During its first few decades, Compassion International found new supporters through ads in Christian magazines and commercials on religious radio programs. During the last few decades, Christian concerts were a major means of reaching new child sponsors.
Now, with fewer Americans donating to charity, the 70-year-old, $1 billion ministry is working to find new ways to engage younger believers, including NFTs, online gaming and cryptocurrency.
It’s all part of preparing for Web 3.0, the Metaverse and beyond.
“We’re reaching out and connecting to diverse new audiences to find a way to meet the needs of children around the world,” said Yaroslav “Yaro” Hetman, Compassion’s senior director of innovation.
The efforts are part of the ministry’s efforts to prepare for “the Compassion of tomorrow,” said Hetman, who was born in Ukraine, graduated from Colorado College in 2007, and worked two years here with the El Pomar Foundation before leaving to become a global marketing executive with Ford Motor Co.
In July, Compassion auctioned off 5,000 pieces of digital art by Patrick Bezalel, a longtime supporter who sponsors children in Haiti. “Many Hands,” a collection of Haitian images created completely in virtual reality and released as non-fungible tokens (NFTs) sold out in 25 minutes, raising $220,000, all of it going to college scholarships for young people in the troubled country.
In May, the ministry reached out to the online gaming community with “2 Weeks of Light,” which brought more than 30 Christian content creators and streamers to the video game livestreaming service Twitch.
Respected gamers took dares from the audience—and one took a pie in the face—all to raise funds to build 25 computer labs for 4,200 Compassion-assisted children in Bolivia.
Gaming for good may seem silly, but the effort connected Compassion to more than a 1,000 new friends and generated buzz in online communities.
“God is moving in the digital space,” said Courtney Dahl, a Compassion innovation specialist. “Countless Christians are using Twitch and YouTube as their mission field to bring the light of Christ to the lost.”
And in April, Compassion made it easier for people to donate cryptocurrency by expanding its work with Springs-based Quantum Metric, an international firm that helps companies connect with their customers. Founded in 2015, the firm has worked with Compassion since 2018.
“We’ve introduced cryptocurrency donations to expand our reach to potential supporters and allow them to contribute in their own preferred way,” said Hetman.
Even though crypto is volatile, and many owners have lost value, Hetman says the currency is popular with people under 40, who hold 60% of the crypto in America and who apparently like investing in currency that’s controlled by a community rather than a government.
More experiments are planned for coming months. Not all are expected to succeed.
“We are testing and learning about areas that are new to Compassion, new to many non-governmental organizations,” said Hetman. “Not all will have a an immediately scalable approach, but some will.”