Introduction to Social Media for Nonprofits

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My name is Sian Wu and I’m a program director for Resource Media in the Seattle office—some of you may know me from some communications work that we’ve done with Russell grantees, and joining me I have Nicole Lampe, program director in our San Francisco office. This training will take about an hour, so if you have any specific questions, please wait until the end, but if you have any problems hearing Nicole or me, please let us know. We also may have some time to walk around some social networking sites at the end, so we can leave some room for that—is there any interest in that?

So a lot of people ask, “why social media” when they’re planning their communications campaigns. The answer is simple. If you want to reach people, you should go to the places they spend the most time. It used to be that when nonprofits thought about online outreach, the first place they went was their website. But going to social networks is a bit like offering delivery in addition to take out. You’re bringing your information to people’s “home,” in other words, where they spend the most time

. We now know that social networks are even more popular than personal email. The amount of time people spent on Facebook increased 566 percent last year. So not only are more people joining social networking sites, but they’re spending more time on them. More time means more potential for your message to be heard.

But just because these sites are the new smart thing to use, doesn’t mean that we should just start throwing content on as many sites as possible. Learning new technology can be time consuming and costly. It’s best to figure out a thoughtful, results-driven strategy that will reach your audiences and accomplish your goals.

How do you figure out what you want to use? Start by asking yourself, “what do you want to happen” and follow up with “who can make that happen,” and “what do we want them to do?” The answer to these questions should be more than “I want more people to know about us,” or “I want to make a big splash with this program.” With social media, people respond best to specific asks and actions. So your social network strategy should be integrated with what you ultimately want people to do.

A good place to start online communications planning is with the five Ws. Who what when, where, why (and how, but that comes later.) Consider your target audience. Where are they located? Is your goal is national, regional or local in scope? This will guide you to the outreach tools that will be most effective. If you have a specific goal around a small community, you might be better off starting your networking at the local PTA meeting, or community email lists, then moving to Facebook or Twitter. If your issue has the potential to have an impact statewide, or nationally, think about using tools with broader reach, like Facebook, right off the bat.

Take for example a campaign we worked on with a nonprofit in Montana called Women’s Voices for the Earth. They wanted to get cleaning product companies to remove toxic chemicals from their products. Their primary target audience was moms with children, since studies showed that they receive some of the highest chemical exposure. Coincidentally, they’re also the biggest target for these cleaning product companies in terms of advertising, since they’re making the purchasing decisions of these products. WVE organized women all over the country using an online event planning tool called Party2Win to hold green cleaning parties, where people learned how to make their own cleaning products using safer ingredients. Using a combination of their email listserv, a Facebook group, pitches to mommy bloggers and a stream of high profile media hits like this one in the New York Times, WVE got quantifiable results from their outreach efforts. People signing up for parties on their website said they found the site through a news article or blog post. Since then SC Johnson has removed all chemicals of concern from their products, and have pledged to disclose all ingredients on their product label. By targeting their audience effectively and giving them messages and actions that appealed to them, WVE hit a home run.

Once you have the audience and your goals worked out, it’s time to move on to messages. And Resource Media is big on values-based messaging. We always start by asking: what do these people care about? How does your issue threaten their values, and what’s the solution? Plan your messages around your previously defined goals. Keep in mind that messages used in social media have to be kept short, snappy and witty. These won’t necessarily be the same message you use in grant reports and brochures. For instance, the name of the Facebook group “Addicted to Starbucks” (A Starbucks-run group which has over 134,000 members) doesn’t correspond to the company’s more mainstream messages on gourmet international flavors, but it appeals to those who would join the group on Facebook.

And Facebook is the first social media tool we’re going to talk about. Because it’s a point of entry for many folks who want to dip their toe into the water. How many of you have personal profiles on facebook? What do you use it for? How about organizationally? Well, FB is first and foremost about community—a way to connect with other users. It’s a relatively young platform, only about 10 years old, but it’s growth has been exponential because facebook offers features for just about every possible user: the college student who wants to keep in touch with new and old friends, the corporation who wants to promote a brand, and the nonprofit organization looking to raise money or awareness for their cause. And, as this picture indicates, it’s all about the profile—that’s really the heart of facebook—you get to create your own identiy on the site, and people will decide how to interact with you based on that identity.

