Jste zde:Agregátor zdrojů

Agregátor zdrojů

Twitter Chats As Pre-Survey For A Training

Beth's Blog: How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media - Čt, 09/09/2010 - 19:15

As part of my work as Visiting Scholar for Social Media and Nonprofits,  I’ve been working with grantees on a variety of capacity building projects – from coaching to workshops to peer trainings.   One of the grantees I’m working with is  The  National Summer Learning Association and I will be doing trainings  at their national conference in November.  I did a TwitterChat with them to help promote the conference, but in the process discovered it was even more valuable to help design instruction.

As an instructor, one of the most important things I do to prepare is understand the learner – their context, their questions, their skill level, and their world.     I do an online pre-survey if possible and browse their social media outposts,  ask questions about the audience to the host, etc.      But one thing I’ve always wanted to try is a Twitter Chat before the session and use it as a focus group.

So rather than just do the expert q/a – that is have participants cue up their questions for me to answer,  I asked them lot of questions .   I learned a lot!

For example:

I even got to ask some questions about summer learning from the view point of a parent and share my experience.

The most valuable insight from the chat was this comment about leads to success in summer learning: relationships.  Now that’s a great connect to the principles of effective social media practice.

I’m using this post as part of my preparation and will encourage participants to share some additional insights in the comments.  All in all, a pleasant way to prepare for instruction.

Kategorie: Odjinud

Give 30 Minutes to Help Pakistan!

Beth's Blog: How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media - Čt, 09/09/2010 - 09:00

I’ve been a board member of Ushahidi for 6 months.  Ushahidi builds tools for democratizing information, increasing transparency and lowering the barriers for individuals to share their stories.   It  was initially developed to map reports of violence in Kenya after the post-election fallout at the beginning of 2008 and has been used for many other projects, including tracking disaster relief efforts in Haiti.  More recently, the London Tube used it to track disruptions from the Tube strike.

The board meets virtually most of the year – via online and old fashioned conference calls.    It can be difficult to coordinate a meeting for 7 people across 7 different time zones – so once a year the board meets in Kenya.   I’m looking forward to seeing their work first hand.

I just got an email from another board member that told me that they’re using Ushahadi in Pakistan for the  PakReport System!  They’re looking for volunteers.  Here’s the information:

Give 30 minutes to help Pakistan

Enabled by a global outpouring of support for the Pakistani people, relief aid and resources have been immediately dispatched to the affected areas. But access to relevant, timely, and up-to-date information about the flood remains elusive in this emergency context.

PakReport is a centralized database for gathering information on disaster-related variables, using information communicated through SMS and reports available in the media. With your help, PakReport can create a useful map of the crisis, available and accessible to all. All it takes is a simple text message to 3441 relating your observations of the flood.

Pakreport urgently needs volunteers to process the massive influx of data they’re receiving from the field, through SMS direct reports, media monitoring, and partnerships with humanitarian organizations. All it takes is a few minutes and a few clicks to get this key data ready for the map. With your help, we can make sure relief reaches those who need it most. People from anywhere in the world can volunteer for this effort!

http://pakreport.org/ushahidi/page/index/2

Kindly also help spread the word around!

Kategorie: Odjinud

Twitter’s Claire Williams Shares Why Literacy Is Her Cause

Beth's Blog: How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media - Čt, 09/09/2010 - 08:45

Note from Beth: As a supporter of the work that the Sharing Foundation does for children in Cambodia, I’ve seen first hand the value of literacy programs in developing countries.   The Sharing Foundation started this Khmer Literacy program for young children of farm workers in Cambodia – that helped these children learn to read and write in their native language and enter school.      I’ve followed Claire’s work in Kenya and her passion for literacy programs – and invited her to share her personal take on why this cause is so important.

Guest Post by Claire Williams, Twitter

Here at Twitter, we believe in being a force for good.

Over the past year, one of the ways we’ve been working to be a force for good in the world is through our partnership with Room to Read. When we began to work together, I was thrilled. Like many, I had duly devoured founder John Wood’s riveting bestseller and I fully admired the incredible work of Room to Read to promote literacy around the world.

This week, nearly a year after first beginning to work with Room to Read, we’re proud to be taking part in promoting Literacy Day. Read our blog about it, check out our literacy micro-site, and tweet with the cool widget we made. If you’re really excited, you can even buy Fledgling wine – the wine Twitter and Room to Read made together to support Room to Read.

As I reflect on what Literacy Day means, I can’t help thinking about the origins of my interest in Room to Read as an organization, and one particularly sticky literacy-for-development related issue that came up during that season of my life.

[What a photo find!! This is Lara Vogel, co-founder of Hope Runs, reading John Wood's Leaving Microsoft To Change the World (look closely at the spine!) in Kenya with Mary, 10, circa 2006]

A handful of years ago, I traveled around the world for a year. On the last stop of that trip, I went to Kenya to climb a mountain. The night before climbing, I spent a night in the guesthouse of a nearby orphanage. I never climbed the mountain.

