Strategic Online Communication for Nonprofits

Posts Tagged ‘nonprofit’

One of our greatest struggles in the nonprofit sector is how to maximize our social impact with limited resources. We’re usually gifted with a tremendous empathy for the people we serve and a passion for what we do—but few of the technology tools we need, because the funds simply aren’t available.

Several generous companies have made their world-class technologies available for free to nonprofits with 501c3 status in the U.S.  These technologies can completely transform the way we do business, and increase our impact exponentially.  They include:

1. Salesforce. Salesforce is a powerful constituent relationship management (CRM) tool that can help nonprofits organize, track and evaluate all interactions with donors, partners, media, and even project beneficiaries.  It is an excellent tool for fundraising, project management, monitoring and evaluation. The Salesforce Foundation typically donates 10 licenses per organization for an annual value of $15,000.  The application is hosted by Salesforce for free, and only requires some customization.

2. Vertical Response. One of the most popular mass email tools on the market, Vertical Response offers user-friendly templates and powerful evaluation tools to measure the impact of email messaging. Vertical Response integrates seamlessly with Salesforce, and is free for qualifying nonprofits for up to 10,000 mass emails per month.

3. Google Apps. The Google App package includes email, calendars, word processing, spreadsheet and collaboration programs, among other features.  Google Apps is designed to replace the costly Microsoft Office package and is free to nonprofits with less than 3,000 users.  Organizations can establish their own email addresses (name@organization.org) with almost unlimited storage.  It is all hosted by Google which means HUGE cost savings:  internal servers are no longer needed so you can say goodbye to server maintenance fees and email downtime caused by internal server problems.

4.  Google Ads. Google Grants is an in-kind donation program that offers free AdWords advertising to qualified 501c3 organizations. The program helps nonprofits promote websites or campaigns through advertising on Google, at a value of up to $10,000 per month.

With so many remotely hosted state-of-the-art technologies available for free, nonprofits can slash IT costs and upgrade to powerful packages that increase productivity, efficiency and visibility.

To learn more about free or affordable technologies and services available to nonprofits, contact Upleaf.

Faced with the reality of shrinking budgets and fewer grant opportunities, many nonprofits– rather “social profits”– are turning to new web-based technologies to help out.

New technologies offer opportunities for online fundraising, publicity, participation in policy debate, and perhaps most importantly—and opportunity to deepen community engagement and social impact.

A new Hatcher Group report surveyed 30 organizations to see how they’re using social media and what their experiences have been.  All respondents reported currently using some form of social media, and most intend to ramp up their efforts next year.

Key findings:

Blogs. Blogs have offered a good ROI for nonprofits.  Nearly 100 million Americans read blogs at least once a month, and effective outreach can take less than 2 hours per week.

• 83% of the organizations reach out to bloggers, but only 30% do so frequently
• 88% reported being cited in blogs as a result of their outreach
• 16% of organizations were invited to submit guest posts
• 93% of the organizations monitor references to their organization or issues in the blogosphere

Facebook. Facebook is popular among nonprofits and with good reason: More than 200 million users, 50% of whom sign in every day; users become fans of causes (4 million per day) offering free visibility and endorsements for nonprofits; nonprofits have collectively raised more than $10 million through Facebook.

• 60% of the groups are currently on Facebook
• Facebook was used by respondents to generate record event turnout using Facebook’s event invites, raise money, and promote fundraising events

Twitter. Twitter was less popular among nonprofits, used by only 24% of respondents.  Those who did use it found it effective for disseminating news, promoting reports, and building connections with other organizations.

Conclusions? While we know that social media offers excellent opportunities for nonprofits, many are still not using it to its full capacity.  Those who are using it are ahead of the curve and already seeing the returns.  For those who aren’t—it’s time to start!

For tips on how to develop effective social media outreach, view our strategic communications blog posts and tweets.

Posted by Elizabeth Beachy, Upleaf Co-Founder