social media Archives - Tendenci - The Open Source AMS Blog

2012-10-172021-07-02

Improving Twitter Engagement in 7 Easy Steps

All marketers are looking for ways to improve their engagement online.

A recent social media study from Buddy Media examined several branded Twitter accounts to look for patterns in which tweets perform better. The results were that seemingly small tweaks to your content can increase engagement for brands. These are all “good habits” you may heard before – but it’s nice to be able to put real numbers to each of these.

Below is a list of 7 easy tweaks you can start applying to your Twitter communication right now to increase engagement for your brand.

First: The Big Picture

None of these tactics are going to work without strategy. Be sure to keep in mind the big picture as the foundation of all of your social media efforts. After you have these covered, the tweaks below will make an even bigger impact.

Aerial Photo by Ed Schipul

1. Start with Strategy

You should have a primary goal for your social media efforts. It may be to drive traffic, increase leads, foster positive brand impression, aid customer service, get product feedback, recruit new employees, etc. Whatever your goal, that should be top of mind as you craft your messages and filter through what content you are creating and sharing online.

2. Real time > Perfect

The advantage of Twitter is that everything is happening in real time. It’s often better to just get your tweet out there into the wild instead of spend too much time worrying about the specifics.

This is the same reason you may find yourself sitting at an event like a friend’s wedding, and see someone set down their fancy DSLR camera down to pick up an iPhone to get a real time shot to share with the world. Real time information is valuable, so don’t let the semantics scare you away from getting content out there quickly.

3. You Can’t Manage What you Don’t Measure

To take full advantage of any social media platform or tool, you need to be sure you are measuring your efforts. Keep track of the cost (including time) and return of these tools. Are you getting traffic back to your site? Is that traffic converting into leads? Are you building postitive PR? What types of posts are the most engaging? These are all important questions to keep in mind as a foundation for all of your work online.

7 Easy Ways You Can Improve Engagement on Twitter Right Now

Once you have the big three concepts above covered, these easy tweaks can help you improve engagement on Twitter.

1. Tweet on the Weekend

Twitter engagement is highest on the weekend, but most brands post during the week. Engagement rates for brands are 17% higher on Saturday and Sunday.

Do this now: If you’re using a tool like Hootsuite or SproutSocial, schedule interesting tweets you would normally post during the week to post over the weekend and measure the results.

Graph Source: Mashable

2. Tweet During “Busy Hours” – Facebook during off hours

The study shows that Twitter engagement is higher during the “busy hours” of 8 AM – 7 PM. This may be because Twitter is so real time – people want to be online while the action is happening, and run the risk of missing out otherwise (FOMO).

Facebook posts, however, have a longer lifespan in the timeline (about 22 hours according to this study in late 2011 & more recently reported as 18 hours in this study in June 2012) than Twitter, so it makes sense that Facebook engagement is higher during the off hours of 8 PM – 7 AM. Facebook timeline uses an algorithm to determine which posts are most relevant to a user – so the lower competition at these times increases your see-ability.

3. Tweet 4 Times Per Day

The old adage was “tweet when you eat” as a rule of thumb on when and how often to post. The BuddyMedia study found that the sweet spot for brands is 4 tweets per day. After that, the law of diminishing returns kicks in and you don’t get as much value for that 5th, 6th, and additional tweet.

Do this now: Save those extra tweets for another day – maybe the weekend! Think strategically about what you will post each day to make sure each post gets time to be noticed and shared.

4. Keep Tweets Under 100 Characters

Tweets under 100 characters have a 17% higher engagement rate than those taking the full 140.

In general, short posts tend to get more attention online because short copy is easier to scan and digest. In PPC advertising, short ad headlines tend to get clicked more because they are designed to grab people’s attention faster.

The other advantage of shorter tweets means you allow extra space for people to be able to retweet you without having to make changes to your original message. You do the editing for them the way you like.

5. Include Links

Tweets with links have 86% higher engagement.

For most marketers, a primary goal of your social media efforts is to drive people back to your website. Including links back to the site is an obvious way to do this. Think of a hub and spoke – where your website is the hub and you are reaching out to engage and share information via the spokes.

