I happened upon a fun and funny online concept brought to you by the smart and clever people at Coca Cola. The entire MyCoke site is filled with some great marketing ideas, but the one that caught my eye is its Coca Cola Smile-izer interactive experience.

If you click on one of the floating Coke bubbles, it bursts open with the sound of laughter created by one of thousands of MyCoke website visitors willing to participate in a little silliness and by doing so, have Coca Cola make a dollar donation to the National Parks Foundation. Each bubble represents one person’s laugh. And, it may surprise and delight you to listen to how unique each person’s laughter is.

What really got my interest beyond the simple joy of listening to laughter bursting forth while I was working (I don’t often hear giggles while at my computer), was the technology application and its potential. While I am not a techie, I am guessing this application is one that can readily be applied by to the nonprofit sector. If Coca Cola can bring you laughter-filled bubbles that translate into good, why can’t Jewish federations bring you animated Chanukah gelt that you click on to tell what you want done with your contribution and have your personal expression get counted in a matching gift program. What about a Jewish day school offering a blessing candle that you click on and then you get to recite and record a blessing of your own making. Or, if this past week, you could have entered a web site and put out a fire in Israel’s north by clicking on a hose or water bucket and recorded your financial support…. The possibilities are endless. What is intriguing is how this technology merges engagement, entertainment and serious purpose and builds a global community.

Go try out the My Coke Smileizer yourself. As they say, “It’s the real thing.”

Gail Hyman is a marketing and communications professional who currently focuses her practice, Gail Hyman Consulting, on assisting Jewish nonprofit organizations increase their ranks of supporters and better leverage their communications in the Web 2.0 environment. Gail is a regular contributor to eJewish Philanthropy.