A lesson from Sing for Hope: Harnessing social media for non-profits
Monday, June 27th, 2011
By Jinna Wang
Sing for Hope social media intern
With almost 200 million accounts on Twitter and more than 500 million monthly active users on Facebook, the power and influence of social media is increasingly hard to overlook. For non-profits, correct use of social media is a great way to promote interactions with volunteers, supporters, and potential donors as well as to reach out to a larger audience than previously possible. Social media really serves to benefit the symbiotic relationship between a non-profit and its supporters.
The world of social media can be a bit daunting for newcomers. With a myriad of options and new tools being invented every day, one could have a difficult time understanding Tumblr or Twitter, LinkedIn or Foursquare, Pongr or Gowalla. Even Facebook is constantly adding new features.
For our team at Sing for Hope, social media is increasingly playing a big part in our community outreach efforts. Social media puts us in direct contact with a wide array of professional artists, from classical musicians to photographers to Broadway performers, mobilizing their talents in volunteer service programs that benefit schools, hospitals, and communities. Our online presence is especially important to our Pop-Up Pianos program, where we celebrate our year-round work in schools, hospitals, and communities by placing 88 pianos across the five boroughs of NYC, bringing access to the arts to the greater public.
Our core group of social media fans or followers consists of Volunteer Artists and music-lovers with an interest in giving back to the community. Since we are based in New York City, we also heavily interact with a broad range New Yorkers, informing our followers about special events, contests and programs.
With the invaluable help of the social media gurus at Invoke, we have gathered some tried-and-true tips for non-profits who are looking to jump on the social media bandwagon. Congrats! You have already taken the first step simply by reading this blog post.
1. Define your community
Who is your target audience? Is it young professionals, college students, or pet owners? With that in mind, choose your social media tool wisely: But no matter who your target audience is, make them the primary focus of your social media campaign when you are first starting out. Start following/adding/“Liking”, and begin to interact with your hand-selected community. Always keep in mind the type of message you would like to send out to your specific target audience. For example, ask yourself: Should my tone be cheerful or quirky, serious or playful? Are the links I’m attaching appropriate for my audience? After you have built up a base, start to think about what others would be interested in your organization. If your core group is all about supporting education for impoverished children, interacting with the pages of the PTA, major universities, and even an office supply store are all logical next steps.
2. The Power of the Retweet
We cannot stress this enough: interact, interact, interact! Interaction is the foundation on which social media thrives. By commenting/retweeting/Liking, you are having a personal conversation on your organization’s behalf with a real person, adding a genuine human touch to a previously voiceless page, and building a relationship just like you would offline. On another note, don’t be shy to friend groups that are similar to you. Establishing a good relationship with a sister organization is a great way for potential supporters to find you, so send them a friendly shout-out once in a while!
3. Explore
Once you have found your comfort zone with a few social media tools, make an account with some new websites and start playing around to see if they work for you. For example, for Sing for Hope’s 2011 Pop-Up Piano campaign, we are bringing in Foursquare, a location-based check-in device, as a major part of our social media network. Since we are placing 88 hand-painted pianos in specific locations around the 5 boroughs of NYC, people can check-in to the exact piano they are playing on, and tweet us about their experience. A prize is even granted to the first person to check into all 88 pianos, generating positive publicity and a healthy dose of competition.
After you become well-versed in the world of social media, be sure to keep your online voice in check to make sure you are presenting the right virtual image for your non-profit. At Sing-for-Hope we are very grateful to Invoke for pointing us in the right direction for social media. They have given us a clear analysis of our current online standings, and great suggestions for we can expand and improve our online presence. Good luck to all our fellow non-profits!