6. Use Hashtags (but only 1 or 2)

Tweets with hashtags gets twice the engagement of those without. This gives users context for your posts and allows them to quickly see related tweets.

Be sure to keep your hashtags to 1 or 2 – at 3 or more hashtags, you see 17% drop in engagement.

7. Include Images

Posts with images have double the engagement as those without.

People love visuals, especially in social media – so take advantage of this and include photos when you can!

Shameless Plug

If you aren’t already, follow us on Twitter @Schipul and @Tendenci for more on web marketing resources and the latest updates from our company, clients, and community!

Happy Tweeting!

2012-10-082014-11-02

Social Media Breakfast – Houston presents

Amiko Kauderer on Social Media — Amiko Kauderer explains how she started NASA’s social media

As a Semi-new Schipulite, I attended The Social Media Breakfast Club which met up at Canopy (Mmmm) last month. Guest speaker Amiko Kauderer talked about the beauty of social media, and how to get your company involved in connecting with the world to bring in brand awareness.

Amiko Kauderer works for the coolest U.S Government agency of all time: NASA. As the Social Media Lead and Web Manager, she is in charge of helping the NASA Johnson Space Center get their message across in today’s digital and social media world thru blogs, Facebook and Twitter.

Amiko applied her 14+ years of experience to get NASA social media skeptics to change their minds and have astronauts open up to the world thru a series of strategic steps. Below are my personal favorite points she mentioned on how you can get your company ready for a Social Media Blast Off.

Getting your company to say Yes to Social Media:

Phase 1: Get your Key people on board First.
Most new concepts or phases of a company tend to be met with skepticism, so getting your key people to say yes to social media is invaluable. Most doors open up and it is less likely for others to question your decisions when big names back you up.
Phase 2: Respect the company’s privacy policy.
As obvious as this seems, it is worth repeating. Some information is appropriate to share, some is not. Letting your company know you will respect their opinion and privacy is important when it comes to gaining their trust, and ultimately open up the gates to communication.
Phase 3: Make it a trend amongst the company.
Never underestimate the force of competitiveness in an office setting and how it can push others to try new things. Once Amiko got one astronaut to tweet (thru lots of begging and pleading) the others quickly followed and wanted to become part of something new.
Phase 4: The Basics of Tweeting
Make sure you take the time to teach your astronauts (or coworkers) the basics of tweeting or posting on Facebook. Amiko wasn’t really talking about the step by step process of Tweeting, but more about a set of guidelines such as relax and be yourself and don’t get too technical because you might confuse others. Last but not least, have fun with how you interact with others like the “NASA Mohawk guy” Bobak Ferdowsi, who would tweet his various hairstyles designed in accordance with the missions he worked on.
Phase 5: Designate a team to keep your posts up to date and engaging to your audience.
It is important to keep your social media posts up to date, creative and engaging, but doing so can prove to be challenging even when it is a full time job. If you don’t have the budget to hire someone, finding people in your company who are media savvy and willing to help should be your best bet.

This Friday is the next meeting of the Social Media Breakfast Club! The topic is making video work with Social Media. More event details here!

*We appreciate SMBC Houston and Amiko Kauderer for this great event, for more pictures please refer to the Tendenci link below*

Check out all of the photos on our website! Social Media Breakfast Club with NASA JSC Social Media and Web Manager Amiko Kauderer

2012-10-042014-11-02

Netsquared September Events: Boost Online Fundraising with Social Media and Wading into Your Online Community Data

This September, I doubled-up on my dosage of “Do-Good Geekery” with back to back Tuesdays at Netsquared events. First, I helped organize the Houston September meetup and then I added a trip ‘Down Under’ to speak at the Melbourne Netsquared in Australia. Here’s my recap from both events, plus links to extra goodies including presentation decks, a resource guide for getting your social media strategy created and driving fundraising dollars through your website, and of course, tons of “Aussie-ome” photos from Australia!

