How Nonprofits Can Effectively Use Social Media

How Nonprofits
Can Effectively Use
Social Media
Sponsored by Womens Way &
Philadelphia Young Nonprofit Leaders
Eileen O’Brien
@eileenobrien

“ A social trend in which people use technologies to get the things they need from each other, rather than from traditional institutions like corporations”
Groundswell by Charlene Li & Josh Bernoff
What is Social Media?

Social media is not a strategy but a tactic
Start with an objective, create a strategy and determine the best tactics
Your strategy could involve increasing awareness, education, fundraising, deepening an existing relationship, changing perceptions or engaging people to take action
Social media may be an appropriate tactic
Key to marketing is telling a compelling story
Social media can enable this
Social Media is a Tactic

Is Your Target Audience Using SM?
Source: Pew Internet & American Life Project

How Is Your Audience Using SM? Source: http://Forrester.com/Groundswell 24% 37% 21% 51% 73% 18% North American Technographics Interactive Marketing Online Survey Q2 2009 Forrester Social Technographics Ladder

Recruit the people within your organization who are passionate about social media
Use it in your own life and become comfortable with the technology
How Do You Start?

Search for communities, Facebook pages, Twitter accounts, YouTube channels for similar nonprofits
Listening may give you insights which will lead the strategy
Learn what’s important to your audience
Can you fill a need? How can you add value?
Social media has been compared to a cocktail party
Listen

Add Value

Measurement is essential
Determine up front how you will measure success
Did you meet your objective?
More volunteers
Heightened awareness
Donations
Increased event participation
Generated PR
Education on issues
Measure

Integrate the social tactics into the entire marketing strategy
Promote via direct mail, email signature, newsletters, announce at events
Collect cell phone numbers & ask for opt-in for future
Market Social Media

Social media is all about being human, so have personality
Never say anything you wouldn’t say in front of your mother
It’s all about building relationships
Treat others with respect
Add value
Golden Rules

Twitter

Twitter is a free social networking & micro-blogging service that allows users to send updates or tweets (text-based posts up to 140 characters long) to anyone who opts to receive them
Asks: What are you doing?
What’s Twitter?

What’s Twitter?

Twitter Users
Source: Pew Internet & American Life Project

Organization
100% branded content, don’t follow people or interact
Can be managed by a team, low risk of going off message
Using interactive tool to push out information, not establishing relationships
Types of Accounts
Source: Beth’s Blog: How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media

Organization

Organization With Personality
Employee(s) who tweet are identified & interact with followers
Makes it personal, builds relationships
May be difficult to scale, succession can be an issue if person becomes so associated with brand leaves, also risk of going off message
Types of Accounts
Source: Beth’s Blog: How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media

Organization with Personality

Thought leaders and cause enthusiasts
For social media & nonprofits: @kanter , @ntenhross , @beautifulthangs , @SocialBttrfly , @peterdeitz
Search on your topics of interest
Look at who others follow
Check out
http://whoshouldifollow.com
http://twitterel.com
http://twubble.com
http://nearbytweets.com
Take your time
Who to Follow

Quality over quantity
When you follow someone send them a tweet explaining why you are following them
Search on your area of interest and then answer questions or respond
“ Seek out people you can help and do it!” Wil Reynolds
Add yourself to “yellow pages”
http://twellow.com
http://wefollow.com
How To Get Followers

Engage with your followers, thank them for support, give them ways to get involved
Weekly Chats
Take part in existing ones or host a chat
How To Get Followers

Check out TwitCause

Most effective online organizing programs whether fundraising or advocacy is to make each of your appeals part of a campaign
People give to funds that generate an emotional response, tell your story
Articulate in simple terms what you are trying to do
Make it urgent, have a deadline
Make it EASY
Targeted Campaigns

Northern Home For Children

100 Uniforms in 100 Hours

YouTube

Second largest volume of searches
In September 2009
84.8% of the total U.S. Internet audience views online video
125.5 million viewers watched nearly 10.3 billion videos on YouTube.com
Source: comScore
YouTube

YouTube program for nonprofits
YouTube Video Volunteers
Can find someone who is willing to use their equipment and skills to help a nonprofit make a video
YouTube

Flip Video
Flip Video
Only $199, HD quality, easy to use
For each Flip Video an eligible nonprofit buys they will donate one

Free to set up a YouTube channel
Centralized place for all videos, can be branded & users can subscribe
Alex’s Lemonade Stand

Can turn off comments or use it as another way to connect

People have short attention spans, so capture attention in first 30 second
Keep the whole video short
Have a call to action at the end
Shoot for a computer screen
Ask for user-generated content
Tell serial stories which engage viewers & keep them coming back
React to current events
Use endorsements
Tag & title your videos with relevant keywords
How Do You Get Views?

Subscribe to the YouTube channels of other nonprofits, they may do the same
Ask people to subscribe
Share links for your videos with supporters so they can help get the word out
Make the embed code available so people can post the video on their sites
How Do You Get Subscribers?

Facebook

300M members worldwide in Sept
120M North America
Fastest growing group is women over 55 years old
Facebook Users

Nonprofits can create customized pages
Claim vanity URL
http://www.twitter.com/yournonprofit
Engage with fans
Comment on their wall posts & help people connect with others
Show people how to connect beyond Facebook
Email sign up or drive to website
Facebook

Non-Profits on Facebook
Facebook Page

Use the data to understand what your fans like, don’t like, what type of content they interact with the most and what they share with their friends
Facebook gives you locale breakdown and demographic information
Facebook Stats

Promote via other marketing channels
Encourage fans to suggest to their friends become fans
Run promotion or contest
Give fans what they want
Be active and add content
70% of all actions on social networks are related to viewing pictures or viewing other people's profiles
Source: Understanding Users of Social Networks
How to Get Fans

Google Sidewiki

A browser sidebar that enables you to contribute & read information alongside any web page
It is available as a feature in Google Toolbar
Google Sidewiki

Google Sidewiki

Resources

ComcastNewMediaExchange.com
Groundswell
Examples of award winning non-profits
Beth Kantar
Beth’s Blog: How nonprofits can use social media
Pew Internet & American Life Project
Netsquared
Momentum: Igniting Social Change in the Connected Age by AllisonFine
Resources

Thanks!
Questions?

How Nonprofits Can Effectively Use Social Media

by Eileen OBrien on Nov 18, 2009

Accessibility

Categories

Tags

Upload Details

Usage Rights

2 Embeds 2

Statistics

How Nonprofits Can Effectively Use Social Media — Presentation Transcript

http://feeds.feedburner.com	1
http://www.slideshare.net	1