In this communications-focused presentation Christine Beddia, Director of Marketing & Communications for Coastal Community Foundation, covers the importance of developing a sound marketing strategy for your nonprofit organization before launching a social media presence.
7. Brand Framework Personality Target Market Brand Flag Vision Point of Difference Positioning How the Brand is Positioned in the “Customer’s” Mind Reason to Believe
Your business is raising money for your nonprofit organization. You do this by building and nurturing relationships with donors. Building your social network online is done in the same fashion as offline, more or less. We will explore some basic concepts and how they can enhance what you are doing online
Social Media platforms help us make social network connections to old classmates, new friends, and with our organizations’ donors and if we’re lucky, future prospects. Think of it as Relationship-Building. Focus on traditional tactics like two-way dialogue, listening, authenticity, and things you would do to build and nurture a relationship.
Exercise unique to your organization Detailed process. See me after.
Few components that are obvious and observable online. The first is your organization’s personality.
CCF’s personality revealed. Conducted surveys, did in-person interviews with donors, staff, and board members. Organization personality, not individual personalities
Highlighted examples demonstrating responsiveness, sharing relevant information, engaging with others online through twitter.
900 million users on Facebook Average user has 130 friends and is connected to 80 community pages
Know what the tool is intended for and how you can get the most out of it and how it fits into your overall marketing and fundraising strategies. Those traditional communication tools are critical to building your network , your social network. Social media tools can help you continue building that network, just online. Even though the tools can be very different in their application , the goal is still the same- to cultivate a loyal and engaged donor base.
Frequency: Tweets- 2 a day Facebook updates- once a day Blog posts- one a week E-news- monthly Direct mail- quarterly Letters- when needed Would you ever call a donor two times a day? 3 reasons people unsubscribe to your communications: communication is too frequent, content is boring users feel the general need to manage the amount of communication showing up in their mail or newsfeed
CCF Connections: what are the connections that we make every day? Identify and share them in the channels. Invest positively in your relationship with fans using engaging, lively and varied content.
non-fan will view your Page Fan view your Page, “likes” a story comment on a story, publish a comment upload a photos and video Paying attention to what people are saying is beneficial so you can be relevant.
Over 1/2/ a dozen local nonprofits leveraged their online audiences to facilitate joint marketing 7 were able to move to 2 nd round and secure $175K for the Charleston community.
Integrating social media into your organization’s marketing strategy can help you fundraise more effectively. These new tools can augment where and how people perceive your brand, learn about your mission, engage with you. Finding the right tools to support those strategies takes planning. The goal remains the same. For most of us in the room, it’s to cultivate a loyal and generous donor base.
The Duke Endowment a social media survey 5,700 grantees, nonprofit leaders, peers and policymakers > 1,100 people answered the dozen questions North Carolina and South Carolina nonprofits
90,000 Tweets, 700,000 Facebook status updates, 1500 new blog posts over 6,000 images are uploaded to Flickr
Using a horizontal logo for avatar Posting more than one status update a day on facebook 3. Not following on a 1:1 ratio on Twitter; DM function won’t work Not applying for YouTubes’ Nonprofit program Not creating Flickr slideshows to tell your nonprofit's story Not adding social-networking icons to your website Ignoring LinkedIn’s company pages Not claiming your “places” pages on Facebook, foursquare, Gowalla, Yelp Posting only (boring) marketing and fundraising content: Come to our event Please like us Donate now Follow us on Twitter Not blogging, telling your story
Register your organization’s domain name, the Facebook page name that best suits, and secure your Twitter ID so that you secure and protect your brand even if you are not quite ready to launch a social media communications platform. Avoid social media identify theft. Cybersquatters register domain names in the hope that companies will buy them back. The misinformation that cybersquatters can distribute will cause confusion in the market place and might cost you money down the road especially if they are using your name and logo to raise funds. Large companies like Kellogg’s, GE and General Motors are all victims of social media identify theft. None of them own their Twitter ID. So they now have to spend even more time (and money) to manage their brands from other platforms. Developing safeguards around account information and how it is shared. Create policies that protect how employees use these tools and how your organization manages activity, including online negative comments.
Center for Women- Women in Business Series: New Marketing Methods - Social Media as Marketing Tool Tuesday from 6pm-8pm