We were extremely proud to have one of our team members selected to lead a panel discussion at this year’s annual SXSW Interactive festival! Schipulite Sarah M. Worthy and former Schipulite Data Analyst Dr. Dharol Stevens, PhD. led a Core Conversation on the topic of “How to Crowdsource Your Mental Health for Free.”
The audience was made up of an array of medical professionals, those looking for better ways to find health information online, and those curious about the topic as it relates to the growing trend of Health 2.0. The panel was a great discussion with lots of feedback and participation. Below are my highlights:
Why Crowdsourcing for Mental Health?
Crowdsourcing is where many people are doing a little bit of the work instead of one person doing all the work.
Over 50% of people in the US can’t afford afford mental health treatment. Mental health issues are complicated and much of the treatment is trial and error. Unlike other medical conditions, mental health symptoms do not necessarily have only one answer that a doctor (even a very experienced doctor) can diagnose with a single test or symptom.
For Mental Health issues specifically, crowdsourcing can help piece together the puzzle of what is really going on for symptoms that are difficult to diagnose. The idea is that crowdsourcing is a tool you can use to be more informed and aware when you visit a doctor.
The Power of Crowdsourcing
Crowdsourcing’s power is in its specifics. Reading other people’s very specific accounts can hopefully ring true to your unique situation as well.
The benefits of these personal experiences include:
Reading other people’s stories lets you know you’re not alone
Seeing stories of those going through treatment may set expectations for what treatment entails
Stories of people who have overcome health issues gives hope that the symptoms will eventually end
Reading other people’s accounts can also help you define symptoms you didn’t otherwise know how to articulate, or things you didn’t know were a symptom you should be paying attention to
These accounts give access to peer support which can be incredibly powerful for those going through any kind of medical treatment
When you visit your doctor, you can ask more informed questions to get to treatment faster
Tools for Anonymous Online Searching
Many people hesitate to do searches around mental health online because they are worried about the privacy issues involved. If your family or peers cause these concerns, here are some resources to try for anonymous searching online:
Incognito mode in the Chrome browser when browsing the web
Duck Duck Go – Anonymous Search Engine with Privacy at its core
Validating Medical Information Online – The Downside to Crowdsourcing
The danger of crowdsourcing is that 50% of health sites have incorrect information. You can combat this by arming yourself with tools to evaluate information online and look for trusted sources.
Tips for Validating Online Medical Information
Verify that it is written by an expert
Make sure it is current & cites valid sources
Look for certifications and disclaimers
Valid Sources for Medical Information Online
Look for .gov or .edu sites
Anything linked from the resource pubmed will be credible
If you find studies cross linked you can look for them on scholar.google.com – Sometimes it will appear as though you have to pay for detailed study information, but any government journal is required to release its studies for free after 2 years
Health on the Net is a great resource as well – this organization’s goal is to publish credible medical information
“It’s never been easier to cross reference information online” – Dr. Dharol Stevens
Mental Health Apps to Help Focus
Mood Tracker tracks your mood over time and shows patterns like how your mood is related to stress, amount of sleep, etc.
The Help Files Module is included with all Tendenci websites, and is a Tendenci module that I use daily for documenting training guides, tips & tricks, and standards/best practices for Tendenci client websites. I was surprised to discover that many of you aren’t using or fully utilizing this module on your Tendenci websites. So I thought I’d provide an in-depth look into the Tendenci Help Files Module, and show you how other associations are using this built-in ‘Wiki‘ tool to engage with their community and succeed in their online fundraising goals.
Let’s dive in and get to know Tendenci’s Help Files Module!
Why? –> Wiki’s Increase Participation!
Wiki, Help Files, Resource Library, Knowledge Base… these are just a few names that people commonly use to refer to a web application that allows users to add and edit content through their web browser with the purpose of collaboratively managing knowledge online.
The best reason your Association should be using some kind of Wiki tool is because it provides more opportunities for your members and donors to interact with you and feel like they’re really part of moving your mission forward.