The story of what happened after that trip has been told in other publications. My traveling companion (and best friend) and I lived in that orphanage for the rest of the year, kept coming back, and started a non-profit organization based there: Hope Runs. In different years, we each generously received fellowships from the Skoll Foundation to study for MBAs at Oxford University’s Skoll Centre for Social Entrepreneurship. I then went on to lead social innovation at Twitter; she went on to study medicine. Our connection to Kenya remains strong; we are also the guardians for one of the children from that orphanage, @sammyikua, who now studies in Maine.

That first weekend in Kenya, when I didn’t climb the mountain, I stayed in the orphanage library. I remember a Spanish-language version of Eva Luna, and a biography of Lance Armstrong. In the years to come, I spent endless hours in that cramped space. Today, if you go through the green gate at Tumaini Children’s Home in Nyeri, Kenya and make a left at the matron’s office, you will find the labor of my love of literacy. Alongside dozens of 9-year-old Kenyans in discarded party dresses, I worked diligently for months to organize the books. I wrote the labels in permanent marker. They cut the scotch tape.

No one can dispute: Literacy is important. But this is not what this guest post is about.

On literacy day, I can’t help but remember the real-life story of something that happened the year I met Kenya. It is a story of literacy, and I hope it will serve as a powerful question for those of us who think about how we can help on an important day like Literacy Day.

Here is my story:

During the year I lived in the orphanage, I had requested many donated things for the orphanage. Many people, organizations, and churches, had responded, and my parents had the role of boxing and bagging many of these entirely random items. Shipping costs are astronomical, and, depending on the items, it can be far less expensive to check items as excess baggage on flights with travelers coming to Easy Africa.

A group of graduate students from Berkeley were coming to Kenya. A kind acquaintance put us in touch, suggesting the students might be able to carry some things for us to Kenya. I took them up on it.

Some weeks later, we got an email from one of the students, freshly in Kenya. She had a bag for us, a bag which originally had held both running shoes and books. It was there the email veered from the typical logistical information. The group had opened the bag before leaving the US and had noticed that some of the books inside were religious. They had left them behind. They did not want to bring religious materials to Africa.

This is what I thought that day: Religion is already here. Bring them the books.

When history dictates that the vast majority of all East African orphanages are Christian founded and funded, the (obvious) result is Christian children. At the East African orphanages I have worked in, upwards of 75% of the orphanage’s annual operating budget has come from North American churches. The children in the orphanage are the lucky ones in their areas; they have a much better shot at a bright future than their peers who do not live inside. Depending on the community the children come from (and excluding Ethiopia as a separate historical case of Christianity sans missionaries), the children are much more likely to be Christian by the time they are young adults (if they were not already Christian when they entered). Some of the most amazing people around are working for social change as Christian missionaries. So are some of the most destructive individuals on the planet.

As I think back on the incident, I am devoid of most of the emotions associated with that day of sitting looking at want and laughing at an email of plenty. On that day, I saw no grey area. I saw empty bookshelves juxtaposed with the impracticality of a Western intellectualism.

Now, I believe I better understand both sides. I am Christian. Lara Vogel, the co-founder of Hope Runs, is not. Although I might personally cart any and all religious materials that do not represent my personal beliefs to those who already believed in those faiths, I would draw lines somewhere in regards to my personal convictions. I would not, for instance, bring books promoting racism.

This is my challenge to you on literacy day: What do you think, and what can we all learn from incidents like this? When you are in the privileged position of being the one to bring the educational items, how do you present a balanced view? And how do you do so with limited resources? If the choice is no book or Christian book, what do you do?

I beg of you: Don’t go for the easy answers. The “secular books are better than religious books” answer is obvious. Avoid it. The “missionaries have ruined the Africa” answer is also another easy out.

Push yourself to really test the limits of your beliefs when thinking about our individual roles in extending literacy globally. What is literacy for development when the West has such a hand in deciding the literature behind the developing?

Claire Williams leads Social Innovation and Philanthropy at Twitter. Find her at Claire.us.com or on Twitter.

Kategorie: Odjinud

How Networked Nonprofits Use Facebook

Beth's Blog: How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media - St, 08/09/2010 - 06:08

How Networked Nonprofits Use Facebook View more presentations from Beth Kanter. Introduction

One of the very first bloggers I started reading and having conversations with about social media was Alan Levine (aka CogDog Blog).     Over the years, we have supported each other’s professional work and personal fundraisers before ever meeting in person.   Last year, Alan invited me to keynote the New Media Consortium’s virtual conference to talk about the future of social and nonprofits.  It was my most memorable virtual presentation as my avatar was June Jetson and I made a flying entrance into the auditorium to the tune of  the Jetson’s theme song.

This year, Alan invited me to present a webinar for participants in the Marcus Institute Digital Education for the Arts on how Networked Nonprofits use Facebook.  This was a fun opportunity to pull together some of my Facebook action learning curriculum and summarize much of the wisdom being shared over on at my Facebook Page.  And, of course, to revisit my Cute Dog Theory and see how it applies to Networked Nonprofits.

This post reflections on the training design as well as my content notes.

Social Learning In Webinars

I’ve been exploring how to integrate social media into instruction at face-to-face workshops and as well as webinars.  The concept of before, during, and after is an important way to plot out your instruction,  getting a good understanding of the audience, and modeling.

