I was just on a call with fellow members of the Association for Healthcare Philanthropy folks when someone asked, “Does anyone here use Twitter or Facebook?”
It appeared I was the only one using social media for my nonprofit. Many wanted to, but their IT departments wouldn’t let them.
Twitter and Facebook and LinkedIn and YouTube are sites that are in the broad category of “social media.” Social media sites are sites that make it really easy for people to connect with other people. And social media sites often have made-up names or names with weird spelling like Plurk or Flickr. But the best part of all of these is: they’re free!
In a time when everyone’s being cost conscious and penny-pinching, I find it hard to believe that people wouldn’t be at least experimenting with free marketing sites!
Engaging in Conversations
As fundraisers, one of our primary responsibilities is to engage donors and prospective donors in conversations. We often do that by giving tours of our facility or taking people out for coffee. These will always remain important tools. But some of my colleagues are saying the current economic downturn is making it more difficult to get appointments.
Wouldn’t it be easier to engage donors in conversations they’re already having?
Millions of people are using sites like Facebook and Twitter. They’re using these sites for professional networking, for personal relationships, and even for sharing family photos to far flung family members, and for expressing their views on just about anything.
Our donors, board members, and local elected officials are using them too. So why wouldn’t we at least experiment with them?
These are ways we can engage in conversations at no additional cost to the organization. Moreover, as people join our “cause” on Facebook or tweet comments to us, their friends see their affiliation with our organization. Haven’t we all wanted more people to tell their friends about us? Or have our patients publically thank our hospital? If they join a page or cause on Facebook, they are. Their friends will see what they’re doing and may decide to check out our organization.
Professional Development
As professionals, these sites also become a terrific, low-cost way to access continuing education. Groups like the Association of Fundraising Professionals and the Association for Healthcare Philanthropy and publications like the Chronicle of Philanthropy and FundRaising Success have presences on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn.
A few months ago, I was writing a fundraising appeal and hit a major case of writer’s block. I know the postscript is the most important part of the letter but I wasn’t able to create a compelling one. So, in desperation, I tweeted “This PS sucks, can you help?” and included the P.S. Within minutes I had suggestions that were far better. And one person even asked me to send her my entire appeal to look over. Her edits made the letter even more compelling!
And as members of these professional groups attend conferences and seminars, an increasing number of them are sending updates while they’re in the session! We all saw this as congressmen and women tweeted during President Obama’s not-the-State-of-the-Union speech. If we aren’t able to be physically present, we can still use these tools to learn what others are learning.
All for free.
When I first joined Twitter, I started following a bunch of fellow fundraisers. We ask questions as issues come up during the day. Some of these fundraisers tweet from conferences their attending. They’ll often append their tweets with a label so it makes it easy to follow those threads. In one case, people thought I’d been at a conference in the UK simply because I replied to tweets from conference attendees!
It’s not Twitter, it’s the Relationships, Stupid
It’s so easy to get enamored with new technology. But it’s not about the tools. It’s not about obsessing over Twitter or Facebook. Social media sites allow you to extend conversations with donors, build stronger relationships between them and your organization, listen to what others are saying about your cause or your organization, and meet colleagues for training and for real-time help. And it’s free.
Who wouldn’t want a free tool that offered all that?
Finally, even if we’re not experimenting with these tools, our donors are. More and more donors are finding ways to use social media to raise funds for their favorite causes. And most of these folks aren’t “asking permission,” they’re just doing it. Wouldn’t we all want donors like that?!
So even if Twitter or Facebook aren’t your cup of tea, it’s good to be familiar with the lingo and methods. That way when a donor starts one of these fundraising drives, you’ll be able to help her out rather than take up lots of time asking her what she’s talking about.
Hopefully I’ve convinced you to at least experiment with using social media for your nonprofit, and helped your IT department see how helpful this can be to fundraising. But before you jump in and start spouting off all the virtues of your organization and begging people to visit your website, take a deep breath and listen to the conversation that’s already going on. Each site has its own culture and etiquette. Would you go into a business after hours and just spouting off headlines about your organization? Of course not, you’d quickly become a pariah, avoided by everyone. Just like at any networking event, it’s important to introduce yourself—you as a person not you as an organization—and engage people in conversation. Ask questions. Listen to what others are saying.
If you’re on Twitter, I’m at http://twitter.com/marcapitman. I’d love to start a conversation with you!
And if you work in an IT department, I am only beginning to fathom the enormity of the task you face each day. That which seems simple to us is usually far more complex that we’d ever imagine. But would you please consider lengthening the internet leash of your fundraising colleagues? The better they do their job, the more resources you’ll have to work with!
Marc,
I wonder if you might be willing to put a little reality on social media, I am a believer. You have thousands of connection, which is impressive. But what is the quality of those connections. How much of your business revenue can you contribute to your investment in social media. Thanks man always great work. j
I have not heard back, I hope you did not take offense. It was not meant that way…just what percentage comes from focused work on social media. I think people will be impressed with your number of conections, but what does that mean in revenue. So I hope you took the question in a positive spirit. thanks j
Thanks Jay. Great question.
Right now, it?s hard to tell how much of my coaching and training revenue is from my ?followers.? I know it?s a small percent of the fundraising for the Foundation. I?m pretty sure I?m starting to get speaking gigs and clients as a direct result of Twitter. But I?m finding it hard to know how much was ?solely? Twitter.