NET2 Tuesday in Houston

Houston Netsquared

The September Houston Netsquared meetup had guest speakers from the Houston CleanWeb Hackathon and Sustainable Houston. Both of these organizations are newly formed nonprofits and are working to grow their community here in Houston around finding ways to make our city more sustainable and “Green”. Our featured presenters, Rosalind Wyatt and Ahshia Berry, shared best practices and tips to utilizing the online data that nonprofits collect from their websites and social networks to create engaging and useful case studies, reports, and other online content. Roz and Ahshia also shared the hurdles Sustainable Houston has faced with their web technology needs, including the value of a geo-location app that would allow Houstonians easily find member organizations that were nearby.

The Presentation Deck

Wading into the Data – Houston Netsquared September 2012 Presentation

Roz and Ahshia also have shared a great follow-up post on the Netsquared.org blog that gives you some tips and resources for analyzing your online data so head over to http://netsquared.org/blog/wading-data-houston-netsquared-september-recap and keep on reading!

Melbourne Netsquared – Social Media and Fundraising FTW

The morning after Houston Netsquared, I hopped on a plane and headed out to Melbourne, Australia where I had the rare honor of being the Melbourne Netsquared guest speaker. My presentation shared insights into how some nonprofits are successfully increasing their online fundraising through the use of social media networks and how other organizations could translate these success stories into actionable campaigns for their own nonprofit. I’m often asked by both nonprofits and for-profits here in the U.S. how they can generate more revenue and leads from social media marketing. It turns out that Australian nonprofits struggle with many of the same challenges that U.S. nonprofits have, with a couple of key distinctions:

Aussie NPO’s have far more social media profiles than most U.S. NPO’s. In Melbourne, the questions expanded beyond just “how to use Twitter, Facebook, and/or LinkedIn” to include a variety of other networks: Pinterest, Google Plus, YouTube, Vimeo, Flickr, etc.
Aussie NPO’s are currently struggling to follow new government regulations on what to do and not to do while engaging on social networks. These regulations present a management challenge that U.S. NPO’s don’t have.

I found it interesting to hear how Aussie nonprofits had similar questions to what I normally hear from my clients and peers here in the United States about how to use social media including things like: engagement best practices, use cases, and managing all of the real time conversations with a limited staff and budget. The Melbourne nonprofits also asked how to figure out which of the channels they could “cull” and how to know what channels would be most effective. My best answer to identifying the best social networks to engage with depends on a number of factors that your social media strategy helps you determine, with the big three factors consisting of:

Learning where your target audience engages most
Finding out who the influencers for your industry are
Determining your resources, including staff, for managing social media campaigns

Find out more about creating a social media strategy for your nonprofit in our new Social Media Strategy Resource Guide: https://www.tendenci.com/social-strategy and here’s my presentation deck from Melbourne Netsquared.

The Secret to Increasing Your NPO’s Online Donations using Social Media

Melbourne’s Best Kept Secret

I was out in Australia to share the “secrets” of incorporating social media and fundraising programs and came back with one of Melbourne’s secrets. The Australians pronounce Melbourne like: “Mel-bin“. I want to send a huge Thank You to Leanne O’Donnell and Richenda Vermeulen – the Melbourne Netsquared organizers! Leanne and Richenda provided me with so much information and support leading up to the presentation and I had a blast switching roles at a Netsquared from organizer to speaker.

Photos and More!

Join us at the Houston Netsquared October 9th event and learn more about making digital videos for your nonprofit: http://meetup.com/NET2Houston and come over to the Houston Netsquared’s Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/NET2Houston to share your ideas and ask questions. Here’s the photos to the Houston Netsquared September Meetup: https://www.tendenci.com/photos/set/41/ Check out photos from Sarah M Worthy’s Melbourne Netsquared Presentation: https://www.tendenci.com/photos/set/43/ Find more photos from Melbourne Australia: http://flic.kr/s/aHsjC7ZXme Find the latest webinar recording and presentation on Lessons on Website Management online: https://www.tendenci.com/website-management

2012-09-252014-11-02

Trend Tuesday: Social Media & Design Evolution (and Twitter’s Latest Update)

Social Media Tools Continue to Evolve

Social media is always evolving. Aside from new tools being introduced constantly, established players are tirelessly innovating and adding new features, tools, and settings to stay ahead of the technology curve (i.e. this year’s Facebook timeline profile design overhaul).

