Lasas New Bulk Mailer, Twitter for non-profits

1. computanews
information systems for advice 152
May 2009
Get Your Message Out
Lasa recently signed up for Charity Technology Trust’s CTTM@il email marketing
service. Ian Runeckles looks at why and how the decision was taken.
F or some time it had been felt that
Lasa was not taking advantage
of online marketing techniques (or
The Training team was also using a
text-based email system developed by
the Rightsnet web developer which
in this issue
Lasa’s Ian Runeckles
e-communications) as best it could. A goes out on a fortnightly basis to about
on buying an email tool
number of marketing campaigns were 850 addresses. It was thought that this
pages 1, 5-6
set to take off and with Lasa’s website could definitely do with an upgrade.
redevelopment and a new marketing
manager in post, it seemed like an Other services such as our AIMS
ICT news from around
appropriate time to look at whether a case management software were
the sector - page 2
centralised bulk emailing system would using Outlook distribution lists for
help. subscribers with support contracts to
Twitter for non-profits
advise of upgrades etc and a bought
page 4
To establish what the appropriate in list which was mailed to annually to
solution might be we looked at what market the product. The Information
ICT events
other parts of Lasa were currently Systems Team, which produces
page 6
doing, the issues which this brought up, Computanews, was looking at how the
the features we might need, what we distribution of the publication could be
SMEX09 report
might use it for and tools which might done with the switch over from paper
page 6
be appropriate. to the pdf format.
Other marketing efforts were mainly
Web services and tales
Current situation ad-hoc using distribution lists in
of the unexpected
We had a system for emailing to our Outlook. The problem with this is
page 8
Rightsnet subscribers (www.rightsnet. that they are personal to the individual
org.uk) that has been in place for a user and there is no overall centralised
control.
number of years. It sends out a daily circuit riding
html (webpage format) summary of the
new articles Rightsnet website which Lasa Circit Rider
is handled automatically and attaches Management issues conference and circuit
more static information. Although fairly Whilst it can be relatively riding update
basic it does the job and the number straightforward to assess, purchase and pages 9-10
of mails being sent would be difficult to even install software or (even easier)
afford using alternative hosted services sign up to a hosted service, there were
we decided to leave Rightsnet as it is a number of considerations which
for the time being. needed to be thought about before
going ahead…
continued on page 5 152
issue
december 2008

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Last Computanews we 40 small grants for specific project has equipped
Lasa reported on what the digital projects. Digital them with free computers
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a new guide to setting up a latest online technology.
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2

3. Computanews independent consultancy for your
now accepts information and communication
advertisements technology (ICT)
If you offer a technology product, Free initial advice: We offer an initial one hour meeting, with
service or event aimed specifically at no strings attached to explore your needs and define the project.
the voluntary sector you can draw
attention to it through the pages of Independent: We are an independently funded so we can give
you unbiased advice.
Computanews.
Computanews is a specialised Understanding: As a non-profit agency ourselves
magazine covering the use of technology we understand the values of the sector
within the voluntary sector. It has a key
audience of: Collaborative and transparent: We want
to build your knowledge, not keep Information and
• organisation managers and trustees
Communication Technology (ICT) as a mystery
• staff responsible for their own
organisation’s IT Thorough: We evaluate your ICT knowledge
• Circuit Riders who provide advice and your ICT support needs and set out the best
and technology support options for you according to your needs.
to other organisations.
Fee discounts for smaller organisations of
The circulation of Computanews is up to 50%. We recognise ‘small is beautiful
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distributed 4–6 times a year. We explore the ICT project for further consultancy
anticipate that the circulation will increase work...
now that it is becoming available as a free,
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Contact us: London Advice Services Alliance (Lasa)
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3

