What does social media mean in general?Social Media is a means of facilitating interactions between people, groups, companies, and organizations. This means creating, sharing, and commenting on content among themselves and others in their community. Examples of social media include social networking sites like Facebook, Google +, and LinkedIn, content communities like Youtube, or information sources like Twitter.Social Media can be understood as similar to traditional media like the news, only with greater interaction from the participants, greater ease and immediacy of information, and the ability to communicate faster than ever before.Social Media is rapidly becoming the method in which information is shared in our culture, so it is no surprise that so many organizations have gotten on board with using these tools.
What does social media mean for your organization?Active engagement with your community –Social Media allows your audience to give feedback to content and messages in real timeRelationship building – Social media can be the stepping stone to more event attendees, donations, client, organization, and partner story telling- ultimately leading to an expanded network of real life connections. Increased visibility – especially to untapped demographics that aren’t engaged in conventional media practices. This is the direction that communication is going in. Traditional media is on the decline with the use of digital media to acquire information is on the rise.Higher Volume of Donations – Many people with the money end up not donating because of the time it takes to write a check, mail out a letter, or make a phone call. Social media gives organizations the opportunity to let people donate digitally using a check card. Since online marketing is also on the rise (such as Amazon), and the fact that most popular browsers enable users to store their CC information to enter it automatically into a webpage, donating becomes a process of just clicking a few buttons. You don’t even have to grab your wallets these days! While social media tools do not generally host these transactions, they enable the connection to these services. Celebration and promotion – Not only is social media an opportunity to promote your events, needs, and story- it is also an opportunity to celebrate the successes of your partners and friends (ask Nancy for source). This plays back into relationship building. Whether it’s reposting content or passing along a message, social media is an opportunity to promote partners that share the same goals in your community.
Blogging – Derived from “web logging”. Followers – Newsfeeds
Idealware:They created The Nonprofit Social Media Decision Guide to help organizations like yours determine what results and benefits you can reasonably expect from social media, and to guide you through the process of identifying the right channels for different goals. From tool-by-tool comparisons and strategies for success to ways to integrate multiple channels, the guide is built upon extensive research, interviews with experts and other users, and our own broad experience.