Some of those changes are functional, some are aesthetic, and some are sort of… both.

Last week, Twitter implemented one of these such changes.

Twitter Adds Cover Photos Header Photos to Profiles!

So let’s get to one of the recent changes we’ve seen in Social Media tools this week that follow this idea. Similar to Facebook’s profile update earlier this year with the addition of a Cover Photo, Twitter has enhanced user profiles with its own version called a Header Photo.

How to Add Your Own Twitter Cover Photo

Implementing a header design to your profile is easy:

Step 1 – Under Settings, click “Edit Profile” and then choose the Design Tab

Step 2 – Scroll down to where yo see the word “header” and click “Change Header” to upload your image

Step 3 – Adjust your image placement and cropping and click “Save”

VoilÃ ! Your Profile is updated!

More Twitter Headline Resources:

From Mashable: 4 Quick Tips for a Better Twitter Header
From Hubspot: Twitter Rolls Out Cover Photos – How to Add Yours Today

“Design, more than anything else, has led to the success of Mint” – Aaron Patzer

So why does it matter? A few years ago, I had the privilege to see Aaron Patzer speak at SXSW Interactive. Aaron is the founder of Mint.com, the fantastically easy to use budgeting/personal finance website that I love (and is now owned by Intuit).

The main thing I walked away with from that talk is the importance of design and visuals in a complex web application like Mint. I pull these quotes from Aaron from my notes of the session, illustrating this concept:

“When you come to Mint, it’s beautiful and it puts you at ease.”
“Mint makes finances friendly.”
“When you have a comfortable website, people trust you inherently”

And perhaps most notable: … “Design, more than anything else, has led to the success of Mint”

The Importance of Visuals in Social Media (And All Web Applications!)

Those are powerful words – and I see a similar evolution in Social Media applications. Many of the tools we use every day were not the first of their kind to do what they do – there were photo sharing sites before Instagram and microblogging platforms before Pinterest. But those that are “winning” are applying visual elements better than anyone else. So it makes sense that the developers of these tools constantly test and mold the visual elements of their applications to continue to push them forward. And I, for one, can’t wait to see what comes next!

2012-04-272014-11-02

Southwest Airlines: Nuts About Social Media!

Southwest Airlines: Nuts About Social Media!

This week, Katrina Esco, Caitlin Kaluza and I had the distinct pleasure of attending IABC’s Southwest Airlines: Nuts About Social Media Luncheon at Brennan’s.

It was my first time at Brennan’s, one of Houston’s most prestigious restaurants (and also a Schipul client). The atmosphere was very formal, but the speaker, Brooks Thomas (@brooksethomas) of Southwest Airlines (@SouthwestAir) Emerging Media team was quite exuberant and quickly made it an entertaining afternoon of knowledge sharing.

Brooks serves as the Managing Editor for the Nuts About Southwest, their award winning blog that gives a voice to the employees and customers of Southwest. He began his presentation on the evolution of storytelling and how our society has formed so many platforms of expression: phone calls, texting, emails, Facebook, Twitter, and so many more. All age groups are getting in on this social media frenzy, including 50-something -year-olds (they’re the fastest growing group of users beeteedubs). And social media is literally at our fingertips; 40% of social media users access it through their phones.

Who should be writing the stories?

I’m glad you asked. Every employee has the opportunity to be a reporter. This way you can create a sort of “corporate newsroom” with in your company. He shares, “Empower your employees to have a voice and compelling stories will happen.”

Browse for content everywhere. You never know where a great story could come from. Your field employees can be pitchers, facilitators and reporters. This comes easier with an established internal communications team, education in storytelling, and empowering your people.

The blog basics of storytelling and creating compelling content that people actually want to read according to Brooks (also the title of his upcoming book. Not really. But it should be.):

Present an idea
Determine the media you’ll use
Establish a timeline so people will know when to expect the story
Be available to assist

I especially agreed with his point, “It’s a lot easier to catch a story when you’re ahead of it.”

AKA: Be prepared! Know your plans. Know what’s visual. Know your time frame. If you have a store opening coming up, get those cameras there to record it, tell people about it to get them to come, know when and where everything is happening so that you are READY when the time comes and you can get the best possible coverage of that story.