4. Events Tips152 Twitter for non-
profit organisations
15 May 2009 - Silver Surferís Twitter is increasingly being taken up by voluntary and community
Day organisations like NCVO, RSPB and the Dogs Trust to promote their
With more than 750 events work to new audiences. Heather Mansfield of Change.org gives her
helping thousands of older people Twitter Top Tips.
get online and discovering how
computers can change their lives. Twitter is an online application that is part blog, part social net-working
site, part mobile phone/IM tool, designed to let users answer the
http://silversurfers.digitalunite.com/ question “What are you doing?” Users have 140 characters for each
posting (or “tweet”).
Read the full article
21 May - Outcomes
Monitoring and IT 1 Authenticity before
marketing. Have
http://nonprofits.change.org/blog/
This conference will help you view/10_twitter_tips_for_nonprofit_
personality and build
understand more about the community. organizations
processes involved in implementing
an outcomes-based IT system. About the author
http://outcomesandit.wordpress.
2 Be nice. Be thankful.
Reply and Retweet!
Heather is the Nonprofit
Community Manager for Change.
com/ org. She also created and
maintains the Nonprofit
28 May - Managing Social
3 Follow everyone
who follows you.
Organizations MySpace, Nonprofit
Organizations Facebook Page,
Media Nonprofit Organizations YouTube
This morning seminar will give Channel, and the Nonprofit
organisations the tools to seed and Organizations Twitter profile
grow, manage, and build their online 4 Don’t worry about
those that ‘unfollow’
networks. Follow Heather at: http://twitter.
you.
com/nonprofitorgs
http://tinyurl.com/odaex3
5 Provide value to
your followers.
Lasa ICT Knowledgebase
www.ictknowledgebase.org.uk/twitter
5 June - Better writing for
charities
This free afternoon seminar from
NGOMedia will cover everything
you need to know about how to
6 Don’t only Tweet
your own content.
Tools
www.tweetdeck.com
make your charity’s ublications as http://twitterfeed.com/
effective and powerful as they can http://search.twitter.com/
be through great copywriting.
7 Use ‘Favorites’ to
organise the chaos! Follow on Twitter
http://tinyurl.com/r45llz http://twitter.com/bullyinguknews
http://twitter.com/greenpeaceuk
8 June - Multi-Media 8 Send messages, but
not auto-responders.
http://twitter.com/dogstrust
http://twitter.com/ncvo
Explained
For those who want to use
multimedia to get their message
across.
9 You get out what
you put into it
http://tinyurl.com/pbhpms
4

