Whether you want to grow your membership, raise funds, recruit more followers, gather petition signatures, find volunteers for your cause, or connect with your community, this presentation will offer guidance that will help you create impact for years to come. JD will cover the strategies and tactics that motivate supporters and newcomers to action, plus tips on how to successfully use social tools to mobilize members, spread awareness, enlist supporters, raise funds, and drive action.
1. Engage your supporters
& succeed
on the Social Web
Social Media for Nonprofits
JD Lasica
Founder, Socialbrite.org
jd@socialbrite.org
2. What we’ll cover today
3-step program:
1. Get strategic & aligned
2. Create great content
3. Use your community
Questions, hugs, tearful goodbyes
3. Relax!
Flickr photo “relaxation,
the maldivian way” by
notsogoodphotography
http://socialbrite.org/sm4np
(all sites in this talk have been tagged for later retrieval)
4. Today’s hashtag
Creative Commons
photo on Flickr
by Prakhar
Tweet this preso! Hashtag: #sm4np
5. Dizzying growth
77% US adults are frequent social media users.*
141 million active blogs (vs. 12,000 in 2000); almost 1 million blog
posts created per day; over 346 million people globally read blogs
6 of top 10 websites in US are social sites (YouTube, Facebook,
Wikipedia, Blogger, Craigslist, Twitter)
Flickr: 35 million people, 4 billion-plus photos
Twitter: 300,000 new users per day
Text messages per day: 4.5 billion
YouTube: 2 billion videos streamed per day
73% of US Internet users are on Facebook
*source: Nielsen Online, spring 2010
6. S T E P 1 : S T R AT E G Y
Get strategic & aligned
CC photo by
Bruno. C. on Flickr
7. Big picture reality check
Before we talk tools, technology or campaigns, do a
self-assessment with your team.
Why are you doing this?
What core values drive your
organization?
What change would you like
to see in the world?
Is there clarity about what your
organization is trying to achieve?
Why are you targeting & why should they care?
Do you have an idea worth spreading?
8. Lay the groundwork
Do you have a social media policy or guidelines?
Do you have a Strategic Plan in place?
Have you studied or surveyed your community?
Have you identified your social media team members
and are they properly trained?
Do you have buy-in from top management?
Do you know how to build evergreen programs before
campaigns?
http://socialbrite.org/sm4np
for policies, best practices
9. Have you defined a clear theme?
Boil down your cause to a strong, single sentence
Vittana:
Help anyone go to college
Alter Eco:
Support fair trade
ActBlue:
Elect progressive candidates
DonorsChoose:
Support public classrooms in need
10. Begin with a strategic plan
It could include:
360 assessment of social
media capabilities
List of goals
Description of online community
Proposed use of social tools
& platforms
Recommendations on
expanded capabilities
Specifics of metrics program
Competitive/peer analysis
It should not include:
Shiny object syndrome
11. Before you start, measure!
‘Data is better than gut.’— George Weiner
Photos on Flickr by Emran Kassim, left, and Vee Dub (CC-BY)
12. Set goals, map metrics
Establish goals Metrics to measure
Grow email list of supporters # newsletter, RSS subscribers
Increase comments on blog avg. # comments/post
Increase website visibility increase in traffic or linkback #s
Increase positive mentions mentions in blogs & social
of organization or cause networks
Have visitors stick around stick rate, bounce rate
Make our content more viral # of shares
Get people to take action # of petition signatures
Get people to attend event # of registrants, year over year
17. Social media can feed your list
Be opportunistic: Take advantage of email signups on Facebook
18. CASE STUDY
Integrate your efforts
thehopeinstitute.us
Moving from tactics to strategy: Direct mail, events marketing
& social media working as an integrated ecosystem
19. Social media dashboards
Hootsuite CoTweet
Tweetdeck Spredfast
Threadsy Netvibes
http://bit.ly/smdash
21. It’s more than Text2Give
The Cove campaign: Text 'DOLPHIN' to 44144
Start & grow a mobile list
Calls to action
Alerts
Feedback loop
Reaches new constituents
Ric O’Barry,
“The Cove”
22. EXERCISE
Is your site mobile-ready?
Low-cost server-side solutions: WPtouch Pro, et al.
23. EXERCISE
Is your site mobile-ready?