“We are story telling and everyone has a story. It is your job to find out what’s compelling on a day to day basis,” he said.

Also, to stay organized; keep your content rolling; and post on schedule, create an editorial calendar and set at least 2 weekly times to post so your customers have something to see on a regular basis. No more than 4 franchise posts a week because that’s when it gets too difficult to keep up with.

Hearing from Brooks and how Southwest Airlines manages their online presence and relationships with consumers was inspiring, to say the least. It’s easy to get caught up in tools and technology, but Brooks didn’t delve into that. His focus remained on the content and the people — it was about the stories and how we relate to one another.

It was a great afternoon of laughter and learning about why Southwest is such a powerful presence in the social media world and blogosphere.

We want to thank IABC Houston for another great event and Southwest Airlines for sending a great speaker who loves what he does (it shows!)

Schipulites and Brooks Thomas at IABC Luncheon — We had a great time! Thanks, Brooks! *Jazz Hands!*

More good news? IABC Houston has these events monthly so check out IABC’s upcoming events!

2012-01-022014-11-02

2012 New Year’s Resolutions Your Website Wants You to Make

Your Organization’s Online Brand relies on providing a positive, interactive experience for your customers on your website. Your website needs to be timely, relevant, engaging and easy to find and navigate to meet the needs of your customers and members. This year, make a resolution to give your website a little more love and your website and your customers will thank you.

Here are our top New Year’s Web Resolutions for you to create a great online customer experience and grow your brand in 2012.

1. Optimize for Mobile

Mobile search and web browsing is going to be critical to being found on the web. It is estimated that nearly 36% of the U.S. now owns a mobile device and more than 80% of of small business owners are smartphone owners as well.

What this means to you is that there is a very good chance your site visitors are using a mobile device to search for and browse your website. Pull out your smartphone or iPad and go to your website. Spend some time trying to access different articles and content from your mobile and think about how this experience compares to the traditional experience from a typical desktop PC. If you are frustrated from the experience – imagine how your site visitors feel.

Now, search Google using one of your keyword phrases from a mobile device and see where you rank. Over the next few months, even high-ranking websites may see a rank decrease from mobile searches if they haven’t enabled user agent-detection for specific devices. Google just introduced Googlebot-Mobile, a new search engine crawler that specifically looks for mobile type CSS that triggers a mobile stylesheet custom for individual users’ devices. Someone browsing the web from their iPad is going to have a different experience than someone from their Android smartphone. Google ranks mobile websites based on factors such as usability, speed, features, and overall performance.

Get started with this web-resolution and register and attend our Free 2012 Search Engine Marketing New Year’s Checklist webinar this Thursday to learn how to optimize your website for mobile search in the New Year.

2. Don’t Forget About the Technical Stuff

As the internet has become more widely adopted by the general public, websites have become easier to set-up and maintain with less technical know-how required. There are some technical truths that still hold true and taking the time to understand these facts of the web this year will help you improve your customers’ online experience.

There’s no such thing as an “Out-of-the-Box” website. All websites require customization like naming menu buttons, adding a logo and graphics, changing the color scheme to match your organization’s branding, and adding content that tells visitors who you are and what you do. All of this takes time and is an ongoing process even after your website is launched live. Your website will look very different day-to-day from the initial set-up to “Go-Live” day.

Where you host your website does matter. Your website requires a host that stores your content, CMS software, and other data on enterprise-level computer hardware (servers and hard disk arrays) connected to the internet with high capacity bandwidth making your website accessible online to anyone who visits your website url. Nowadays, this typically means a cloud environment like Amazon Web Services which offers security, expandable storage and bandwidth when your site experiences unexpected spikes in traffic, and a dedicated IT staff available 24/7 to maintain, update, and repair the infrastructure hosting your website.

Learn more about the Cloud in this great video from SchipulCon 2011 and learn more about website CMS platforms in our free upcoming webinar “How to Select the Best Website CMS for Your Organization’s Website.”

3. Improve What’s Inside Your Website – Content!

You have a beautifully designed website that takes visitors’ breath away when they stop by – but have you focused on developing and implementing a content strategy that communicates to your visitors who you are and what you do once their breath returns?