Does it ?count? as ?solely related to Twitter? if they first saw my FundraisingCoach.com website then replied to a Tweet? Or if they saw my book at the AFP International Conference in New Orleans and then googled me. Or if they ?got to know me? because of my slides on SlideShare or Scribd but first contact me on Twitter?
Would a donor be a donor because of ?social media? if they stumbled across your Facebook page but sent an ?unsolicited? check to your office?
I don?t do direct sales calls, and I haven?t done a direct mail appeal until last week, so it could be that 100% of my Fundraising Coach income comes from my internet activity.
Can you see I haven?t figured out how to measure ROI? 🙂 I definitely need to read more of Beth Kanter’s blog. She?s doing a lot on measuring the ROI.
Also, when I started the social media with a different strategic focus. My focus was connecting with others and leveraging my work as a pastor. So many of my followers are from that. And others are from my homebrewing interests. Very few are my core donor demographics.
I think nonprofits or businesses will have a quicker learning curve if they have a strategy. I had no intention of building SEO or using direct marketing copywriting to spur people on to action. Organizations with some sort of marketing training and strategy will probably have better results than I have!
But, Jay, your question is an important one. I don?t spend a ton of work time doing this stuff. My main fundraising remains direct mail, phone calls, emails, and personal solicitations. I don?t think that will change anytime soon.
I?m hoping that my doing this social media stuff will help our donor evangelists. Our fans. I?m hoping it?ll give them the keys to tell their friends, ?Hey, check this organization out. See why I think they?re so cool?
I want to be able to talk their language when they come rather than asking them if ?twitter.com? has 2 t?s in it. 😉
I?ve spent almost 2 hours?ok, just over 2 episodes of West Wing!?working out this answer. I hope it?s coherent!
Hi Jay. Amazing timing, isn’t it? 🙂
I try to take a 24 hour Sabbath every week from FundraisingCoach and Inland related work. This week’s happened to be from yesterday mid-afternoon to today mid-aftenoon. And there was the Central Maine Brew Fest today too!
I’d love your feedback on my response though.
Hi Marc,
I agree with you that using social networking sites can be a tremendous benefit for establishing important relationships. My fundraising efforts last year were contributed to and announced to other networks because of a small number of relationships that grew on Facebook and Twitter.
I will disagree with you that it is free. Only the actual tools are free. There is a cost in time for training and use of the tools. They can be VERY costly if there is not a plan on how to use them efficiently and effectively. I believe the fear of these tools sucking a significant amount of time from a person’s workday is a key reason some organizations ban the use of these tools.
Having a plan for building relationships online, limiting the amount of time the sites are used and only using a small number of these sites (even 1) is the key.
Thanks for your comments, Roger.
I had wondered about the “cost” of employee time. That’s why little things like using Twitter to update Facebook or Ping.fm to update all your networks, including LinkedIn, can be a huge help.
As can scheduling tweets with tools like TweetLater.com.
I’m glad for your input!
Marc,
I think you are on the money…I was curious about what you were finding because of the volume of people following you. I am learning a lot just from the community that is twitter, facebook, linkedin. For example I learned about UStream because of twitter…Thursday night in Toronto we had 220 people in a room and 380 on line watchin the event live from around the world. I there is a cost not to be playing in the social media world. I am getting speaking gigs because of the media as well. I look forward to sharing ideas as we all learn. All the best and keep in touch j
These automated tools can help build a person’s reputation as an expert if sharing useful information across sites. However, I am not convinced they help do much to build personal relationships. That requires a personal touch above and beyond the actions the automated tools bring.
The goal should be focused on building quality relationships rather than a large number of mostly unresponsive followers.
Roger,
I do not understand your absolute clarity about what the “goal” should be. Why should the goal be building quality relationships? Why can’t individuals have their own goals for web tools?
I
Jay, thanks for asking the great questions. I LOVE that you used UStream. So cool!
One of the biggest values of Twitter for me is the recommendations people make about tools like UStream.
Roger, I agree with Jay. There isn’t a one-size-fits-all approach. For instance, I automate my blog posts because they are usually written on Sunday nights. But my core audience reads them at work, so I set it up to have a better chance of being read. And it works. My open rates on the email and read rates on the website are high.
Also, the automated things can help free the nonprofits up to be more personal. They can schedule the necessary tweets about an event, just like they’d schedule ads in a newspaper.
Marc,
I thought it was very insightful and timely of you to make the request of IT departments to lengthen the “Internet leash.”
While it’s understandable from a management perspective to not want your staff spending all day Tweeting and making FaceBook comments, just as you wouldn’t want them texting or emailing their friends and family either, but it strikes me that if that’s the only worry, then perhaps what you have is a staff issue and not a social media issue.
Perhaps a happy medium would be to loosen the leash with some designated staff members who can become the online voices and faces of the organization.
The fact remains that more and more of the entire nonprofit world, both donors and organizations, are strengthening their social media relationships every day.
If yours in an organization that’s not yet using social media, then you’re being left out of a very important conversation. And who knows, they may even already be talking about you!
Richard,
I LOVE your quote: “…but it strikes me that if that’s the only worry, then perhaps what you have is a staff issue and not a social media issue.”
Great point!