I recommend you check out a terrific presentation, by Julie Spriggs, that gives you tons of insight into how Nonprofits can use a Wiki for different collaborative projects including:
Maintaining a central repository of knowledge that your Association has amassed
Managing large projects that involve lots of moving pieces and diverse people/roles
Collaborative document creation and management
Planning large events like your annual fundraising Gala or membership drive
Organizing your knowledge base by department and committee groups
Connect with and involve your constituents in your association’s activities
Wiki’s provide a platform for everyone involved with your organization to come together and communicate, collaborate, and share their knowledge and ideas.
Wiki or Help Files…?
Tendenci websites all come with the module called “Help Files”, but we know you probably want to pick your own name to suit your organization. You can easily change the label of the module that displays on your website’s public pages inside your Help Files site settings.
What’s Included in the Help Files Module?
Tendenci’s Help Files Module gives your organization a built-in wiki tool as part of your association management platform, and we’ve built Help Files flexibly so you can use it for different purposes depending on your unique nonprofit’s needs.
Here’s my top 3 Neatest Features of the Help Files Module
You can try out all the features on our Live Demo Site. Just head here: https://www.tendenci.com/try-now to get Super User access!
1) Use the Selective Permission Controls for tiered access to different Help Files, enabling everyone in your community to collaborate to your knowledge base securely and privately as needed by your association’s procedures and polices. Check out the screenshot below that demonstrates how easy it is to selectively share access for viewing and making changes to individual help files.
Tendenci organizes your User permissions by Users, Memberships, and User Group types. You can create custom User Groups and add individual users and then provide them with secure access to only the files they should have access to.
2) Tendenci makes it easy to Automatically Filter and Promote your most important Help Files with the Help File Sidebar.
The Help File sidebar provides quick access for your site users to Request a Help File as well as a menu for Help Files that have been marked as Featured, FAQ (stands for Frequently Answered Questions), and Most Viewed. When new help files are added to your website and include one of these three tags, they’ll automatically be displayed on the sidebar.
3) Use Topics to Organize and Segment Your website’s Help Files Module. Only Super Users can add new topics and at least one topic must be selected when adding a new Help File. This helps you keep your online community resource files organized and easy to find.
Whenever a member adds a new help file and selects the topic, then this help file will only show under that topic. Topics that don’t have help files won’t be displayed on the main menu, so you can create your Topics using a predetermined structure before you’ve had any files added. Another nifty feature, to me, is that Tendenci recognizes who has access to help files within certain topics and your members won’t ever see the Topics label for your internal staff files when they login. Users only see Topics and Files that they have permission to view, and nothing more.
SEO Bonus!
By including your association’s wiki within your Tendenci site by using the Help Files Module, each new page created counts as new content to search engine crawlers! If you foster an online wiki for knowledge sharing and encourage your members to participate and contribute, they’ll help you with your online marketing efforts naturally.
Ten Benefits for You and Your Members!
Create a Private Resource Repository using Help Files
Here’s 10 great ways you can take advantage of the cool features included with the Help Files module and boost your association’s online community participation:
Enable members and registered site users to collaborateon your wiki – this saves your staff time and makes your members feel included!
Create an Internal Repository for your staff and/or Board – use Tendenci’s selective permissions to control who has access to each individual help file. Create on boarding guides for new staff members that only your association’s key personnel can see, without effecting public help files.
Setup Help Files and topics based on user groups – group members can view and collaborate on knowledge specific to the group purpose, and as group members change, the history of the group’s knowledge is available on your site.
Post important local community resources – include things like your organization’s emergency preparedness policies, how to take action in the case of a crisis, and information about other local organizations and groups that support your mission.
Create a place for event participants to add session notes and takeaways – Create a new topic or Group for event attendees and let them add and collaborate on help file notes from the different sessions. After the conference, embed the presenters’ slides and any other rich media (ie videos and photos) inside the help file.
Offer training guides for developing new professional skills – Use the selective permissions controls to create members-only repositories and share industry reports and valuable training guides with your paying members and contributors- or make them free for anyone who stops by your website, it’s your choice!
