Corporate Social Responsibility – How to donate for Chilean earthquake relief. If you’re in the USA, resources to find out about those affected and a way to donate. I’ve put up the app for finding people in the sidebar, for a few days.
Well done to Google’s socially minded developers for getting this up so quickly. That’s the bouquet.
But here are national language versions, telling Americans to call an American phone number in French and German. That’s not the point. The point is *WHAT DO WE NEED TO KNOW IN EUROPE*. Can’t you guys look it up, in, like, the worlds premier search engine, for example, and get the RIGHT FRECKING RESOURCE SHOWN!
UK: http://www.google.co.uk/relief/chileearthquake/
FR: http://www.google.fr/relief/chileearthquake/
DE: http://www.google.de/relief/chileearthquake/
And Matt Cutts – see a defence of Google’s transparency on the Google Official Blog. The issue is how you act to us.
Examples? Apart from the Chilean Earthquake relief? The UK moved spend online faster than the US; we have a higher penetration of Google in search than the US. But Beta’s are run from the US. OK, it’s a larger market, and closer to you – but we always feel like the poor relation.
Example? Google does a “Small Business Initiative” – that only plays in the US, as a part of a US domestic play. Fortunately, small businesses elsewhere in the world don’t face any similar problems. Lucky, eh? Or you might be accused of focusing on US domestic issues and ignoring the rest of the world?
Example? High speed connections. Offered in the US. OK, so the US is favoured? Or Europe is a valued partner? Which is it? (And yes, I do know about the European Public Policy Blog and the “Big Gig” article)
You want more? I’ll find you more examples of how, when Google has a choice, it treats the US as a favoured player. And the rest of the world can watch how a first class citizen is treated. It’s now how much you explain openness and transparency, it’s how you behave.
You want us (the rest of the world) to feel that we aren’t second class citizens? Start acting as if we aren’t. When you treat us like valued partners, we’ll feel like valued partners. Basic customer service management and public relations messaging. If you want to include us in your world, you’ll need to make us feel included. Otherwise we’ll feel that you favour US interests.
Update
2010-03-02 (note sure when it was fixed) I’m now seeing US resources in local languages. Thanks, that’s an improvement for a global company. Still feels that you think of the USA first. And that’s still worrying for people outside the US – what does this behaviour say about how you think of us? Smaller brickbat. Bigger bouquet. But the brickbat is still in play. You’re still insulting the rest of the world.
2010-03-01: The page now has a list of non-US charities accepting donations. Better. There’s still an focus on the US, though, with phone numbers for US citizens to call, or example. The information is still not geotargeted. And although there are pages for the domain level servers, such as this page on the UK domain, it still contains information for US Citizens to call US phone numbers.
2010-02-27: Google Buzz, of which I’m becoming an increasing fan, helped me find a Google staffer, who’s passing this suggestion on. Bigger bouquet. Still a brickbat in the air, though…
More – Google Blog’s Post with more resources.
Here’s the brickbat. The referenced page needs resources for non-US people – even in the middle of charitable efforts, Google focuses on the US. Just bloody annoying for a globally dominant player. The internet is not used in the USA alone. I wish Google would stop acting as if the rest of the world were dumb hicks still using smoke signals and drums for long distance communication.
The agencies available for donation are not changed by language settings. I can pick “US English” or “Spanish”. I’d rather make a donation to a UK charity – they can get tax relief on it which increases my donation value. It’s not because I’m chauvinistic about giving only to UK charities. There’s economic value in my donating to a UK charity that isn’t available if I send the money to a US Charity.
This US-centric response is precisely the kind of US-obsessed thinking that leads to my fears about Google impacts in Europe – see the article about Google, Ciao and Foundem.
They’ll lose the brickbat and get a bigger bouquet if they add national pages or use geotargeting to get the right charities and information resources on the page. The UK is not alone in helping local donations give tax benefits to the charitable recipient or to the giver. Please think globally, you globally dominant, parochial player!
