Everyone wants to be more successful selling their cause marketing programs. But how? Try social media. It’s been a key part of my success, and I bet social media can help you too. I’ll talk about how to use social media to sell cause marketing in another post. But let’s first confirm why you should use social media for cause marketing in the first place.

Social media makes the selling process easier. Selling is hard enough, that’s why you need a non-sales sales tool. In steps social media. Social media isn’t good for selling, and, not surprisingly, people don’t like to be pitched on social media. But they do want to be engaged. Engagement is key as persuasion occurs through identification. People buy you from you when they can identify with your attitudes, values, interests, background, beliefs, etc. You don’t use social media for selling. You use it to engage stakeholders and to build identification.

Social media keeps you top of mind. Samuel Johnson famously said that people need to be reminded more than they need to be informed. Social media tools–if you’re active on them (no, they don’t work if you just sign up for them and then abandon them)–have an ever-present quality to them. Social media puts you just a tweet, a wall post or a comment away from connecting with your prospect.

Social media allows you to be useful. Don’t just be good. Be good for something. I always try to be useful to my followers. I share case studies, introduce them to people, congratulate them when they succeed and encourage them when they fail. Social media is a great way to be and stay helpful.

Social media allows you to be your wonderful self. Social media is conversational, interesting and fun. It lets your personality shine through! You can use acronyms, contractions, abbreviations. You can speculate, debate and be light-hearted. In short, it encourages you to communicate authentically and sincerely. People don’t buy from causes or companies, they buy from people. Social media allows you to be the man or woman that people want to buy from.

Social media keeps it real. Long letters nobody reads. Emails with attachments. Stupid, wasteful meetings. Meet and greets with lots of gladhhanding. You won’t find these on social media. But if you find even a semblance of them, you can move on quickly. Social media in general is direct, brief, informal, highly engaging and solution-oriented. Isn’t that just the kind of communication you want with a prospect?

“Fate leads those who are willing. The unwilling it drags.” – Seneca

I’ve been thinking and talking a lot about mobile and cause marketing lately. Mobile seemed to be a big buzz word at SXSW earlier this month and I know firsthand there was lots of talk about it at Nonprofit Technology Conference the following week. Over the two days I was there, the only sessions I attended were on mobile. A lot of chatter about mobile devices!

Frank Barry got me thinking about mobile again this morning (Frank does that from time to time) with this infographic. Mobile is pervasive, inescapable and dominant. Like a tidal wave heading for our shores, there’s no running or hiding from it. As cause marketers we have to man and woman up!

But many of us are still playing in the sand oblivious to the impending wall of smartphones, apps, check-ins, texts, and mobile web sites bearing down on us.

As cause marketers we need to resize our thinking for mobile and prepare for the future.

1.  The change begins with you. I’m surprised by the number of aspiring cause marketers I meet that don’t even own smartphones, or choose to use them like regular cell phones. You can’t lead your organization’s mobile efforts if you’ve never looked at a web site or replied to an email on your smartphone. While people nod their heads when I say mobile is important, they strangely don’t believe that this revolution applies to them.

2.  Get busy. Think about everything you do as an organization and what needs be optimized for mobile. A little daunting, huh? Take a breath. A speaker at NTC talked about this (beginning at slide 19) and identified four key areas to rethink for mobile: text campaigns, mobile web sites, applications and email campaigns. This is great place to start.

3.  Start using Foursquare. Sure there are other location-based services to try: SCVNGR, Facebook Places, Gowalla, Loopt, etc. But Foursquare is the Facebook of location. So if you’re pressed for time or interest, stick with Foursquare. Check-in to locations, click on “Specials,” add pictures, leave tips (something I’ve only begun to do thanks to a push [more like a shove!] from Estrella Rosenberg.) Focus on becoming more comfortable with how location marketing works for businesses and where cause marketing is playing and could play a key role.

4.  Get social NOW! “Wait a minute!,” you might be thinking. I have to embrace mobile and jump on social media too?” Yep, here’s why. Social media is the ying to mobile’s yang. They belong together. 50% of the people on Twitter use Twitter mobile. People watch 200 million Youtube videos a day on their mobile devices! Mobile devices are social devices. If you’re not going to pick up a bat and glove and play along with people, don’t even bother showing up for the game. Or sit in the stands as spectator.