Great content is relevant to your visitors and is also what attracts search engine crawlers to boost your website’s search rankings. Content isn’t limited to just text anymore either. Add photos from recent events, upload digital training and product videos, and integrate your social media accounts with your website to give your website visitors a full view into your organization’s online brand.

January is the perfect time to go through your website and review existing articles, news releases, and other content and make sure your latest press releases isn’t from 1996. Look at your website through the eyes of your visitors and think about what is not being communicated about your organization that should be and make a list of these items. Tip: Create a weekly schedule to write new content on these topics in 2012 and you’ll see an increase in your site traffic as well as your search engine rankings.

Learn more great ways to improve your website’s 2012 Content Strategy on the SEM blog and register and attend our Free upcoming webinar “Writing for the Web” to improve your website’s content this year.

Tools for Successfully Keeping Your Web-Resolutions

Here are a few more tools and resources we’ve put together to help you succeed:

Send us your questions and come hang out with us at our Houston Headquarters or Silicon Valley, California office!

2011-11-18

Our Favorite Facebook Pages

Some of us at Schipul spend a lot of time on Facebook. A LOT. But don’t judge, it’s totally part of our job. Whether we’re sprucing up a profile picture for a client, building out an iframe, checking out the latest Facebook updates (and there’s ALWAYS an update) or trolling to see who’s doing what with their audience, this social networking site commands a good deal of our attention. As such, we’ve seen it all when if comes to the best and worst of Facebook fan pages. Check out the faves from some of the Schipul staff:

Katrina’s Favorites

No surprise here. Our fashionista/Creative Services Team Account Executive, Katrina Esco, LOVES how Nordstrom uses their Facebook page to highlight their services, and they keep fans coming back with beauty how-to videos hosted by their beauty director using a Beauty Central app.

Katrina also gives Sephora’s Facebook page props for always keeping their content fresh with new promotions as demonstrated on their Exclusive Deals tab. But Katrina gives Sephora the most points for recognizing the importance of photos and fan engagement on their page by feeding in customer pics taken in photobooths installed in select retail locations. You can even browse by location and date.

Scooter’s Favorites

As for me (Katrina *Scooter* Kokoska), I get a kick out of the Skittles Facebook fan page. And to be perfectly honest, I don’t like the candy even a little, just their marketing. The Skittles page encourages fan engagement by soliciting fan photos and featuring a different “Rainbro of the Week” each week as their profile picture. Also, their posts are random, silly and make me smile (and their not self-promotional). My favorite random post from them this week: “Sometimes I sneak up on my alarm clock when it’s sleeping and yell ‘How does it feel!‘”

I also have mad love for the (client) Tony Chachere’s page. Now this page doesn’t flaunt a lot of bells and whistles. Why? Because it doesn’t have to. Tony’s skips the games and apps and gets right down to what Facebook is all about: Community. They post content about real people doing real things in real life, and their fans love it.

Erica’s Favorites

Creative Services Team Graphic Designer, Erica Bogdan, totally digs Red Bull’s Facebook page for their fun videos and games, and loves the aesthetics of the Anthropologie page because: “It’s sooooo beautiful and makes my closet sad.” But Erica’s favorite page? Franklin the Dog of course.

Garrett’s Favorites

Creative Services Team Assistant Account Executive Garrett Thomas has some interesting favorites of his own. While he doesn’t ‘Facebook like’ the Barbie page, he thinks they do a great job of bringing together Barbie’s multiple personas in a palatable format for their target market.

And he loves the Stride Gum page because, well, who doesn’t love a Yeti with a sense of humor?

What are some of your favorite Facebook fanpages?

2011-11-172014-11-02

Tapping into human motivations for Social Media success

Humans motivations that drive Social Media success

View more presentations from Katie Laird

Ed and I had the opportunity to speak to a great group of nonprofit professionals at the 2011 Power Tools For Nonprofits conference in Houston, TX this week.

Our topic touched on ways nonprofits can view their online marketing strategy differently by exploring their audience’s motivations and tapping into them throughout a campaign or network content activity for maximum impact.

