Are you a nonprofit? Did your organization create impactful videos in 2011? Do you want your organization to be recognized for making great videos and maybe win some incredible prizes? Perfect.

The 6th Annual DoGooder Nonprofit Video Contest is taking submissions starting February 1st. The contest is presented by YouTube and See3 Communications and generously sponsored by Cisco and us, NTEN. We’re seeking out and celebrating the best videos that nonprofit organizations have created to advance their missions using this powerful medium to create meaningful change for the better.

So what do the winning nonprofits get for participating?

The four best videos will each receive:

• $3,500 in prize donations
• An additional gift of up $3,500 (US) worth of Cisco products to help each winning org harness the power of human and technology networks to multiply their impact on the people and communities they serve.
• Free registration to the 2013 Nonprofit Technology Conference, provided by NTEN.

This year’s contest features a special category for all orgs, regardless of size: “Best Video Storytelling” will celebrate videos that employ narrative and tell the real, human stories of people, organizations, and issues.

The winning videos will be announced at this year’s Nonprofit Technology Conference and featured on YouTube’s homepage on Thursday, April 5th.

You read that right: the winning videos will be featured on the YouTube homepage.

At the end of last year’s contest, the winning videos received almost 1 million new views after being featured there for just one day.

For nonprofits, video is a great way to share your mission, get out a message, and tell the stories of the people and issues you support. The medium educates, inspires, and moves people to action. The DoGooder Awards recognizes nonprofits that see the importance of this. This contest is meant to show nonprofits of all sizes they can win by making video part of their communications strategy.

Organizations are more video savvy than ever. Last year’s contest had nearly 1,400 entries from 821 organizations in 4 countries. There were 24,000 votes cast by the public and a surge of views on YouTube for the entrants. That’s encouraging, but 2012 is a new year and the contest organizers want to make sure as many amazing nonprofits enter as possible.

Here are some details to get you started:

• Submissions for Best Small, Medium, and Large nonprofit organization as well as Best Video Storytelling must be videos made between January 1st 2011 and February 29th 2012 . Each nonprofit can submit as many videos as they would like, but the contest encourages only the best work from each organization.
• Entries cannot exceed 10 minutes in length and are limited to nonprofits from the US, Canada, the UK, and Australia. See contest rules here.
• All nonprofits are welcome to enter their video. There are no specific types of missions we are looking for. The contest is about recognizing nonprofit organizations for outstanding use of video to create meaningful positive change.
• You can submit your videos from February 1st until February 29th. Tell your friends at other orgs to submit as well!
• Starting March 14th, voting is open to the public, so be sure to share the word (Email, Facebook, Google+, Twitter, carrier pigeon, smoke signals, etc.).
• Important: Your organization MUST be a member of the YouTube Nonprofit Program. If you’re not already,make sure that’s the next thing you do after you read this post (it’s quick, easy and free to eligible orgs). If you’re picked as a semifinalist in the contest, YouTube will make sure your organization’s application for membership is approved in time to be eligible for public voting.

Start thinking about which creative, compelling, and interesting video your nonprofit wants to submit, then plan to rally your supporters to vote in March. Good luck!

This message is cross-posted from the NTEN blog.

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Whether you are part of a nonprofit organization, an action campaign, a local community, or a school, you know that it is through stories you can showcase your work, change people’s minds, inspire them to make change, or join you to make a difference. As we all continue exploring the vast horizons of the internet and the social tools it offers, be sure to check out the applications that help you continue telling stories with the power of video, maps and more. Here are four that currently have my vote – please share yours!

1. Historypin

Historypin is a new (and free) application for Android, iPhone, or the web that arranges photos, videos, and text in the context of time and location (leveraging the Google Maps API). Ever since it launched earlier this summer, I haven’t been able to stop using it both to learn and to share. For example, when I travel to a new neighborhood or city, I open the app as I walk down the street to explore photos and stories of my exact location across history. I also have been taking photos of buildings and locations and sharing them back to the community to continue documenting the world around us. The potential for how organizations can use a tool like this is endless – the ability to easily and accessibly put together your stories and content with the locations where it all takes place is so exciting! Be sure to check it out for yourself or watch this video to take a tour.