Before the session,   I spent some time reviewing Museum Facebook Pages – luckily the MIDEA project has them organized into this handy list.  My goal was to find examples of some if the concepts I was going to share from the group itself.    This helps spark peer conversations and indeed a quick check of the chat transcript shows it to be case.

I had hoped to find a good example of a museum or an arts organization with a custom landing tab.  I struck out.   So, I posted a request on my Facebook Page and participants offered up some great examples.    If you want to encourage social learning through social media, you have to model the model.  So, I shared with participants how I discovered relevant examples.

Having the traces of the discussion unfold via social media channels is important both during the event as well as after the event for learning capture.   I set up a wiki page that includes my slides, a link to a rowfeeder spreadsheet for the hashtag (#midea), and the archived recording of the session.

The MIDEA Institute has a nice model of networked learning that allows for a larger network of people with “looser ties”  to join while the smaller group of Institute members can continue the peer learning conversations.     The content presented in Webinars by “experts” will help leverage these conversations through “Round Ups.”   The conversations between institute participants are happening across social media channels – I imagine the role of a network weaver here will be vital to the learning.   I’ll look forward to read any reflections from Alan on how this worked.

Content

I gave a quick overview of the  Networked Nonprofit and how the concepts in the book relate to museums.     I covered the following points with lots of examples from museums as well as pointers to some of the best thinking on Facebook best practices.

  • Networked Nonprofits that use Facebook effectively have a social culture that allows them to scale to have everyone using Facebook.

Networked Nonprofits or museum have leaders that aren’t afraid to deconstruct their fear of letting go or being transparent.  That make having everyone on Facebook a culture norm through professional development and learning for everyone on staff.    They have codified a social culture and make it easy for other departments to have a presence and to empower all  stakeholders to spread the organization’s mission on social networks.   They also understand how to leverage and work with free agents or groups that may create “unofficial pages.”

  • Networked Nonprofits know how to listen, engage, and build relationships on Facebook that allow them to reach their goals.

Aliza Sherman's "Birth of A Superfan" as it applies to Facebook and Museums

They  scan for conversations about their museums on Facebook, but more importantly use tools like NutshellMail to monitor and join in conversations happening on their wall.  Their status updates are not all about them or always asking their stakeholders to do something.    And, they take the time to get to know their fans and transform them into brand ambassadors.

Based on Aliza Sherman's "How To Know A Good Fan"

  • Networked Nonprofits know how to use simplicity to do more with less.

They have made the mindshift from scarcity to the abundance that networks offer and know how leverage their networks.    They make use of Facebook tagging feature in wall posts and have encouraged other users and fan pages with similar audiences to do the same – they don’t see it as a competition.

  • Networked Nonprofits have articulated SMART objectives and a target audience for their Facebook page.

Networked Nonprofits know exactly what they want to accomplish on Facebook and who they want to target.   This helps them easily understand whether they need one Facebook page or several or how to rebrand a single page for different campaigns.  They also know how to make use of a customized landing tab – articulating value at a glance and a call to action that ladders up to the objective.  Take for example the Museum of Contemporary Art in Cleveland or Yerba Buena Center.

Right now it is fairly easy to create a custom landing tab using FBML and tools like Pagemodo,  Facebook recently announced that it will no longer support new installations for FBML for custom landing tabs (although existing installations will be supported).

  • Networked Nonprofits have a solid and aligned content strategy for Facebook and other channels where they link, distribute and co-create.

Networked Nonprofits know how to creatively give themselves some link love on Facebook.  They have a carefully crafted content plan to cross distribute content via Facebook, email channels, and on the web that takes into account frequency, style, and format.    The Metropolitan Museum of Art “Art of the Day” on Facebook and Web site is an excellent example.   Their content creation strategy also includes opportunities for their fans to co-create content with them.

  • Networked Nonprofits practice deep engagement techniques on Facebook.

They ask their fans their opinions, test their knowledge, pair promotions w/content, and say thank you. Here’s some examples and tips.  They use fun conversation starters.  Engagement conversations revolve around getting people to look and discuss the art or may encourage them to participate in a gallery activity inside the museum.  They run contests, but they are sure to follow Facebook Guidelines. ( See these two posts for more explanation.)

  • Networked Nonprofits promote their Facebook presence through all channels.

Whether it is texting or promoting offline,  they experiment with many ways to increase their fan base.

  • Network Nonprofits use measurement to learn and improve their Facebook strategy and presence.

They use an approach called Spreadsheet Aerobics.

How else do Networked Nonprofits use Facebook?

Additional resources

Kategorie: Odjinud

How To Get a Wikipedia Page for Your Nonprofit

Beth's Blog: How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media - Út, 07/09/2010 - 16:30

Note from Beth: Here’s another terrific guest post from Manny Hernandez.   What has been your experience getting a Wikipedia Page for your nonprofit?

Guest Post by Manny Hernandez

Because it was such a painfully long process and because I couldn’t find too many complete articles when I googled “Wikipedia nonprofits“, I decided to share the lessons we learned so that you may not make the same mistakes we made.

Build your reputation and “notability” first

No matter how important you think your work is (and I am sure you are doing amazing things for others in the world), your organization needs to be notable, according to Wikipedia’s guidelines, before it can be Wikipedia-worthy. Quoting:

An organization is generally considered notable if it has been the subject of significant coverage in reliable, independent secondary sources. Trivial or incidental coverage of a subject by secondary sources is not sufficient to establish notability. All content must be verifiable.