Build a globally diverse resource library – Your website is accessible day or night from virtually anywhere in the world, and with modern day web browser translation options, your International supporters can share their global perspectives on your association’s cause related issues.
Provide getting started guides for your community – new members path, how to volunteer vote for board etc
Think collaboration-both inside your org as well as outside -invite other associations and chapters to contribute on the wiki.
Document external resources and company account information– for tools, like software and vendor accounts, where your staff can quickly access to download, read, learn without the hassle of a search or wondering if the links will be active in a year
Get Members and Volunteers Working Together on Special Projects and Events!
Now you’re equipped with a deeper understanding of ways that you can use Tendenci’s Help Files like any other wiki to reach out to your community, manage volunteers, create a repository for resources. Best of all, the Help Files module comes with Tendenci ready to start adding content to “out of the box”. I’ve added a few help files to the Tendenci Demo site, and you can see that it only takes a few minutes to quickly get your Topics and a framework for adding new content to your site’s Help Files module.
10 Minutes to Set-Up
In about 10 minutes, you can set-up access for your staff and members and give them the tools they need to help you keep up with your online and offline resources. And don’t worry if you aren’t sure how to get started because I’ll help you out!
You can leave a comment below, and include your Tendenci website URL, if you’d like to schedule 10 minutes with me through an online web conference where I’ll walk you through the set-up process. Before our 10 minute training, I’ll send you a quick template that will help you identify the main Topics you’ll want to start building your knowledge base. You can also submit a request using our “Request a Help File” – just be sure to leave your contact information as shown in this screenshot:
We at Schipul love sharing knowledge and inspiration – especially the fantastic free videos that come out of the annual TED Conference! In honor of the 2013 TED Conference (which starts TODAY), we’ve put together a few of our favorite TED videos to share.
A few ways to follow along with the TED Conference:
Benjamin Zander – The Transformative Power of Classical Music
Quote: “The conductor of an orchestra doesn’t make a sound. My picture appears on the front of the CD — but the conductor doesn’t make a sound. He depends, for his power, on his ability to make other people powerful. And that changed everything for me.”
Quote: “When we work from a place, I believe, that says, ‘I’m enough,’ then we stop screaming and start listening, we’re kinder and gentler to the people around us, and we’re kinder and gentler to ourselves.”
Quote: “I believe our only hope for the future is to adopt a new conception of human ecology, one in which we start to reconstitute our conception of the richness of human capacity.”
It’s Friday and we had some fun in the Schipul offices today! There are tons of Harlem Shake Videos out there on the internet – and we decided to contribute our own!
This week is Social Media Week – a week of events held worldwide with a mission to bring social media to the real world!
The Houston marketing community is hosting its own events this week, and we were happy to attend Monday night’s happy hour at the beautiful Okra Charity Bar in Downtown Houston.
Located downtown, Okra Charity Saloon donates its proceeds to a different local Houston charity or social cause each month.
For each drink purchased, you receive a ticket to vote for the charity to be supported that month. The wooden ballot boxes are lined up along the side wall, where you drop your ticket for your favorite.
The space is beautiful – it feels like a hidden spot tucked away in between the buildings of downtown Houston. The ceiling is a skylight of glass that is wide and open but somehow doesn’t take away from the cozy atmosphere.
It was a great event!
More Photos From #SMWHOU Okra Happy Hour
More Social Media Week Events!
Be sure to check out the rest of the week’s #SMWHOU events:
Thursday February 21 – Cactus Music Asks “Have You Heard?” Hear the first-ever community curated playlist inspired by Houston! 5 PM – 7 PM
Friday February 22 – Social Media Breakfast This fantastic panel will discuss the hottest trends in social media that will impact Houston in 2013 and beyond! 8:30 AM – 10 AM
Saturday February 23 – Houston Instagram #Instacrawl Join Houston Instagrammers for an informal city crawl to some of Houston’s favorite spots! 10 AM – 2 PM
Last night at our monthly NetSquared Houston meetup, Felicia Bates and I presented on Injecting FUN Into Your NonProfit through visual, interesting, shareable content! We discussed several new free tools to help you generate this content and connect your community online.
