In 140:
Sloane Berrent (@sloane) blogs at The Causemopolitan about cause-filled living, including nonprofits, cause marketing and social innovation.

Short Bio:
Sloane has over 10 years of experience in digital marketing and fundraising with a focus on what happens when you put the two together. She is also a lifelong community organizer and philanthropist. She is a nationally recognized speaker and has given over 20 talks, seminars and workshops during the past 3 years on how to maximize social media for social good. Her inspirational story has been featured on NPR, CNN.com, Mashable, The Chronicle of Philanthropy, Psychology Today, LA Times, LAWeekly, TechCrunch, TriplePundit and Read/Write Web and she has been published in GOOD, PopTech, WhatGives?! and on the official blog for the United Nations. Sloane was the “Citizen Journalist” for MySpace and The Wall Street Journal at the 2010 World Economic Forum in Davos and was named a Top 10 Twitter influencer at the 2010 Clinton Global Initiative and a “Top Women To Follow On Twitter” by Forbes.

She has been blogging since 2005, first as an editor for the largest city-based blog in Los Angeles, LAist and then for her own blog, The Causemopolitan. In addition to The Causemopolitan, Sloane is also is the curator of Help A Woman Out. She has raised, to date, over $2.5 million dollars for nonprofits and impacted the lives of thousands through her extensive use of social media including Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and Flickr. Her work includes time as a Kiva Fellow in the Philippines and creating viral campaigns like Cause It’s My Birthday to raise money for malaria nets in Ghana.

Sloane lived in New Orleans in 2010 and continued to have a strong focus on social innovation including being the organizer of the first CrisisCampNOLA (as part of CrisisCommons) following the earthquake in Haiti, creating Gulf Coast Benefit as a response to the Gulf Coast oil spill and co-founding an award-winning weekly e-newsletter called NOLAlicious. Sloane had the opportunity to travel to Ghana (2010) and Haiti (2011) to see her projects become a reality. She continues to be an ambassador for nonprofits and cause-based partnerships and was named in June 2011 one of the spokespeople for the Children’s Health Fund and Clorox partnership Check-In For Checkups.

She is Vice President of Digital Marketing for Lippe Taylor and its sister agency ShopPR, both communications and public relations agencies in New York with a focus on women, women’s products and women’s issues. Originally from Pittsburgh, PA, Sloane has a BA in Political Science from the University of Vermont and is currently pursuing a Masters in Public Administration from New York University’s Wagner School of Public Service. She resides in New York City.

A Little More:
The first time I ever left the United States was by myself when I was 12 years old and in the seventh grade. My mom put me on a plane to Paris to visit my aunt who was in graduate school there. I had one year and a half of French under my belt, which helped asking for directions when I was confused and for ordering croissants and hot chocolate. My aunt had class during the day and I would set off exploring by myself, getting terribly lost but seeing amazing things. At the end of that week I had two takeaways; there was a gigantic world out there to see and that as scary as it seemed at times, I could handle it.

That same year, walking home from school as I did every day, I past The Children’s Institute as I had a million times. This time I walked in and asked if I could volunteer. I knew kids lived there mostly recovering from serious injuries or surgeries but didn’t know if there was anything I could do to help. I was 12 and unaccompanied, but determined. How could I walk home from school every day past this place when I knew kids inside were struggling to learn to walk again? Turns out they had a program at night where people would get into a pool and help with physical rehabilitation. I was a great swimmer, I asked my mom’s permission. It was a go! It was to be my first weekly volunteer activity.

So when asked when I realized that my life would be dedicated to cause and to help others in the world, I have to say it all started when I was 12 at the intersection of travel and volunteerism.

I started an all-school recycling program in the fourth grade. I was the first Youth Chair to the Pittsburgh AIDS Task Force when I was sophomore in high school. I co-created an all-school volunteer “Day of Caring” my junior year that is still in place today. I gathered friends to volunteer in college. It was a part of my fabric, something that fit right and I didn’t grow out of.

Philanthropy, giving back, inspiring others to find something they care about – to start small, start anywhere – has always been part of my DNA.

I rediscovered that passion while working in the Development Department at The Archer School for Girls in Los Angeles. Our team secured the School’s first year in raising a million dollars for their Annual Giving campaign and secured a $5 million gift creating a financial aid scholarship fund for minority students. I wrote grants securing over $550,000 for academics, financial aid and other needs of the School. I saw the raw power of fundraising in changing the lives of under-privileged and disenfranchised girls as well as the power of education as the most important tool towards empowerment.

