Do you already carry a branded credit card, maybe for your University or favorite sports team? More and more large nonprofit organizations offer these “Affinity Credit Cards” to both keep their organization at top of mind each time their constituents use their credit card and also to raise a bit of money. Most of these cards give a small percentage back to the nonprofit organization each time the credit card is used. Especially when the economy is reeling and donors might not be able to give their usual donations, these credit cards allow them to give back without a donation.

In the past, this was really only an option for the largest nonprofits. But some companies are now offering this option to nonprofits of all sizes. Two we’ve taken a look at are CapitalOne’s CardLabConnect and CardPartner. They both offer basically the same options:

• The Organization can offer a few different designs with the organization’s branding and/or associated photo.
• Constituents get a credit card with no annual fee and competitive rates.
• When the Constituent uses the card the first time, the Organization receives $25 (CardLabConnect) or $50 (CardPartner).
• The Organization will receive a specific percentage of every payment a Constituent makes with their credit card: 0.3% from CardPartner and 1% from CardLabConnect.

The major difference? CardLabConnect is run by Capital One and promoted by NetworkForGood, so their trustworthiness is very high.

Whichever option suits you best, NetworkForGood has a couple of useful articles available online to help you better understand these services:

1. A discussion of Affinity Credit Cards for small nonprofits in general.
2. An Affinity Card Campaign Guide and Planning Calendar.

Have you considered an Affinity Card for your organization? Please let us know if you choose to implement one of these services and what you learn in the process.

Now that many camps are utilizing Facebook to reconnect with their alumni and other constituents, many are asking, “Should I create a Facebook Page or a Facebook Group…or both for my camp?” Lots of nonprofits are asking the same question, so you can find a lot of discussion on this topic online. In particular, I found this blog post on the Why Facebook blog to be useful. In this post, Mari Smith has broken down the pros and cons of Facebook Pages and Groups. In particular, I found these nuggets to be the most useful:

Facebook Groups:

The Good:
- All activity on a group goes into your constituents’ news feeds in Facebook. This is how you stay top of mind with your existing group members and also find new people to join the group. (Edit: Facebook Pages now offer status updates that go into Fans’ newsfeeds – this is much more viral than what the Groups offer.)
- Messages go to the constituents’ Facebook Inboxes

The Bad:
- You cannot add any of the great applications in Facebook to a Group (more on this below)
- If for some reason you don’t want the group any more, it can be tough to delete. Luckily, you can get help from Facebook in turning the group into a page. (Edit: This option is no longer available from Facebook)

Facebook Pages:

The Good:
- Pages are indexed, so search engines like Google can find the page
- You can add applications to your Page to offer additional functionality. For example, you can add the Causes application and show current fundraising campaigns. And Camp Gilboa added a Google Calendar application to show their calendar of events right in their Facebook Page.
- You can work on parts of the Page offline until they are ready to be published.

The Bad:
- Not much activity goes into your constituents’ news feeds; this limits the viral marketing of your Page. (Edit: Pages now offer status updates that go directly to Fans’ news feeds – this is no longer a “bad”.)
- Messages sent out to your “fans” are not found in their Facebook Inboxes (as they are in Groups). Instead, they show up in a less viewed area of Facebook.

The conclusion? Unfortunately, there is no right answer for everyone. Do a little research on both. Figure out what your goals are for the community on Facebook. And then, no matter which you choose, listen to your constituents and interact. That’s the power of these social media tools.

(Edit – with the recent changes on Facebook Pages, we recomend a Page for a nonprofits official presence on Facebook. However, if you have a thriving Group on Facebook, it may not be worth the effort to change. And don’t forget about those grass-roots created Facebook Groups out there – continue engaging those constituents!)

Have you created a Facebook Page, Group, or both? What have you found to work well? Not so well?