5. continued from page 1 Locally installed bulk setting up new templates etc.
email software CTTM@il is being used by LVSC
who said, “We found them very
Lasaís email checklist This would need to be installed on helpful and they also have just started
a local PC or server. Whilst this doing free training sessions for
• Is there a business case for might give more control and existing clients so if we get new
this? perhaps flexibility, there could be starters etc they can pop along to a
• Who will use/manage the more administration and we’d be morning session. We have the 20,000
lists? responsible for backing it up. emails option and it's more than
• Does the system comply Training could also be an issue. enough even with every team sending
with Data Protection out bulletins. The stats are fantastic.
legislation? Examples which we looked at Also it organises all the subscriptions
• Will it link to the existing included SendBlaster (www. and unsubscribes.”
CRM database? sendblaster.com), Atomic Mail
• Is there a budget? Sender (www.amailsender.com),
• Ability to send out around e-Campaign 7.0 (www.lmhsoft. What then?
5,000 – 10,000 emails per com) and Handymailer (www.
After a demonstration from LVSC
month bulkemailsoft.com). The feature sets
as to how they were using the tool,
• Bounce management are fairly similar, some allow
it was recommended to Lasa’s
• Statistics – tracking click- sending to a limited number of
management that we sign up for
throughs on links in mailout addresses for a low cost, then
CTT M@il hosted service. As an
etc upgrading to a pro version for full
NCVO member we also took
• Ability to breach spam functionality.
advantage of a discounted scheme
filters whereby we could get double the
• Adhere to accessibility best amount of emails for the same
practice Hosted services rate. We signed up for a year’s
• Easy management and There is any number of hosted contract with an allowance of
production by a number of email services – Idealware looked 10,000 emails per month at a cost
staff (but be centrally at those which were mainly US of £700.
managed) based such as Graphic Mail
• Ease of use and potential (www.graphicmail.com), Constant A template for the emails was set
for training Contact (www.constantcontact. up which reflects Lasa’s online
• Have a number of different, com), MailChimp (great name identity using the same colours and
but not mutually exclusive, www.mailchimp.com) and a similar layout to the new website.
lists for different types of Network For Good’s Email The mail tool was tested using a
mailing Now (www.groundspring.org). list of new AIMS Free subscribers
However, the one we looked at in and subsequently it has been used
most detail was CTTM@il (www. for Computanews subscribers and
ctt.org/products__services/ctt_mail). the Rightsnet training list.
The CTT tool means that not only
To host or not to host Based on the successful can we send bulk emails without
Once we knew what we were DotMailer service (www. directly affecting our own systems
after, we did some research into dotmailer.co.uk) CTTM@il is being and handling the inevitable
the products that were available. offered to UK charities by CTT bounced mail. The reporting is
This basically split down into those (Charity Technology Trust). CTT fairly sophisticated and shows how
which we’d have to host ourselves offers price bands based on the many mails were sent, how many
on our server or which were number of emails sent per month, delivered, number opened and
hosted online. A useful article starting at 100 recipients for £10/ forwarded, links clicked and so on.
which helped with our research is month with a one-off set up fee of
Idealware’s survey of newsletter £100 which includes setting up a
tools at http://www.idealware.org/ template for the email, address
articles/fgt_email_newsletter_tools. books and a training session. CTT continued on page 6
php also offer ad-hoc services for
5

6. contíd from page 5 SMEX09: Social Media
Maria Diaz at CTT has been Exchange
incredibly helpful with setting up
the system and answering the
inevitable queries. We have now Computanews reports from the recent SMEX09
also bought the domain lasanews. masterclass and a surprise visit from acclaimed film-
org.uk through CTT which means
maker Ken Loach.
that mailings will originate from
the mail@lasanews.org.uk email
address. CTT offer a service
whereby the domain is registered
with appropriate spam monitoring
M any larger non-profit
organisations are using
social media tools like blogging,
build online communities. The
Dogs Trust uses uses the social
networking site Facebook and
services so that it avoids being Twitter and Flickr to promote micro-blogging tool Twitter to
mistaken for a spammer (and their campaign communicate directly
therefore increases the chance of messages directly with their supporters,
reaching the target audience). If a to the audience, but run awareness raising
respondent replies to the address how does that apply campaigns, and find
the mail is then forwarded to a to the vast majority homes for dogs.
lasa.org.uk mail address. of the sector’s
small and medium During the lunch
There is still more work to do sized organisations? seminar, Steve
with other Lasa products able to sounddelivery’s Bowbrick, blogger-
be marketed through the service Social Media Exchange Ken Loach at SMEX09 in-residence at the
and lists to be set up. We may also (SMEX09) masterclasses BBC, said that focusing
be able to establish links to our aimed to answer the question by too much on social media tools
database to synchronise data so providing delegates with bite-sized such as Twitter, Flickr, blogging
that we are holding up to date sessions and case studies to help and podcasts could exclude
information on both systems. We organisations apply social media people with visual or hearing
also need to think about what data tools to their own situation. impairments as well as those who
we want to capture from new have no access to the internet.
subscribers which will assist with The recurring theme of the Nevertheless, he said this was not
the marketing effort and also day was using story-telling to a reason to stop testing the limits
reporting to funders. So far, it’s communicate messages - whether of social media, and that ignoring
been an encouraging start… it be via blogging, video or audio. technological shifts was no longer
In the current climate with an option.
Next month in Tips #153 Maria funders cutting back, organisations
Diaz’s shares her top tips for email able to tell their success stories
good practice. and connect with funders and Resources
supporters would be best placed http://socialmediaexchange.org.uk/
Resources to survive. video/ken-loach-video-clip
www.icthubknowledgebase.org.uk/ http://socialmediaexchange.org.uk/
bulkemailsoftware To reinforce the point, acclaimed tag/presentation
film-maker Ken Loach spoke at www.dogstrust.org.uk
www.idealware.org/articles/fgt_email_
length about the value of story-
newsletter_tools.php
telling to illustrate quite complex
and often political issues. Book now
Four masterclasses running sounddelivery will be running
throughout the day connected another Social Media Exchange in
delegates with real-life examples London on 1 June.
of non-profits using social media
tools to tell their story and http://socialmediaexchange.org.uk
6