Low-cost server-side solutions: WPtouch Pro, et al.
24. EXERCISE
Is your site mobile-ready?
Low-cost server-side solutions: WPtouch Pro, et al.
25. S T E P 2 : C R E AT E C O N T E N T
Use personal storytelling
Find emotional core, use videos or photos to make us feel
invisiblepeople.tv
26. Showcase stories of hope
Ed Givens, 30 years on Skid Row ... ... and today.
100khomes.org from Common Ground
27. Create lightweight media
Don’t look now but you’re a content creator!
Room to Read: Winner of TechSoup Storytelling Challenge
Deeper dive—media: socialbrite.org/sm4np
28. Evolve your content strategy
Build up a following organically: Content + Conversation
Awareness > Influence > Action > Impact
31. Your FB news feed? Bad news
Facebook rewards content & conversation, punishes inactivity
http://bit.ly/edgerank-checker
32. STEP 3: USE YOUR COMMUNITY
Create a listening post
Set up a listening post
(monitoring dashboard)
to track what’s being
said about your
organization or cause.
Listen before engaging.
Deputize folks to do this.
Supplement with a social
media dashboard.
Engage before the Ask
Deeper dive—monitoring: socialbrite.org/sm4np
34. Create a conversation hub
Where will you engage with supporters?
Your blog Community site (WiserEarth)
Facebook Social hub (Change.org)
Twitter Contest site
Deeper dive—community: socialbrite.org/sm4np
35. Enable friction-free conversations
Make sure your site is
conversation-enabled!
Lower the barriers to people talking
about your cause by using third-
party authentication services.
37. CASE STUDY
Make your cause tangible
http://charitywater.org/projects/map/
Average mycharitywater campaigner raises $1,000
38. Don’t do all the heavy lifting!
Creative Commons
photo on Flickr by
Jason Means
Tap into the sharing community
39. Find your champions!
Find the big kahunas in your sector by using your listening
post. Then, influence the influencers.
Establish a rapport and only then reach out to try to convert
them into evangelists & ambassadors for your cause.
Scope out Twitter Lists that intersect with your organization
or social cause.
Connect with other social media influencers through their
blogs and other networks.
Deeper dive—monitoring & community: socialbrite.org/sm4np
40. Use social love handles!
Generate an Attention Wave to socialize your campaign
42. The awesome power of free
Free content! Free resources!
Free photos Socialbrite.org/sharing-center
Free videos (eg, TED talks) Creativecommons.org
Free music & audio Techsoup
Free services! Free expertise!
Google Grants BarCamp
YouTube for Nonprofits PodCamp
Google Earth for Nonprofits WordCamp
Social Media
Free software & platforms! Club
WordPress & its plug-ins
Open Office, Google docs
Drupal, Joomla
43. flickr.com/creativecommons
Creativecommons.org
• Rich source of free
commercial & noncommercial
images
• Flickr: 160 million
Attribution, Noncommercial,
No Derivatives & ShareAlike
licenses
• Use them for your blog,
website, email or print
newsletter, presentations, etc.
• Don’t just take. Share!
45. Build community, not eyeballs
here’s an amazing
difference between building
an audience and building a
community. An audience
will watch you fall on a
sword. A community will fall
on a sword for you.
— Chris Brogan
Author, “Trust Agents”
46. Final thoughts
Begin with a plan, not with the tools.
Nice & easy does it. Be patient.
Don’t forget to listen and to measure!
Get aligned & integrated, attack the silos.
Make email, events & social media work together.
Build internal & external relationships. Understand
your organization’s capacity.
Make it super-easy for others to use your content.
Evaluate, iterate, relaunch. Be flexible & nimble.
Don’t do all the heavy lifting!
47. Christmas in June! Color handouts!
Share them at http://socialbrite.org/sm4np
48. Resources & tools
What you’ll find at socialbrite.org/sm4np
Free tutorials on the best way to use
Facebook, Twitter & blogs
24 online fundraising sites
Top cause organizations
Free reports
Free photo, music, video directories
Collaboration tools
Geolocation tools
How to use mobile strategically
Tons more. All free & shareable.
49. Thank you! Questions?
JD Lasica, founder
Socialbrite: Social tools for social change
email: jd@socialbrite.org
Twitter: @jdlasica
@socialbrite
I follow back and respond to all emails