2. Animoto

Animoto isn’t a new tool, but it is still in my top five. And for good reason: I love tools that help make quality content and storytelling something that all of us can create. With Animoto, you can put together photos, slides, and text with audio and video to create a compelling story from all the various elements you may have created separately or gathered at an event. There are terrific examples I’ve seen, like Epic Change’s Tweetsgiving campaign video, and you can previous more examples on the Animoto website. Bonus: nonprofits can apply to get Animoto Pro for free!

3. Posterous

When it comes to sharing stories, we all have our preferred methods of how to post, and where, and even who to share with each time. Posterous is a blogging tool, that is really so much more. You can, as with traditional blogs, have a site that shares your posts with the world. You can also create groups to share privately across a team, and organization, or a network. Plus, you can add authors to a blog to be sure it isn’t just you that’s responsible for posting. The best part is that you can post in a manner of ways: from the platform, from your email, from your phone, etc. This way, you can build community amongst your volunteers with a private group for sharing lessons, build momentum during a campaign with all your organizers posting to one stream, or create a dynamic blog for your organization with all kinds of media and posts. Oh, and it even has auto-posting so when you’re spending your time creating change, you don’t have to remember to cross post to Twitter! Check it out and see if it’s right for your team.

4. Storify

Have you been to an event or conference where many people were tweeting highlights from speakers and taking photos, but then when you searched for the content there was just SO much of it? With Storify, you can search across multiple social platforms and pull together the content that’s of interest, as well as add additional text, to create a story (whether it’s a recap of an event or a chat, or highlights from the news) that’s shareable and includes voices from across the community. You can also use it to pull together content you and your organization have shared across the web to tell the story of your work. You do need a Twitter account to use it. Even if you don’t have an event or campaign going today, try out Storify with a topic of interest or just use “#nptech” to pull together content from the nonprofit technology sector. Give it a go!

5. Bonus: Instagram

I couldn’t include this one in the main list since Instagram is only available for iPhone users at this time, so I’ve added it as a bonus. I am an Adroid user, but all of my friends with iPhones have great feedback about this application that allows you to take photos, apply filters, and share all from your phone. There are also complimentary tools like Tweegram to add Twitter text to your Instagram timeline. I definitely think there’s potential here for building out features and opening up the application, as with anything, if the community calls for it. So join me in saying, “I’ll try that, please!”

Looking for more resources for turning your organization’s stories into digital engagement? Want to check out examples from other organizations already testing and learning? Be sure to visit TechSoup Global’s digital storytelling section for webinar archives, blog posts, and chat archives!

What are your favorite tools or tips for telling the story of your work and impact online? Be sure to share links to the tools you love so others can check them out!

Presentation

Resources

Community & Content

I’ve documented the community and content mapping processes before, you can use the slides above to see the process or review the blog post with instructions.

You can also use these links to get the templates:

• Community Mapping template
• Content Mapping template!
• Metrics Tracking template!

Analytics and Metrics

During the class, we talked about the importance of tracking and the possibilities that exist for tracking usage beyond just your organization’s website. Here are some of the resources to help get Google Analytics set up elsewhere and make the most of it:

• http://www.webdigi.co.uk/blog/2010/google-analytics-for-facebook-fan-pages/
• http://blog.wikispaces.com/2008/07/google-analytics-for-your-wiki.htm
• http://mashable.com/2007/05/09/27-google-analytics-features/

We also talked about user testing and storytelling with data. Here are some links to help you get started:

• http://www.nten.org/research/lets-talk-how-open-apis-can-change-how-nonprofits-manage-data
• http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/awesome-free-tools-infographics
• http://www.wildapricot.com/blogs/newsblog/archive/2010/05/25/make-your-own-infographic.aspx
• https://www.google.com/analytics/siteopt/splash?hl=en

Learning in Action

One of the case studies I used in our discussion was last year’s To Mama With Love campaign from Epic Change. Well, as of yesterday at noon, this year’s campaign is off and running! I shared my story and my heartspace on the blog yesterday, and would love to hear what you think of their campaign, if you’ve donated or contributed a story, and whether you think love can change the world. To Mama With Love is also completely open for anyone to participate in, so visit http://tomamawithlove.org and get started!