7. s? s?
nt m
lie le
e crob
or p
m re
o lasa
m more answers. more support.
rightsnet welfare rights training
Dear Colleague,
Busier than ever? Our new welfare rights training programme has been
specifically designed to help you give the best and most efficient advice to
your clients in the current climate.
We’ve created a brand new welfare rights training programme based on
your feedback about your needs. But don’t forget that we also offer a wide
range of courses which we can tailor to your organisation’s needs as part of
our in-house service.
We’re also currently offering 20% off our courses. We'd like to give you a
voucher entitling you or a colleague to 20% off your next course with us!
To claim your voucher simply ask when you attend your next training
course. And you can get 10% off any course booked three months in
advance. And finally, don’t forget to register your organisation for our new
loyalty card when you next attend a course with us – for every five events
the sixth is free!
With 100% of attendees rating our courses as very good or good you can be
sure that you’ll be getting the high quality training that you'd expect from
the UK's leading welfare rights website.
Find out more and book at:
www.rightsnet.org.uk/training
Contact us: training@lasa.org.uk or call us on 020 7377 9981
7

8. Web 2.0 and Tales of the Unexpected
Web based services or cloud computing – where computing power is delivered
over the internet as you need it, rather than from your desktop computer – can
potentially offer many benefits to voluntary and community sector organisations.
However, before making the jump to web based services, organisations also need
to be aware of the potential pitfalls.
agencies can demand to see of users – or at least until their
W ith a web browser and a
few mouse clicks we can
share documents and collaborate
content stored on any computer,
even if it is hosted on behalf of
servers collapsed, irretrievably
losing their user’s data in the crash.
another sovereign state. Paul Head over to http://ma.gnolia.com
with colleagues, buy goods and
Ticher discussed this issue in the to watch a video of Ma.gnolia’s
services and save on venue and
knowledgebase article Data founders admitting that they didn’t
travel costs by attending online
Protection and Web Based carry out any back-up testing. If
training. Whilst this is fine for
Applications. your data only exists in one online
individuals, organisations with
service you should take immediate
services to deliver need to be
It’s also worth remembering that steps to back it up to a location
aware of issues around accessibility,
as of April 2009, a new EU you have physical access and
privacy, data protection and
directive now requires all ISPs in control over.
business continuity - because even
the European Union to store
in the wonderful world of web 2.0
records of user emails and internet Do your research and choose a
it’s not unknown for users to be
phone calls for 12 months. well established product by a
locked out of their own files.
respected provider – you don’t
Accessibility want to find the company goes
SLAs and Terms and belly up taking all your data with it.
Web based services have barely Conditions A quick trawl though Google will
begun to address issues of web flag up service providers with a
accessibility. AbilityNet’s State of The Service Level Agreements
poor record of customer care.
the e-Nation 2008 report found (SLA) provided by Microsoft and
Google make it quite clear that
that web based social networking Conclusion
sites like Facebook, MySpace, their services are provided ‘as is’,
‘with all faults’, ‘without warranty’ As with all things, take the time to
YouTube,Yahoo and Bebo, were
and ‘as available’. Until online think about the risks you are
effectively ‘locking out’ disabled
service providers get serious about entering into. Whilst millions of
visitors, the majority of whom
SLA’s that do something for the individuals are quite happy to live
couldn’t register or participate, in
customer, ask yourself if a service with web services that offer no
clear contravention of Disability
provided without warranty is fit guarantee and is entirely at their
Discrimination Act (1998).
for your organisation’s purposes. own risk, managers of voluntary
Data Protection and The recent wave of outages sector organisations should think
suffered by Twitter due to surging carefully and ensure risks are
Privacy
demand also highlight that despite recognised and planned for.
In the real world, national borders all the promises, web based
and national laws of sovereign services do fail. Resources
states take precedence, but this
www.ictknowledgebase.org.uk/
lags some way behind the reality of Reliability webservicerisks
cyberspace, where Google and
As for service reliability, a case in www.ictknowledgebase.org.uk/
Microsoft make no promises about
point is Ma.gnolia, a social dataprotectionandweb
where an end user’s data is
bookmarking site that stored www.abilitynet.org.uk/enation85
physically stored. Under the US
bookmarks for tens of thousands
Patriot Act, the FBI and other
8

