As we close in on the start of the new year, many nonprofits in Alaska are anticipating the 2010 Permanent Fund Dividend for good reason. This will be the second year that Alaskans will be able to check off one or several nonprofit organizations to support with a portion of their PFD when they apply online. Even $25 can make an incredible impact on the lives o Alaskans, especially if everyone picks, clicks and gives. Just see what Red Cross of Alaska, CASA, Wish Upon the North Star and Alzheimer's Resource of Alaska have been able to do with your contributions this past year.

This is also the second year that the Pick. Click. Give. awareness campaign is using social media to draw attention to the Permanent Fund Charitable Contributions Program.

In addition to the Pick. Click. Give. blog, there is also a presence for the campaign on Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, YouTube and CauseCast which is a cause-related video sharing site.

There are several things that Alaska nonprofits - and any nonprofits - can learn from using social media for awareness campaigns.

There are several takeaways for nonprofits from a social media standpoint:

1. You Can Be Targeted. Social media can be effective as not only a global or national communications tool but can also be calibrated to be hyper-local and even hyper-rural. For smaller nonprofits whose scope doesn't reach beyond a state or a region or a town, social media can still prove useful and can be that finely targeted.

2. You Need to Pick the Right Tools. Not every social media tool is right for every nonprofit or every campaign. And you don't always start out picking the right ones, but as long as you monitor, measure and assess results from each, you can eventually zero in on the right ones. Even Pick. Click. Give. started out using a number of additional social media tools that eventually proved less useful in reaching Alaskans so we pared down this year to focus more energy on fewer, more effective tools. Holding onto MySpace was possible because it takes less resources to maintain than Facebook or Twitter. Holding onto Twitter even though the numbers may be smaller is a strategic move to be ready for the 3rd year of this program when more Alaskans will be used to Twitter communications. Twitter is still an excellent traffic-driver even before true interaction and engagement sets in.

3. You Must Coordinate Efforts. Social media tools can be linked together and coordinated in such a fashion that they can be utilized with a very small staff. Last year, one person ran the bulk of social media efforts in a few hours a week. This year, we are lucky to have one additional person devoted to social media a few hours a week and have better internal coordination with our project partners such as Rasmuson Foundation and the Nerland Agency (the ad agency that developed the programs brand and the PSAs). Social media cannot exist in a vacuum. All stakeholders in a campaign or project must be willing to keep social media top of mind and to keep the social media team in the loop in any marketing or communications discussion. And the social media team needs to know how to make the right noises at the right times to be noticed and not forgotten.

As Jordan Marshall of Rasmuson Foundation so eloquently put it, "The beauty of Pick. Click. Give. may be that it reminds people that they can make a big difference in peoples’ lives, so when they get the ask from the nonprofits they’re more inclined to act."

And that, too, is the beauty of using social media to remind people that the causes we are working to support truly matter to real people. People reaching out to and connecting with people. You can make a difference.

Pick. Click. Give.

How is your nonprofit using social media to reach out and connect?

If you haven't been there yet, The Foraker Group now has a Facebook Page at http://www.facebook.com/theforakergroup. If you are a member of Facebook, feel free to become a Fan of our Page. We're beginning to integrate social media into our communications to continue to provide timely and useful resources for our Partners and all Alaskans.

What is a Facebook Page?

Because The Foraker Group is an organization, we've set up a presence on Facebook - the most popular social network on the Internet - using a Facebook Page. A Page on Facebook is different from a Profile which you as an individual might have as a Facebook member. Pages are for companies, organizations, products, celebrities and other entities or individuals wanting a more professional presence on Facebook.

Some organizations - including many in Alaska - have set up Profiles instead of Pages. They may have done this a year or so ago when Pages weren't as prevalent, and they have probably built a large friends list over time. Unfortunately, if an organization has a Facebook Profile instead of a Facebook Page, they are at risk of losing the content and contacts they've accumulated because they are in violation of Faceboook's Terms of Service i.e. the fine print in your Facebook user agreement. Facebook regularly disables Facebook Profiles that they deem a violation of their rules.

