Social Media
When it comes to Web 2.0 or social media, tools like Facebook, Twitter, blogs and video sharing services like YouTube can help nonprofits spread the word about their causes. If you’re not sure what this means or how to go about using these applications, Fenton Communications offers some guidance.
Fenton recently released WATTA? 6 Steps to Joining the Web 2.0 Conversation, an overview of how to develop an effective social media campaign strategy. Lisa Witter, John Gordon and Amanda Fox from Fenton recently presented an overview of their guide for an NPCC workshop.
New media tools such as Twitter and Facebook don’t replace old media — websites or print material, email and press releases — they enhance and augment them. For example, you might use a Twitter post to let your followers know about a significant finding in your organization’s new study or your new program (drive them to your website) or to enhance your fundraising by creating a Causes on Facebook for followers to join or donate to (check out http://apps.facebook.com/causes/about).
Social media is about connecting people quickly and efficiently online. It does not replace face to face communication, but allows conversations to happen immediately and continue online. But first you have to become part of the conversation and you have to start using these applications. “You are your own social media machine for your own organization,” Lisa Witter notes. How many friends does your organization’s Facebook page have? How many people might see your tweets? You can start by building your own personal networks. Identify your target audience, and beyond that, encourage them to engage their own audience. Social media expands exponentially. Executive directors should also be involved, Witter recommends. “They can’t just say ‘Go do this,’ and remain apart from it.”
Using social media tools is about pushing out your message but it also involves paying attention to what others are saying. Before joining the conversation, you need to look at blogs and tweets to see what others are saying about your cause or even possibly your organization. And, you need to continuously monitor blogs to see what others are writing about and what phrases and words people use. Use the following sites to search blogs: www.technorati.com, www.blogsearch.google.com, www.icerocket.com, www.socialmention.com.
There are dozens of Twitter applications to help you manage your Twitter accounts. For example, Twittersheep is an application that analyzes words in your followers’ Twitter bios so you can get an idea about language, issues, how things are phrased and what your friends’ interests are. It’s at http://twittersheep.com. Find more apps at http://twitter.com/downloads.
Be prepared to spend a good chunk of time getting your efforts underway. Witter notes, “The tools are free, the research and time spent are not.”
Before you can put any of this to use, you need to have developed an idea. . . a concept . . . a cause to build your campaign around. Witter notes that it has to be an “active” idea that will engage your audience and cause them to take action. Your content has to be compelling enough to engage your audience and get them to share it with their audience. You can’t Twitter if you’ve got no Tweet.
To read more about social media, check out articles at TechSoup: www.techsoup.org/learningcenter, Network for Good: www.fundraising123.org, NTEN: www.nten.org/research/mobile-social-media, and Beth Kanter’s blog at www.beth.typepad.com. A Fast Company article at www.fastcompany.com/magazine/139/do-something-stinking-it-up.html offers some lessons learned.
The National Council of Nonprofits offers a sample internet posting policy that focuses on staff who blog, tweet, etc., and a sample media spokesperson policy at www.npccny.org/databank.htm.
Other social media policies can be found at www.mitchhurst.com/2009/10/guard-rails.html and http://mashable.com/2009/06/02/social-media-policy-musts. The 10 Golden Rules of Social Media are at http://webworkerdaily.com/2009/05/26/10-golden-rules-of-social-media.
Lisa Witter is COO of Fenton Communications which specializes in press and communications for nonprofit and social-change organizations. She can be reached at lwitter@fenton.com. WATTA? and other guides on positioning and branding from Fenton, including Take a Position: 10 Tips to Set Your Organization Apart, and their most recent guide, Now Advertise This: How to Make News with Public Interest Advertising can be downloaded for free at www.fenton.com/resources/industry-guides.
This article originally appeared in the November 2009 issue of New York Nonprofits the monthly publication of the Nonprofit Coordinating Committee of New York, Inc. www.npccny.org