If social media has become the driving force behind the people driven economy, then how exactly does that make a difference in the world? To answer that question, you have to look around and see what people are doing with their time to benefit others. Take for example what Stacey Monk is doing with TweetsGiving, a movement to improve the lives of children in Tanzania by giving them access to the Internet.

Last year TweetsGiving raised over ten thousand dollars to build a computer lab in Tanzania so that the kids would have access to the Internet and all the information that it provides. This year they are on the march again with Tweetsgiving 2009 and they have already raised over thirteen thousand dollars as of the writing of this article.

Consider for just a moment that this money has been raised without a marketing budget, without an ad campaign, without billboards, radio spots, or television ads. The money has been raised solely using one “word of mouth” transmission at a time and the dollars raised continue to grow each day as that word of mouth marketing passes from one personal social network to another.

How do these things pass from one person to the next? Well, last year when I was asked to help out with TweetLuck, another social fund raising event, I said yes because a friend asked me to help someone they knew. I didn’t know that this year I would be asked to help build the TweetsGiving.org community website from the ground up or that I would have the awesome opportunity to work with an incredible team of social entrepreneurs that span the globe. I didn’t know that I’d get to work with a project manager from California, an East Coast User Interface developer, a Harvard graduate, a Georgia based graphic designer, or a Dallas based web developer. All I knew was I was being asked to help kids in Tanzania and it sounded like something worth doing. Someone I knew ask and I said yes.

That’s exactly how social media works. Someone asks you to do something and you say yes because their social capital is deposited in your social bank account and as they ask for something, they either add to the balance of that account or withdraw from it. This is the same online as it is offline. We are all motivated to action by something. Social media simply provides the communication channels we need to get things done fast. It’s not the technology itself, but the fundamental social psychology that drives things forward.

So how does social media make a difference to a school in Africa? That depends on you and what you do after you read this article. Tweetsgiving has already raised thirteen thousand dollars, but you can help them reach even higher. Help them spread the word about Tweetsgiving and contribute financially to the great things that are going on with this grass roots movement right now. That’s what social media is all about.

What will you do next with social media?

Charles McKeever
OpenSourceMarketer.com

Accelerate your business online using social media.