You can immediately tell the difference between a Facebook Page and a Facebook Profile because Pages have Fans while Profiles have Friends.

An important difference between a Facebook Page and a Facebook Profile is that a Page is publicly accessible to people who are not members of Facebook so it becomes a powerful Web presence for your organization that shows up in Google Searches. Facebook Profiles are only accessible by your Facebook Friends which means someone must be a member of Facebook and then send you a Friend request (which you must accept) in order to interact with your organization through your Profie.

Benefits of Using Facebook Pages

How can your organization benefit from a Facebook Page? Many nonprofits are limited in budgets and resources for outreach to constituents, donors, the media and the public. While a web site can serve as an effective destination for an organization, many people these days consider web sites as places for background and archived information rather than an active and dynamic communications tool.

Also the money and time costs of designing, building and maintaining a web site can be a burden, particularly if an organization's site was not designed with an easy-to-use content management system. Many nonprofit organizations are saddled with outdated web sites where they are at the mercy of Web developers for even the most simple updates.

Other organizations use their web sites as repositories of information, for a list of services, to house a calendar of events, but when it comes to outreach, they are relying on an electronic newsletter - or even a print newsletter - to get the word out about their organization and important events. These days, a web site by nature is too static - and often too overloaded with information - to serve as a consistent outreach tool for shorter, more frequent messages.

While a blog is a useful tool to publish content more frequently, a blog can also be a burden on an organization's resources if they aren't equipped to publish content on a very regular basis.

A Facebook Page doesn't demand the same kind of content publishing and is instead a more conversational resource where shorter bits of information - usually with a link to additional information - is the norm.

Using a Facebook Page Effectively

At the very minimum, here are a few things you should do with your Facebook Page:

1. Connect your blog to Page. If you have one, add your blog's RSS feed URL to the Notes section of your Facebook Page so when you post to your blog, it automatically updates your Page.

2. Add Facebook Events. If you hold events, particularly regularly occuring events, you can use the Facebook Events feature to augment your Page. The Events tool integrates with your Page, and you can use it to spread the word about classes, meetings, etc. using a tool that makes it easy for others to invite their own Facebook friends to your event.

3. Link to Resources. While Status Updates can be intimidating for some people, updating your Facebook Page doesn't have to be hard. Connecting your blog updates your Page status as does adding new events. You can also post links to relevant resources including those on your organization's web site as well as others on the Web.

4. Respond to Comments. As you gather more Fans on your Page, people may start commenting on your Status Updates. A quick response is always appreciated and helps strengthen relationships. Your response doesn't have to be long - just an answer to a question or acknowledgement of what they've said. While it is important to interact with your Page Fans, don't feel obligated to respond to every single comment, but don't ignore them all either.

Facebook Pages are easy to set up and easier to maintain than a web site or blog. They also give you a direct communications channel to the people who you serve or who you want to reach with important messages about your organization. And when one person interacts with your Facebook Page, that action can be seen by dozens or even hundreds of their Facebook Friends giving your organization an instant and exponential reach beyond your own contacts.

Does your organization have a Facebook Page? If so, please include a link to it here so we can visit it!

In the old days, a blog was a place to post a list of links to other web sites, sometimes with commentary to give some context to the list, hence the term Web Logs or Blogs. Today, a blog can be the hub to your entire social media efforts, a place where you can link to your pages on social networking sites and accounts with other social networking tools.

While The Foraker Group dips a toe into the social media waters, we're using our blog as

• a place to draw attention toward important articles and resources on The Foraker Group web site;
• a place to comment on and link to interesting news stories regarding nonprofit issues;
• a place to provide perspectives on the use of social media tools by nonprofits;
• a place where we can hear from you to learn about your opinions on issues we blog about or on ones that you're facing.

