How Twitter helped one small business reach millions and raise money for bushfires

Mark Harbottle is one of Australia’s most successful social networking entrepreneurs. So he had high expectations that his companies Sitepoint and 99Designs could raise $50,000 for the victims of the Victorian bushfires using social networks.

But in one night he raised more than $75,000, with 95% of it coming from people overseas.

“We know a lot about this stuff, but I am blown away with how many people we reached, so fast,” he says.

Harbottle says that when his staff came to work on Monday morning, some had been personally affected by the terrible fires, which have so far claimed more than 180 lives. “Everyone had a story of someone who was affected. One of our staff’s friends had died, and another had his farm burnt down. So we put our heads together and initially decided to donate some money, probably about $5000,” he says. “Then we thought, we can do better than this – what are we good at?”

Harbottle and his staff decided to run a sale for three days, selling five ebooks for the price of one, reducing the price from $US150 to $US30, and then donating all the proceeds to charity. “It doesn’t cost us to deliver the books, so the cost was staff time to put the offer together. We spent two days on this and got the offer up last night at 5pm.”

Harbottle posted the offer on Twitter, where he has 22,000 followers. “We also called a bunch of influential bloggers who we knew, and they retwittered our tweets. I said we were running a book sale and donating 100% of the proceeds to charity to help the victims of the bushfire. That was it, and the community really rallied, with people blogging and telling us we are setting a great example and it’s a good cause.”

Harbottle says sales started to come in instantly. “Every time I refresh the page there are 10 more people who have brought some books.” He says nearly all the sales are from overseas. “These people have not been personally affected by the fires. But I think it is a real offer than got their attention. And then the fact it was a good cause meant they spread the word.”

He estimates his offer has touched millions of people all over the world overnight. “It would not have been possible without Twitter. We set up a page on Facebook, but that wasn’t as successful as Twitter.”

Sixteen hours later he has raised $75,000 and expects by the time the sale ends in three days to have raised $150,000.

“We hadn’t even told our customer base about it via email, which is what we would usually do. Twitter and Facebook have made it so much easier to get the word out,” he says.

Harbottle and staff who have so far donated $15,000 worth of their own time, are spending today on Twitter fuelling the conversation, announcing updates and telling people of the coverage they are getting.

“I just can’t believe how you can reach so many people in such a short amount of time.”

To buy the ebooks, go to Sale.sitepoint.com

Individuals, businesses and organisations wishing to make a donation to the State Government’s Victorian Bushfire Appeal Fund can go to www.redcross.org.au or call the toll free number 1800 811 700