Social Networking
Building NonProfit Relationships Equals Success
The Forgotten Element = Relationships
On a phone call today I was asked what I believe was the most important factor in the success of a nonprofit that most forget. For me that is an easy question and one I believe is also the same for any business. In this day and age of email addresses, usernames, and twitter accounts many forget that relationships are golden. Whether you are in business for profit or not-for-profit, if you are not devoting a large percentage of your business toward building relationships, you are missing one of the most important aspects of marketing. If you build the relationships with your volunteers and donors and forget the rest, the finances, programs, and success will fall into place. Read on and let me show you how to build loyal relationships that can make all the difference in your business. I will start out with explaining the why and give you practical how to at the end.
The Missing Puzzle Piece
In this day and age more than ever people want to be known. It is a need that we are all born with, that we want people to know who we are. Think about it for a minute, when you walk into a room of strangers, doesn’t it feel great when someone knows you? Sure it does, it feels awesome. It does not matter whether you are in a room of strangers, in the cyber world, or walking into a restaurant for lunch. When someone knows you or wants to get to know you it makes you feel really good. Imagine what it must feel like when you are in one of those venues and
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.
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6 Steps to Making a Bigger Splash
You, yeah you!
Everyone is involved in non profit work, however, some are more focused on changing the world with their involvement than others. Read on and figure out how you can make a lasting impact in that which you focus your charitable giving and involvement.
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