Social Media Now | Design for Good
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Social Media NowAdapting to Facebook and Twitter
while Anticipating the Next Big Thing
Presented by
Don Havey and Stacy Kim
Social Media Now | Design for Good
Meet Don & Stacy3
Stacy and Don run 3c32 and Design for Good together.
3c32 is a design studio dedicated to offering unique and engaging design
solutions to socially responsible businesses and organizations. Stacy
works primarily on the design side of things, Don manages development.
Design for Good is a work in progress. Through DFG, Don and Stacy plan
to provide strategic design resources, support and guidance to nonprofits
interested in evaluating and improving the effectiveness of their
communications.
Between them, Stacy and Don have over 10 years of experience working
on web-based projects. They are members of the dial-up AOL generation.
Social Media Now | Design for Good
A quick show of hands4
Does your organization have an active...
Twitter account?
Facebook page?
Website with an RSS feed?
(No right answers here. Just wondering about your experience level.
Not every organization needs each.)
Social Media Now | Design for Good
What to expect today5
The plan:
An overview of the conceptsNew media vs. traditional media, pros & cons comparison
What social media tools exist today? What‘s next?Best practices and types of uses, plus ways to measure effectiveness
Examples of good nonprofit social media campaignsFundraising, using Twitter & Facebook, and activating followers
Develop a social media plan of your ownEstablish a reusable workflow
Q&A, brainstormingMight as well solve some problems while we‘re all sitting around
Social Media Now | Design for Good
Broadcast media: pushing out8
Traditional media (TV, radio, newspaper, mail, etc.)
relies heavily on the concept of broadcasting.
broad∙cast –verb to spread widely; disseminate 1
Not such a bad definition, right?
Large audiences necessitate one-way messagingToo much time and effort to address each member individually 2
Don‘t blame the toolsetContrary to popular belief, technological limitations
are not the primary factor behind one-way
communication; two-way communication breaks
down when the author cannot reasonably
spend enough time with the entire audience 3
Social Media Now | Design for Good
Advantages & limitations9
Pros
Well-established guidelines for
effectiveness
Campaigns easily scalable to
audience size and media type
Existing industry standards for
measurement
Close to 100% penetration
(TV, mail, etc.) in U.S. 4
Most audiences comfortable
with traditional media
Cons
Little incentive for audience
engagement and action
Delivery channels are neutral
at best, sometimes untrusted
Typically once-and-done;
removed from daily workflow
Cost and content restrictions
can limit message depth
Social Media Now | Design for Good
Social media: a living network11
Social media is all about creating opportunities for
communication in as many (preferably interchangeable)
forms as possible.
Personal, meaningful two-or-more-way interaction‖A group of Internet-based applications that build on the ideological and
technological foundations of Web 2.0, which allows the creation and
exchange of user-generated content‖ 5
User as publisher, editor, curator, criticAllowing your audience to become participants
Flexibility is keyOpen source data formats allow information
to be shared across platform-independent apps
Social Media Now | Design for Good
Advantages & limitations12
Pros
Learn (much much) more about
your audience
Real-time interaction possible
Opportunities for collaboration
and deeper engagement with
supporters
Highly trusted and targeted
Encourages serendipitous
connection-making
Narrative; puts a human face
on the organization; evolves
Cheap… very cheap
Cons
Proven, but not fully
understood yet
Limited audience size; young
Effective campaigns require
some serious creative thinking
Fundraising large amounts is
very difficult 6
Social Media Now | Design for Good
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Time for a Shift―The great French Marshall Lyautey once asked his gardener to
plant a tree. The gardener objected that the tree was slow growing
and would not reach maturity for 100 years. The Marshall replied,
'In that case, there is no time to lose; plant it this afternoon!‗‖ -JFK
Social Media Now | Design for Good
Future-proofing: no checks, no mail15
Between the mid-1990s and present day, the number of
internet users has grown from ~10 million to ~2 billion. 7
In 1995, how did you…
Find information?
Communicate with friends?
Pay for purchases?
(Needless to say, it is hard to imagine nonprofits
fundraising via postal mail in 2030.)
Social Media Now | Design for Good
Not your grandma‘s audience16
Your audience is always changing, but today, so is the
very concept of ―audience‖.
You are still the primary actors, but your supporters no longer simply pay
admission, sit in the seats, and watch the performance.
We‘re not just talking about bringing people up on stage. We‘re talking
about letting them help write the play and perform it with you.
Social Media Now | Design for Good
(Re)(re)(re)distribution17
The founding principle behind most social media sites is
this: make it easy to share and redistribute information.
Good broadcast-style campaigns converge on similar network behavior
(think Super Bowl ads that go viral), but the potential for redistribution of a
message is built into the DNA of new media.