One more thank you to Laurel for inviting me to participate and to her class for the terrific discussion!

This year, winners will again have the chance to win one of four $2500 grants generously provided by the Case Foundation, awesome video cameras from Flip Video, a free registration to next year’s Nonprofit Technology Conference provided by NTEN and more. For small nonprofits that have small funds in the video department, we have a new category for the best “thrifty” videos produced for under $500. And… wait for it: the winning videos will be announced at this year’s Nonprofit Technology Conference hosted by NTEN and featured on YouTube’s homepage in March. (The YouTube part is sort of like having your nonprofit video seen during the Super Bowl.)

Learn more about the contest guidelines and how to submit your video!

Over the last week, technology has played an unprecedented role in bringing aid to and saving lives in Haiti. Over $22 million has been raised by the American Red Cross via text message (about a fifth of total Haiti-related giving to the organization so far). And then there’s the role that Facebook and Twitter are playing.

Those social media tools, along with dozens of others, have been used to help family and friends locate one another, to direct food, clothing and medical support to specific locations, and to help direct rescue workers to individuals alive and trapped under rubble.

That’s social media for social good, and that’s exactly what NTEN and NetSquared want to highlight with Beth Kanter this spring at SXSWi.

Of course, we don’t just want to talk about Haiti — we want to highlight some amazing work from around the sector, while also building a nice little library of case studies we can all learn from. So, we invite you to share your social media for social good story. We’ll choose three to highlight in our session, and we’ll share all the stories we can on our sites and at We Are Media.

Submit your Social Media for Social Good story today!

Working from this premise, this travel documentary project seeks to answer the question:

How is global social change made where media, technology and creative people meet?

Through blog posts, photos and web video, Morgan Sully, will document the stories of creative, innovative communities found in European galleries, international events, meetups, barcamps, fabrication labs, and innovation competitions.

I want to learn and ’share back’ as much as possible so that other groups doing similar things can do it together.

Other key questions include:

• How is community-based innovation related to economic development?
• How do artists, entrepreneurs and other ‘creatives’ support themselves doing the work they do?
• How do creative communities, spaces and networks support and sustain innovation?

After a generous grant from the Center For Digital Storytelling, Morgan has already gotten his ticket over and is looking for further funding (in between working on some other, paying web projects) to support the trip.

Want to help Morgan do this?  Here’s how (in order of importance):

1. Make a pledge to the Kickstarter campaign now.
2. Share this post with anyone you know
3. Write to him! – Let Morgan know of any cool places worth checking out in England, Holland or Norway. And of course, you can just write to say hello, too!
4. Tweet about it: (using this link: http://bit.ly/3Y50fV)
5. Blog about the project (you can even grab a widget for your blog post)
6. Share the campaign on Facebook
7. Join the We Operate Best Together Facebook Fan page

And of course read more about the project here: http://travel.memeshift.com

The mission of YouTube’s Video Volunteers platform is to connect nonprofit organizations with skilled video makers who can help them broadcast their causes through video, reaching new audiences online and driving action around issues and projects that matter to them. In partnership with allforgood.org, the new platform that connects volunteers with volunteer opportunities, “Video Volunteers” pools video-related volunteer postings and connects YouTubers with these opportunities.

Want to use your video skills for good?

Become a YouTube Video Volunteer.  There are lots of great organizations who need your help to broadcast thei cause and change the world. This is your chance to help!

