The speakers included Lisa Petrides, founder of the Institute for the Study of Knowledge Management and Education (ISKME), Osman Rashid, CEO and co-founder of Kno, Salman Khan, founder of Khan Academy, Glen Moriarty, CEO and co-founder of NIXTY and Philip Bronner, from Novak Biddle Venture Partners.

Undoubtedly, there are several factors which Petrides describes as "game changers" in education: information available freely everywhere, personalized learning, widespread access to the Internet. But with the obstacles in the education system, including its political and legal barriers, there's a sense that it is difficult for entrepreneurs to get a foothold - and get funding - for education technology.

Education is a Huge Market Now, but Will Open Content Change Things?

But Kno's Rashid argued there are huge opportunities. The annual market for education technology is $88 billion, and growing at a rate of 21.7% a year. The market for digital textbooks alone is $54 billion.

But as the panelists debated what constitutes "disruption" in education, both Khan and Moriarty argued that the future of much educational content was likely to be free and open. Khan Academy, for example, is in the process of becoming a "real free virtual school for the world." But the move to make content free shouldn't devalue the learning experience, and there are lots of opportunities to build analytics and management platforms.

Despite the emphasis on free content and opencourseware, venture capitalist Philip Bronner made it clear that investors are interested in startups working in this area - good news for education technology entrepreneurs.

See Also

• Build Your Ed-Tech Startup With Help from the Kauffman Foundation
• As Interest in Online Learning Grows, Udemy Lands $1 Million in Angel Funding
• 5 Ways Tech Startups Can Disrupt the Education System
• Ed-Tech Startup LearnBoost Takes Aim at Legacy Software Systems
• Using Social Games to Teach Kids Entrepreneurship

Education is a huge market and one that has been resistant, maybe even allergic, to most real change and innovation. For profit education is remaking the landscape in the U.S. but still faces some real credibility issues.

Traditional educators look on for profit firms with scorn and condescension. The reality is that technology and profits are going to force the traditional educational institutions to change. I doubt that the Ivy's will ever seriously change their primary model of providing an undergraduate edcucation, but technology and the availability of information will make some change inevitable. To say that google threatens the very existence of the top tier universities may be overstated. But it could make the middle and lower tier schools unrecognizable to us in 15 years. To survive, many will be forced to change dramatically. Some will focus exclusively on narrow areas of study. Others will slash their cost structure in order to compete. How far and how fast these changes hit higher education in the U.S. is still unclear. But as these institutions are forced to diversify revenue streams, the for profit and technology models start to look better and better.

Really interesting article in Ad Age this week about the decline in younger drivers. http://adage.com/digital/article?article_id=144155

It is clear that the Internet is direct competition for the automobile. It used to be the way to be free and see your friends was to get your license and drive. Not any more. Just log on to Facebook. No need to leave your room.

KFC's marketing is hopelessly lost. Its not hard to see how they got here. They are, and have been, the market leader in fast food chicken for years. They got there with Finger Licking Good fried chicken. At some point, consumer demand for greasy, heavy food began to change. So KFC had to adjust its menu away from Finger Licking Good chicken.

This is where their marketing nightmare began. With a changing menu they the tried what seemed like a new slogan every month. Let's hope that Unthink is the last of these changing slogans. What the hell is Unthink? Seriously? Its like Think Outside the Bun, only not effective and stupid.

But perhaps marketing isn't the problem. Perhaps the product is the problem. After all, Taco Bells campaign has worked because young men want to it its food. Who is dying to eat new KFC products? Well, perhaps, like me, you can't actually think of a new product they serve. That might make it a little difficult to crave it wouldn't it?

"So Good" doesn't sound any more promising, but maybe they will stick with it long enough to come up with product people actually want to eat.

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Facebook co-founder Chris Hughes talks to Dana Goldstein about his new venture for connecting volunteers to non-profits, Jumo, which goes up today, and why Obama’s Organizing for America fell short.

Among Facebook’s tight-knit group of co-founders, Chris Hughes has always been the idealistic one.