5.  Stop talking about your fricken web site. I do believe that web sites are important. I don’t believe they are the digital holy grail for your cause. Without innovation, engagement and portability it’s an online billboard that doesn’t change or engage, and the people that do see it generally just ignore it. Get over your web site.

We all have limited time and resources. The cause marketing of tomorrow requires that you give your full attention to mobile, location and social media.

The mobile wave is hurtling toward you. Will you float or flounder?

I love examples of local cause marketing, especially when they involve social media.

Take the recent partnership between Massage Envy and Second Harvest Food Bank in the Santa Clara and San Mateo counties in California.

Huh? You might be thinking. Massage Envy has 600 locations nationwide. Second Harvest Food Bank is a member of Feeding America, the largest national hunger relief charity in the U. S. with 200 locations in all 50 states.

It’s hard to think of these two as local, but they are.

Massage Envy are franchised stores. In Santa Clara they’re run by regional developer Charles Goodwin. He and his wife are local supporters of the food bank and he came up with the idea of having a social media challenge with the charity.

Second Harvest Food Bank is a certified member of Feeding America. But they’re an independent food bank in many ways. They have their own logo and didn’t change their name after the 2008 brand makeover to the parent organization.

We can learn a lot from what these two organizations did in December.

It started with Massage Envy putting up $15,000 and challenging the food bank’s supporters to earn it via social media.

• “Like” the food bank’s Facebook Page ($5)
• Comment on the page or “like” any posting ($2)
• Follow them on Twitter ($5)
• RT or mention Twitter handle, @2ndharvest ($2)
• Post a photo showing your support on Facebook, Twitter and Flickr (bonus $5 each!)

Goodwin wasn’t asking the food bank to do the impossible, which already had an active blog, thousands of friends on Facebook and lots of Twitter followers to boot.

This is one food bank that knew how to butter its own bread. You should too if you want to replicate its success.

Not surprisingly, the food bank hit its goal and got the $15k. I bet it got some great new, engaged fans too. I’m sure Massage Envy benefited also from all the people who took took notice of their wonderful support.

I really admire Charles Goodwin and Massage Envy for cause marketing the right way. They made it all about the cause. And in doing so, people will never forget him or his company. If only more companies knew the power of forgetting themselves and focusing on making a difference. Karma really does exist

Congratulations on a great program. I’ll say it here and in my book. My co-author and I have picked the Social Media Challenge as one of the “Top Ten Local Cause Marketing Programs We Wish We Could Take Credit For”.

Thanks to everyone who came out to the Social Media Breakfast – Boston today. It was great seeing everyone and talking about the intersection of social change with social media and mobile devices.

As promised, I’ve included my slides above and below are links to some posts you might find useful.

What is Cause Marketing? If you still have questions, this post should answer them. Be sure to check out the comments as they offer varying opinions from mine.

Point of Sale. This is our bread and butter cause marketing strategy because it’s easy, lucrative and works well with social media and other types of fundraisers. For a primer on point of sale, start with this post. Keep in mind that point of sale is sometimes called register programs, mobiles, paper icons and scannables. The words change, the strategy is the same.

Our latest point of sale program is with Ocean State Job Lot.

Location-Based Services. The future of location-based cause marketing is bright with services like Foursquare and Checkpoints. Check out these posts.

QR Codes. A big complaint about transactional cause marketing is that it’s, well, too transactional. Shoppers give a buck not always knowing what they are supporting or how it helps. But with QR codes cause marketers can inform, educate and inspire shoppers right at the register (or in the aisles). Read about the future of these offline hyperlinks here and here.

The Grouponing of Small Business. Groupon has had a big impact on how small businesses view marketing partnerships, including cause marketing. Small businesses are actively looking for a social component to their marketing. They are increasingly expecting personalized, sophisticated campaigns that effectively segment and target consumers. Finally, discounting and couponing have earned a new priority for small businesses. All of these new priorities need to be factored in to cause marketing programs.

Humans Rule. Social media, mobile and cause marketing are merely tools for connecting human beings for a charitable ask. Check out the findings of the Cone 2010 Cause Evolution Study. You should also read my case study of William-Sonoma and St. Jude to read about good people doing good point of sale for a good cause.

Don’t hesitate to contact me if you have any questions. If you either work for a cause or with one, my employer and I also share best practices of point of sale programs, including how to make them work with social media, in a three part webinar. The next one will be in late January.