See the slides below and we’ve included a presentation recap in this post as well!
When we say “FUN” we mean interesting content that people want to share! The more fun content you create online, the more your community will want to share it and help you broaden your reach online.
Social Giving is on the rise. In 2002 4% of donors gave online, while in 2012 65% gave online.
The average donation through social media continues to increase each year as well, as people are more comfortable donating online and more non-profits are taking advantage of new online tools.
Sharing Increases Donations – And People Want to Share NPO Content
Nonprofits who incorporate Social Media into a fundraiser generate almost 10 times more money raised than those who don’t.
And the best part? People want to share cause related content!
A New York Times Survey found that the number one reason people share something online is to give others a better sense of who they are and what they care about. This includes nonprofit causes and content!
Content: Think Interesting, Visual, Shareable – And Strategic!
When planning the substance of the content you can create online using these tools, remember to always keep strategy first. Focus on the goals for your online efforts with every plan you make. Whether you are increasing donations, volunteers, or awareness – establishing credibility and showcasing your motivations are key.
Ideas for shareable nonprofit content to create:
Show who benefits and the impact
FAQs & Q&A topics
Showcase your people – staff and volunteers
Cover Events
Stats & Education
Think Real Time
Say “THANK YOU!”
Ask for help from your community – ask them to share their stories!
The #1 Communications Challenge for nonprofits in 2013 is lack of time to produce quality content.
We have gathered a list of tools we are enjoying using to create content that will hopefully help you create some FUN interesting visual shareable content in a relatively short time!
Wordle (Wordle.net) generates visual word clouds based on content you plug in. You can plug in an RSS feed like your organization’s Twitter account or Blog to show what topics you post the most about, or copy and paste text from any document like a press release or yearly report to see what topics are most prevalent!
Tweet Charts (TweetCharts.com) provide real time data about any topic, hashtag, user, or phrase across Twitter. Use it to monitor and showcase what is going on around your primary focus topics or brand name – or to find influencers across those topics as well.
If YouTube were a search engine it would be #2 in the world. More people search YouTube each day than Bing or Yahoo.
Apply for the YouTube for Nonprofits program to gain access to additional features like graphics customization and clickable calls to action in your videos.
Don’t have video footage from your last event? Animoto (animoto.com) lets you quickly and easily turn images into video by creating animated videos based on images you upload. The interace is extremely easy to use – you choose the images, the transition options, and design theme and create a video that you can upload to YouTube.
This tool is free for up to 30 second videos and a pro account allows you create longer videos.
Vine (vineapp.com) is the newest Video Sharing app created by the team at Twitter. It is billed as the “Instagram of Video” and lets users post 6 second videos that play in a loop similar to an animated GIF. Videos are quick to make, watch, and share by your community!
GroupMe (Groupme.com) is a group SMS text messaging tool. You can use it to coordinate volunteers, committees, and board members by creating groups for each of those audiences.
Causes (causes.com) is a tool for driving change. You can start a cause for your nonprofit and manage anything from petitions to fundraisers, to polls.
Google Hangouts are on air video chat sessions between multiple people. With Google Hangouts you can create Circles, have conversations, and get your community and nonprofit talking and working together regardless of location. automatically records your session and posts to youtube. More on getting started with Google+ Communities
Analytics are showing that not only has Pinterest exploded in growth over the last year, but also that users of this site tend to purchase things they share on it more than any other social network… which means revenue for marketers who can take advantage of this tool!
According to Comscore, Pinterest buyers spend more money, more often, and on more items than any of the other top 5 social media sites.
81% of U.S. online consumers trust information and advice from Pinterest.