Don’t kill the messenger! This set the rules of their site and it’s worked for them so far… though the jury is still out on this one. So, your blog? Not typically a reliable, independent secondary source. A passing mention in an article in your local newspaper? Not notable enough. Does it suck? Ask me! But if you come to think of it, it’s what keeps the site as encyclopedic as it can hope to be.

Make the page about your organization, not your programs

Our earlier attempts at getting a Wikipedia page up were focused on a page about TuDiabetes, the diabetes social network we run in English. As our first program, it got the most visibility at first and it got the most reliable (in our opinion) media coverage earlier. However, TuDiabetes, unlike Facebook or Google, is not a household name (not yet at least!) and it isn’t its own organization: it is a program of the Diabetes Hands Foundation.

The results when we posted a TuDiabetes page on Wikipedia in 2008 were disastrous. But I am going to let a screenshot of the page speak for itself:

Your Wikipedia page should encompass all your work. Not only will this be a more complete depiction of your work: it will also furnish you hopefully with more notable and reliable sources to insert as references in your page.

Let others write about you

This, to me, was one of the most puzzling things about getting a Wikipedia page started (for a nonprofit or any other organization). One of the arguments we heard from Wikipedia in our first attempt to write our own page was that others had to do write about us. It didn’t dawn on me that the this implied other MEDIA (reliable media, that is). It is not a problem for you to write your own page, but you have to make sure the reliable references are there and that you are writing about something bigger than a program you just launched.

Last few tips

  • It helps to get a copy of a book like Wikipedia: The Missing Manual, but you don’t need it as much these days as you used to back in 2008 when it first came out. Recently, Wikipedia has added new features that make creating and editing articles a lot easier.
  • Reputation management online is key, so make sure to watch your page. After you log in to Wikipedia, you will see a little star (it’s blank by default) next to the View History link for the page. Click on it (which will turn the star blue) to have your page added to your Watchlist.
  • No matter how tempted you may feel to “trick” Wikipedia, don’t do it. Don’t waste your time or loose your account’s credibility in the process. Stick to the Wikipedia guidelines and address the concerns they may have about your page when you post it in a timeline fashion. Respect their decision even if you dislike it: this doesn’t mean you are not supposed to talk with them about your questions or ask for a more detailed explanation about a particular decision, but always do so in a respectful way.
  • Most important of all: getting a Wikipedia page for your nonprofit is not a sprint. In the world of Web 2.0, this is as close to a marathon as it gets. Be patient and do your homework. It will pay off in the long run.

If you have any lessons you have learned from your experience with your Wikipedia page, I would love to hear them.

Manny Hernandez is a social entrepreneur, community strategist, president of the diabetes hands foundation, founder of tudiabetes and estudiabetes, author of ning for dummies

Kategorie: Odjinud

The Blue Sweater 500

Beth's Blog: How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media - Po, 06/09/2010 - 20:06

A year ago Jacqueline Novogratz was featured in a  guest post from Think Social about the themes in her book, The Blue Sweater.  My first introduction to her book was from Lucy Bernholz and shortly after that James Wu from the Acumen Fund gave me a copy of  and this profile in the Economist.   After reading it, I did a book giveaway on my blog asking readers to suggest ways they might apply the ideas in the book.  The winner was Lethal Sheethal who was about to leave for six months on her Kiva Fellowship in Peru.    Before leaving, she did a fundraiser and raffled off her copy of the book.

That was a networked approach to leveraging the ideas in the book.   But Acumen Fund is taking it a step further by announcing The Blue Sweater 500, a competition that will provide copies of  The Blue Sweater free of cost to the most creative ideas for using the book.   They are giving away 500 paperback copies of The Blue Sweater in quantities of 25, 50, or 100 books to organizations that can leverage the ideas.  Entries will be judged based on originality, impact, and need. Winners will receive a shipment of books this fall and will be asked to write a post for Acumen’s blog that will share the outcomes of their projects with the world using photo and/or video.

To enter the contest and for information, read this post.

Kategorie: Odjinud

Chasing the Squirrels Out of Your Email Box: Gmail Priority Inbox

Beth's Blog: How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media - Pá, 03/09/2010 - 19:18

I like to joke about how using social networks like Twitter can give you “ADOLAS” (ADD, Oh, look at Squirrel!).    The reference is from the Disney/Pixar movie UP – the scenes where the talking dogs can’t finish a sentence because they get distracted by a squirrel.

I’ve tried to come up with some manual ways to avoid this on Twitter.  For example,  colleagues using the #squirrel hashtag and we remind each other to focus or suggest other techniques.   But to tell you the truth,   I’ve had a major squirrel problem with my email.

I’ve been using Gmail for many years.  I use labels, filters, and the stars to filter and prioritize emails.   I’ve been using the color coded labels to indicate work flow and use RED for one called !!!_Priority so it appears on the top of my filter list.    I’ve trained myself to go to that label first when I feel overwhelmed.

But, today, Google has released Priority In Box – what I like about it is that it automates and extends the manual processing of priority email.   It  gives you a little symbol for “important”  and “not important” so you can flag those priority messages and they appear on the top of your list.