Cause marketing won’t cure cancer. Or end hunger. Or stop domestic violence. Or usher in world peace. Or save puppies from the pound.

I know this because cause marketing is blessed and cursed by having what Malcolm Gladwell calls “weak ties.”

[I immediately connected with Gladwell's concept of weak ties when I read The Tipping Point years ago. Like Roger Horchow in the book, I prefer friendly yet casual social connections. It's no surprise I love cause marketing and social media.]

Here’s how Gladwell recently described weak ties in relation to social media in The New Yorker.

The platforms of social media are built around weak ties. Twitter is a way of following (or being followed by) people you may never have met. Facebook is a tool for efficiently managing your acquaintances, for keeping up with the people you would not otherwise be able to stay in touch with. That’s why you can have a thousand ‘friends’ on Facebook, as you never could in real life.

The ties surrounding cause marketing are equally weak. You check-in at a billboard for a cause and a company makes a donation. You donate a buck at the register to feed homeless families (or was it homeless dogs?). You buy a pair of sneakers and you may or may not know that a percentage supports breast cancer research.

You’ve read this blog enough to know that cause marketing has its merits and raises millions for causes. But it will never be the first, third or twentieth reason people cite as why we cured AIDS, stopped global warming or left no child behind in the classroom.

Why? For the same reason social media will never bring peace to the Middle East, unite Africa or save the oceans. Ultimately, it takes bands of people (offline, not shopping), organized for change, to accomplish these great tasks. Not wall updates, tweets, posts and check-ins. And certainly not pinups, cause products and promotions.

One of my favorite social media experts, Jason Falls, explains:

Social media [and cause marketing] are communications channels, not power structures. The hierarchy of order that produced the civil rights movement may have been helped by social media, but it would have (and did) happen without it, too…. Sure, Facebook messages may be the carrier pigeons, but carrier pigeons don’t win wars.

And pink ribbons won’t cure cancer.

Kate Olson and Geoff Livingston have released a free e-guide to Cause Marketing Through Social Media that should be on the virtual bookshelf of every cause marketer’s library. You can bet it’s on mine.

Kate and Geoff’s approach to online cause marketing is comprehensive and unique. Yes, I talk about online cause marketing here on SG, but my focus is generally on online programs that are an extension of traditional offline cause marketing. Good stuff, but Kate and Geoff treat social media as a unique platform for cause marketing. And a very new one at that. That’s why I’m learning from them just like all of you.

While the e-guide is geared toward companies, a lot of it applies to nonprofits as well. Here are just a few of the points that resonated with me.

Have you cultivated an online community? So many of us want to do online cause marketing, but do we have the engaged online community to support it? It takes time to turn a fan base into a community that responds to calls for support and action. This is something that came up last week with The Ellie Fund and Get5Give15.com. It’s not enough to just put something out there on the web. If you launch an online cause marketing program but no one is there to interact with it, will it make a difference?

Kate and Geoff use the example of Pedigree Adoption Drive, which has over a million Facebook fans. When Pedigree whistles for its fans they respond because their community is present and engaged.

Can you sell the campaign in your company [or nonprofit]? The e-guide has an excellent section on selling online cause marketing to the boss, including starting with a small pilot project to get the green light on bigger projects. Kate and Geoff also offer some valuable responses to common objections to cause marketing programs. One objection I would add–because it still comes up a lot–is “Do we really need to be involved in cause marketing?” Fortunately, we have recent and powerful evidence to support our case thanks to the Cone 2010 Cause Evolution Study, which shows the value of cause marketing, especially for key consumers likes millennials and moms.

What campaign format will deliver the most social and business impact? This section is useful because it’s like taking a class: Online Cause Marketing 101. From Crowdsourced Voting Contests to Issue Awareness Campaigns, you get definitions and examples of the most popular online campaigns.

Case Study: Tyson Foods Hunger Relief. Toward the end of the e-guide, Kate and Geoff profile the online cause marketing program Pledge to End Hunger/WeCanEndThis that my friend and fellow cause marketer Scott Henderson developed.

This program is especially important for local nonprofits and businesses because it had:

• Online and offline features, a likely direction for local nonprofits and businesses.
• In-kind contributions of food to needy areas around the country, illustrating that not all campaigns need to involve money, but they must address a need and have value. This should inspire organizations of all sizes that they can make a difference and help in variety of ways.
• An important message for businesses of all sizes: check your ego at the door and put the spotlight on the cause. The reflection directed back at you will be worth the wait.

