May 29, 2009 | Read Time: 1 minute
Even your most cash-strapped donors have the wherewithal to contribute “twollars” — a virtual “currency of appreciation” in circulation on the social networking site, Twitter, designed to raise awareness and money for charity.
According to a twollars fact sheet, each Twitter user is assigned 50 twollars which can by freely exchanged over the network via 140-character “tweets.” But only nonprofit groups can cash in the virtual currency for real dollars (at an exchange rate of 10 twollars to $1). Users who exhaust their twollar bank accounts can purchase more from charities, or earn them by visiting Web sites of businesses that give them away.
Rebecca Leaman at the blog Wild Apricot asks the critical question: Will these virtual dollars ever add up to real cash for charities? Her hunch? Unlikely.
While the concept has apparently raised $1,500 for for charity: water, that group’s position as a test cause for twollars makes its experience atypical, she predicts.
“When the conversion of twollars to dollars depends on Twitter users reaching for their credit cards instead of their keyboards, and promotion has to come from your own network of supporters, ‘your mileage may vary,’” she writes.
As with most other social networking tools, she writes, the real utility of twollars will likely be as an awareness-raising device.
To date, nearly 60 nonprofit groups have signed up to receive twollar donations, including Vitamin Angels and Livestrong.
Is your organization one of them? What do you think of the idea? Share your comments below.