Explore the Priority In Box tab in the settings and you’ll see that you can group your in box into different priority levels.  Incoming email gets separated into sections: important and unread, starred, and everything else.   These too can be customized.

I’ve been using the star to indicate an email that has a task that I need to do or come back to.    But I also use labels to indicate work flow like “reply,”  “read,” “schedule,” and  “waiting for.”    (I also so subject matter labels/filters as well).

Over time, you train gmail to automatically put the important emails at the top.  I’ll be curious to see how this works.

There are more suggestions and features that you can use to help you fine-tune your filtering of priority emails/tasks.

This feature has the potential to help me fix my email squirrel problem.   That is – when I open up my email box – I get distracted versus seeing a prioritized list.

Kategorie: Odjinud

The Art of Beginning for Improving Social Media Practice

Beth's Blog: How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media - Čt, 02/09/2010 - 04:52

Two or three years ago, I received an email from Chris Brogan asking if I would give some advice to a recent college graduate named Avi Kaplan who was interested in a career of using social media for nonprofits.   I chatted with Avi and answered some of his questions.    Not long after that, Avi helped Stacey Monk develop a strategy for the very first Tweetsgiving.

A few weeks ago, Avi asked me if I would participate in a blog tour for the Jewels of Elul focused on renewal and beginnings that benefits a residential addiction treatment center in Los Angeles.  The Hebrew month of Elul (which started on August 11th), the site will feature reflections from prominent figures on Renewal and Beginnings and a blog tour as well.   While I don’t have a strong connection to the nonprofit or even the cause,  I know Avi and wanted to support his work.   In addition, the theme of new beginnings and renewal has been on mind lately.

This last year has been a year of many new beginnings – a move across the country,  a new title, a new book,   a new blog,  a new company, and new friends and projects.   Starting something new is hard for some people.  It is a change after all.   But with every new project, you always need an end point for reflection.

And that’s the point I want to relate to social media.    Whether your begin a new campaign or a new routine, it is important anticipate a point of reflection.  We begin a new project – sometimes with to high expectations or excitement.   But what we don’t anticipate is the stuff that won’t go perfectly.

When end up avoiding talking about mistakes and we avoid reflection that explores and opens up new breakthroughs because we’re moving too fast into the next action.    So, with your next social media beginning, be sure to hit the pause button at the end asks some questions that might lead you to new insights.   Here’s a list of questions that my colleague, June Holley,  shared with me that I’ve been using.

1.What worked really well in this project?
2.Did it accomplish goals or outcomes? In what ways?
3.Did it fall short? Why?
4.What would you do differently?
5.What surprises came up during the project? What unexpected happened? What could you learn or capture from that?
6.What insights did you get during the project?
7.What processes did you use that worked well? Which didn’t work so well? Why do you think that was?
8.How did people work together? Were there conflicts? How were they handled? Did people get any new insights or perspectives as a result?
9.Were there people or perspectives missing from this project that you would include next time?
10.What skills and processes did you help people learn as part of this project? What skills and processes would you spend time on if you did this over again?
11.What were the most innovative aspects of the project? How did they work?
12.What did you do in this project that you could transfer to other projects?
13.What is the most troubling aspect of the project? What might you do to deal with it differently?
14.What skills came in most handy during this project? What skills did this project make you realize you need to acquire?
15.What really puzzles you about this project? What are unanswered questions you have about what happened?
16.What intrigues you about this project?
17.What would you like to learn more about that would help this (or other projects) in the future?
18.Where did we mess up? Make mistakes? Fall on our face? What can we learn from this?

“This post is part of Jewels of Elul, which celebrates the Jewish tradition to dedicate the 29 days of the
month of Elul to growth and discovery in preparation for the coming high holy days. This year the program is benefiting Beit T’shuvah, a residential addiction treatment center in Los Angeles. You can subscribe on Jewels of Elul to receive inspirational reflections from public figures each day of the month. You don’t have to be on the blog tour to write a blog post on “The Art of Beginning… Again”. We invite everyone to post this month (August 11th – September 8th) with Jewels of Elul to grow and learn.”

Kategorie: Odjinud

Get Your Social Media Strategy in Shape With Spreadsheet Aerobics

Beth's Blog: How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media - St, 01/09/2010 - 19:47

Flickr Photo by Metro Transportation Library and Archive

Successful social media is like going to the gym because the discipline of a good routine gets results much like  working out on a daily basis.

If you have put on running shoes for the first time, do you think you can really expect to win the Boston Marathon? If you are just starting out or if you haven’t identified a strategy and a good regular routine, can you really expect success? You need to make social media a daily habit; understand the rules, the landscape, and above all give it time to work.

Actionable Measurement

The gym metaphor resonated because lately I’ve been obsessed with the idea of  “SpreadSheet Aerobics, an actionable social media measurement strategy that is fit and trim and light on its feet!   When I coach nonprofits on tactics and talk about measurement, their facial expressions change happy to annoyed.    Collecting data is often viewed as an onerous task.   It doesn’t have to be that way.