These are just a few of the things I found compelling about Kate and Geoff’s Cause Marketing Through Social Media. You should read the e-guide for yourself.

With plenty of sidebars, graphs and illustrations, this 26 page e-guide is an easy read and a great reference to what surely will be the next great frontier of cause marketing.

Thanks to everyone who turned out for the live discussion today at Philanthropy.com on Foursquare for Charities. I hope you learned something!

Today’s transcript

To help digest some of the things we talked about, here are the posts I’ve written on Foursquare for your education and enjoyment.

I wrote a two-part series on Boston-based Boloco and their Foursquare program and how nonprofits might learn from it.

Part 1

Part 2

Here’s a guest post I wrote on Foursquare for Philanthropy.com

How Nonprofit Groups Can Benefit From Foursquare

Here are two posts on the big Foursquare launch at SXSW this spring by my friends at StudioGood.

Part 1

Part 2

A groundbreaking program here in Boston that sparked my initial interest in Foursquare was Harvard University’s use of the geo-location service. Here’s their story and what nonprofits can learn from it.

Harvard Schools Cause Marketers on Foursquare

Are you convinced that CauseWorld is the next Foursquare? I’m not. Here’s why.

CauseWorld: Location-Based Cause Marketing

I hope you enjoyed today’s live discussion. If you have any questions just leave a comment.

Additional Reading & Listening

Podcast: Making the Most of Location Based Networks by Allison Fine

A Social Media Experiment Raises Big Money for Small Charity (Story on my wonderful co-presenter today Estrella Rosenberg).

It seems lately the more I talk to nonprofits about cause marketing the more I talk about social media and how the two are inseparable. Unfortunately, many aren’t quite sold that these two belong together.

Here’s my case for why social media and cause marketing go hand in hand.

Social media teaches you cause marketing. Social media is the only tool I use to follow trends in cause marketing.

• I read the key blogs in my industry (Cone, Scotty Henderson, Mike Swenson, Paul Jones, Olivia Khalili & Cause Marketing Forum) via links on Twitter and my Google Reader.
• I follow several dozen people on Twitter who work in the profession.
• I’m a member of Cause Marketing Forum’s Linkedin group.

Social media is a prospecting tool. Linkedin is the platform everyone thinks of for prospecting. But what of Twitter, Facebook, even Foursquare? I’ve already made connections through Twitter. Facebook has been a great place to gather background information on prospects. (Not everyone’s profile is closed to outsiders. Mine is open to Facebook users within the “Boston Network.”) While Foursquare is the new social media player on the block, I’m already watching who’s using it and where they are checking-in. You never know when I might be there too!

Social media can build stronger partnerships. Social media is all about the conversation. The relationships I have with partners that use social media are almost always stronger than the ones that don’t. (Of course, I may not be the norm as I favor what Malcolm Gladwell called the strength in weak ties.) There’s a lot to be gained with a social media connection. It’s instant, casual, sometimes personal and generally informational as a lot of sharing happens. Think of social media as the letter that rarely gets lost, the phone call that more often gets answered, the email that usually gets the reply or the  unannounced visit that is not unwelcome.

Social media distinguishes you from your competitors. Cause marketing isn’t that new for a lot of the businesses you’re calling on. It has been around since the early 1980′s, after all. But social media is brand new for almost everyone. Heck, Youtube is only five years old! When you combine cause marketing with social media, you get a more powerful pitch that gives you an edge over your nonprofit competitors. Business partners will appreciate that their “cause expert” is staying abreast of the latest trends and is open to sharing their expertise.

Social media is the future. 350 million people on Facebook and you think it’s going away? Youtube is the second biggest search engine after Google and you think it’s a fad? 90% of the businesses on the Inc. 500 list use Twitter and you think only kids use it? Whether you like social media or not, it’s here to stay. It may not always be called WordPress, Facebook, Twitter and Youtube, but the online conversation genie is out of the bottle.

If you still don’t think social media and cause marketing are the greatest match since PB&J that’s up to you. But cause marketing alone will make the mouth stick when social media with it will make your pitch better and easier to swallow.

Don’t be known as the person whose mouth is better stuck shut.