When the social networking site first took off in 2004 and his roommates Mark Zuckerberg and Dustin Moskovitz dropped out of Harvard to make a killing, Hughes—a middle class kid from North Carolina—returned to college and graduated, writing a thesis about Algiers. When candidate Barack Obama intrigued Hughes, he shocked Facebook CEO Zuckerberg by quitting the company to work in the unprofitable world of campaign organizing, where Hughes helped to build and run MyBarackObama.com, the candidate’s groundbreaking online organizing tool. When the presidential race ended and Hughes needed to chart his next move, he tried venture capital, doing a stint as “entrepreneur-in-residence” at General Capital Partners in Cambridge. But he kept asking himself what he could do to contribute to the greater good.

“We have a real problem when it comes to giving,” Hughes said. “People tend to give around moments of crisis, at the end of the year, maybe when they see a really dramatic photo or video.”

So Hughes traveled to Africa, India, and Latin America. He spoke to development gurus like Jacqueline Novogratz of the non-profit Acumen Fund and Jeffrey Sachs, the Columbia University economist famous for his proposals on how to eradicate global poverty by 2025.

“I was constantly thinking, ‘What do I know and how can I use what I know to help these people?’” Hughes said of the social welfare thinkers and activists he met during his travels. “I took some serious time trying to think through that question.”

Where he ended up was Jumo.com—a new networking site to connect non-profits to the public and to one another, which soft launches Thursday morning. By fall, members will be able to use Jumo to learn more about social justice causes, donate money, and find out about opportunities to volunteer time and skills. The name means “together in concert” in Yoruba, a language spoken in Eastern Senegal, which Hughes visited last April and fell in love with.

On Jumo, Hughes says, a college student looking to volunteer during spring break will be able to type in the dates of her vacation, the regions to which she’d like to travel, and see a comprehensive list of volunteer opportunities. A lawyer fluent in Spanish might be able to help Latin American governments rewrite building codes to better protect against earthquake damage. A Washington, D.C. woman who gives regularly to Planned Parenthood could learn about related, smaller organizations that need support, such as Hughes favorite One by One, which funds the $420 surgery that repairs obstetric fistulas, a preventable condition caused during childbirth that can lead to a lifetime of stigma for affected women, who often leak urine and feces out of their vaginas.

Hughes recently relocated from Brooklyn’s Prospect Heights neighborhood to the Village to be closer to friends, he says, yet—perhaps a sign of his desire for do-gooder, bohemian cred—“I felt sort of bad about leaving Brooklyn.” Jumo, a non-profit, is now his full-time job, and since he decided to move forward with the idea in January, he has been able to raise about $500,000 from individual donors, hire two full-time staffers, and rent office-space in SoHo.

Whether the non-profit sector is ready to embrace a new social networking platform remains to be seen, especially given these organizations’ often-limited staff time and lack of familiarity with cutting edge technology. And there’s competition—Ning, for instance, allows non-profits to build their own branded social networking websites using pre-fabricated tools. But the most formidable rivals are Hughes’ old friends at Facebook, which already offers the application Causes, on which users can donate money and promote non-profits to friends. Hundreds of thousands of non-profits are members of Causes, and in the application’s first two years, 25 million Facebook users “joined” at least one of the causes. But according to a Washington Post report, the majority of Causes non-profits have never received a single donation through the application.

Good for Chris Hughes. There have been a number of small companies, mostly not for profits, trying to create a better, easier way for people to get involved in volunteer activities. Looks like Jumo may eat them all.

This seems like a cool app. Not essential to living and breathing....but cool nonetheless. Could be a really cool way to provide more living memory to kids pictures. (Yes, I have three kids and take lots of pictures. Some of which have very funny stories about when or where they were taken.)

The Most Influential Cause Marketing Campaigns

Cause Marketing Forum Founder Offers His List of Top Efforts

Posted by David Hessekiel on 02.10.10 @ 02:10 PM

David Hessekiel

Thousands of programs designed to do well by doing good have been launched by businesses and nonprofits over the last 30 years. Many have been short-term and pedestrian, while others have been inspiring and impactful.