9. Lasa Circuit Rider Conference
9 June 2009
Riding the crest of a slump • surviving in tough times
essential recession survival tools for circuit riders, individuals and organisations
interested in circuit riding.
• Practical, relevant solutions for small voluntary organisations
• Show you how to apply them in your work
• Focus on the tools you need to survive the recession
• Encourage everyone to discuss issues and share experiences
• Delivered in plain, jargon-free English
Venue
IBM Bedfont, New Square, Bedfont Lakes,
Middlesex which is situated to the south of
Heathrow Airport.
Booking is now open and closes on 29th May
To register for the conference and the drinks reception go to:
www.lasa.org.uk/crconference
Keep up to date
Get the latest news by joining the UKRiders mailing list
http://lists.lasa.org.uk/lists/info/ukriders
Lasa is grateful to IBM for donating the venue and to CTT for supporting this conference
9

10. Circuit Rider skills and
standards - an update
Back in Computanews 150 we introduced you to the London Region ICT
Infrastructure Project. This three year, Big Lottery funded project has as its main
aim to ensure a Circuit Rider training framework is in place to provide a quality-
assured professional service to frontline groups in London. It will do this by
training Circuit Riders (and other VCS ICT workers) through standardising and
assuring the quality of Circuit Rider skills for VCS organisations.
O ver the past few months, Lasa has been • Develop a portfolio of evidence to show
CIRCUIT RIDING NEWS ROUND-UP
working to develop a learning programme and application of the learning
environment which is appropriate to the sector. • Use the services of expert mentors
Through working with expert advisers and • Support other learners through the process
consulting with an advisory group, the decision was • Become peer certificated upon completing the
taken to develop a personal learning programme learning plan
based on the competency document published last
year, which uses a guided process to assist ICT Core competency modules
workers with their development. The programme is currently arranged around two
levels, the first of which is based on the core
competencies that a Rider needs to work effectively
with organisations. This level is arranged into four
modules:
1. Characteristics of the VCS and VCOs, the
environment in which they operate and how this
affects their use of ICT
2. ICT systems, tools and resources use and
support and their potential impact in small to
medium sized VCOs
3. ICT Sustainability - Policy development, costing
and funding
4. Consulting, assessment and planning and project
management
Lasa is currently working upon the online platform
Planned for launch in late summer, the programme and resource base. We’ll be presenting the project at
offers Circuit Riders and others working in VCS ICT the Circuit Rider Conference in June. If you would
the opportunity to: like more information you can contact Sarah Lord
Soares at Lasa, slord-soares@lasa.org.uk
• Consult with an adviser as to the skills which
need to be acquired or improved upon
• Create a personal learning plan
• Access expert resources on and offline through
a bespoke platform
• Attend introductory sessions on the learning
modules
10