Kiva.org: June 2008 Archives

J.K. Rowling, author of the best-selling Harry Potter book series, recently gave a great commencement speech at Harvard. In her speech, the second of her two primary themes was the power of imagination. She said, "Imagination is not only the uniquely human capacity to envision that which is not, and therefore the fount of all invention and innovation. In its arguably most transformative and revelatory capacity, it is the power that enables us to empathize with humans whose experiences we have never shared." Making loans to individuals through Kiva actually feeds that part of our imagination...it offers a unique perspective into lives that we will likely never know "in reality

For those of you have never been to a music festival in Northern California, it's hard to put it into words. You have the chance to meet unique people named, 'Noodle,' 'Crystal Head' and 'Bike Hugger.' You may even have a chance to take a 'Hippie Bath,' which I learned is a head to toe spritzing of, in my case, lavender scented holy water. If you are trying to set up a booth, don't depend on finding things very easily. There are good intentions and then there's good organization...and perhaps the two don't always go together.

That said, it was a fascinating experience and we learned a lot about how people respond to microcredit, in general, and Kiva and KivaB4B, in particular.

Our first takeaway was that people love Kiva...see my post 'To Know Kiva is to Love Kiva.'  Talking about KivaB4B and the co-branded card was easy with this group.

However, it wasn't as easy to bridge the gap between some of the other groups we encountered. For example:

1. There were many folks who had heard of Kiva...they would say something like, "oh, yeah...I remember Kiva. I heard about them on Oprah." 
2. Then, there were those who had heard of micro credit, but not Kiva.
   
3. Finally, there were those who hadn't heard of either, but were pulled in by the 'helping entrepreneurs' message.
   

Talking about microcredit and Kiva was easy. We could actually invite people into the experience. However, finding a way to take that step to the credit card will take some creative thinking. 

Nancy Price is the cofounder of SheKnows.com (which got its start in 1999).  She is also a big-time Kiva fan.

For example, she has "helped buy cows in Azerbaijan, food in the Dominican Republic, clothing in Kenya and fund construction in Mexico."  And, of course, it was all from her computer.

Yet, as she notes, the process isn't impersonal.  Basically, on Kiva you can easily search for entrepreneurs and read the profiles.  When you make a loan, you'll also get periodic updates.

She also mentions that Kiva gets a lot of help from PayPal, Google and Yahoo! (such as in terms of processing and advertising).

So click here to check out her post.

This is a cool idea for a company devoted to entrepreneurship. "This past December, Inc.com embarked on an editorial project to cover the rapidly growing phenomenon of microfinance. As a staff, we contributed a modest sum and became lenders on Kiva.org, sponsoring a diverse group of entrepreneurs that includes Phal An, as well as business owners located in Peru, Ecuador, Uganda, Tanzania, and Tajikistan. Updates on these entrepreneurs and their businesses and how they are using their loans are being posted frequently on a new Inc.com blog called "The Kiva Connection."

The most recent post is a great interview with a rice winemaker from Cambodia. Link here.

Paul Marsden on his ClickAdvisor blog wrote a very flattering post about Advanta's two latest initiatives, ideablob.com and kivaB4B. He referred to them as 'crowdsourcing' and 'crowdfunding' platforms. I hadn't heard the term 'crowdfunding' before, but it definitely describes Kiva well.

I don't think we could have gotten a quote as supportive as this even if we went out a did a pay for blog post kind of program (hmmm....how much do those cost?). Paul says,  "In a nutshell, we think kivab4b is brilliant. We just wish Advanta cards were available in the UK - we'd change credit card providers in a flash for this, it's brilliant marketing, smart use of digital media, and exemplary CSR. Other brands - particularly, financial services brands, could learn from this..."