The most popular categories of sharing are Food & Drink, DIY, and Home Decor (source)
Most Popular Categories Shared on Pinterest
Pinterest Demographics
80% of Pinterest users are Women
50% of Pinterest users have children
28.1 percent of Pinterest users have an annual household income of $100,000. (source: Ultralinx)
Monitoring Pinterest Brand Activity Online
So you got it: Pinterest rocks and you’ve started using it as part of your social media strategy. You’ve created branded boards, added Pinterest Sharing widgets to your website, and are reading everything you can about best practices for Pinterest marketing (I recommend this great post from HubSpot: “The Ultimate Guide to Mastering Pinterest for Marketing“). Now what?
With all of the new Social Media Tools out there, it is getting more and more difficult to keep track of all of things people are saying about your brand online.
We recently discovered the tool PinAlerts – an easy to use tool that sends you updates when content from your domain is pinned on Pinterest!
Getting Started with Pinterest Brand Monitoring in 3 Easy Steps
Step 1 – Create an Account
The form is really simple – just a name and email and you can get started.
Step 2 – Add Domains
Add as many domains as you like, separated by a comma, that you want to monitor Pinterest posts for. You have options to receive emails once an hour, one a day, once a week, or as it happens (similar to Google Alerts).
Click “Create a Pin Alert”
Step 3 – Receive Emails!
PinAlerts will send you emails at your specified frequency. The emails contain the image that was pinned, the name of the person who pinned, and a link. The nice thing about this is that on Pinterest people use their real names – so you can figure out who your influencers are fairly easily (instead of having to decipher usernames).
Note: I did notice that the first email came through with some older things that it discovered for the first time when I signed up.
Sample Email Alert:
Manage Your Alerts
Log back in to edit, add, or remove alerts you have set up. The interface is really easy to use – so you can add and edit your alerts as much as you like!
What other tools and resources are you using to aid in your Pinterest efforts? Share them in the comments below!
Each year in January, I spend time researching different market reports from 2012 to identify the upcoming trends within the technology industry. I use this information to predict what technology and marketing trends will most likely matter to the nonprofit association and open source community so I can give you insight without having to spend the time researching all of this data yourself.
I’m really excited about 2013 because I see a dramatic shift coming this year in the way we all interact with and think about information technology. Knowledge that was once proprietary or extremely difficult to gain is being pushed out onto the web in a volume that we can’t consume fast enough.
Take Coursera.org, for example, where you can take courses from Universities like Stanford, CalTech, and John Hopkins. For Free!!
Coursera is just one of dozens of online education platforms that have free (or nearly free) classes on virtually any topic. Add to this the important details that because the classes are offered through your web browsers – you also can access them anytime and any place with the added bonus of an online community from connecting with the other students who’re taking the class. Personally, I prefer the learning experience I get when I’m on Lynda.com or Codeacademy to that I received back in college. I predict that as more people gain access to the web through cheaper and faster mobile devices, more people are going to these online learning sites instead of paying tens of thousands of dollars in tuition.
Knowledge is Freedom
Knowledge is power when someone else knows how to do something you need done and don’t know how. When you know how to manage your own website, for example, then you can choose whether or not you want to pay for someone to manage your site. You also have the choice of how much you want to manage and how much you want to outsource.
Schipul Technologies has always believed that education is key, and provides tons of free training and resources for our employees and our community. This year, we’re really ramping up our training opportunities for clients and web developers looking for more Tendenci training. Keep an eye on our Events Calendar to find new webinars, in-person workshops, and other classes we’ll be adding this year. We’ll also be sharing more nonprofit website success stories and technology tips and tricks in our email newsletters and here on the blog.
What topics do you want to learn more about? Tell us in the comments below or send us an email. Now, here’s the 3 tech trends I predict will be the biggest nonprofit boosters in 2013.
Avoid the “ooh shiny!” Syndrome in 2013
All three of my top trends are going to be familiar to you. There’s no surprise tech hidden in this blog post… and that’s because 2013 is going to be the year we all focus on simplification and education. Marketers are overwhelmed trying to produce enough content and users don’t have time to read it.
