I used to be quite the curmudgeon about online video back in the day—ask anyone I worked with in the late nineties at AppNet’s Nonprofit practices or later in the early 2000s as the head of the Internet group at Easter Seals. My reasons were simple... the technology just wasn’t ready yet. Too much could potentially go wrong, and I’m very careful (some might say paranoid!) about make sure there’s never any interruption in the donor’s online giving usability path.

1. Back then, a majority of our client’s constituents didn’t have broadband on their computers.

2. Problems abounded creating the right versions for cross players, browsers and accessible versions.

3. The video equipment was expensive and difficult to use.

But oh! what a difference a few years make! Now I’m a fan! And why?

1. US broadband penetration has now grown to 63%.

2. As the medium has evolved, support has come forth to stabilize online video formats.

3. The low cost Flip video camera and other new technology is democratizing video making.

So now that all those pesky technical obstacles are out of the way, now what?

Now it’s all about the content. And wasn’t it always, really?

Video is the next best thing to being there. How many times have you (or your development director) said, if only our donors could be here in our service centers, meet the people we’re serving, see the needs first hand. Video is a wonderful tool to help with that storytelling.

Storytelling with video can be a wonderful way of explaining a difficult or overwhelming concept. Watch the moving video above about one family’s experience with Trisomy 18 and see how it helps us understand the condition, the need for support and research, all through the story of this one little boy.

This article was written by Shirley Sexton, the Director of Interactive Marketing and Fundraising at See3 Communications, a firm that provides interactive media and marketing to nonprofit organizations. To learn more, sign up for their free webinar, “Crafting a Nonprofit Video Strategy” on August 26th.

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