I can’t count how many times an organization, a campaigner or a consultant has asked for my opinion about “how can I make this go viral?” My response is usually
Great reads from around the web on April 28th
I come across so many great conversations, ideas, and resources all over the web every day. Here are some of the most interesting things I’ve found recently (as of April 28th). You can join the conversations in the comments, or click through to the original posts to find what others are saying.
To follow more of the things I find online, you can follow @amysampleward on Twitter (which is just a blog and resource feed), or find me on Delicious (for all kinds of bookmarks).
- HopenSource – Thanks to @350 for the link – check out this great portal of hope and inspiration from Grist Magazine. "Show why Earth's not effed" and get inspired from the stories of those making change.
- LearnPhilanthropy.net – Online venue for grantmaker education – "The Grantmaker Education Initiative is bringing people together to create a stronger, more rational, and less fragmented system for grantmaker learning than we have today — one that builds a new culture of professional development in the field, works better for the individual learners involved in philanthropy, and better for the many groups and organizations that provide learning programs and resources to them.<br />
<br />
LearnPhilanthropy.net is a simple online venue we’ve created to invite dialogue among those who are passionate about grantmaker education. We hope to establish a collaborative learning community — with plenty of space for ideas and wisdom of the field. We aim to work together to create a vision for meeting the education and learning needs of people in our field. We invite you to join us, take our survey, and we welcome your contributions." - Do Something: Helping Humanity With a Click of the Mouse | Fast Company – "Sending a text or clicking to vote may be the trendy way to help humankind. The question, says Nancy Lublin, is whether such so-called slacktivism really works. Name-calling is never nice — that much most of us learned in kindergarten. Go ahead and criticize the substance of an action or the content of a speech, but just calling a person a nasty name is like pulling hair. Unfortunately, a lot of it happens in the do-gooder sector–and lately, much of it has been directed at projects that could fall under the umbrella of a newish movement called "slacktivism.""
- OPEN CALL: Do Nonprofits Make Films? We Say Yes! – netwitsthinktank.com – "What's the top thing you can do this year to engage your constituents? Both online and off? Quick, what springs to mind? Well I'm here to tell you that it should be video. If you are going to do one new thing in 2010 to help get the word out about your organization’s mission, it should be to create a video."
- What You and Your Nonprofit Should Know About Facebook Changes – Beth's Blog – Facebook seems to be an ever-changing landscape whether it's features, privacy, security or functionality: something's always changing. Beth has a great post discussing some of the changes and how they impact your organization on facebook.
- The State of Online Word of Mouth Marketing [STATS] – "In a session yesterday at Forrester’s Marketing Forum, Forrester analysts Josh Bernoff and Augie Ray presented research findings on peer influence and word of mouth marketing. Some of the statistics were surprising, and the presentation was rife with practical tips for marketers we thought worth sharing."
Great reads from around the web on April 21st
I come across so many great conversations, ideas, and resources all over the web every day. Here are some of the most interesting things I’ve found recently (as of April 21st). You can join the conversations in the comments, or click through to the original posts to find what others are saying.
To follow more of the things I find online, you can follow @amysampleward on Twitter (which is just a blog and resource feed), or find me on Delicious (for all kinds of bookmarks).
- Social Media’s Changing Landscape to Make A Profit – Online Fundraising, Advocacy, and Social Media – frogloop – I'm really looking forward to this conversation – what do you think? "Admit it – you don’t like when things that you are quite comfortable with suddenly change. As social networks try and become profitable they are experimenting with new ad models and trying to drive more traffic to increase ad revenue. Twitter’s beta advertising model via "Promoted Tweets" and Facebook’s new Fan Page “Like” button (which is replacing the “Become a Fan” button) is buzzing with critics’ opinions. Are these changes good for nonprofits bottom line too? The jury is out."
- From Social Entrepreneurship to Social Interpreneurship — Social Edge – There's a great post and conversation starter from Peter Deitz up on the Social Edge blog talking from social interpreneurship. "What is social interpreneurship you ask? I’m not entirely sure, in light of its classified nature, but I would hazard a guess that it’s two parts Internet, five parts Interaction, and ten parts Interdependence. Flipping through the Skoll World Forum program and rerunning the highlights in my head, I see evidence of social interpreneurship at every turn." Join the converstaion!
- Chris Brogan Talks Nonprofits and Trust Agents – netwitsthinktank.com – One of the basic best practices I am always talking about with organizations starting out with social media is to be a real person – not an "organization" online. Have real pictures and have real conversations. Here's a great video with Chris Brogan and next steps for being "real" online.
