If you’re looking for a reason to blog, you need look no further than the hurricane-ravaged Gulf Coast, from Louisiana to Florida, where Katrina’s fierce winds and brutal, punishing rain resulted in what could be America’s deadliest natural disaster since the 1906 San Francisco fire and earthquake.
As I wrote here back in December, 2004, “a blog makes it possible for the everyday communications professional to distribute newsworthy, thematic content to a large, like-minded audience – without many, if any, layers of approval – almost instantaneously. If timeliness is a critical element of your publishing plan, it’s an irresistible platform.”
Today, there’s no valid reason for any organization involved in the business of providing disaster relief not to have a blog in its communications toolbox.
A blog can be set up immediately and inexpensively.
And by granting the opportunity to respond to any and all posts, a blogger is able to open a dialogue, receive constructive feedback and build an honest, mutually-beneficial relationship with his or her constituency.
A blog is a centralized repository for experience and expertise, an incredibly easy way to disseminate key, timely news and information to an audience of readers who are already interested in what you have to offer or – in the case of fundraising – ask of them.
A blog is infectious, too. Like a good viral marketing campaign, the content of the best blogs is passed from reader to reader, extending the author’s reach – and influence – exponentially.
A perfect example of how a blog can be used as an emergency response to a natural disaster is The South-East Asia Earthquake and Tsunami (or SEA-EAT) blog, which features a post today on blogging for disaster relief (today has been proclaimed International Blogging for Disaster Relief Day) and – in a touch of bittersweet irony – Hurricane Katrina.
Other random online initiatives, resources and noteworthy responses on behalf of all the helpless, innocent victims on the Gulf Coast:
*An “Emergency Update” on Hurricane Katrina from Covenant House at 4 PM on Monday, the day of the storm, was the first appeal for financial assistance I took delivery of by email.
*The second request I received for an online donation was on Tuesday at 6:16 PM. It was from the American Red Cross, and the subject line read, “Situation Critical: Emergency Mobilization Underway.”
*Just before midnight on Tuesday arrived another Hurricane Katrina-related email, this one from Governor Howard Dean of The Democratic Party, asking me to help the disaster relief effort by donating to – again – the American Red Cross.
*On August 29, the folks at NPAdvisors.com announced that they have launched a blog, saying: “We decided that now is the time to start posting our thoughts about disaster fundraising so that all nonprofits can participate in the discussion.” Their blog can be found here.
*The September 1 edition of Denny Hatch’s Business Common Sense featured an interesting column on “Dealing with Katrina and 9/11.”
*Charity Folks, a leading online auction venue that provides technology-based solutions to nonprofit organizations, just opened bidding in an auction to benefit the victims of Katrina as well as thousands of other disasters that the American Red Cross responds to each year.
*Paul Chaney, President of the Radiant Marketing Group and a Mississippi resident, has been blogging all week about this catastrophic event.
*Nonprofit technology consultant Deborah Elizabeth Finn reports that her friend, Andy Carvin, of the Digital Divide Network, has created a Katrina Aftermath web site.
*Grassroots.org has declared that all online donations it receives during the month of September will go towards relief for the victims of Hurricane Katrina.
*According to today’s edition of DIRECT Newsline, The Marketing Research Association (MRA) has launched a Researcher-to-Researcher Relief Assistance Blog “to aid any marketing and research professionals that have been affected by Hurricane Katrina.”
*And, finally, via B.L. Ochman’s What’s Next Blog, Best Friends Animal Sanctuary “has set up online information and resources about animal rescue groups efforts in the aftermath of Katrina.”
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