Non Profit Blogging
Your Junk
Your Junk is Your Responsibility
Communication to your business or nonprofit is like wind is to a kite. A kite can look great lying in the grass however, when the wind sends it soaring in the sky, it dances effortlessly with such delight. Communications is what connects your business to the outside world and can send it soaring into the sky or falling to the ground. You are the one holding the kite string so lets, briefly in this first of the “Communications Series,” cover some basics and in the next few articles we will cover all aspects of what you should have in place to communicate effectively with everyone. Make sure you grab the RSS or email feed above to receive all the articles.
candyMany Flavors
It is important that people can communicate with your nonprofit in the flavor that is comfortable with them. You may prefer old fashioned methods like email or postal mail, but the world is changing and you need to change with it. Yes, email and postal mail are old fashioned. I remember the days when people would give you a blank stare when you asked them for their email address or web site address, and have no idea what I was talking about. Well it’s time to update to the year 2009. Read on and I will explain how you can move your nonprofit into the current year and help people connect to you better and more efficiently. Only and except click on the link for the full article…
Top NonProfit Posts for February
February has been a big month for great posts that help nonprofits learn to fundraise, brand their image, and use social media to get their messages out. We thought a nice post to round out February would be a link to many of these articles on the same page for easy reference. Maybe you dream to start a Nonprofit but don’t know how. There are even links to great articles on how to start a nonprofit. Whatever your depth of knowledge in the nonprofit arena, there are quick and timely articles for everyone below that are sure to help you increase the success of your nonprofit. Read on and enjoy the free information, all we ask is that you pass the web site address on to at least one other nonprofit that could benefit from the information also. This is just and excerpt to read the entire article click the link below…
14 Advanced Twitter Tips
Twitter Like a Pro
The last two articles Tweet or Not to Tweet and Tweet Tweet Nonprofit should have gotten everyone up-to-date on the basics of Twitter. Now that you have your twitter account set up and hopefully following a few people as well as being followed I wanted to take this space to give you some tips to get you tweeting like a pro as well as being well mannered in the twitter arena (etiquette). Read on to get some more advanced Twitter tips… This is only an except the complete article can be found at the link below…
Top 10 Reasons Nonprofits Should Blog
Top 10 Reasons Every Nonprofit Should Have a Blog
Part of the Series “Be a Social Media Expert Series” here.
When you start and run a nonprofit, you’ve just signed up to become the best storyteller in history. If there is anything you need to do well, it is to develop your story and then tell it over and over and over again. See http://oceangrand.org/a-simple-fundraising-formula/ for a step-by-step on how to develop and tell your story. Telling your story needs to happen in all kinds of ways, shapes and forms and in this article I am going to explain why your nonprofit should have a blog and be telling your story on it. Read on and I will break this complicated subject down into 10 bite-sized pieces.
Blogs and Web Sites
Blogs are not much different than web sites anymore except for a couple of critical differences. Web sites contain mostly “static” information which is information that you or a webmaster puts on the site, but once there, rarely changes. It resembles a brochure on the web more than anything. On the other hand, a blog has pages also, but the “blog page” (like what you are reading here) has ongoing posts or stories that are easily changed and updated. The blog gives you the ability to quickly post new information without needing the help of a webmaster. The other pages on a blog can also easily be changed. So in essence a blog is a web site with multiple pages that are easily changed with the addition of an area that has ongoing new information posted to it. It much better resembles an effort to tell an ongoing story. There are a lot of added benefits to having a blog rather than a static web site, that I will outline 10 reasons below, and then take you through the 10 reasons to set up a blog for your own nonprofit.
Blogging Benefits
I get asked a lot if every nonprofit should have a blog and I personally believe they should. Every nonprofit understands the benefits of having a newsletter whether it is one you design, print and mail or one that you put together on the web and send out in an HTML email. A blog, if done well, can serve as the newsletter for your nonprofit with constant updates, success stories, pictures, and needs that are accessible by more people in more ways. When I say accessible in more ways, I am referring to RSS and email subscriptions which we will cover below.
Benefits of a Blog For Your NonProfit
1.Easy to Update
Blogs are much easier and quicker to update for the average person. A new article or change can be updated and be live on the web as fast as you can type and push the publish button. This gets your most relevant information to the web and in front of the world quicker than any other method. No more static web pages; instead, every page on your site will be relevant… This is just an excerpt, see the link below for the
complete article…
Tweet or Not to Tweet?
I am writing this after spending the morning on Twitter and FaceBook. You may not have any idea what I am talking about or know just enough to believe it is a waste of your time. That is the whole reason we at Ocean Grand have decided to put together a series of ongoing articles around “social media” for non profits. Read on to learn how social media is here to stay and how you can get on board to help your nonprofit become more successful.
The key to getting, keeping and engaging donors, funders, and corporations is by building a relationship with them. There is no alternative to building relationships, the relationship comes first and always first. There is also no alternative, not even through social media, to engage your non profit supporters in the “flesh”. However, social media is a great platform to tell and retell your story (read more about “your story” here). The more ways you are able to get the information and successes out to people who are interested in them the farther your reach. Social media (Facebook, Twitter, etc) is another way to get your story and successes out to those that want to know about them, plus find some others that maybe interested in the mix.
Social media is also a way to keep donors and others up-to-date with your cause and what you’re doing to impact the world in a simple and easy way. A couple “tweets” (tweets are short messages on twitter) a day will help all those following the progress of your non profit to know what you’re doing today to help the cause. Likewise, it is a great way to invite people to your fundraisers, events and projects. By using Twitter, others who get your tweets can pass the message along very easily, possibly generating lots of buzz about your upcoming function. If those tweets are also posted automatically on your FaceBook “wall”, then you have reached two audiences that otherwise would have had no idea what you were doing. For example, maybe you are holding a fundraiser or event in Virginia. Several tweets throughout the day from your mobile phone and everyone around the world knows how it is going.
This morning I wrote an article on “What Have You Done Lately That You Are Proud Of?” When I posted the article from the Ocean Grand blog http://www.oceangrand.org the post was tweeted and then also sent to our FaceBook wall. Almost instantaneously several people joined our twitter following who were not following before. The link to the article in the tweet was also clicked on and read by many from our twitter following. It was a quick, easy and effective way to let those that were interested know there was a new article.
