More Than Directories to Engage Asian American Donors and Volunteers

- Dien S Yuen

Asian American nonprofit groups are spread over the U.S. with the majority of them concentrated in states such as California, New York, Hawaii, and Texas.  While regional directories exist, there is no comprehensive directory of groups in the U.S. that serve the Asian Americans/Pacific Islander community. Organizations such as the Asian Pacific Fund (San Francisco Bay Area), Asian American Federation (NY metro area), Asian Pacific Community Fund (Los Angeles area), and the Institute for Asian American studies at UMass Boston (Boston area) have listings of affiliate organizations. Now, there is a new directory for the DC metro area.

The Metro Washington DC/Baltimore Chapter of AAPIP created CONNECT! a regional guide of nonprofits serving Asian Americans/Pacific Islanders. There are 26 nonprofit organizations listed. The Cherry Blossom Giving Circle of Greater Washington will use Connect! as their official giving guide.  It is hoped that the tool will be used to engage potential volunteers, board members and donors.

While these directories are useful to locate groups and resources for the community, I believe they are not donor-friendly tools and cannot be effectively and easily shared with others. These guides are general listings, with descriptions and contact information.  Some are hard copies while others are online listings - usually in large pdf files. Unfortunately, they do not describe detailed programs of needs or issues, provide budget information, make it easy to give, or generally evaluate the work of the organization. In other words, they do not create an easy way to engage donors, i.e., provide a platform for them to give or learn. The information is also not presented in a format that creates communities.

It seems to me that we need a national, online platform that incorporates social media tools and communicates the work of our organizations. If we want to engage donors and volunteers, then we need to make it easy for them to find us and learn about our work. The platform must also provide an effective mechanism for donors to give and if desired, be able to share it with others. It should also provide a way for donors that have similar interests to engage with each other.  

Directories of nonprofits are like the yellow telephone book for businesses. Now, let's see if we can build a platform that is user-friendly for donors in web 2.5 format.

Photo courtesy of rutty

Comments

[Dien Yuen]

Hello Sokunthea and Danielle,

Several years ago, when we started Asian American Giving, we had wanted to create something like GiveMN and GlobalGiving for the Asian Pacific community. We decided to hold off and see the reactions first from our blog and then see how the web based platforms were doing in the marketplace.

At my day job, we are working with Great Nonprofits to get groups overseas involved and we are getting some interest. Domestically, as far as I know, no API organization has taken the lead in promoting the use of Great Nonprofits. Perhaps it is a campaign that the AAPIP - Washington DC based chapter or even the Cherry Blossom Giving Circle can take on? We can help you promote the work on our site if you wish.

We are holding onto a list of API organizations, currently 750 of them. We don't know what to do with them and have thought about creating an online directory too. But then we ask, does creating a directory correlate to systematic increases in funds? We do not have these answers but from my experience, a directory only starts the research process and we need more than that to engage donors. Your evaluation on the impact of CONNECT! directory would be interesting to share with our readers, especially in terms of net dollar results, i.e., how much was invested in creating CONNECT! and how much was was raised.

Thank you for reading our blog. I believe you are both the first representatives from institutional funders that have responded to our posts. If you wish to highlight the work of the DC - API community, we would be more than happy to serve as that platform for you.

[Sokunthea Chhabra]

I'm glad this conversation is taking place and agree with so many of your points, Dien and Danielle. Since, Danielle, has our local perspective covered on the Connect! Guide, I won't comment further on it.

The call for a national platform that communicates the work of organizations and incorporates social media tools sounds fantastic. I wonder if the discussion should be more around - how can the current ones that were created for this reason, like Great Nonprofits and VolunteerMatch, be improved. What's lacking? How can they be enhanced with other value adds that exist. Or, how can seemingly successful more localized platforms like GiveMN be enhanced, replicated and expanded?

[Danielle M. Reyes]

I agree with many of your comments. There is more that can be done and I hope we can get there soon. That said, it doesn't fairly represent the full extent of how the local AAPIP Chapter of the Washington, DC Metro area plans to use and distribute the limited number of hard copies we had printed - which is in person and using our networks. It is also important to note that we created and produced Connect! as a Guide because that is what volunteers, professionals, and funders told us they wanted to have. After conducting numerous focus groups with nonprofit organizations, funders, and professionals we strategically chose to provide only brief information and refer folks directly to the website of those organizations because that was what our audiences wanted and recommended. They did not want to be inundated with a mini-report on each nonprofit, but merely to be given an introduction. We listened. The AAPIP Chapter here is working with our community partners to build a community of resources in the Greater Washington Area, sharing information, reaching out in person and online. Our research told us that the strength of our personal networks and our ability to meet people face-to-face in this small city would raise the visibility and lend credibility to many of these organizations that have not yet established a relationship with institutional philanthropy. When it comes down to it, the philanthropic community as a whole is not as technologically advanced as many might think...the majority don't accept online applications, still print physical annual reports, etc. I'm sure we'll get there, but at this time, when funders in this community really want information about a group they don't know, but have heard of (perhaps through a guide like Connect!) they call me, other program officers, or people they know for trusted guidance and input. I'd argue that funders don't make major funding decisions based solely on information received through online communities, paper guides, or personal relationships, but a combination of all resources. I love the internet, but the reality is that there is still an important place for hard copy materials, if distributed and used strategically.

[Archana]

Great initiative! The South Asian Philanthropy Project has been assembling resources on giving as well as a list of organizations that are run by or benefit South Asians (here or abroad). We welcome suggestions and listings. We do not vet the listings, rather just list everything we receive in kind of an open format. I'd love to be involved!