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NetSquared enables social benefit organizations to leverage the tools of the social web.
Nonprofit Support Yellow Pages
Supporting organization:
Craigslist Foundation
URL:
http://www.craigslistfoundation.org
City:
San Francisco
State/Region:
CA
Country:
United States
Project Vision Statement & Potential Social Impact:
Emerging nonprofit leaders need easy access to local resources and services that support their mission. Whether it is grant writing assistance, tax advice or event planning, nonprofits across the country could benefit greatly from a simple directory of local nonprofit support resources. By connecting an entire community of nonprofit leaders with resources they need, we can impact the effectiveness of social sector work throughout entire metropolitan areas.
Sustainability (financial) model:
Support resources that are nonprofits themselves will receive free listings. Paid listings will be offered to for-profit support resources. This model has a proven record of success for a Minnesota-based nonprofit support directory.
Potential obstacles:
There are few technological obstacles to completing the project itself. Craigslist Foundation's main challenge will be finding elegant technological solutions to maintaining its commitment to collaboration. Where localized directories already exist (for instance in New York City and Minnesota), we would like to encourage the use of these resources with minimal interruption of the user experience.
Resource Needs:
The two primary resource needs are programming and UI design.
Key Milestones:
- Functional administrative interface
- Functional advertiser interface
- Yellow Pages directory available for testing in San Francisco Bay Area
- User feedback integrated into the system for public launch.
- Expansion of listings to regions beyond the San Francisco Bay Area.
Project Summary:
FIrst launched in 2006, Craigslist Foundation’s Nonprofit Support Yellow Pages (http://www.craigslistfoundation.org/yellowpages) is a Web-based, local nonprofit support resource directory that connects San Francisco Bay Area nonprofit leaders and social entrepreneurs with the local resources they need to fulfill their mission, regardless of cause or sector. Ultimately, our vision is to expand to a national, or even global, series of local directories accessible through a single point of entry, very much in line with the model of our namesake, craigslist.org.
Craigslist Foundation proposes the development of a database-driven, self-service version of the Nonprofit Support Yellow Pages that will alow the expansion of the directory to new cities. Nonprofit entities that provide capacity building services and support will receive free listings, while for-profit entities can create customized listings on a fee basis.
As part of Craigslist Foundation's commitment to community-driven content, we will invite Yellow Pages users to provide feedback on the resources listed in the directory, and we will enable user-generated taxonomies to help emerging nonprofit leaders find the resources they need.
Craigslist Foundation believes in the open source software development model, so we intend to make the Nonprofit Support Yellow Pages an open source software development project.
