If you sit through the fluff at the beginning where I talk about some of the campaigns our agency, StudioGood ran at SXSWi, you’ll get to the point where Frank Barry asks me to give my Top Five Tips to Nonprofits. I didn’t know he was going to ask, but it turns out that I had something to say.
Here’s the video. The Top 5 hits right around the 2:40 minute mark. If you just want to read my tips, they’re below.
Top 5 to get started:
1. Start with what you’ve got:
Most NPOs already have a tremendous asset going in: Their existing donor email list. By using tools like Flowtown, nonprofits can quickly and easily determine what social networks their existing supporters are using. Once you’ve found them, start following them!! Flowtown also adds email tools that enable a nonprofit to reach out based on the social media footprint of your donor. Their program is definitely worth a look.
2. Talk to Them
Once you’ve identified where your base exists in social media, start talking. Most nonprofits have an existing message plan or calendar for releases. Or at the very least a calendar for appeals. Take whatever you’re already saying and chop it into bite-sized chunks. Use tools like Hootsuite to schedule outbound messages so that you’re putting in 2-3 hours of prep time per week to get 3-4 outbound messages a day.
3. Respond to the inbound
This one is pretty simple. Even though you’re now automating the outbound, you need to make sure someone is watching the @replies – once people start responding, re-tweeting, or interacting with your message, make sure someone is talking back. It’s more important that this is someone knowledgeable about the NPO and its nuances than that someone is on call. 30 minutes a day from the exec director is better than a full-time intern.
4. It’s not different
You know your message. You know your audience. Extend the message through social media, don’t change the message or think you need a different message for the “social” audience. Drive folks to a Call To Action, (feel free to use our Facebook Funding Widget) make your appeals using new tools, but don’t change what you’re asking folks to do.
5. Now, analyze
OK, some of the new people you attract ARE different from your base. Use survey tools like Survey Monkey on the new folks to find out how they found you, and what they want to see in the future. Heck, when they donate, use tools like the ones Blackbaud offers to maximize the return on your base.
Whew. Didn’t know I had it in me. The most important tip of all? Get started. Most of the folks who are “experts” today are self-starters who didn’t know any more two years ago than you do right now. Go get ‘em.
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Tags: blackbaud, causes, charity, flowtown, nonprofits, social media, surveymonkey, tips, tools
