Social media campaigns empower constituents to raise awareness and funds

By Joe Boland

Social media takeaways from the experts

Social media is still an evolving and sometimes confusing medium. Here, some social-media fundraising experts provide key takeaways to successful use of this powerful tool.

David Neff, creator, co-found and director, Lights. Camera. Help., and senior digital strategist, Ridgewood Ingenious Communications Strategies

It all starts with a good blog. Organizations that have a good blog are able to build up a close connection with their readership. A close connection turns into being able to reach out to those folks when you need to and mobilize them. Oftentimes, that blog then goes into Facebook. Facebook makes it a lot more conversational and casual. From there, it leads out to other social-media channels such as Twitter, FriendFeed, Flickr, etc. From what I've seen, that success drives from active blogging and spreading out from there.
Repeat, especially on crowded mediums like Twitter and Facebook. Obviously, you have to judge your audience. The same message three times a day might not work. But the same message on your Facebook page twice a week might be perfect depending on your audience.
React to campaigns. You need to react to things happening in the environment not within weeks, not after you've run it by your board of directors, but you have to react to things as they happen.
Run campaigns that are on a deadline. We need $10 and you to ask 10 friends by Dec. 10, go! Give them a deadline and push them toward that deadline.

Read about Ridgewood's success using these best practices in the 30/60 Challenge.

Donna Wilkins, president, Charity Dynamics

Research that Charity Dynamics has conducted indicates that volunteer fundraisers who use social-media tools set higher fundraising goals, reach more donors and raise more money than their peers. Volunteer fundraisers achieving the strongest fundraising success are those that combine offline, online and multiple social-media tools.
Social media opens up new fundraising channels for nonprofits. On average, 75 percent of donors that are attracted through social media are new to the organizations that they're supporting.
Organizations using social media should be sure that it's integrated into their overall fundraising and marketing programs, versus being siloed and treated as a stand-alone project. Nonprofits achieving the strongest results have begun making social-media tools a regular part of their fundraising kits.
As with other online tools that a nonprofit has implemented, fundraisers must have access to metrics for social-media tools they're using in order to best understand what's driving success, as well as uncover areas they may need to adjust.
It's always important for nonprofits to have a plan and goals in mind before jumping in to social media. Don't just use different tools because you think they're neat or cool. Have a plan, know what you're trying to achieve, and know what unique audiences and communication opportunities each social-media network offers.
That being said, organizations also shouldn't be afraid to experiment. Nonprofits should be willing to try new things to see what social-media tools and approaches work best with their constituents.
Let your constituents lead you. Many of the best ideas come from watching innovative constituents and empowering others to take the same actions.

Marc Sirkin, chief community officer, Autism Speaks

Is your organization ready for social media? Is the culture ready for embracing this holistically; how do you break the walls down between departments? Social media is a team sport.
E-mail is the core. Try to get an e-mail address from those you engage with online.
Experiment. You have to spend a little bit of time trying stuff to see what works.

Frank Barry, manager of professional services, Blackbaud

Be there before you ask. If you just show up one day and ask for money, people will not respond.
Be part of the community. Have a presence there where you, as an organization, always engage with people; participate, share and communicate.
Be human. Don't just post your press releases or tell people you want money. Act like a human being who is in others.
Be active in social-media channels, and help your supporters spread their messages.
Make it easy and exciting for your supporters to communicate with their networks.
Give your supporters, donors, volunteers and advocates an easy way to fundraise on your behalf.
Create a challenge or competition that inspires people to compete.
Come up with cool prizes that motivate people to engage in fundraising efforts.

It's a refrain you hear over and over again: Fundraising truly is all about the donors, the supporters, the people who allow your organization to fulfill its mission. And nothing drives that point home like the phenomenon of social media. With sites like Twitter and Facebook, blogs, YouTube and [insert your social-networking platform of choice here], supporters are more involved — and in control — more than ever before. They drive the conversations. They spur new ideas. They do things their way.

So with all these great, new outreach and engagement tools at its disposal, how can your organization harness this still-new medium to empower constituents on your behalf? There are many strategies and  initiatives already playing out all over the fundraising sector — with plenty more new and unforeseen ideas still to come. Here, FundRaising Success highlights some creative and successful ways organizations are using social media to raise awareness and funds.

Special-event widgets

Event fundraising — such as walks, runs and bike rides — really lends itself well to social media. Tools like Facebook and Twitter allow people to spread the word about an upcoming ride they're participating in and solicit pledge donations, for example.

"If we think about social media, it's all about peer-to-peer communications," says Donna Wilkins, president of online nonprofit solutions consultants Charity Dynamics. "It's communicating with your friends, people you already know, and for so many nonprofit events, what they are is peer-to-peer fundraising. There's really a lot of natural synergy."

Several organizations have had tremendous success at raising both awareness and funds using Facebook (and Twitter, for that matter) with fundraising widgets. They can be embedded on event participants' social-networking profiles and messages, displaying information such as: "X amount of days to reach my goal," "My goal: $10,000" or "Raised: $200." The widget specifies the event, and then links to a donation page for the organization so participants' friends, family and followers can make gifts on their behalf.

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