- Advice & Resources for Your Online Organizing Career – Check out this great round up from the presenters at the "Online Organizing – Career Night event that includes lessons, insights, and even job opportunities!
- Grizzard Communications Group – Free social media tools & the ‘experts’ who can’t answer “How?” – Eric has a great list of free social media tools to help you find content, monitor trends and much more! "In the last week, I attended both the NTEN Nonprofit Technology Conference and the AFP 2010 Conference. One problem that I saw in many social media sessions at both – and a problem that I see far too often at social media conferences, seminars, and How To sessions – is that speakers and panelists rarely provide tangible How To advice to people struggling to get started. They tell you you should do something, “Start up a Facebook Fan Page and start posting content interesting to your fans,” but regardless of how hard they are pushed, they rarely can say how to go about figuring out what content your fans find interesting or maybe even how to gain new fans."
- 10 Take-Aways from SXSW for Nonprofits — Nonprofit Geekery – Happy that I came across Matt Koltermann's wrap up from SXSW. It was a few weeks late but better than never! My favorite take away from this list: 4. Make sure your website behaves like an approachable and likable person. "The annual SXSW Interactive conference in Austin, TX—which brings together tech geeks, social media peeps, and other online folk—wrapped-up yesterday after five intense and inspirational days. I attended a bunch of sessions focused on how nonprofits, in particular, can take advantage of technology to meet their mission—here’s a short-list of ten things that really stuck."
Great reads from around the web on April 12th
I come across so many great conversations, ideas, and resources all over the web every day. Here are some of the most interesting things I’ve found recently (as of April 12th). You can join the conversations in the comments, or click through to the original posts to find what others are saying.
To follow more of the things I find online, you can follow @amysampleward on Twitter (which is just a blog and resource feed), or find me on Delicious (for all kinds of bookmarks).
- NTEN's Remake of "Bohemian Rhapsody" | NTEN: The Nonprofit Technology Network – "Because of the generous matching funds from Convio, large donations from thePort and Firefly Partners, and the support of nearly 200 nptechies, we were able to surpass our scholarship campaign goal and bring nearly 70 staffers from small nonprofits to the 2010 Nonprofit Technology Conference. That was the meat, now here's the pudding: the NTEN community's remake of "Bohemian Rhapsody", Muppets style!" Be sure to watch close for cameos of myself and many others 🙂
- Nonprofits Take Note: Donors are what they tweet | Social Citizens Blog – "As with many new technologies and developments, social media is being used in surprising and unintended ways to analyze and reveal unexpected data and trends. Twitter, Facebook and Google tools have already been used for market research, sales predictions and targeted advertising. Twitter, for example, has shown remarkable accuracy at forecasting box office success, even more accuracy than the currently used (and comparably complex) Hollywood Stock Exchange method. Now credit card companies are reportedly using foursquare and other location sharing platforms to predict divorce, and therefore financial troubles, by analyzing the places people are checking in frequently – the logic being that Home Depot and Bed, Bath & Beyond check-ins demonstrate stability in a way that frequent late night bar check-ins do not."
- 'Online fundraising will change everything' – Third Sector – "Azadi Sheridan, the chair of the Institute of Fundraising's Technology Special Interest Group, tells David Ainsworth why donor 'churn and burn' won't work in the future. The big changes to fundraising in the coming years will spring from the power of the web, according to Azadi Sheridan, chair of the Institute of Fundraising’s Technology Special Interest Group. He says charities have been relatively slow to start using the internet to communicate with their supporters, but he believes they will catch up quickly."
- Wild Apricot Blog : 5 Tech Tools for More Engaging Events – "Real-world events are the ultimate in social networking, and nothing beats face-to-face communication. But it can be challenging to connect with everyone you want to meet at a large event and even more difficult to follow up with the attendees afterwards. And what about those in your community who can’t travel to your meeting or conference, for financial or other practical reasons? How can you bring those people into the fold of your event, too?"
- What can Google Buzz do for you? A study for non-profits | Think Social – "Two weeks ago, Mashable posted a how-to for non-profit organizations trying to use Google Buzz. We wanted more than four ways to use the new tool. Think Social writer and resident digital anthropologist Krystal D’Costa interviewed folks on the Google side and non-profit side for a closer look. (You can also read what Krystal’s previously written about Google Buzz.)"