I then worked at Starlight Starbright Children’s Foundation as a National Development Officer expanding my responsibilities to include a focus on direct mail, special events, mid-level donor stewardship and Board relations. With an annual budget of $12 million, fundraising was critical to run programs across 13 offices nationwide and in my tenure I raised over $2.5 million from individual donors and worked with the Program Department to create new campaigns to continue to help seriously ill children and their families both while in-patient and as out-patients waiting for their next treatment.

During my time at Starlight, I co-founded Answer With Action with two friends. Answer With Action provided socially-conscious young professionals in Los Angeles a chance to get together and volunteer combining boutique volunteer experiences with networking opportunities. I left Starlight to take Answer With Action to a new level providing fundraising, cause-based marketing and digital strategy to for profits and non-profits. It was during this time that I started to get actively involved with the Los Angeles tech community. Understanding that online would play a crucial role in the future of social action campaigns, I joined Causecast in January 2008 as the third hire, first as a Nonprofit Relationship Manager and quickly thereafter taking on the role of Director of Business Development. From a simple investor deck and a newly ordered Apply computer, we built Causecast from scratch.

We launched at TechCrunch50 with over 25 nonprofits and celebrity leaders on the site promoting their work in the nonprofit world. We were dubbed “The One-Stop Philanthropy Shop.” The niche social networks were emerging, letting people play with the people who were most like them and hopefully, while on our site, getting involved with cause and finding a way to incorporate cause into their everyday life.

This was the Fall of 2008. In the largest month of layoffs the U.S. had seen since 1983, national unemployment rose to 6.7% for the month (10.2% overall). Without a solid revenue model, the site began to falter. I, like many, woke up on day and found myself out of a job.

One week later, in what I now call a moment of equal clarity and despair, I decided to NOT to just and get another job. Instead, I put 30 days notice on my apartment, ended a relationship, sold most of my things, put the rest in storage and bought a one-way ticket to Buenos Aires. I had savings. I didn’t know for how long I would be gone. I didn’t know what was going to happen. I just knew I had always felt given the chance to travel and GO and SEE and DO, that I would.

I spent two months in South America including Argentina, Colombia and Ecuador, returned to the U.S. to be on a panel at SXSW and then went to New Orleans for two months to give back and dig into what it was like to try to rebuild a city in America devastated by national disaster. Little did I know I would fall in love. With New Orleans. With her strong sense of community and burgeoning social entrepreneurship scene. That I would feel, from the moment my feet hit that Louisiana soil, that I was home. During that time I was accepted into the Kiva Fellowship program. I said “farewell for now” to New Orleans.

Next up was the Philippines where I focused on poverty alleviation for women through microfinance. In order to raise the money to go on the Fellowship, I created a online campaign using my blog and social networking tools to raise $7,500 in one month. I really believe through my story-telling, pictures and video, people were able to feel like they were a part of the experience bringing a 360 degree feel to both my fundraising campaign and my Kiva Fellowship. My bond and tie with the Philippines will never be broken. I lived in her provinces and took bucket-showers in her villages. I met the women and people there and worked incredibly hard to give them all the resources, knowledge, and skills I had to make their infrastructure stronger. I traveled all across the Philippines and then to Cambodia, Thailand and Burma.

When I got back the states that fall, I launched Cause It’s My Birthday, a national fundraiser to raise education and money for malaria nets to be distributed in Ghana. My partner on the project and I worked with Netting Nations, a 501(c)3 and raised close to $20,000 during the month-long campaign and specific week-long series of “giving instead of getting” birthday parties.

I moved to New Orleans, as I knew I would, in December of 2009. A year after leaving Los Angeles behind. It was a magical and wondrous time in my life. Throughout my personal and professional life, I’ve always believed there was a way to tie together my actions with cause. I think radically, I act passionately, I reflect deeply. New Orleans was the perfect place for that.

In 2011, one more shift happened. I moved to New York City. It was a place I had always dreamed of living and the right cards fell into place.

It’s all a work in progress after all. It’s all still happening even now. I’m excited to be sharing in the journey with you.

If you’ve made it this far, at least say hi and let me know! I love connecting with new people.

Virtually yours,
Sloane