Four Days; $700,000
Social Networking Works
“If this isn’t a true definition of community,
I don’t know what is.”
-Bobbie Davis, Family Friend 
The Scenario
Nineteen year old Michael Treinen is in the fight of his life. Suffering a relapse of Acute Myeloid Leukemia, he needs a $500,000 bone marrow transplant, but his $1M lifetime insurance limit has been exhausted.
With only a few days to raise money to cover the costs, the Treinan family turned to email, asking friends and family to donate $20 within three days and forward the email to 20 friends. By day 2, several people at Brainstorm had received the plea from the nearby community; some from up to 4 different sources.
More than Enough
The message quickly spread beyond the immediate community and donations came in from across the country. By day 3 the family had raised $175,000. By 3pm day 4, $355,000. By 7pm that day, over $400,000. And by day 5, the deadline, they had raised over $700,000. Today, a week later, the count is $856,000.
The media’s coverage of the grassroots campaign resulted in a state insurance program approving an expedited high-risk insurance policy that would cover 60 percent of the transplant cost.
More than Money
Social networking delivered something else, too. At last count Michael Treinen’s Caring Bridge blog showed 169,670 visits and 3,677 people had left messages via the guestbook. What better encouragement to lift Michael’s spirits?
More than Email
Success in social networking is inspired, launched and sustained by the trusted connections between people. The Treinen’s email pleas were sent from friend to friend; had they been sent from strangers or generated by faceless scripts, the Michael Treinen story wouldn’t have happened.
Whether you make widgets or offer something more philanthropic, social networking demands transparency and an ongoing investment in others. Then, when the time calls for it, your friends—and even people you don’t know—may respond when called upon.
Anticipate More
Under the circumstances, the Treinens couldn’t have dreamed of, much less considered what to do should they exceed their expectations. It’s being placed in a trust fund to cover Michael’s future medical needs and they’ve said any overage will be donated to charity.
The lesson being, be prepared and model outcomes to scale in proportion to the potential explosive power of online social campaigns.
[ Image: Kazze ]
Tags: Higher Ed Marketing, Social Marketing, Featured, Electronic Communications, Philanthropy, Inspiration, Healthcare, Culture, Blogging, Foundation Marketing, Marketing, Financial
April 10th, 2008 at 8:45 am
Great post and great example of social networking.
April 10th, 2008 at 8:03 pm
Great post and great to see both the virtual and local communities stepping up! Best wishes to the family
April 10th, 2008 at 8:26 pm
@robert, @Chris Thanks guys. Yes this being so close to home makes it all the more palpable.
April 11th, 2008 at 8:12 am
What a great story! This is quite the example of how these simple, virtual networks and friendships can truly change the world; for a young man, for a family, for a community, for all.
Thanks for posting this. I had somehow missed this story.
April 11th, 2008 at 9:00 am
@Tracy Sorry you missed it initially but enjoyed it eventually. Perhaps I need to re-tweet a pointer to it. :)
An alternately fun and serious piece to write. And a fascinating and important tale on a number of levels - as you intimated.
This young man and his family reside not more than 10 or 15 minutes drive from here. The close proximity put a number of us here at Brainstorm on the initial mailing list so it was an easy story to engage with and follow.