In the past two days, I’ve heard two compelling fundraising stories that wouldn’t have been possible without social media. The first comes from a Kiva fellow, Kieran Ball, who followed the path of a $25 loan from his former office at Credit Suisse in London to a rice farmer in Cambodia. The 11-minute video is well worth the downloading wait if you’re on a slow connection.

The second story comes from Beth Kanter, the go-to guru of social media for nonprofits in the United States, who also does significant work in Cambodia. For her 51st birthday she used the Causes application on Facebook and several other tactics to raise more than $6,000 to buy school uniforms for Cambodian students. Read the whole story on her always informative blog, How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media.

Al Majmoua (in the video above) is one organization that has used Kiva successfully in Lebanon, as explained in the mini-doc Linking Lebanon (English/Arabic).

Have you or your organization experimented with fundraising or lending using social media or SMS? If so, please share your experiences in the comments section.