We know that good practice is to establish SMART objectives for your social media strategy and identify the audience before you executive.  You also need to think through your content and engagement strategy.  You should also be thinking about what to measure and set up an efficient method for collecting that data.   And, of course, making the time to actually look and think about what the data means.

We get so overloaded by meaningless data collection, that we’re exhausted before we get to do the fun part:  making sense out of it.  I don’t try to measure everything.   I find it overwhelming and a lot of  it won’t help me refine my strategy.  Spreadsheet aerobics is actionable data.   What does that mean?

  • Measurement should inform specific decisions and/or actions.
  • Do not measure everything, but do measure what is most important to your objectives.
  • The data you gather should help you learn.

Avoid Measurement As Therapy and Drive By Analysis

Another pitfall is doing “drive by” analysis.    Let’s take Facebook pages as an example.   Rather than download a spreadsheet of the most important data points for a month from Facebook Insights (the Facebook page analytics tool which was recently upgraded) and comparing it against content, engagement, and outreach strategies,  administrators glance at the summary insights on their page and draw subjective conclusions.

Avoid this measurement as therapy trap.   When we see the green arrows pointing up and the numbers look good, we might think — “they like me, they really like me.”   But you can’t really put that data into context and learn from it.

Here’s my spreadsheet aerobics daily and monthly routine.    I grab the monthly daily data from the insights tool (old version)  and download into a spreadsheet.    Out of the 25 or metrics I could look at, I only collect the following metrics:

  • Total Interactions
  • Likes
  • Comments
  • New Fans (Likes)
  • Unsubscribes
  • Page Views
  • Photo/video Views (optional if I’m testing as content strategy)

I also have columns in daily spreadsheet for labeled “content format”, “content topic” and “promotion”.  In the content line, I put a link to the actual post noting the type, voice, or if it was a fan posting.  I also make notes about what promotional tactics I used.   Then at the end of the month, allocate a half hour to look at the numbers for the month in comparison to other months – and look for insights and trends.

In reviewing my spreadsheet, I discover what works. For example, open-ended questions work, particularly those that allow people to share their knowledge or ones accompanying a good resource link.

I’ve looked at frequency of posting and day/time of the week, but have learned what my sweet spot is for my audience on Facebook and no longer track it on a regular basis.

It is also important to track exactly how you promote your Facebook page and what helps you recruit more fans.  I keep notes on when I’ve tweeted a link, speaking dates, posting updates in my status about my fan page and all the multi-channel ways you need to promote your page.

I’ve also discovered that it is important to identify as many opportunities to set up experiments that you measure and learn as you go. This is where I’ve gleaned most of my insights – a combination of quantitative metrics culled from Insights and what people are saying on the page.

What are you learning from your social media measurement strategy?   How have you kept your data collection trim, fit, and actionable?  What is the most compelling thing you learned about your social media strategy through measurement that lead to better results?

Kategorie: Odjinud

What Tools Are You Using for Listening, Engaging, and Social Media Management?

Beth's Blog: How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media - Út, 31/08/2010 - 18:20

Based on the discussion threads in my Facebook page,  I’ve updated my mega list of tools in my social media listening and engaging instructional wiki.   In reflecting over the past three years,  the definition of listening tools has broadened beyond “monitoring” or “research” to include several categories:   social media engagement management,  analytics, influencer identification, and social network analysis.

Here’s a couple of new tools I’ve been exploring:

RowFeeder should be in your spreadsheet aerobics routine.   It searches Twitter and Facebook for phrases or hashtags and dumps them into a google doc spreadsheet.  Saves a lot of cut and paste time and great for analysis.   The basic version is free, but you can add on data like Klout scores for a minimal fee.   It’s particularly useful for aggregating hashtags from events or trainings.

NutshellMail:   About a month or so ago, Manny Hernandez mentioned this free tool as a social media time saver. It grabs all your “bacn“  from social networks and aggregates into a single email.  The sources include Myspace, Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.  You need to customize which updates (wall posts, friend requests, Twitter lists, etc.) to make it useful for your needs.   I’m testing it with Facebook because it grabs both my personal profile stuff as well as from Facebook pages that I am an administrator of.

You can also customized the delivery time and frequency.  That means it can arrive in your email box when you’ve scheduled to work on it.    The email that arrives links you to the places you to respond. This seems like a good tool for those starting out and and with small followings.  Saves you time logging in and checking or getting separate notices in email from the social network site.

My colleague, Devon Smith, mentioned another tool, Postling, which aggregates your social networks into a single dashboard online and is also free, although it lacks the robust features of paid tools like Spredfast or SmallAct.

I’d like to update my listening/engaging tools list.

What tools you are using for listening, engaging, social media management, and finding influencers on your social media outposts?

Kategorie: Odjinud

Win A Free Ticket To WomenWhoTech Annual Telesummit on 9/15

Beth's Blog: How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media - Po, 30/08/2010 - 18:47

While some may think there are not a lot of high quality women who can speak on technology issues or are starting tech companies, it simply isn’t true.

Women Who Tech brings together talented and renowned women breaking new ground in technology who use their tech savvy skills to transform the world and inspire change.  The summit provides a supportive network for the vibrant and thriving community of women in technology professions by giving women an open platform to share their talents, experiences, and insights. The 3rd annual Women Who Tech TeleSummit will take place on September 15, 2010 from 11AM EDT to 6PM EDT, with over 800 women from across the US and abroad in the non-profit, political and business world and featuring an incredible lineup of thought provoking panels featuring technology change makers.

