but it has to be a part of your overall strategy. While the SM aspect of Pay It Backwards was one of the things I was responsible for (with a couple of others), the event was successful because we paid attention to all aspects, and utilized face time as effectively, if not more so.

    Great post, Andrew!
  • Great points from both of you! I really hope that when we look back in "the future", social media will be remembered as a catalyst for making our world better and more social offline - not just online. #pibTO was a great example of that!
  • Great post Andrew. It's so important to use the power of social media to connect people face to face. I'm proud of the hard work the team out in to make it possible and all the people that came out to make it happen!
blog comments powered by Disqus