Learn more about how to submit your nonprofit’s volunteer opportunity or how to help a nonprofit at YouTube’s Video Volunteers program.

Today was the first webinar in the Storytelling & Social Media series from NTEN and TechSoup Global.  I’m happy to say that I had the great honor of serving as the speaker for the webinar and had a ton of fun.  It’s always a little weird to talk over the phone and not be able to hear or see those you are presenting to, but everyone was really great with comments and questions and responding online so I knew I wasn’t talking to myself!

If you want to check out the recording of the session or register for webinars that are still to come, check out the full line up.

Today’s webinar focused on the building blocks of social meda; things like tagging, RSS and how to get started finding the conversations taking place online.  Here’s my slide deck:

The questions folks asked at the end were terrific!  Some of them, along with my answers, include:

• How much time a day do you spend reading (RSS feeds)? I used to be quite worried about reading everything that came into my reader.  Until I finally “got it.”  Even if you don’t read the post that comes in your RSS Reader, that content isn’t lost and the knowledge is still at your footsteps.  You can search within your reader and find content that came through that you might be looking for, even if you didn’t read it the first time.
• How do you separate personal and professional contacts or content online? I share a lot of information online, but if it is something I really want to be personal, I take advantage of the settings in different applications and mark things as private or hidden.  Most all of the tools you’ll use online allow for you to show or hide different content for different users or groups.
• What’s the difference between Netvibes and Google Reader? Netvibes is a lot like an iGoogle home page and is designed to have many different widgets or boxes that are customizable.  You may have a weather widget next to an RSS feed of your organization’s blog, a calendar widget and a feed of Google Alerts, and so on.  Google Reader is designed to organize your feeds and let you share them with your contacts/the world – without having boxes and widgets.  I like to use Google Reader most of the time, but keep my Netvibes up-to-date for times when I want to narrow in on certain topics because of the way you can view the feeds.  You can see screen shots of both of these in the slide show above.
• How do you create a tag? If you are using Delicious, for example, you don’t need to create a list of tags or a taxonomy you have to stick to before you actually start saving bookmarks.  You can create a new tag every time you save something if you want to.  When you save the bookmark, you add the tags you want associated with it, and those can be new or ones you’ve used before.  That’s it; once you hit save that tag is created.

There were other questions and some good conversations.  If you were on the call and had a question that didn’t get answered feel free to ask it here in the comments or you can check out the Emerging Technologies forum in TechSoup to join the conversation.

Upcoming events in the series include podcasting, video creation, creating social buzz, and social media ROI.  Check them out and register here!

Download the recording of today’s webinar on Social Media Building Blocks.

Thanks to all those on the webinar today! It was a lot of fun talking with you and I’m happy to keep answering questions and discuss how we can all use social media better to more effectively and efficiently change the world for the better!

How should managers and staff plan for an executive transition at their nonprofit? How would you define capacity building? What is ongoing learning for an organization?

Do you know the answers to these common nonprofit questions?  Third Sector New England wants to be sure you can find the answers, to those three questions and many more, in a way that’s engaging than searching and reading.  How?

Third Sector New England’s Video FAQ

Thanks to the work of Denise Moorehead of Third Sector New England, the distinguished videographer Steve Garfield, and Deborah Elizabeth Finn, a growing number of videos are collected on TSNE’s Strategic Communications Blog.  As Deborah explains, “We’ve put together a number of short segments in which TSNE’s mavens respond to frequently asked questions about topics such as finance, human resources, program evaluation, diversity, and fiscal sponsorship for nonprofits.”

The plan is to move these videos off the blog and into a web-based video reference tool that nonprofit managers and staff could access as needed.  Deborah says she’s hoping, “that we’ll eventually be able to add Seesmic to the mix, so that nonprofit professionals can use their web cameras to add comments and follow-up questions, thus sparking a real exchange of knowledge.”

Check out Third Sector New England’s Strategic Communications Blog to find videos on the questions above and many more.