3 posts tagged “facebook”

More from Craigslist Foundation's recent NYC Nonprofit Boot Camp;  Big Duck's Farra Trompeter offered an engaging session on social networking - is this a tool that nonprofits should be taking full advantage of now?

If your organization does take the plunge, expect that it will require a 2-3 hour investment daily.  A recent feature at Philanthropy Journal confirms this, also describing who is best suited to fit this role:

• Knows and enjoys social media
• Is tech savvy (but doesn't have to be a geek)
• Knows your organization and is committed to its mission
• Has a personable, outgoing writing style

Is your main goal is to raise funds or to attract and interest current / prospective constituents?  So far, few nonprofits have successfully been able to prove that the potential return is definitely worth the dedication of resources to social networking activities.

Farra recommended these first steps in Facebook:

1. find out whether other organizations with compatible missions are already there, and what they are doing
2. create fan page
3. create cause

Some nonprofits have been also to receive donations through text messaging, although this also is a relatively new initiative.  Twitter is already used by nonprofits such as Red Cross and ASPCA to distribute information.

Starting and maintaining a presence on social networking sites confirms the trend that your constituents may never find your organization's web site, so why not go to where they already are?

Other good resources on this topic:

• Beth's Blog - How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media
  
• Media Rules - book & blog 
• Nten's We Are Media Project - social media starter kit for nonprofits
  

At the quarterly Not-for-Profit Webmaster Round Table meeting this week, I initiated a discussion on social networking, stimulated by Tuesday's Wall Street Journal article, A New Generation Reinvents Philanthropy. In addition to the popular MySpace and Facebook sites, the article mentioned many new ways in which our supporters are finding to raise money for their favorite causes.

David Milner, who has run the webmaster group for several years, raised an interesting question.  If pages are created on these new sites and successfully generate interest in the organization, this will hopefully increase traffic to the nonprofit's main web site.  But if the nonprofit maintains the MySpace and Facebook sites while neglecting its own web site, how will this come across to the constituent?  I also asked - how does the nonprofit decide which content to put on these sites while making sure there is consistency with its own web site?

The social networking sites present an interesting opportunity for us to engage a new audience.  It is likely that visitors will seek out an organization on these new networks before visiting an organization's main web site.  So we'll need to make sure that our nonprofits have a presence on these new sites while also keeping our own web sites fresh.  This will be a challenge, but it's easier to go where our constituents are than hope that they'll find our organization web sites.

In addition to MySpace Impact and Facebook's Causes, other sites mentioned in the article that are attracting interest especially among younger constituents include Change.org, DoSomething, Firstgiving, GiveMeaning,, Kiva and SixDegrees.

Carie Lewis, Internet Marketing Manager at the Humane Society recently blogged about her organization's success in using Facebook on Wild Apricot's non-profit technology blog.  Major points:

• Through collaboration with Project Agape, which runs the Facebook Causes application, they've had success in connecting with constituents who are active in other nonprofit organizations with similar missions
• MySpace or Facebook?  Although it's a bit early to know for sure, so far they've had more success with fundraising on Facebook and advocacy on MySpace.
• In addition to Facebook Causes, they've also participated in applications available at Change.org and Care2

Many specific suggestions in getting the most in engaging constituents through Facebook are in the blog posting, Using Facebook to Spread Your Message.

An interview with Project Agape staff about Causes Facebook is available on the Non-Profit Tech Blog.  Causes has raised over $300,000 in only a few months of operation!