Social Media Now | Design for Good
The price of failure18
Web-based campaigns are tricky, but failure is
essentially free, due to the low cost of admission into
the social media carnival.
The key is to integrate the time you spend building your organization‘s web
identity into your daily workflow.
Social Media Now | Design for Good
Fund vs. friendraising19
Social media is better suited to friendraising than
fundraising. It helps you build connections—avenues for
finding donations, volunteers, grants, media attention,
etc.—but it does not magically create money.
Don‘t try to force your social media efforts to fit into a standard fundraising
model! It‘s a different game. Friendraising increases your potential for
fundraising: it reduces the number of degrees of separation between you
and prospective donors.
Social Media Now | Design for Good
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New Media Tools & UsesWhat can this new approach do for you?
What types of content match each social media site?
Social Media Now | Design for Good
Connect & engage21
Interacting with your supporters is the number one reason to
use social media. Stay in front of them!
Here‘s how we recommend connecting:
Twitter and other short-status-update services are great for finding and
publishing breaking news, special events and secrets (important!), and
campaign progress updates (―if we can get 25 more followers…‖)
Facebook and comment-enabled community sites are ideal for gathering
feedback and starting conversations to keep your audience engaged (and
solve problems); don‘t forget to create a plan for comment moderation!
Your website should house ALL content in some form or another and offer it
up to users in an interchangeable format, such as RSS or Atom
Comment-enabled blogs can be a good way to offer supporters a view from
inside the organization, addressing challenges and successes
Social Media Now | Design for Good
Connect & engage: sample tools22
Facebook wall Twitter feed Facebook events
YouTube Your own blogMeetup
Social Media Now | Design for Good
Share & collaborate23
Rule of thumb: anyone who has had success on the internet
(with anything) will be happy to tell you about it.
Ties to other organizations are just as important as ties to supporters:
Twitter, Facebook, and other status-enabled services can be a great way to
keep track of how other organizations are doing, what works, and what
doesn‘t
RSS feeds, email newsletters & digests, and micro news sites such as
Twitter can help you keep you updated on foundation announcements and
aid in the grant-finding process
Many sites, organizations, and agencies have begun opening the doors to
their resource archives; look for public APIs that can be used in
combination with your own website and applications
Use document sharing services to collaborate internally and externally
Social Media Now | Design for Good
Share & collaborate: sample tools24
Facebook ―discussions‖ Twitter RTs StumbleUpon
YouTube video responses Google DocsMindMeister
Social Media Now | Design for Good
Streamline25
This sounds like a lot of work, but you can always
count on the web to build the right tool for the job.
There are many ways to simplify web-based updates:
Automatically push updates out from your website to Twitter, Facebook,
etc. using modules in your CMS or by importing RSS feeds
Use third-party social network merging applications (such as HootSuite,
TweetDeck, and Google Buzz) to aggregate your profiles and send
across-the-board announcements
Keep track of your favorite sites using a social bookmarking service
(e.g. StumbleUpon, Delicious, Digg, etc.); browse relevantly-tagged
favorites for inspiration; recommend sites to other organizations
Social Media Now | Design for Good
Measure28
Everyone wants to see the numbers.
There are two key principles to successful social media measurement:
Send them to you: End goals should be located on your own website
Set up unique funnels: Create campaign-specific landing pages and
goals; give users unique objectives and rewards for achieving them
Measure the results using these methods:
Website analytics: Learn and install Google Analytics or similar to get to
know your audience better; find out who is interested in what content
Social network analytics: Facebook, Bit.ly, AddThis, Google Adwords,
and other services all offer some form of user tracking
Historical comparisons: Analyze new- vs. old-media success
Social Media Now | Design for Good
Prepare for future trends32
Let‘s try our hand at some internet fortunetelling. Where
is the web headed? What‘s next?
There will be data… lots of dataThink of the amount of personal data you generate on a daily basis:
emails, browsing history, status updates, location… now multiply that
by 10 years; successful future web services will focus on parsing
existing data in unique ways; interchangeable data formats will be key
Decreased separation, increased augmentationAs connectivity increases, the web ceases to act as an alternative
reality 8 and instead becomes an extension of daily life
Long live the appAs the web grows ever more complicated, users will continue to show a
preference for task-specific tools that do the dirty work of finding info
Social Media Now | Design for Good
Prepare for future trends, cont‘d33
So how can we prepare for the data zombie attack?