This year, instead of creating a new account for every “next big social media app” – spend time looking into your analytics to see what’s not working that well and cut it out. That’s why each of my predictions include some of the things to consider before you jump into the newest web trend. You’ve got a lot on your plate this year if you’re going to change the world, so be selective with your time.
Trend #1 – Online Video Becomes Mainstream
In the 2012 report released by the NPD Group, 45% of people in a survey said that the TV was their primary screen for watching online videos. In 2011, that figure was 33%. The report also discovered that online video viewing from PCs is declining, because more people are watching internet videos on their TV’s, instead of watching traditional television and cable programs. It’s pretty obvious to me that in 2013, we’ll see that number rise well above the 50% and online video becomes something families watch together.
Google’s been preparing for this for years and you can apply for the Google for Nonprofits program to get a premium YouTube Brand channel that offers additional tools to customize and promote your stories through video. If you already have a YouTube Brand Channel and are trying to figure out how to better utilize it, then check-out this cool YouTube Brand Channel Interactive Show And Tell Google and TED developed. Download the Playbook Guide: Youtube for Good to get started with Youtube for your nonprofit with great tips, examples, and advice specifically developed for nonprofit’s seeking to boost their engagement online through videos.
Should You Focus on YouTube This Year?
Videos are a great platform for telling engaging stories and driving action from people and are a perfect tool for nonprofits. Videos also take time, money, and a fair amount of expertise with filming and editing. Before you dive into a YouTube Brand Channel, you’ll want to evaluate your resources and compare them to the costs involved with managing the production process to create new and engaging videos regularly.
Large organizations probably want to get serious about allocating a portion of your budget for video marketing and make this the year you commit. Smaller and mid-sized organizations who haven’t done any online video marketing yet may want to start with making one video that they can embed on your website and share on your Facebook page to get an idea of what an ongoing video campaign would entail.
I wrote about nonprofit video storytelling in a blog post last year with great advice that still holds true. In addition though, new online video tools have been popping up almost daily that are inexpensive and easy to use. Here’s a few video apps I recommend that will introduce you to online video production and marketing:
Animoto’s Video Maker How- To
Animoto – I love how EASY it is to use Animoto and they offer free upgraded features for nonprofits. Check out the Animoto blog to watch other nonprofit videos created with Animoto.
GoAnimate! Videomaker – Sign-up for their basic plan (it’s free) and try your skills at making animated videos. GoAnimate also has a ton of Video Maker Tips on topics like selecting animation software and directing voice overs in your videos.
Wistia – Host your online videos here instead of YouTube when you need to keep your videos privately accessible by members or specific people. Wistia has a free plan that includes 5 videos, and integrates with other tools you’re already using like Salesforce, Google Analytics, and many social sharing sites, including Facebook.
Trend #2 – Leave Your Wallet at Home, Just Remember Your Smartphone!
Mobile Payments just might be the biggest disruptive tech in 2013. This technology is changing the economy in Africa at a pace never before seen, and Africa isn’t the only economically disadvantaged country that’s benefiting from mobile technologies. Ironically, the U.S. is one of the slowest countries to adopt mobile payments technology, primarily because the US banking industry already had a very large technical infrastructure in place that wasn’t compatible with mobile payment tech.
Americans are gradually adopting mobile payments, and Starbucks, in a partnership with Square, is leading the pack of businesses who’ve discovered how to profit from mobile payments, with a reported 7 million users paying for their morning cup of coffee with their smartphones. Mobile and web merchant account providers have been learning from the early adopters, like Starbucks, that the key to increasing consumer adoption of mobile payments means designing a better experience via “virtual wallet” apps for iOS and Android devices.
Square, for example, offers a free mobile wallet app that includes features for earning and tracking loyalty points from participating vendors, sending and receiving virtual gift cards, and reporting tools on how you’re spending money. Square wants to increase adoption of mobile payments by creating that emotional connection between a consumer and their virtual wallet; evident when you visit their website:
“A wallet holds credit and debit cards, half-punched loyalty cards, wrinkled checks, and ancient receipts. But a wallet should do more. It should help you discover great places and earn you rewards. It should help you build relationships, not just pay for things.”
