And the winners are ...

Since its inception, organizations and individuals looking to change the world have used YouTube to rally an audience around a cause. Working at YouTube, we love seeing inspiring videos shared around the world everyday. “Good” videos have in turn inspired us to build tools to make it easier to run a campaign on YouTube and turn video views into action. We’ve made a 30-page “Playbook for Good” full of best practices to help you make the most inspiring and impactful cause videos possible and the videos just keep getting better and better.

That is why, for the fourth year in a row, we joined with See3 Communications to run the annual DoGooder Video Awards to recognize the year’s best nonprofit and cause videos. This year there were four different categories. And, for the first time, we accepted videos from creators looking to change the world one view at a time, not just nonprofit organizations.

The finalists chosen in the first round were all excellent examples of how far "cause video" has come since we first launched the YouTube Nonprofit Program in 2007. Nonprofits (and other DoGooders) are becoming increasingly savvy with online video; they're making funny, creative, episodic, and interactive cause-related content. They’re turning video views into awareness, petition signatures, donations, volunteer hours, and more. The four winners were chosen from more than a dozen finalists by public voting. Here they are:

Best Nonprofit Video Award: Follow the Frog 



The Rainforest Alliance’s “Follow the Frog” is a humorous tale of a well-intentioned epic misadventure, showing that sustainability-minded consumer choices can be more effective for change than vigilante conservation.

Change Agent Award: 350km message for women with ovarian cancer



After losing his mother to cancer, Raf Bauer set out on a 350-kilometer walk across Scotland to raise awareness and funds for Target Ovarian Cancer.

Funny for Good: No Joke. Choice Matters. Everywhere.



Pathfinder International’s “No Joke. Choice Matters. Everywhere.” comically portrays the difficulties many women face when trying to access reproductive health care. While presented in a comical light, the video outlines actions to help women for whom a lack of access to health care is no joke.

ImpactX Award: END7: How to Shock a Celebrity



The Sabin Vaccine Institute’s “How to Shock a Celebrity” successfully brought attention to seven Neglected Tropical Diseases (NTD) and helped generate funds to end these diseases by 2020. The campaign used video to, first, grab attention and then present a solution that donors could easily fund. The video translated into donations that averaged 20 cents per view. At more than 220,000 views, that’s quite a few vaccines, considering it only takes 50 cents to provide one person with treatment and protection against all seven NTDs for up to one year.

You can check out all of the 2013 finalists here.

Jessica Mason, YouTube for Good, recently watched African Men. Hollywood Stereotypes. [mamahope.org]

Turning the PSA on Its Head With YouTube

Today’s guest post is from Water.org about an exciting campaign they’re working on to raise awareness about the water crisis. For more information on the YouTube Nonprofit Program visit YouTube.com/nonprofits.

While Water.org is known for our innovative approach to solving the world water crisis, we're less well known as YouTube stars. But every week we use YouTube to share the stories of the people we meet who don't have safe water to drink and to educate people about the water crisis.

With Matt Damon as our co-founder, Water.org can’t claim a lack of star power, but our experiences on YouTube have taught us that having a Hollywood celebrity in frame is not always a guarantee for viral online success.

Over the past few years we've included Matt in a variety of our videos, visiting our project sites, doing interviews, and in other cases "dressed up" for a specific role (like in Damon Claus for a Cause). From looking at our views, it is clear that "one-on-one" interviews with Matt and humorous videos are more popular than what people call traditional "public service announcement" (PSA) videos. It's not all that surprising since both humor and connectedness are key to the YouTube experience.

However, as interesting as this might be, our most successful YouTube moments happened when we invited established YouTube stars to visit our project sites and report back to their own audiences what they experienced. Cummulatively, these videos have nearly 3 million views - more than the lifetime views on our entire channel. Check them out:



So when we sat down and were brainstorming about new ways we could bring the water crisis to new audiences it made sense to integrate what we've learned and try something completely new: Matt Damon + YouTube Creators + humor + information = turning video views into awareness and action. 

Today we are launching an online campaign of videos that feature Matt Damon and a collection of YouTube stars like Wheezywaiter, Lisbug, Shaycarl, and LivePrudeGirls. Check out these videos and watch out for more in the coming weeks.



Finally, support the campaign by signing up here and we'll keep you up to date. Collectively, we will be raising awareness for the water crisis that, in the end, will make the lives better for the millions of people who struggle each day to find a safe drink of water.

Mike McCamon, chief community officer at Water.org, recently watched “When is Thanksgiving? Colonizing America: Crash Course US History #2.”

Let us help turn your video views into action

Today, we’re happy to announce two new updates from the YouTube for Good team to help you make the most out of your channel.

First, we’re kicking off monthly online trainings for members of the YouTube Nonprofit Program. These will be ‘101 level’ trainings - perfect for nonprofits who recently joined the program or are just getting started with a YouTube channel. The trainings, which will be conducted via Google+ Hangouts on Air, will take place at 9am PT on the last Tuesday of every month.