It's the last objective where we need your help and participation. A blog can be an incredible community-builder, however, someone needs to be brave enough to come out from the shadows and not just read but respond. We know you're out there (our blog stats show an average of 100 readers per blog post).

Now's the time to introduce yourself. We'd like to turn this blog into a powerful community where we each have the opportunity to voice our opinions and tell our stories. This is not a broadcast medium.

What's on your mind as someone working with or within a nonprofit organization?

Recently, we created a Facebook Page for The Foraker Group to explore the value of social media specifically as a communications tool throughout Alaska particularly for people working with Alaska nonprofit organizations as well as our Partners.

There are several things to note about the Page and the use of Facebook for communications:

1. Page Not Profile. Facebook Pages are tools that companies and nonprofit organizations can build to create a presence on Facebook. People can then show their support or interest by becoming a fan of the Page.

Note: Nonprofit organizations are not supposed to create Profiles on Facebook according to Facebook rules. If you have a Facebook account, then you have set up a Profile. Some organizations have incorrectly set up Profiles for their organizations instead of Pages and run the risk of having their accounts suspended by Facebook which means losing all the "Friend" connections and content.

2. Blog Feed. The Foraker Group is feeding its blog posts into the Facebook Page so you can now read this content in multiple platforms including on the blog itself, on the Foraker Facebook Page or by subscribing to the blog's feed (there are subscription options towards the middle of this blog page).

3. Events. We'll post The Foraker Group calendar events to the Facebook Events feature so you can also access information about upcoming classes and events from your Facebook account.

Note: By saying you'll attend on the Facebook Event Page does not confirm your reservation for the class or event. It simply notifies your friends on Facebook of an interesting event you are attending. You still must register via The Foraker Group web site as usual.

4. Discussion. There is a Discussion link at the top of the Foraker Facebook Page where you can click to start or join in on a conversation. We're testing out the value of an online discussion forum so feel free to leave some comments there.

If you're using Facebook, we hope you'll become a Fan of The Foraker Group Facebook Page to help us explore this new communications asset.

If you are using Facebook, what are you using it for specifically?

Are you always on the go? Do you have a long commute and want to spend that time learning something new? You might want to try podcasts. Podcasts are basically downloadable audio files, often in the format of a radio show with a host, sometimes guests, and in the case of nonprofit podcasts, timely and helpful information about issues of interest to nonprofits and philanthropic organizations.

Most well-produced and popular podcasts are under 30 minutes in length although some are longer and still others are under 10 minutes. You can listen to podcasts on the Web, however, the ideal way is to download the MP3 files onto your computer and load into your MP3 listening device like an iPod. A great source of weekly free podcasts is iTunes.

Here are some podcasts that might be of interest to anyone working at or with nonprofit organizations:

Philanthropy This Week - A new audio offering by The Chronicle of Philanthropy covering nonprofit news with expert guest views.

Social Good - Allison Fine offers her nonprofit consulting expertise and interviews guests (also offered by The Chronicle of Philanthropy).

Social Media Goodness - The Foraker Group communications consultant Aliza Sherman (your humble blogger), talks about the basics of social media geared toward nonprofits.

Craigslist Foundation Nonprofit Boot Camp - Based on workshops given by the Craigslist Foundation to discuss nonprofit issues with a lot of expert advice.

Conquering Nonprofit Chaos - Author Bradley Burck breaks down concepts from his book of the same name.

What are your favorite podcasts that can be helpful to nonprofit organizations and their staff, volunteers and board?

Here's an interesting survey worth taking. Hopefully they will do a geographical breakdown and we can get some stats on Alaska nonprofits.
 

The Nonprofit Social Network Survey is a joint project of NTEN, Common Knowledge and The Port.

This survey seeks to understand how NONPROFITS are using online social networks. In the first section, we ask about your organization's work with commercial social networking and social media sites. The survey asks whether your organization hosts your own social network on your website using specialized software.