Facebook can definitely be fun, and lots of folks use it for that purpose. So we encourage clients to keep their Facebook content relatively light, engaging, and solution-oriented rather than doom and gloomy. But the network does have some impressive history with the human rights movement in colombia, and the story of A million voices Against FARC really demonstrates its power as an organizing tool.

So, what made this campaign so effective? A couple things.

And, of course, before deciding that Facebook is the right tool for a campaign, we recommend cehcking out their demographic statistics to get a handle on whether your target audience spends time there. The good news with Facebook is that a LOT of people are on it– 350 million and counting, more than half log in every day. Facebook users tend to be pretty diverse, slightly more female, reasonably well educated and affluent. Reight now, the two largest user groups are 35-44, and 45-54, and but, as you can see from this chart, the fastest growing demographic is the 55+ set, which is good news for NGOs since that age groups tends to be philanthropically inclined and poilitically engaged. I’ll send around a link where you can get a snapshot of the user demographics for all the sites we’re talking about today after this training, so no need to take copious notes right now.

Next, I want to talk briefly about Twitter. And I like to think of Twitter sort of like passing notes in class. People tend to use it while they’re doing something else, to share juicy tidbits or breaking news that just can’t wait until they have time to compose an email, newsletter story, and newspaper article. My colleague Sian likes to say that people check Google to figure out what the score of last night’s game was. People go on Twitter to see what people are saying about that three pointer Kobe Bryan shot 30 seconds ago. Twitter is about the right now. Twitter has been used in large conference-type events, where tweets by participants are projected in a room, then attract people from all over the world to join in. Twitter’s most recent high profile example has been in Iran, where tweets kept people organized and journalists notified directly from people on the ground.

So, just a quick look at Twitter demographics here./

Nicole, 100% of attendees would like to know more about how Flickr works, so feel free to spend more time here.

The online video networking site You Tube has become so popular, the amount of time spent on video sites has shot up 2000 percent in the past six years. But its use goes beyond pure entertainment. It’s interface allows people to upload their own movies relatively easily, and embed movies in email and websites. You’re also able to comment on controversial and favorite videos, and create profiles and “channels” so that users can directly find the content that particular individuals and organizations are producing. An early example of how You Tube was used successfully in an advocacy campaign was when Oxfam launched a campaign to persuade Starbucks to improve the lives of Ethiopian coffee farmers by supporting an agreement for Ethiopia to trademark their coffee beans. As part of their Starbucks Day of Action, Oxfam wanted a way to grab Starbucks’ attention and build a worldwide movement of awareness and action for free trade. Oxfam filmed their protest in Seattle, and edited it into a YouTube video that educated members of the public and activated supporters and free trade activists. Let’s take a look at it here. (click)

Shortly after, Starbucks corporate posted its own video on YouTube—let’s take a look at it here (click). I won’t go through the whole thing, but you can see why there aren’t as many viewers. It just isn’t as engaging. But Starbucks’ action sparked the attention of bloggers and mainstream media and to curtail growing negative publicity and to defend their brand, in the end Starbucks conceded and agreed to allow the trademarking of Ethiopian coffee beans, resulting in increased average revenue for Ethiopian coffee farmers.

There’s a wide range in the types of people who use YouTube, depending on the feature. Active contributors, who are creating their own videos and posting them online, are more likely to be younger, while the act of passive viewing includes people of all age ranges while still skewing younger. So if you’re creating a campaign that depends on people creating and posting their own videos, you’ll have most success targeting a younger audience.

The last tool I want to talk about might not occur to you as part of the social media world, but Wikipedia is absolutely a community-driven tool. It’s the web’s first public encyclopedia, and is unique in that it allows the public to edit encyclopedia entries, so the public has control over how an issue is framed. Although, just so you know, there is a team of dedicated editors to make sure that entries don’t become to biased or inaccurate.

Wikipedia and Google go hand in hand—since Google prioritizes pages that get edited often, and Wikipedia pages are constantly being edited, the Wikipedia page on your issue will most likely be on the first page of someone’s search. Start out by googling your main issue topic and seeing what comes up. Is it your argument, the opposition’s argument, or insubstantial or inaccurate information? Go into Wikipedia and edit a page that presents your issue in line with mainstream ethics and values. Wikipedia is often the first stop for people unfamiliar with a topic, because it has the reputation for providing digestible, basic overview information in an accessible way. Reporters visit Wikipedia to get their feet wet on an issue, but rarely stop there. So, when to use Wikipedia. Use it if you are trying to get publicity on a new or arcane issue that doesn’t have good web presence on other pages. Go to Wikipedia and create a new page. You can link that page to other related topics within Wikipedia, and include plenty of links. In the end, editing a Wikipedia page on your key issue is free and relatively easy—it’s invaluable to provide links to your own home page, as well as recent reports or useful news stories. And use it when your issue has been misrepresented and opposition info dominates a search. Just be sure to present your information neutrally, and provide references to your information, to avoid editing wars.