The first training will be at 9am PT on July 31, 2012. Here’s how to join:

Directions To join in the conversation during our Hangout On Air: 
  1. Make sure you have a Google Account and Google+ profile or page setup. 
  2. Add YouTube Nonprofits Program page to your circles. We'll add you to our circles, then invite you to the Hangout on Air. 
  3. This Hangout on Air will begin at 9am PT on July 31, 2012. Additional trainings will take place at 9am PT on the last Tuesday of every month. 
  4. Log onto Google+ and you'll see an invite to join the hangout in your notifications (upper right hand corner of the page in a red box). Click through to the conversation! 
  5. If the link is not available in your notifications, click the hangouts icon on the left hand side of the page and look for a hangout called "YouTube Nonprofits Introduction" among the hangouts available for you to join. 
If you'd rather just watch and listen, and don't want to be recorded: 
  1. Point your browser to the YouTube Nonprofits Program Google+ page and click on the Hangouts On Air thumbnail. 
  2. Navigate to the YouTube for Nonprofits YouTube Channel and click on the live feed. This is the best option if you do not have a Google account. 
Second, we recently announced that we will allow YouTube users to link to a Change.org, Donorschoose.org, RocketHub or Causes page via a YouTube annotation. An annotation is a little dialogue box that pops up in a video and allows video creators to convey a message. In the past, these annotations were only able to link to a YouTube video, channel or search result. Now they can link to the four sites above, in addition to Kickstarter and Indiegogo. We’re excited to see how you use these new features to encourage audiences to sign petitions, take action and donate. 


Ramya Raghavan, news and politics manager, recently watched "Water in Adina Faso"

And the Next Causes are...

Last month we announced YouTube Next Cause: a new program designed to help nonprofit organizations that are already changing the world better use online video to drive action.

We were honored, inspired and deeply moved by many of the applications we received.

We are proud to introduce you to some members of the first class of YouTube Next Cause: 20 organizations who’ve demonstrated passion and huge potential for using YouTube to further their causes.

The organizations come from big cities and small towns across the country from Illinois to Colorado to Texas to California and many work all over the world. They also work on variety of issues from animal abuse to homelessness to poverty alleviation to children’s health.

 Check out these great organizations:

 

Autism Speaks
Children's Hospital Boston
IFAW - International Fund for Animal Welfare
Sunlight Foundation
BuildOn
American Heart Association
CARE
American Foundation for Equal Rights
Malaria No More
The Humane Society of the United States
The Pablove Foundation
COTS - Committee on the Shelterless
Durango Discovery Museum
Save Mount Diablo
Art Resources in Teaching
breakthrough
Per Scholas
The Supply
Born Free USA
The Lazarex Cancer Foundation

Stay tuned to this blog for more updates from the YouTube Next Cause channels, and learn more about other programs helping partners grow at the YouTube Creator Hub.

Jessica Mason, communications associate, recently watched “The Story of Keep Calm and Carry On

A ‘Next’ step for YouTube nonprofits

Last year we launched YouTube NextUp to accelerate the growth of the next big YouTube stars. Then in October, we announced YouTube Next Chef and YouTube Next Trainer to turbocharge up-and-coming cooking and fitness channels by great YouTube video creators. We’re excited to share the latest addition to the Next Creator family of programs: YouTube Next Cause for nonprofits.

YouTube Next Cause is designed to help organizations that are already changing the world better use online video to drive action. At a one-day summit in San Francisco on April 2, selected participants will get access to everything from training in YouTube fundamentals, to promotion and community engagement tips, to one-on-one consulting sessions to grow their YouTube presence.

We’ve always sought to make YouTube a platform for nonprofits to broadcast their messages. And we’ve seen amazing things happen when the YouTube community comes together in support of great causes. With 4 billion views a day, we want to make sure nonprofits have the tools they need to reach the global audience on YouTube and turn video views into donations, volunteerism and awareness.

Applications for YouTube Next Cause are due on February 27, 2012 at 11:59PM PT, and the selected nonprofits will be announced on March 5. This program is open to organizations that are part of the YouTube Nonprofit Program (full eligibility requirements). You can apply online at: http://goo.gl/ODbI6.

Check out what nonprofits are doing on YouTube at youtube.com/nonprofits. And tune in around March 5 to learn more about some of the great nonprofit organizations chosen and what they’re doing to change the world!

 

Hunter Walk, director of product management, recently watched “Using YouTube with a Purpose - Helping Kids in Bangladesh.

YouTube for nonprofits, reloaded with new tutorials and features

Nonprofits are an important part of the YouTube community, and their videos have educated and inspired audiences since the early days of the site. We launched the YouTube Nonprofit Program in 2007 to help organizations take their work to the next level, and since then, more than 16,000 nonprofits have joined the program. There are hundreds of nonprofit organizations with millions of views on YouTube, and dozens with more than ten million views, like Greenpeace, Khan Academy and UNICEF.

We’ve made a couple of updates to the program that we hope will help nonprofits use video in new and compelling ways.
  • The Playbook Guide: YouTube for Good. This is a how-to resource specifically targeted at nonprofit organizations, with sections on how to create content, raise funds, connect with other community members and more.
  • Improved features. As part of our new Channels design, we’ve made the donate button on nonprofit channels even more prominent, making it easier than ever to support the causes you care about.


If you’re a YouTube Nonprofit Program with other ideas about how we can make the program better, tell us your suggestions in the comments below! If you’re a nonprofit in the U.S., U.K., Canada or Australia and not yet a member, visit www.youtube.com/nonprofits to learn more and apply.

Valerie Streit, YouTube Next Lab, recently watched “Martin Luther King Jr. on NBC’s Meet the Press in 1965.