I’m honored to be included on this “dream team” roster of women (and a few guys including fellow Zoetican, Geoff Livingston) working on the forefront of social change and technological progress, among them: Mary Hodder, Technologist and Founder of of Dabble.com,  Author Blogger and CEO of Zoetica Media, author Clay Shirky, Elisa Camahort Page, Co-Founder of BlogHer, Rashmi Sinha, Co-Founder of SlideShare, Connie Reece, Co-Founder of Social Media Club, Amy Sample Ward of NetSquared, Kaliya Hamlin of Shes Geeky, Genevieve Bell of Intel, Heather Harde, CEO of TechCrunch, Irene Au of Google, Lynne D. Johnson of the Advertising Research Foundation and Tara Hunt, author of the Whuffie Factor.

Here’s the list of panels.   I’ll be presenting on a panel “Social Media ROI” with Lauren Vargas from Radian 6, with Cheryl Contee as the moderator on Sept. 15th from 2-3 PM EST.  Here’s the description.

Social Media ROI

Do you know what kind of an impact social media is having on your brand, mission, or bottom line? How do you put a monetary value on branding? This panel will discuss realistic metrics and benchmarks any organization can use in their campaigns and ensure that your using the right strategies and tools to listen and engage your audiences on different social networks.

Details about how to register and more program details here.

I have two comp tickets to give away.   If you’d like a chance at winning those, leave a comment below on why you want to attend.  I’ll pick two winners at random.

Kategorie: Odjinud

Reflections from Networked Nonprofit Workshop for 300 People

Beth's Blog: How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media - Pá, 27/08/2010 - 17:57

Colorado Project View more presentations from Beth Kanter.

Chip Conley was the keynote speaker at last week’s Craigslist Foundation Bootcamp and one thing that he said that has been stuck in my head is:  “You can have a job, a career, or calling“    The latter, a calling,  is when you can tap into an internal motivation that fuels and inspires you.    It resonated.  I feel that my technology training for nonprofits work is more like a calling for me than simply a job or career.   For the past 15 years, I have been excited about nonprofit technology training design and delivery and it is what I will continue to focus on as part of my role  at Zoetica over the coming years.

This week I lead a full-day workshop for 300 nonprofits and foundations on social media strategy and tactics.   The workshop was presented by the Colorado Association of Funders and the Colorado Nonprofit Association and sponsored by Gill Foundation,  Gay & Lesbian Fund for Colorado, The Colorado Health Foundation, and The Colorado Trust.

The day was designed as a one-day  interactive strategy session in the morning and intensive mini-workshops on tools and tactics in the afternoon  lead by a cadre of local social media specialists and experts.   The morning had two segments, beginning with content and small group exercises on several themes from the Networked Nonprofit including culture change, transparency, and simplicity.    Geoff Livingston did a great job at live blogging the first section in the morning.

The second part of the morning was designed around the Principles of Social Media Strategy and used a new version of the Social Media Game intended for a large group of people.   The afternoon featured six mini-workshops that drilled down in the use of the tools such as Facebook, Blogging, Storytelling, Listening, Twitter, and Social Media 101.  (The Colorado Trust blog has notes here.)

Some Reflections


Balancing Learning Through Content Delivery and Sharing Experience

I’ve constantly stretching myself to learn new techniques that help nonprofits embrace and effectively put social media strategies and tools into practice as well as address the change management issues of becoming a Networked Nonprofit.   It isn’t about content, although that is important.  What I’m most excited about is “networked learning” – it is part peer learning, part content-delivery, and another part engaging people in the room and not in the room in conversation through the use of social media.

The stretching part for me with this workshop was how to do you design for small group conversations and then full group sharing with 300 people in the room?    You offer some ideas, concepts, and good conversation starters.    The video above shows the whole room discussing an important Networked Nonprofit concept, simplicity (focus on what you do best and network the rest.)

From Conversational Keynote To Conversational Workshop

I’ve been playing with the conversational panel or conversational keynote models for short sessions (60, 75 or 90 minutes.)  I started experimenting with these concepts back in 2008 at SXSW session on Nonprofit ROI and SXSW Session on Nonprofit Crowdsourcing as well as at the NTC in 2009 on a session mapping metrics to strategy.   I’ve using the technique to deliver conversational keynotes at conferences.

A conversational approach is not an expert or a group of experts talking the whole time.  Nor is it a 40 minute expert presentation or a series of expert presentations on a panel followed by Q/A.    That is the “Sage on the Stage” model.   A conversational panel or keynote does some blending of learning modalities – it includes some content-delivery and structured small group and full group conversations.    There is a lead facilitator – in the panel or keynote model – it’s the Oprah with the mic.

My design question:  What is the best way to use this approach for a full-day workshop for 300 people?

With shorter sessions with half as many people and a decent room layout, you can run the mic yourself.   The biggest challenge for me was scaling with mic runners.    I had mic runners stationed at different quadrants of the room who would go to the person who wanted to speak.    It was hard to get people as engaged as a full group after the table discussions.  I’m not sure if this was just the way it is,  stage fright to report out to a large group that included funders, or perhaps it needed another method than mic runners (fixed mics stationed around the room?)