The survey takes about 10 minutes to complete. The survey results will be analyzed and announced at the NTEN Nonprofit Technology Conference in late April 2009. The survey is confidentiality, and your responses are completely anonymous.

Trendwatching recently came out with a report titled "Generation G: That would be G for 'Generosity,' not Greed." The premise of this report is that "Giving is the new taking" and "sharing is the new giving." Giving is growing as a national mindset which dovetails nicely with our newfound social media skills of giving, sharing, engaging and collaborating.

Some reasons cited in the report for the shift in thinking and acting is the recession and consumer disgust over the current financial meltdown. Consumers want to identify institutions that care. And while the report is geared toward the commercial business and how to tap into this shift, nonprofits are poised to benefit greatly even during bad economic times.

Today's individual is empowered by communications, publishing, sharing and engagement tools like never before. Whether they are creating Facebook Causes and inviting their 100+ friends to join them in supporting a cause (including soliciting donations in some cases) or extolling the virtues of their favorite nonprofit to their 1000s of Twitter followers, social media is the fan on the fires of giving and peer influence to join in.

Read more about Trendwatches report here and view a slideshow about Generosity as the Future of Marketing.

How are you tapping into this generous state of mind to benefit your nonprofit or cause? Or are you not even in the social mediasphere yet to connect with individuals with the interest and wherewithall to give?

When it comes to marketing, nonprofits - like many companies - tend to go for the familiar. What do we know? What have we done in the past? Direct mail? Check. A print newsletter? Check. A fundraising event? Check.

Whether or not these tactics have actually been successful in the past, they tend to be the typical course of action. Even if they are not cost effective or time efficient, more often than not, everyone at an organization can at least agree on the statement "that's the way we've always done it."

Unfortunately, today's funders and constituents are no longer consuming their information in the same ways. Today's marketing tactics are not familiar. So how does a nonprofit with limited capacity get up to speed?

Social Media Marketing (SMM) - marketing through blogs, microblogs, social networks, podcasts, etc. - addresses several issues that nonprofits face as they evaluate programs and activities for their staff and volunteers.

1. Cost - How much is it going to cost us? We don't have the money for this.

2. Time - How much time is it going to take? We're all stretched to the limit.

3. Capacity - How many people are going to have to manage this? We're short-staffed.

Like any tools and tactics for marketing, nobody can say that social media marketing is free and takes little or no time. Every time you reach out to constituents or funders, there is an associated cost. Social Media Marketing doesn't erase that. But here is how SMM addresses marketing issues many nonprofits face.

1. Cost 

Assembling the tools you need to engage productively in social media marketing are more often than not free. There are free blogging tools such as Wordpress.com and Blogger.com. Almost all microblogs are free such as Tumblr and Twitter. Video sites such as YouTube are free to upload and host your videos. Utterli is a free solution to podcasting. So when it comes to costs, the tools are downright affordable.

The other cost often associated with SMM is consulting. Few nonprofits have staff on board who are familiar enough with social media to assemble an integrated social media toolset for the organization. Consultants in this area aren't cheap, however, those who work with nonprofit organizations are sensitive to cost and can develop a basic foundation of social media tools to get started for a reasonable price.

Ideas: Many nonprofits have staff members or volunteers who are very familiar with social media - and they might even be the teens or 20-somethings who tend to get overlooked when it comes to marketing initiatives. One of the biggest mistakes nonprofits can make today is to fail to tap into the digitally savvy young people in their circle. Elevating them to "Social Media Coordinator" could bring much needed knowledge and energy to the fore.

2. Time

Social Media Marketing takes time, there's no doubt about it. But does it have to be unmanageable madness? Of course not. If an organization takes the time or invests in a consultant's time to set up a compact set of social media tools - a blog, a microblog, and a handful of social networks or media sharing sites - they can immediately begin tapping into the conversations that are already happening online without them.

