How Breast Cancer Awareness Groups Use Facebook and Twitter

I read an article on montgomeryadvertiser.com titled
'Social' Support: Breast cancer groups use Facebook, Twitter to boost awareness.

Here are some interesting facts from the article:

• Breast cancer groups use social media to reach people who might not otherwise hear their message.
• Breast cancer groups have different objectives and different groups they try to reach.
• Volunteers for the American Cancer Society use social media to get the word out about events.
• Susan G. Komen for the Cure uses its Facebook page, which has more than 280,000 likes, to drive traffic to its website. People are coming to their website to learn more about the information they are posting.
• Twitter is also useful for posting information about events. Followers of a group can retweet messages for their followers to see.
  

After reading this article, I started thinking about nonprofits using Facebook and Twitter.

Here are my thoughts:

• Organizations can encourage their supporters to post information about upcoming events and campaigns on both Facebook and Twitter.
• Use Facebook and Twitter to post links from your organization's website. Link to new reports, studies, press releases, new resources, and any other new content on the website. Followers and people who like your organization do not check your organization's website daily. They can see your new content through links on Facebook and Twitter.
• Organizations reach new people through social media.

Bloglines and RSS Feeds

I just read an entry on BlogHer titled "Is RSS Dead? Bloglines to Close on October 1". I have been using Bloglines since 2005 and had two accounts.

The first account I created was to get the latest news from blogs about nonprofit technology, educational technology, and web design. For the past couple of years I had stopped checking that account because I was too busy checking my second account.

The second account was for The Nonprofit Blog Exchange. I used the public account to post the blogroll on The Nonprofit Blog Exchange blog for about 5 years.

I made the switch a few months ago to Google Reader. I had noticed that feeds were not loading correctly in Bloglines. I thought some blogs were not updated anymore. But it turned out it they were still updated, the updates loaded in Google Reader but not Bloglines. I moved The Nonprofit Blog Exchange account over to Google Reader.

After I made that switch I went into my other account and noticed Bloglines now required a word verification to sign in. I really did want to deal with that to read my rss feeds each time I logged in. I finally moved my other account over to Google Reader.

I would be lost without an rss feed reader! It helps me keep track of all the blogs that are part of the exchange. I use it to help me with writing roundups and it helps me figure out where I leave off reading each blog.

How to Use Delicious to Find and Share Disaster Relief Resources

In September 2005 I wrote an entry titled How to Tag Hurricane Katrina Bookmarks on del.icio.us.

Recently there have been more disasters and it is time to revisit this topic.

What is delicious?

Delicious is a great tool to share bookmarks with others. When you add a bookmark, you can add tags that are related to the link.

You can find shared bookmarks by using tags or by using the search engine.

What resources can you find and share on delicious?

• News articles about specific disasters
• What organizations are helping and how they are helping
• Information about volunteering
• Information about donating

Disaster Relief Related Tags

disaster AND relief
http://www.delicious.com/tag/disaster+relief

hurricane
http://www.delicious.com/tag/hurricane

earthquake
http://www.delicious.com/tag/earthquake

flood
http://www.delicious.com/tag/flood

oilspill
http://www.delicious.com/tag/oilspill


For specific disasters, you can use the following format:

http://www.delicious.com/tag/TYPEOFDISASTER+PLACE

Earthquake AND Haiti
http://www.delicious.com/tag/earthquake+haiti

Earthquake AND Chile
http://www.delicious.com/tag/earthquake+chile

Flood AND Pakistan
http://www.delicious.com/tag/flood+pakistan

Hurricane AND New Orleans
http://www.delicious.com/tag/hurricane+neworleans

Oil Spill AND Gulf Coast
http://www.delicious.com/tag/oilspill+gulfcoast

For hurricanes (or tropical storms) you can use the following formats-

http://www.delicious.com/tag/hurricane+NAME
http://www.delicious.com/tag/hurricaneNAME
http://www.delicious.com/tag/NAMEOFHURRICANE

Hurricane AND Katrina
http://www.delicious.com/tag/hurricane+katrina

Nonprofits Use Social Media More Than Businesses and Education

The University of Massachusetts Dartmouth Center for Marketing Research published a report titled US Charities’ Adoption of Social Media Study. This is the third year they have published a study about nonprofits using social media. They received responses from 76 organizations.

Here are some of the findings of the report:

• In 2009, nonprofits used Social Networking (96%) and Twitter (90%) the most. Social Networking went up from 32% in 2007 and 79% in 2008.
• In 2009, 65% of nonprofits used blogs which went up from 34% in 2007 and 57% in 2008.
• In 2009, 93% of nonprofits used Facebook, compared with Higher Education at 84% and Inc. 500 at 61%.
• In 2009, 90% of nonprofits used Twitter, compared with Higher Education at 59% and Inc. 500 at 52%.
• In 2009, the adoption of blogging for nonprofits was 65%, compared to 51% for Higher Education, 45% for Inc. 500, and 22% for Fortune 500.

7 Ways to Improve Nonprofit Websites

This is a topic I have written about before on my blog. Earlier entries I have written are Website Pet Peeves and Content Ideas for Non-profit Websites.

I just read a blog entry at Marketing for Nonprofits about nonprofit websites and I started thinking about this topic again.  Listed below are some ways to improve nonprofit websites.


1. Easy to Find Content

What content do you want people to know about on your site? Make sure website visitors can find this information quickly! Examples include how to donate, how to volunteer, how to sign up on e-mail lists, events, and campaigns.

2. News Items

Make sure you keep press releases and other news sections current! There are many organizations that have not kept their news sections updated in years - it's hard to believe that these organizations have not had any news in over a year or longer

3. Contact Information

There are many organizations that do not list their contact information or it is hard to find on their website. Readers want to know where your organization is located! If your organization does not want to put down complete contact information, at least put down the city and state or country if you are not located in the United States.

4. Page Titles

There are many websites that do not have the organization's name in the title. These websites have titles like Home Page or Home. That's not very descriptive! Be sure to include your organization's name in the titles of your pages! Also, if you are updating a newsletter or something else with a date on it, be sure to remember to change the date on the page. I have seen lots of newsletters on websites (and e-newsletters) where the title says April 2010 when it is really for May 2010.

5. Design

Content Management Systems are the way to go now for nonprofits. However, there are still nonprofits who are updating websites manually and these sites do not always have the best design and usability. Make sure all webpages on the site have the same color and navigation scheme. Make sure visitors are able to tell what text or image is a link. Make sure the information is not cluttered and there is not too much white space.

6. Social Media

Does your organization have a presence on Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, YouTube, Flickr or another related site? Be sure to include the links to these sites on your organization website! It can be listed on the homepage or it can be listed on a separate page for Social Media. Be sure it is easy to find on the site! Also remember to include your website address on these other sites. Alot of people learn about your organization through these websites.

7. Blogs

Does your organization have a blog? Make sure the link is easy to find on the website! Be sure the name of the organization and link to website is on the blog. As a nonprofit blog reader, I have seen many blogs that do not tell me what organization it is or a link to their web address. Remember that some people learn about your organization from your blog!