Well, things have definitely slowed down at the AIDS Clickathon since the Marketing Pilgrim marketing contest ended and the buzz surrounding the WebProNews article died down.  There have only been 116 clicks raising $29 in the last week.  At this point, I would definitely say 8 weeks is too long to sustain momentum for a campaign like this.

On a positive note Jotham Opicho, the Kenyan pastor who will be working with Molly and Joseph to help them build and operate the orphanage, is here in the Tampa area visiting with people, speaking, and building support.  I hope to have an opportunity to visit with him while he's here.

Over the last several weeks, I've been seeking suggestions and advice as to things we could do differently that might help the AIDS Clickathon to be more successful if we do another one in the future.  I've also been brainstorming some ideas of my own.  Some of them include:

1. Have someone create an interactive (Flash) game that would appeal to teens and early 20s who make up the majority of social networking users.
2. Allow people to click more than once (perhaps once each day) in order to keep people coming back to the site regularly during the campaign.
3. Involve more people in the planning and preparations, especially people who represent groups that could help to spread the word such as teens who are active on MySpace, college students active on Facebook, AIDS/poverty related bloggers.
4. Since it's estimated to cost about a dollar a day for each child who lives at the orphanage and each child will probably eat 3 meals and a snack, if each click results in a 25 cent donation from our sponsors, each click is essentially the equivelent of a meal.  If we do another Clickathon, it might be more interesting to track "meals purchased" instead of clicks.  It might also be more appealing to say each click provides a meal for a child.
5. In addition to tracking total meals purchased, individual participants (people who click) might enjoy seeing how many meals they personally have helped purchase through their clicks as well as the clicks of their friends they've referred.  Tracking this would require a registration, so it would be completely optional.  A person could be credited with 1 meal for each click, 1/2 a meal for each click by a person they refer, 1/4 a meal for their friends' friends clicks, and so on.
6. Continuing that thought, we could create an "honor board" to recognize the people whose clicks have purchased the most meals.
7. Further continuing that thought, we could create a little website widget (HTML, script, or image) that a participant could put on their website or MySpace profile that would show in real-time the number of meals they've helped purchase and inviting them to contribute a meal with a free click. 
8. Make it easier for people to subscribe to receive updates in their email by having a single box to enter an email address and submit button on the AIDS Clickathon status page (the page that shows the current amount raised).  If people are allowed to click once each day, the daily update could be automatically sent each morning to include a link they could click right from their email (plus any news from the previous day).
9. Make it easier for people to email their friends by including the "tell a friend" form on the AIDS Clickathon status page (the page that shows the current amount raised).

So, what do you think of these ideas?  I'd appreciate your feedback on these, plus any other suggestions you might have.

With just 7 days left, how 'bout we all give one more push to bring some new visitors to the site.