It’s hard to believe that this month marks my 5th anniversary blogging.

On average I’ve posted 100+ times a year. (Although for a time a good many of those were “Cause Marketing Links” (short news stories) from my Delicious account–something I don’t do anymore).

This year blogging took a back seat to Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin. Mid-year I added Foursquare and Posterous.

Twitter is the best of the bunch. On Twitter I finally found a community that talked back to me and followed my tweets back to my blog where the conversation continued. It was great to finally be sharing posts that you knew people were actually reading and enjoying.

But even with my success on Twitter, not to mention all the fun I have on it, I’ve grudgingly accepted that Twitter is a great complement to blogging but not a replacement.

A great servant but a poor master, if you will.

When I look around at the avatars on my Tweetdeck the smart people are blogging first. Chris Brogan posts every day on his blog. Jay Baer and John Haydon post three days a week. Problogger Darren Rowse publishes three blogs with loads of content.

Some of these people also spend a good deal of time on Twitter and other outposts. But social media is their full-time job!

So in 2010 these are my social media goals for Selfishgiving.com:

Post three days a week. I like Jay Baer’s idea of publishing on consecutive days (he likes T, W, TH), but I can’t make any promises in the beginning. But posts on three days I will do.

Posts will be around 300 words. John Haydon has been encouraging me to write shorter posts all year. I’m going to give them a try. Every week or two, I’ll probably write a feature post that will be 500 to 1000 words, which is my normal length.

Posts will revolve around three themes. Sponsorship, cause marketing and social media. Sponsorship should be a more common topic on my blog as nonprofits are more often grappling with sponsorship issues when it comes to corporate partnerships. They view cause marketing more as an advanced strategy; one they may not be ready for. Social media is a great complement to both sponsorship and cause marketing and a hot topic a lot of people are interested in these days.

Publish my email newsletter twice a month. Right now my newsletter is geared toward readers who aren’t on social media and don’t subscribe to my blog via RSS. Sadly, this is probably most of the nonprofit thought leaders I want to reach! I’d like to offer something *special* in my newsletter for email subscribers who already read my blog, but this means creating new content. And right now, I just don’t have the time for this. I would love your suggestions on this front.

Update my Facebook fan page as needed. I recently created a fan page for Selfishgiving.com with two goals. First, to give people in general yet another reminder of new content on my site. Second, for those folks within the Facebook cocoon , an easy way to follow and read my blog that is familiar and comfortable.

Continue tweeting, just not as much. No worries, or cause for celebration. I’m never giving up Twitter. But I don’t think I need to be on it every twenty minutes, do you? I plan to check my Twitter stream each morning to my heart’s content (not too onerous as I only follow 200 people) and then shut it down for two hours. Repeat. I will no longer sip for pleasure. I’ll gulp for effect.

Personal blogging on Posterous will play a role. I’m just not sure how much at this point. But one thing is for sure. I. Love. Posterous. It’s so easy to use (even wrote a post on it). And when it comes to pictures and video it really is a snap to email media right to the site. I might just use Posterous for cause marketing videos or sets of pictures, and everything else non-text related. I recently read a suggestion to create a subdomain for your Posterous blog and post your pictures and video there. I just might do that.

Give Selfish Giving a major overhaul. During first quarter 2010, I’ll be moving Selfishgiving.com from WordPress to Headway with the help of @GrantGriffiths, @JohnHaydon and @mikhaelacraig. The overhaul will include a new landing page for SixFigureCauseMarketing.com and a custom design for my email newsletter and Twitter page. In addition to giving the Selfish Giving brand a more professional, consistent look, I want optimize my blog for SEO and to fully integrate it with my other social media outposts.

Market my teleconference cause marketing program. I think SixFigureCauseMarketing.com and teaching other nonprofits how to build successful partnerships with businesses is a great idea. The people I’ve talked to about it think it’s a great idea too. But I have yet to actively market the program to nonprofits. That’s will change this year.

[Added 12/30] Spend more time building community. For Christmas I got Gary V’s Crush It and it’s a good read. When I read this I felt like Gary was talking to me:

A lot of people get wrapped up in designing their blogs and writing or taping their content. But creating your content is the easy part. [!!!] Of course your product should be as good as it can be, but it should also be the least time-consuming element of your whole endeavor. What you do after you tape a show or write or record is the whole game. Creating community–that’s where the bulk of your hustle is going to go and where the bulk of your success will be determined.

