Hi,
This was discussed a great deal at the New Times, New Tech Conference in Mpls
on Friday (where Ann T was a big hit talking about web sites). Lots of
nonprofits are struggling with the same thing.
The keynoter was Gavin Clabaugh of the Mott Foundation. His response was
pretty simple and he repeated it often...think about your message and your
audience.
Jumping off from Gavin and the conference I think it is clear that we need to
not just use these tools willy-nilly (unless you think it is fun, and if you
can combine your work and fun go for it). We need to be strategic about where
you spend your time:
*decide who are you trying to reach
*figure out what tool/s your audience is using
*delop some simple metrics so you know what success looks like (i.e. I will
spend 2 hrs a week and expect to get the word out to 25 people each week, and
get x number of people to act in a certain way...maybe that is hits on your web
site)
*act on your plan and check back on your metrics
I don't think it is too different than what we've all always done for
marketing. It still takes time, but now it can be less expensive. The other
big change I see is that now we need to not only think about our message and
our audience, but also we need to begin to think about where and when our
audience will be most interested what we are trying to "sell" to them.
Using Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, etc. we can develop online networks, but
just sending out announcements is not enough. Obviously, being who you are you
were able to cobble together some networks pretty quickly for the MnBroadband
Coalition. You would know the strategy questions better than I would, but if
it were me I'd lay out my goal for this segment of the project:
*maybe it really is just to reach 100 or 1000 people
*maybe it is to focus on one of the coalition principles and have a certain
number of members contact key policy makers
Hypothetically, if the focus were the latter, I'd do just as Kristin Larson
suggests and use the various networks (that you have time for) to focus on the
one tool or tools that will enable you to do that. Maybe those key policy
makers have an open forum you could use a more formal email campaign or
LinkedIn campaign to get written responses for. Perhaps a web site or open
GoogleDoc that enables members to sign up to contact key people would be best.
Maybe a key policy maker is on Twitter or maybe their staff is.
I may be just foolish, but I won't think this web 2.0 revolution is big or
scary to those of us with small projects and networks. I think it is to our
advantage. As these techincal revolutions (to use Gavin's phrase) happen
around us, we just need to return to a focus on the basics, just the kind of
things I think most of the people I know at nonprofits (and you as well) are
good at.
Rick
Rick Birmingham