Here are just a few take-aways: Remember to communicate your message clearly, authentically, and to the right people. Don’t underestimate the value of visuals online. And social media is just one aspect of strategic communications—integrate it, don’t worship it. We hope we’ve given you some good pointers on how to engage in a social media campaign. I saw on the survey we sent out to folks that a lot of people haven’t been able to use social networking sites effectively. We hope this training will help you change that.

And now we’ll open it up to some questions, or if anyone would like to take a tour around some of these sites, now would be the time to do that. So I’ll open it up to the floor, anyone?

1 Favorite

Beth Baldauf, Nonprofit Professional at United Way of the Midlands, 6 months ago
Tags socialmedia nonprofit

Introduction to Social Media for Nonprofits - Presentation Transcript

Social Media Navigating the Menu of Possibilities January 2010
Why Social Media?
Social Media: By the Numbers Last year the total amount of time spent of Facebook increased 566 percent. The value of online real estate is increasingly measured by time spent, rather than pages viewed. Social networks are now the fourth most popular activity on the Internet—ahead of personal email. Know the social media landscape before you plan
Planning Strategically
There’s a menu of possibilities Start by interviewing yourself Social Media Menu  Appetizers Flickr Wikipedia  Entrees Twitter Facebook  Dessert You Tube
What do you want to happen? How far do you want to go? Anticipate a response Be specific Develop your social media strategy to meet your objective
Who can make it happen? Know your audience Pair up social media and mainstream media Case study: Women’s Voices for the Earth vs. Cleaning Product Companies
What do you want to say? How should you say it?
Facebook First stop and one-stop shopping
Facebook Unite and build communities around a cause Organize a multitude of voices Case Study: FARC vs. Facebook
Facebook
- Appeal to people’s values: the logo and tagline say it all.
- Use it as a vehicle for storytelling.
- Let user-generated content dominate.
- Message should be empowering.
How do I target my audience?
- Who’s using these tools?
Twitter Join the conversation
Twitter Case Study: TuDiabetes
Twitter
- Be proactive—find users with smart tools
- Keep content fresh and up-to-date
- Organize around late-breaking news
- Be authentic and responsive
Typical U.S. Twitter User
- 53% female, 47% male
- 46% college, 37% no college, 17% grad school
- 83% white, 7% black, 5% Latino, 5% Asian
Flickr Because a picture’s worth a thousand words…
Flickr Case study: Trust for Public Land vs. Excessive Concrete
Flickr
- Leverage user-generated content
- Give a little, take a little
- Tag your photos
- Give credit where it’s due
You Tube Case study: Oxfam vs. Starbucks
You Tube Case study: Oxfam vs. Starbucks
How do I target my audience?
- Who’s using these tools?
Wikipedia The people’s encyclopedia
Wikipedia
- Frame the debate
- Inform the media
- Partner with Google and dominate search
W ikipedia The Free Encyclopedia
Snapshot of tools More Americans get news from local TV than from other mainstream media outlets Facebook: Good for building community Twitter: Way to share breaking news Flickr: Helps you find and share compelling images YouTube: Make your case in 60 seconds Wikipedia: The official word on your issue or organization
Rules that apply across platforms More Americans get news from local TV than from other mainstream media outlets Communicate your message clearly, authentically and to the right people. Don’t underestimate the value of visuals. Social media is just one aspect of strategic communications—integrate it, don’t worship it.
Liz Banse, Associate Director Sian Wu, Program Director Nicole Lampe, Program Director Copyright © 2009 by Resource Media All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright holder. Published by Resource Media: Resource Media 159 Western Ave. W. Suite 480 Seattle, WA 98119 206-374-7795 www.resource-media.org Any opinions, findings, conclusions or recommendations expressed in this publication are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the view of the organizations or agencies that provided support for this project.