I felt almost guilty when I read this because I knew outside of Twitter, this is an area with which I’ve been remiss. But like Scrooge at knees of the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come, I repent and will honor community in my heart and try to keep it all the year.

But enough about my goals. What do YOU think of my goals? Or just tell me about yours. Maybe we can learn together.

Of all the different social media tools I’ve tried (e.g. Twitter, Facebook, blogging, etc.), a new one I just started using, Foursquare, probably has the most potential for cause marketers.

Why?

Because the backbone of Foursquare is the businesses at which its members visit, check-in and score points.

When you pop into a store, bar or restaurant you can earn points, badges or can even become mayor of your favorite hangout if you “check in” enough. You can also share tips and comments with your friends, check to see if any are close by, give them a shout-out via text or phone and broadcast your Foursquare activities on Facebook and Twitter.

Smart businesses recognize that Foursquare lets customers build the buzz for them. Customers spread the news of cool hangouts or great places to shop, flag meet-up spots for friends, visit new places for points and revisit favorites to retain their title of mayor.

And businesses are working with Foursquare to reward members with everything from special discounts to free products.

As one article points out: “For businesses, it’s social media meets customer loyalty in a tangible and measurable way.”

And since cause marketing is all about helping businesses support their favorite causes in ways that enhances customer loyalty and favorability, Foursquare could be a great fit with cause marketing in a lot of different ways. Both in how Foursquare currently works and how it might work with future updates.

Here’s how.

1. A fellow Boston-based nonprofit colleague @gradontripp–and top ten finisher on Foursquare’s Leaderboard last week (201 points to my measly 68)–tweeted the easiest way nonprofits and businesses could work together.

2. I could use Foursquare this month to promote both Halloween Town and its presenting sponsor, iParty. With almost 50 stores in New England, we could offer the Foursquare mayor of each store on October 23–the day before the event opens–4 free tickets to Halloween Town. iParty would be thrilled because you become mayor by having the most check-ins at a particular business.

3. You all know that I’m a big fan of pin-up programs. Foursquare may be a good way of reminding and motivating consumers to support these lucrative programs. For example, this past summer my nonprofit did a pinup program with four New England businesses: Tedeschi Food Shops, Ocean State Job Lots, iParty and The Upper Crust. The program went well and we raised well over $100,000.

But what if Foursquare members were reminded when they checked-in to any one of these stores about the cause promotion–and maybe even got a discount when they supported it. This could help us raise more money at the register where cashiers are not always good about asking customers to donate.

It also helps the business to earn their halo by letting every foursquare member that patronizes that business know–in a way it’s hard for he or she to miss–that that business gives back to the community.

I also think you could offer a special discount to repeat shoppers at stores that sold pinups. Or maybe shoppers that checked-in at any three stores (say Tedeschi’s, Ocean State Job Lot, iParty) could be entered to win Red Sox tickets.

4. To support the above program, Foursquare could add a “Do-Gooder” badge for members to earn. And how about “Karma Points” for good deeds.

5. Foursquare could also be a useful for cause marketing percentage-of-sale programs like the Absolute Boston program I posted on recently. When you check-in at your favorite liquor store you could get a ping on Absolut Boston and its support for the Charles River Conservancy. Maybe Absolut or the store could throw in a 10% discount on a second purchase as an added bonus.

This would work great at Starbucks where Foursquare could remind members that five cents from every coffee sold goes to Product RED to fight AIDS in Africa.

6. I can’t wait for the Foursquare charity shopping event! A nonprofit could recruit businesses to offer generous shoppers a one-day discount when they show their Foursquare check-in. Imagine a bunch of Boston stores on Newbury Street hosting a weekend charity event. Donors/Shoppers donate $100 for discounts at some of Boston’s swankiest shops. When customers are ready to buy they flash their Foursquare check-in at the register, which confirms their discount, and then they move on to the next participating store.

The shopping fundraiser would be good for Foursquare too because shoppers would need to sign-up for the service to see all the great discounts right on their mobile device.

Foursquare is social media, but it’s also a game. And games are best played with others. Today’s game is how best to use Foursquare for cause marketing, and I think I deserve to be the mayor of this one. Sorry, Gradon.

But the games only begun and you can earn points in my book with your own ideas. You have the mayor’s ear.