Armistice Day & cause motivated influence

Today is Armistice Day. The day that the first World War was finally declared over. With the conflict in Afghanistan ongoing, maybe this year the importance of supporting the Royal British Legion's poppy appeal has once again been raised to a new generation of people to whom the 1st and 2nd World Wars are just things to be read about in history books.

Anyone that's ever been to see the war graves in France can not but help to feel humbled by the massive loss of life. Bing UK & Bing France were both showing their support today:

I posted recently about the Twibbon poppy you could add to your Twitter icon, and then duly went on to encourage my Twitter buddies to join the cause, more than once...

 

Many did add a poppy.  I was in the very great company of 22k other Twitterers.

A 2 minute silence was observed across the nation at 11am in honour of the fallen soldiers.  Look at the Twitter trends:

To me this is the digital equivalent of the Lance Armstrong Live Strong yellow bands many of us were sporting a year or so ago.

A simple gesture, but which via tools like Twitter can reach into many nooks and crannies of the interweb that mainstream media couldn't achieve and  proves that there's some serious critical mass / reach possible, if you capture imagination and motivation, which time upon time is the brick wall I come up against when challenged to prove social media and word of mouth can actually deliver.

No-one forced those 22k people to adopt the poppy. It was voluntary. It succeeded for all the usual reasons that people are happy to be associated with something, be it a brand, a campaign or a cause.... it makes them look good, it's useful, interesting or relevant.  As a result they were happy to become advocates and use their influence to spread the word (= awareness) to encourage participation (engagement).

Being charitable...

I'm doing my bit for charity this week, and I am shouting about it not because I want the recognition but because there are some great causes that are worthy of support, and digital spaces can really help amplify the reach of these initiatives.

I've made a donation to the British Royal Legion Poppy Appeal, and am wearing my new self-adhesive poppy with pride (no more pins, great!), but beyond that I've added a Poppy Twibbon to my icon on Twitter, spreading the news of my support for this great cause far and wide, publically, and in reality reaching far more people that way than the number of people I interact with in person in a week.

Have you got yours?  Easy to add (and remove for those of you that are jumpy) just click here.  Just make sure you stick some money in a donation box too!

Then, following on from Remembrance Day, there's BBC Children in Need. They've adopted a similar approach, allowing people to spread the word for them, by offering ways to sport a Pudsey Bear Bandana on your social profiles, in conjunction with a PayPal donation which makes the twibbon notion work harder. Smart. 

The nice chaps over at ETV have kindly sent a few of the guys in my office a cuddly Pudsey and are going to donate £1 for every photo they receive of Pudsey on his travels, so here's one I took this morning.

 
Pudsey and I will no doubt be sharing many adventures over the next few weeks as I'm happy to harness the genorosity of ETV for a great cause. These days, motivated by a good cause and equipped with a phone that takes photos it's incredibly easy to get people involved & creating content.

What could your brand do to harness the power of mobile as an always on hand device & to encourage consumers to get involved?  I loved this Yahoo campaign from the summer.