Disperse your presenceOne of the keys to survival on the web is to offer your audience many
channels for engagement; do this by tapping in to as many existing
networks as possible, but don‘t forget to maintain a consistent identity
Get used to transparencyShift your organization to the web slowly, but start now
Invite collaborationThe goal of a nonprofit is to successfully solve the problem it addresses;
the web is a perfect tool for sharing, just check your ego at the door
StandardizeDesign creatively, but offer information to supporters in a technically useful
way; maybe someone will offer to build you a free Android app
Social Media Now | Design for Good
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Highlights Consistent avatar
Useful Tweets
Timely information
Utilize lists
Social Media Now | Design for Good
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Highlights Consistent avatar
Useful Tweets
Timely information
Utilize lists
Highlights Custom tabs
Custom applications
Facebook is the perfect
place to gather stories
Social Media Now | Design for Good
Case study #2: successes39
Highlights Creative us of twitter
Incentive for followers
Timely
Single purpose tweets
Social Media Now | Design for Good
Case study #2: areas for improvement40
Highlights Posts are different
Foster community
Simplified tabs
Social Media Now | Design for Good
Social media asset mapping: step #143
First, let‘s list the content we‘re working with and some tools.
Social Media Now | Design for Good
Social media asset mapping: step #244
Next, let‘s consider how the content flows through each tool.
Social Media Now | Design for Good
Social media asset mapping: step #345
Finally, let‘s look at the specifics of each tool in the map.
Remember that this is just a boring old sample! Get creative!
Twitter: Facilitate conversation with supporters; status updated
automatically using CMS module when adding weekly news
Facebook: Facilitate conversation with supporters; manage events; allow
followers to sign up for email newsletter
Flickr: Manage annual event photos
Constant Contact: Manage email lists
Website: Automatically import events from Facebook; automatically import
photos from Flickr; manage monthly web info and weekly updates; unique
landing pages for each semi-annual fundraising campaign
Social Media Now | Design for Good
Homework time: help another nonprofit46
Uh oh, time to prove you‘ve been listening.
There is a worksheet in your handout. Fill out a few of your organization‘s
goals (for a specific campaign or in general) and your target audience,
then pass the sheet in. We‘ll shuffle them up and pass them back out… it‘ll
be up to you to take a look at someone else‘s situation and make a social
media strategy recommendation.
Maybe something as simple as creating a Facebook cause? How about a
time-sensitive Twitter campaign giving away free admission to a local
museum in exchange for volunteer work? A real-time map of all geotagged
social network activity related to the cause?
Social Media Now | Design for Good
The case for a new media approach49
The internet is not a tool, it is a living network… and you are
a big part of it! Social media is not just about finding
supporters, it is about developing relationships.
Connect & engageListen to question feedback; let your identity evolve; expand your reach
Share & collaborateFind similar organizations facing similar challenges, share successes and
resources; utilize the collective mind of your supporters
StreamlineKeep in front of your audience; merge your campaigns and workflow
MeasureFailure is free and it happens; find what works for your organization
Social Media Now | Design for Good
Next steps50
Keep up the momentum:
Develop your own social media mapOpen a Twitter account and tell the world how much fun you had today
Make one big organizational switch to the webMaybe begin sharing documents on Google? Or importing all of your
resource bookmarks to Del.icio.us?
Talk to a web designerAsk about the current state of your site, what measurement tools your
organization is using, and how to integrate social media into your CMS
Check out the rest of the Design For Good resourcesHeck, I guess you could even become a member if you want more
campaign-specific guidance and consulting (designforgoodmaine.org)
Social Media Now | Design for Good
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Go Forth and Multiply(The size of your organization‘s audience)
Social Media Now | Design for Good
References52
1. broadcast definition Dictionary.com Unabridged. Retrieved October 19, 2010, from Dictionary.com website:
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/broadcast
2. audience size ―you can see Oprah; Oprah can‘t see you‖ Clay Shirky, Here Comes Everybody (New York:
Penguin, 2008) pp 90-96.
3. two-way breakdown ―the power log distribution of weblogs‖ Clay Shirky, Here Comes Everybody (New York:
Penguin, 2008) pp 122-130.
4. traditional media penetration ―percentage of households that possess at least one television: 99‖ The
Sourcebook for Teaching Science. Retrieved October 19, 2010, from CSU Northridge website:
http://www.csun.edu/science/health/docs/tv&health.html
5. social media defined Kaplan, Andreas M.; Michael Haenlein (2010). "Users of the world, unite! The challenges
and opportunities of Social Media". Business Horizons 53 (1): 59–68. Retrieved from Wikipedia.com website:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_media
6. fundraising difficulties ―To Nonprofits Seeking Cash, Facebook App Isn't So Green.‖ The Washington Post.
Retrieved October 19, 2010, from The Washington Post website: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-
dyn/content/article/2009/04/21/AR2009042103786.html
7. internet user growth Internet World Stats. Retrieved October 19, 2010, from Internet World Stats website:
http://www.internetworldstats.com/stats.htm
8. alternative reality ―what seemed like a deep social change‖ Clay Shirky, Here Comes Everybody (New York:
Penguin, 2008) pp 193-196.