As we enter a new decade, I've tried to identify the most influential cause marketing campaigns. My hope is to educate and be educated by inspiring a dialogue on the most outstanding work in this field.

1. American Express Statue of Liberty Restoration (1983): During a three-month period, American Express offered to contribute 1 cent for each card transaction and $1 for each new card issued and backed the offer with a substantial media campaign. The effort raised $1.7 million to restore the statue and Ellis Island, moved the needle for Amex's business and gave birth to the field of cause marketing.

2. Yoplait Save Lids to Save Lives (1999 to present): This has become one of America's best-known breast cancer campaigns. The fact that consumers save and mail in millions of sticky lids to raise 10 cents each to support Susan G. Komen for the Cure is testimony to cause marketing's motivational power. Yoplait does a masterful job of integrating this transactional program with its sponsorship of Komen's Race for the Cure, continually refines the initiative and supports it with paid and earned media. To date it has raised more than $26 million.

3. Dove Campaign for Real Beauty (2004 to present): Unilever didn't adopt a cause; it created one with breakthrough creative that sparked an international discussion of beauty stereotypes. It developed the Dove Self-Esteem Fund and hopes to reach 5 million young women with information on positive body image by the end of 2010.

4. 1,000 Playgrounds in 1,000 Days (2005 to 2008): The Home Depot and KaBOOM took employee volunteerism to new heights with this national three-year program to build great places for kids to play within walking distance of their homes.

5. The Members Project (2007 to 2008): Promotions that ask consumers to direct corporate giving are growing common, but American Express pioneered the use of social media and buttressed brand appreciation with this effort. Over two years it gave away $4.5 million, including top winners the Alzheimer's Association and U.S. Fund for UNICEF.

6. Whirlpool and Habitat for Humanity (2004 to 2007): The appliance maker transformed its previously little-known commitment to provide a range and refrigerator for each Habitat home built in the U.S. into a major driver of brand loyalty with a multimedia campaign featuring Reba McEntire. What's more, they did all cause marketers a favor by measuring and sharing the impressive results.

7. Lee National Denim Day (1996 to the present): A traditionally male brand, Lee made huge inroads with women by embracing the breast cancer cause in a unique way: It empowered consumers to organize workplace drives at which employees contributed $5 for the right to wear jeans to work on the first Friday in October. Over 13 years, the program has raised nearly $75 million for breast cancer research and advocacy.

8. Product (Red) (2006 to the present): Founders Bono and Bobby Shriver boldly threw out the cause-marketing rule book to create (Red). Their privately held company created and licensed a hot brand to The Gap, Apple, Armani and other marketers and staged an unprecedented launch. Although often criticized for a lack of transparency, (Red) has raised more than $140 million for the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria and continues to attract new corporate licensees such as Nike and Starbucks.

9. Live Strong Bracelet (2004 to present): When the Nike and Lance Armstrong Foundation came up with this idea to raise funds and awareness for the supercyclist's cancer charity, no one dreamed it would become a worldwide fashion item worn by presidential candidates, movie stars, kids and grandmothers. To date, more than 70 million of the glorified yellow rubber bands have been sold for $1 each.

10. What did I miss? What do you think are the most influential cause marketing campaigns of all time? Either comment here or go to www.BestCM.posterous.com to critique this list and nominate great attempts at doing well by doing good.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

David Hessekiel is the founder and president of the Cause Marketing Forum, a business dedicated to helping companies and causes succeed together. Its eighth annual conference will be held in Chicago on June 2-3.

Cause marketing is not easy to do....there needs to be a real cause. Sometimes marketers can create one by tapping into real consumer values....sometimes consumers create their own and adopt brands or anoint brands to the cause. This was a good article about some of the most important cause marketing campaigns. I think what is missing however are the public health campaigns which in many ways have been the most effective and visible of these types of campaigns.