A wallet that helps you build relationships? That sounds exactly like the kind of wallet a great donor is going to have, and that’s why nonprofits should start incorporating mobile payment options that go beyond the web page.
Things to Consider Before Jumping into Mobile Payments
Of the three trends I list here, mobile payments is the one that you definitely shouldn’t ignore. Why? Because it’s relatively cheap, easy to set-up and manage, and you don’t want to ever miss a donation opportunity. Gen Y and Millenials are growing up and growing ever more attached to their mobile devices, and they don’t have the barriers towards adopting new technology.
If you haven’t been taking online payments through your website, then this could be a great opportunity to jump into digital payments for donations. That being said, you still want to do the research to determine if and how your organization can benefit from mobile payment adoption. Here’s some tips to help you evaluate mobile payments:
If you aren’t able to or don’t need to accept financial contributions, then it’s probably safe to say you don’t need mobile payments.
You probably don’t need to spend the money to have a custom mobile app designed, however if you’re looking for options then you might want to check out LevelUp’s white label option which saves you time and money by giving you a custom designed app built on a pre-existing platform.
Sixrevisions has a great article that provides an overview of online payment processing including definitions of commonly used terms and reviews of 10 most common online merchant account providers.
Trend #3 – Tablets are More than Just Mobile, They’re Everywhere
Many nonprofit organizations have been using tablets for engaging with their constituents over the past couple of years. Museums, like the Smithsonian and Children’s Museum of Houston, incorporate tablets into their exhibits to increase interactivity with their members. Humanitarian organizations, like the Red Cross and FEMA, are using tablets for their mobile staff who need access to email and online tools while working in remote locations or regions that have had their infrastructure destroyed from natural disasters.
Even though many nonprofits have readily adopted tablets for mobile engagement efforts, most haven’t taken a look at how their own .Org’s website looks on a tablet, or more importantly, tried to complete their online donation form from a tablet. This past year, tablets were repeatedly out-purchasing smartphones, and I’m predicting that nonprofits will miss out on potential fundraising opportunities if their websites aren’t donation-friendly for tablet users.
What does your website look like on an iPad? How does it look on a 7″ screen vs 9″ or 10″? These are the kinds of questions you should have been asking in 2012, because there’s a great chance that visitors are looking at your website from a tablet now more than their smartphones. If you’d like to see some examples of great mobile sites for nonprofits, check out Nonprofits.org’s article on Nonprofits.org has a great article that shares three great mobile nonprofit websites http://nonprofitorgs.wordpress.com/2012/10/08/three-nonprofits-pioneering-responsive-web-design/”>Three NonProfits Pioneering Responsive Web Design.”
Tablets give you a faster browsing experience and longer battery life compared to smartphones, without sacrificing their portability. In addition to providing a better mobile experience than smartphones, tablets also tend to have lower prices for features than smartphones. You can spend $600+ for an iPhone5 or you can spend $400 for a Google Nexus and get a higher performance tablet that comes with more storage, longer battery life, and a bigger screen. Tablet prices are dropping fast too, with $100 prices being touted at CES this year.
Granted, the tablets don’t come with the ability to make phone calls – but who cares? We can download one of the numerous free (or nearly free) apps that allow us to have voice over IP chats and just hunker down in the nearest Starbucks or McDonalds for the free wi-fi. Check out Viber’s app, for example. I find it interesting that the only “downside” I can think of to a tablet versus a smartphone is the size – and if we go back to trend #1, you’ll recall that we’re rapidly moving our online video experience to the larger tv screens. We want the larger screen.
Tablets seem to have found their niche as the perfect balance between mobility, performance and screen size.
Should You Invest in Tablets and Mobile Tech?
I highly recommend you head over to Beth Kanter’s blog to find the in-depth answer to this question in the post: How and When Should Your Nonprofit Organization Invest in Mobile. It recommends you look at your site’s traffic sources and if you’re getting more than 20% traffic from mobile devices, then you should prioritize getting a mobile-friendly website design. If you’re getting less than 20% mobile traffic but the vast majority of your online community is reporting issues with using your site on mobile devices, you might also want to look at a redesign.