If all of those tools are integrated and inter-connected, then it will take even less effort to manage and maintain them.

Ideas: Make sure all social media accounts are set up using a single email address, preferably one dedicated to Social Media Marketing and not somebody's work or personal email. Managing emails is much easier when all social media correspondence and friend requests go into a single pool. Take advantage of email filters to more quickly sift through the emails that need to be addressed versus the ones that can simply be archived.

3.  Capacity

Part of the "capacity solution" was addressed in #1 - tapping into the resources you have but may be overlooking.

I know of an organization that has a 20-something person passionately engaged in social media and actively interested in helping with social media initiatives at work. However, the social media duties have been assigned to a person who is unfamiliar with the technologies and sites. While that person is a highly qualified marketing person who can engage in strategic thinking, they are uncomfortable with social media. Therefore, the organization has missed powerful opportunities to engage and grow their membership and increase their brand visibility because they've failed to tap into the right resources for the job.

Another way to address the capacity issue is to outsource the upkeep of SMM to a volunteer. With the proper setup and with clear written guidelines, a volunteer could be put to good use going through the organization's SMM email account and taking action where needed.

Social Media Marketing can be a cost-effective and time-efficient way to reach out to potential funders and constituents. Make sure you know your audience. Survey them to see if they have a MySpace page or Facebook account or if they Twitter or blog or even if they prefer email to regular mail. You'd be surprised how many people have shifted the way they want to hear from you, but you just haven't asked.

How are you changing the way you are reaching out to your funders? Your constituents?

Social Actions has come up with an initiative called the Change the Web 2009 Challenge.

From their blog: 

 What if the NYTime.com had a “Take Action” button next to every article – that, once clicked, displayed the best ways to take action inspired by that article? What if every popular website – from news sites to blogs to social networks -- included opportunities to make a difference. Change the Web 2009 seeks to inspire a movement to revolutionize the web – to realize a “philanthropic web” – where it will be super easy to find ways to take action no matter what website you're visiting.

The challenge is to build the best web applications "that embed opportunities to take action on the websites, blogs, and social networks that we already visit online."

Are you up to the challenge?

Read more...

And view their slideshow presentation about the initiative here:

Beth Kanter had a recent post on her blog titled "What's theopportunity cost when a nonprofit blocks employees from using social network sites during work hours? " This is a timely post because we recently had this discussion regarding The Foraker Group's lack of access to key social networking sites such as LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. The reason for the block isn't a Foraker policy but instead one of the organization's nonprofit third party provider.

There are clearly very good reasons not to let employees access social networks on the Web. The amount of time that could be wasted playing around with a Facebook account could cost any company or organization a great deal of productivity time.

Kanter spoke with Wendy Harman, who is responsible for social media strategies at the American Red Cross who said this about her job:

 Officially, it's 100% social media.  I truly believe that being present in an open, giving, and transparent way in spaces where your supporters are already spending their time will lead to a stronger loyalty to your mission. But, in this economic climate the Red Cross is certainly making more aggressive online marketing moves.

The Red Cross recently benefitted from a $50,000 donation that was leveraged by Facebook users. Clearly, social networks are a key driver of support and donations for the organization.

On the home front, The Foraker Group is helping to administer the Pick. Click. Give. campaign on behalf of the Giving Coalition. None of the organization's employees can access any of the key social media sites critical to the campaign. Because the block is part of a larger policy affecting an even larger number of employees across a number of organizations, the block isn't something that could be easily lifted.

However, it is worth thinking about the policies that dictate what sites to block when an organization is using social media for outreach. When used judiciously, social networks on the Web can be an enhancement to any strategic communications plan.

Read more of Harman's interview about the Red Cross blocking social networks.

Does your organization block MySpace, Facebook, Twitter and other social networks? If so, why? If not, how are you using social networks in your organization's strategic communications plan?