Social Media Game: Scaling Small Group Learning Exercises

The second part of the morning included a brief presentation about the principles of social media strategy based on what I’ve been teaching for the past 5 years.   Geoff Livingston did a great live blog post on the content.

The interaction component was a new version of the Social Media Game that I first used in 2007 with David Wilcox.    The largest group I ever worked with was with the Meyer Memorial Trust in Portland for 150 nonprofits and with Compasspoint for a 100 organizations.  I’ve done many, many reiterations of the cards, the game design, the learning objectives, the composition of the small groups, modalities (peer assist versus simulation), etc.

The Environmental Defense Fund has used the game for an internal training for 300 people.   I applied the lessons learned from that to the challenge was scaling this for 300 people from different organizations in a way that helped experience a strategy brainstorm and help them make choices about the tool/tactical sessions later in the day.

When I’ve used this curriculum, I listen to the conversations at the tables to see if people are engaged, stuck, or have questions.    It is hard for one person to do that with 300 people and 30 tables, but the experience has given me some great ideas on how to scale that.   Also, there is the perennial issue around expertise groupings — the tension between mixed levels and like cohort groups.   I’ve experimented both ways and have come to the conclusion that you cannot please everyone.

Refining Real-Time Networked Learning

Real-Time networked learning is incorporating social media into your instruction – before, during, and after.   You can learn more from my “Social Media For Trainers” presentations and wiki.    Our hashtag #ztrain generated 567 tweets from 126 people -the majority were in the room.    The priority was to use social media to enhance the experience of people in the room, although not everyone views using live tweeting as a benefit to the conversational process or learning.

Hashtag Stats

What the Hashtag is a simple tool for aggregating tweets into a transcript and some simple stats, but after experiencing Marc Meyerand Jason Breed’s Hashtag Social Media Chat and their tool that aggregates tweets, I need to do some re-thinking.

My Zoetica colleague, Kami Huyse, suggested a tool called rowfeeder.   It has a lot of features, but most importantly it grabs hashtags or keywords from Twitter (and Facebook) and dumps into a google doc spreadsheet with other data points.   It’s free but you can purchase additional data for reasonable amounts (for example you can get Klout Scores).

The best thing about having a transcript like this it allowed me to do a pattern analysis and learning assessment of the  tweets.    This will help improve the networked learning design for next time.   Some analysis questions:

  • What points were the participants in the room tweeting?   How did that relate to the learning objectives?
  • What is the form of the Tweets as related to Bloom’s Taxonomy?
  • Were there conversations taking place between Twitter users that extended the learning or were people mostly parallel online note taking?
  • Were people not in the room engaged in any of the conversation beyond retweeting?

What Powers Learning:  Sharing Experiences and Stories With Peers

I am a big believer that people can learn as much from the peers in the room as the “expert on the stage.”    As an instructor, if you go in with the idea that you will be “filling people with knowledge” you don’t let the most valuable form of learning emerge – sharing the wisdom that comes from experience.  (The Colorado Funders Association is doing this on its blog about philanthropy stories. )  The fun part of instructional design is embedding opportunities for this to happen.

Whenever I teach workshops, I also like to collect stories from participants and add them to the materials.    I taught a breakout session called “Actionable Listening and Engaging Techniques.”    One of the topics we looked at was the issue of how to respond appropriately to negative comments and trolls.    Samantha Horoschak from the Gathering Place (an agency that servces homeless women) shared their experience dealing with a troll on Facebook, illustrating best practices when the troll is not some random stranger.

On this two minute video, Dan Hanley, Director of Development, Boulder County Aids Project, talks about how Twitter is a useful tool in his fundraising work primarily for Twitter’s ability to connect and develop relationships with new donors.

Lisa Harris from Colorado Health Care Foundation and Kindle Morell from Colorado Health Institute shared how they have formed an informal social media peer group of people from different health care organizations in the Denver area. They meet for breakfast and do not have a formal agenda – they discuss areas of practice, including working as change agents inside and outside of their organizations.

The Challenge of Transfer

One-day or half-workshops are only one touch point.  They are good for getting a large group of people of to speed.  But the real learning comes happens by putting something learned (an idea, a method, a tip, or technique) into daily practice.    That is what guided the design of my “Social Media Lab” that continues the peer learning while getting past the challenge of transfer.

That is one reason why I always incorporate a reflection at the end that helps participates identify one small action step.  I ask participants to share on an index card as part of a raffle for my book.   The information is also valuable for improving the learning design.    In addition to the concrete technical and tactical action steps (e.g.  set up a listening post), here some additional action steps that indicate the learning from the day will be taken back to others in the organization:

  • Bring learnings from the day back to my team as soon as possible
  • Sit down with my executive director to discuss a process for a social media policy
  • Have a social media strategy brainstorm with staff
  • Clarifying exactly what we want to accomplish with social media and the audience
  • Sharing what I learned from my colleagues at the workshop with staff

I can only echo the tweet above:  Thank you so much for everything I learned and meeting great people.


Kategorie: Odjinud

Odjinud

další




Nadace Vodafone


Centrum pro online media