Tablets come with an entirely different interface from other devices, navigating the web using gestures. Finger swipes and taps interact with web pages different than a mouse and keyboard. Most websites, even those with responsive or mobile stylesheets, weren’t designed to engage with visitors that way. A recent survey done by Compuware.com on tablet user web experience expectations shared that not only did tablet users expect a website page to load in 2 seconds or less, tablet users also expected their tablet to perform as well as their laptops.
If you don’t own a tablet, I recommend heading to your local Best Buy or Fry’s and playing with some of the different models. Find one that has access to websites and go look at yours and other sites and try clicking through the sites and performing the same functions you would normally perform from your PC and Smartphone. In particular, try making a donation on your website from a tablet and see if you run into any roadblocks.
Did you run into problems testing your donations form using a tablet? If so – you probably will want to look at updating your site to a responsive designed theme. Want to go more in-depth with tablet design for websites? Here’s some great articles I recommend:
Find out the “Do’s and Don’ts” for tablet website design in this article on 1stwebdesigner.com, which includes tips like keep your website design simple, don’t use flash animation, and consider the information tablet users are looking for when they visit your site so you can highlight this on your homepage and in your site’s headers or footers.
Webdesign.tutsplus.com has a great article that teaches the 6 tips to remember when designing for tablets. The article gives realistic advice like how to design for fingers instead of mouse clicks, and designing for multiple orientations.
Check out the results of a 2013 Consumer focused survey by Accenture which evaluates the devices that are going to be the most popular, and shares the best tactics to use based on your audience’s preferred devices – download the PDF of the Survey and Read the Full Article on TechCrunch.com.
What Trends do You See Coming in 2013?
My predictions are based solely on my experience and research, and you most likely have a different perspective that I haven’t thought of yet. What trends do you see coming in 2013 that nonprofits should be paying attention to?
The database server has been restored and Tendenci 4 sites are back up and functioning.
We apologize for the inconvenience this morning and thank you for your patience. We are working to examine the root cause of the issue to prevent similar issues in the future.
9:15 AM
One of our Tendenci 4 Database Servers is experiencing a hardware issue this morning and some Tendenci 4 sites are down. Our Support team is on site working on the issue.
We apologize for the inconvenience and will update here as soon as we can.
Questions? Contact us at support@tendenci.com or (281) 497-6567 ext 411
UPDATE: Final Results and Congrats to our Winner Kelly!
Below are the results of the poll!
We picked a random participant using Random.org and the winner is Kelly P.!
The Big Game is on Sunday and whether you’re in it for the football, the commercials, or the real-life drama of two brothers coaching against each other in the Super Bowl for the first time ever… over 100 million of us will be watching (111.3 million last year set a new record!).
In support of our Silicon Valley California Office we are pulling for the San Francisco 49ers in the big game on Sunday – And we want to know who you are rooting for!
Who will you be rooting for in the Super Bowl Sunday?
Vote in our poll and we’ll send one participant something sweet!
Vote before 5 PM Central time on Thursday January 31. We’ll pick a random poll participant and send you something sweet – if you’re in Houston we’ll send you cupcakes from Crave in your team’s colors!
Crowdsourcing’s power is in its specifics. Reading other people’s very specific accounts can hopefully ring true to your unique situation as well.
The Help Files Module is included with all Tendenci websites, and is a Tendenci module that I use daily for documenting training guides, tips & tricks, and standards/best practices for Tendenci client websites. I was surprised to discover that many of you aren’t using or fully utilizing this module on your Tendenci websites. So I thought I’d provide an in-depth look into the Tendenci Help Files Module, and show you how other associations are using this built-in ‘
Each year in January, I spend time researching different market reports from 2012 to identify the upcoming trends within the technology industry. I use this information to predict what technology and marketing trends will most likely matter to the nonprofit association and open source community so I can give you insight without having to spend the time researching all of this data yourself.
