Blood Donation Awareness Month: How Branded Communication Rises To The Call

In recognition of January being Blood Donation Awareness Month, branded communication reseller 448 Connect shares how First Orion’s branded calling technology helped a hospital in an emergency situation.

It was Thanksgiving 2022. Mark Sanger, co-founder of 448 Recruit, a blood donor recruitment service, and 448 Connect, a branded calling reseller, learned his team received an urgent call from a longtime Central Texas-based client.

“Our director of client services got a telephone call from our client on Thanksgiving afternoon. And she communicated to him that there had been a five-car accident in the city in which they operate. And because of that five-car accident, there were 11 trauma patients that were being treated in the emergency room or the emergency department of this particular hospital,” Mark Sanger, co-founder, 448 Connect and 448 Recruit said.

Two of the trauma patients in this accident were O negative, the rarest blood type.

“This hospital almost depleted all their inventory of O-negative blood. And that’s significant, because there’s always more patients that need that particular blood type. So, they reached out to us and said, ‘Hey, we need help.’” Sanger said.

Between their veteran recruiter working the mornings of Black Friday and the day after and First Orion’s branded calling technology, they were able to gather donors.

“In those six hours, 28 appointments [were scheduled], so almost five appointments an hour, which is about 70 percent more than what we typically average during our normal course of business. Out of those 28 donors, by Tuesday, close of business 22 of them had actually donated a unit of whole blood, which basically replaced all the product that was being used on the shelf and then some.”

Showing how the North Little Rock, AR- based company’s branded communication technology not only spread the emergency alert, it also put a spotlight on the desire to give back.

“Because of that 32-character display, we were able to identify ourselves as the client, plus the O- negative urgent appeal, and then people who were negative see that on their display. They’re like, ‘Oh, my gosh, they must really need my blood.”

“They were able to take our technology, and use it in a very timely manner, to be able to enlist the support of blood donors in a specific zip code to get them to donate blood based on that situation. It was a great example of how our branded calling solutions really can help companies identify who is calling and why and generate results in a hurry,” Mike Coleman, channel chief of First Orion, said.

With January being Blood Donor Awareness Month, this emergency shows how branded communication can make a lifesaving difference.

It is recognized during the first month of the year because this is typically the period of critical blood shortages. Between the holidays, winter weather and flu season, people are less likely to donate around this time of year too.

“When Mark called and said, ‘we have an unbelievable example of how your technology works, and how we‘ve been able to essentially make a difference in many people’s lives, It takes it from kind of a business technology to essentially more than that, right? it enables companies like his to be able to be uber-productive, and generate results in near record time, which they had never seen before,” Coleman said.

“Money obviously drives the business role, but I think they’ve got a purpose, and kind of a value proposition that goes a little bit beyond that, and in our industry specifically. I don’t know if it could hit home any more than saying, ‘What we do, we do it better and it‘s helping us save lives,” Sanger said.