If you haven’t read it, Ed’s article ‘3 Motivations of People: Material, Social and Ideological‘ is a great read — although with this presentation he offered up a fourth motivation: FEAR.

It’s amazing how fear (both individually and as a population) can control our actions. Whether it’s holding off on a big purchase, switching banks, seeking stress release opportunities and more, it truly is a driving factor in our daily decision making.

Nonprofit groups can leverage this fearful motivation by pointing out what could happen without an audience’s support (no dinner for a local family) or what is currently happening as they read / watch / Tweet (rainforest demolition) – but we’re quick to encourage using your influence for good on the Web to also help paint a more positive picture with a more balanced approach.

Talking candidly about the big scary issues is important, but don’t forget the value of connecting through social, material and ideological motivations too!

You can see all of our slides here on Slideshare and be sure to connect with us on Twitter with questions and comments: @eschipul and @happykatie

2011-11-082014-11-02

Three Awesome Social Media for Nonprofits Tips

298508_282920165072633_196928427005141_954938_2087709913_n — Crowd at Social Media for Nonprofits

Judging from the packed house at the San Francisco stop on the Social Media for Nonprofits Conference tour; organizations are still looking for best practices and new ways to connect with volunteers and donors online. And for those Bay Area nonprofits lucky enough to attend the event, they got some fantastic advice that they could put to use right away. I am always delighted to attend an event with concrete steps attendees can use, and so as to not keep all the goodies for myself, here’s three things that really stood out to me for a nonprofit trying to connect via social media.

Tip 1: Don’t Try To Be Everywhere

You’ve no doubt run in to this – with so many different social media spaces out there, which ones should your organization be on? All of them, right?! No. It’s just not practical, and it also can make it difficult for your constituents to connect with you online if they’re not entirely sure where to go. A great example of this came from Christina Samala, the online community manager for the Story of Stuff [which, by the way, has a new movie out today – The Story of Broke]. Since most of their community is on Facebook, that’s where they spend most of their social media time. It wouldn’t make sense to take away from that in order to throw time at other outlets that the community isn’t engaged in. As Christina suggested; think of your organization as a person – how would that person talk and where would it hang out? Who would it hang out with? It sounds a little hokey, but it’s a great way to make sure your nonprofit is communicating with the right people and in the right way.

Tip 2: Volunteers are Where It’s At

I know. Sounds like a total “DUH” moment, right? But I was amazed to hear the stats behind volunteers and donations. Did you know that 2/3 of volunteers donate to the organizations they work with, and when they do they donate TEN TIMES that of a non-volunteer? Getting your volunteers engaged can have a huge impact on your organization. The three R’s for volunteer engagement, from Greg Baldwin of VolunteerMatch, are Recruit, Retain, and Recognize. A great way to do all three online is via the Johnson & Johnson &you widget. This is a neat little tool that will allow you to bring in your volunteer opportunities, events, and news and display them on Facebook or your website. (Innov8Social has a list of some other great tools to check out). And social media gives you a great way to recognize your volunteers and donors – you’ll be amazed at what a little shout-out will do for a volunteer’s spirits!

Tip 3: Close the Loop

This is a phrase Schipulites are well familiar with! It’s not just for letting someone know when you’ve completed a task – it’s also for letting your supporters know when you’ve reached a fundraising goal. Everyone wants to be part of a winning team, and when you set realistic and specific goals (like, “We want to raise $2,000 to buy a new computer for our classroom”) you’ll find that people are more likely to get involved and get you there. When you then share with the world your success, you’ll find that those who were a part of it will get hooked on that feeling – and will come back again and again. I think often nonprofits are always moving to the next goal and next event, and we sometimes forget to update on previous efforts. If you put out a call to action for donations or volunteer help, be sure to close the loop with your community and let them know a goal was reached and how it’s impacting others.

The Social Media for Nonprofits Conference may be coming to a city near you – so check it out online! And if not, don’t despair – slides from all the presentations are up online and following the hashtag #sm4np is a great way to virtually attend a future event. And we want to hear from you! If you’re working with a nonprofit – volunteer or staff – tell us, what are some of your favorite ways to connect online?

Photos courtesy of Social Media for Nonprofits / Jim Vetter Photography