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Choosing Social Media Tools
- 1. Choosing Social Media Tools Presenter: Cindy Leonard, Technology Services Manager Bayer Center for Nonprofit Management at Robert Morris University
- 2. Goals for Today’s Session • Understand the basic and most popular types of social media tools. • Receive a framework for thinking strategically about using social media for your cause. • Get hands-on practice with choosing social media tools to solve an organizational challenge.
- 3. Social Media + Watersheds = Opportunities + Challenges • Opportunities: –Engagement – New audiences –Share your stories –Low-cost • Challenges: –Internal tech savvy –All volunteer groups –Engaging constituents not online –Availability of Internet access
- 33. Framework Questions to Ask Before Choosing Social Media Tools • Why do we want to use a social media tool for communication? • Who is our intended audience? • Where are they? • How do we intend to engage that audience? • When will we manage social media engagement? • How will we measure success or lack thereof?
- 37. Social Media Game • How this works: – Each group will “make up” a fictional nonprofit by filling out the given worksheet – Each group will be given an index card with an organization problem to be solved using social media – Each group will receive a set of social media tool cards
- 38. Social Media Game • You have a ½ hour to select the most appropriate media tools to solve the given organization problem. • There is a constraint: the numbers on the bottom of each card represent the amount of time/energy you will invest in each type of tool. • All of your chosen tools must add up to 8 or less.
- 39. Social Media Game • If there is a type of tool you would like to use that is not represented on these cards, fill out one of the blank cards given and see me for scoring the tool.
Editor's Notes
- Social media for watersheds – Opportunities and Challenges Opportunities: Engage constituents in new ways Outreach to new audiences Share your stories in new and compelling ways Low-cost of social media tools Challenges: Lack of tech savvy among board and volunteers All volunteer organizations – who will manage the social media efforts? Engaging older volunteers and constituents who may not be using social media Lack of Internet access in some of the more rural areas – maybe no access, maybe limited or slow access
- So many social media tools, so little time. Where to even start? I’ve made an attempt at categorizing the more popular tools, many of which you’ve probably heard of and some you may even be using on a personal basis, if not in your organization. Keep in mind that, as we talk about social media tools that exist today, sometimes the website and the tool are the same thing, sometimes not.
- Categories: Social networking – Facebook, LinkedIn Goals: To connect with and engage other people and entities, like companies or organizations. Have conversations, share content, make new friends and find new supporters. Pros: Multiple types of content capabilities. Have discussions and conversations. Do networking and find new friends and supporters. Cons: Control. Privacy.
- Categories: Content Sharing – Flickr, YouTube, SlideShare, Podcasting, Blogging, Twitter Goals: To share content created by your organization. To curate content created by other organizations. Story-telling, Educational, etc. Pros: Great free storage space for your content. Can get your content organized. Cons: Copyright concerns. Availability of content. Ability to create particular types of content.
- Categories: Collaboration – Wikis, Social bookmarking Goals: To collaboratively create and/or organization resources and content. Pros: Eases collaboration. Centralized storage for information. Cons: Who gets what degree of control? Copyright concerns. Who decides taxonomy and structure?
- Categories: Virtual Worlds – Second Life Goals: To engage people and share content in a 3 dimensional online space. Pros: Rich multimedia experience possible. Can simulate real-world interactions more closely than other tools. Cons: Bandwidth heavy. Video memory heavy. Learning curve for use is higher. More time to create and manage than other tools.
- Framework for choosing social media tools Why do we want to use a social media tool for communication? (Goals) Who is our intended audience? Where are they? What online tools are they already using? How do we intend to engage that audience? By sharing content? By having conversations? Both? When will we manage social media engagement? How much time do we have to spend? How will we measure success or lack thereof? On reviewing the answers to all of the above questions, what tools are likely to be best suited to our intended audience, available time, and content type.
- What about fundraising? You’ll hear a lot about using social media for fundraising. With the exception of splashy media stories or large-scale natural disasters that quickly capture the attention of potential donors across the globe, social media does not make fundraising automatic or easier. Social media gives organizations new ways to meet and engage new potential donors and supporters. It lets you tell your stories to them. It gives you different ways to tug at potential donors’ heartstrings. People don’t give to causes simply because they are good causes. They give because they care about something. Social media outreach, whether it be content or conversation-based, will be most effective when it engages the emotions of your audiences.
- As a quick example, I’m going to show you a series of two photos. This is a of an oil spill cleanup in Alaska.
- Which photo makes you want to help by donating? Why?
- Social media framework