Justin G. Roy

Recently, I came across a post by Celeste Wroblewski, vice president of external relations at Donors Forum in Illinois on Getting Attention blog titled Less Is More! – Uncommon Advice from a Nonprofit Social Media Enthusiast.

Wroblewski brings up some very valid points for the use of time in social media but does focus a bit more on the traditional billboard marketing strategy rather than stepping out of your comfort zone, realizing and understanding that today’s consumer is demanding a much different experience with your brand (yes, a nonprofit is a brand). It goes without saying that social media (online branding and marketing) is not a fad, it’s here to stay, and the delay in acceptance only puts your competitors that much further ahead.

Moving into a more donor-based brand, isn’t the purpose to share your mission, open your arms, and educate your different constituents? You do not have to share that you recently got a coffee or saw a plane, but what about opening your gates a little to let folks know what goes on in your office on a daily basis? If something funny happened that day, share it. Let your current and [just as important] potential future donors get to know you as a human.

Let’s not forget (and I am not going to explore it today) the additional search results that come from participation on social networking sites. Can your brand afford not to create additional pages of search results?

I wanted to share my response to the article and ask for your opinion:

My response:
There are some great points brought up in the post above, in regards to sometimes flooding the online waves and I wanted to thank, Celeste for posting!

I do agree on the “rules” or accepted numbers challenge above; there really is not any “proven” magic number on how many blogs, posts, comments, tweets, or what-have-you. When you see interesting posts or information that you think your followers would like to read – post it. If you don’t then do not retweet something or post just to cross it off your list. Everybody’s following and their habits are different than another’s, so experiment and find out what works best for you in regards to building your followers/friends/readers/etc.

I am curious, however, why a nonprofit would go out onto any of these social networks if they are not going to be active? Simply being present is not enough for any online branding and marketing (aka social media) strategy. Would you attend a networking event and sit in the corner, choosing one person (based on the numbers), walk up to them and announce your good news, then walk away?

Any good strategy/plan would understand and touch upon the importance of building your audience (your target market), engaging your audience, building links and traffic to your site, and having a call to action. It’s time to throw away the billboard mentality and truly understand what online marketing and branding (social media) really is.

Time (free or spent) is absolutely an ongoing challenge for any brand (yes, nonprofits are brands too), adding in the question of who is responsible for social media. Some larger brands have resources to assign and most small(er) businesses don’t. When I speak to small business owners, I often remind them that it is just as important to “work” for your own business and don’t loose sight of that. If you allocate 10 hours a week to marketing then fit social media and engagement strategy in there.

I am really curious to hear others thoughts on this, knowing that I may be standing alone in left field. However, just as we embrace the ability to say what we feel we also need to embrace the possibility of standing alone.

What are your thoughts?

Last week I posted about being approached by Barbara Talisman from Talisman Associates to comment and contribute on her blog, Talisman Thinking Out loud, to a blog post she was at the time writing on social media connections. A wonderful (I might be biased) post came out of our conversations and interviews and was divided into two parts; it was pretty long as one and I think Barbara forgot how much I like to talk and how difficult it is to interrupt/cut me off when I get going.

(Click here to read Part 1)

The two major questions we talked about for Part 2 of the post, included:

• What does looking at someone’s website or blog tell you about them?
• Does it matter if they represent a company v. personal brand?

Remember with whatever web (2.0 or have we decided on 3.0 yet) era we are in it’s important to remember that our main source of information is the world wide web. World Wide.

How do you, or your brand, want to be portrayed? As somebody who understands the need to claim their space online and engage with their visitors or somebody who half-you-know-what their strategy?

Click here to read Part 2!

Honestly, it’s 2010 and if you do not have a URL for me to browse to you have lost me. You do not need to be a technical genius to build your own website on Go Daddy (or any of the others) or a blog-website combo on WordPress. If you really cannot build one, ask your network and barter with your strengths – somebody once offered me a home cooked meal (with her family) in exchange for help setting up a WordPress site (the meal/deal was amazing).

I was recently approached by Barbara Talisman from Talisman Associates to comment and contribute on her blog, Talisman Thinking Out loud, to a blog post she [was at the time] recently wrote on evaluating your social media connections.

The first three questions we addressed (the next set will be posted next week):

• What makes a good person to follow on Twitter or how to determine who to follow v. block?
• How can you tell if someone on Twitter is legit – coming from a place of honesty, truth or knowledge?
• Does having a lot of followers and tweeting a lot mean you have something to say?

In today’s follow me – watch me – please engage with me world it’s important for everybody (regardless of industry) to understand their strategy, understand who and what their brand is, and communicate properly. Insert integrated communications.

Rather than repost the entire article, please visit the blog: Click here to read the post!

The power of networking online is huge! There are many sites available, and it seems there is a new one coming out almost every week. So how to you chose which one to use? Not sure. Keep in mind what type of networker you are and how much time you really want to spend building your network.

I’ve found many different types of people on LinkedIn, and I am going to break them into two groups.

Those who openly network.

Those who do not openly network but want to join your network.

I think the first is self-explanatory, but I do want to rant a bit (of course I do) about the second.  Why not give to get?  I had a conversation with one of my connections earlier this year who just did not seem to “get it” when it came to networking.  He was insistent that he did not want to share his connections for fear that somebody would steal them.  Seriously (I asked)?

On a site with over 20 million people, who are connected up to 3 degrees away, the probability that your connections are not at least, somehow, connected with somebody else is a preposterous idea.  After a few “zings” back and forth, I had to end the conversation. 

Fast forward 4 months.  I check my LinkedIn (my friend is still not an open networker) and see a request for an introduction from said friend.  Interesting.  So, I wrote back and let him know I could not forward the introduction for various reasons; the main reason was my belief that I could not promote somebody who will not share their connections but expect somebody else to share theirs. 

Needless to say, I removed him from my contacts.  Yes, that might have been brash, hasty, and a little stubborn.   

So, I ask you.  Are you an open networker, closed, or selfish (like above)?  I would really like to hear from people on both sides of the fence. 

If you are somebody who allows others to see their contacts, feel free to send me an invite.  To answer you beforehand, no I never have nor will go through somebody’s contacts to invite them. However, the power of connecting now may mean a resource at your fingertips later.

My profile on LinkedIn.

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