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Thursday, September 22, 2011

Why every Non-Profit organization should have a Facebook page

I've been talking to a lot of non-profit organization executives recently and discovered that many of them do not have a Facebook fan page, or if they do, there is no strategy for gaining new supporters and donors and no real engagement of the supporters (fans) that they do have.

It's a huge opportunity that's being missed here.

So, let me share with you in a nutshell, the Top 10 Benefits a Non-profit could have with even a basic Social Media Marketing strategy:
  1. Create a platform for engagement of supporters - donors and prospects - at relatively low cost.
  2. Turn your e-mail list into a base of fans and vice-versa. The trick would be to send an email promoting your fan page (and what it has to offer) and simply asking recipients to become fans; you can also put a "join-our-mailing list" form on your fan page.
  3. Educate the public and existing supporters about your organization's mission.
  4. Add a video message with a passionate, unpolished statement (from the Executive Director) addressing your organization's mission so visitors can see and hear that message - they simply have to click the Play button; a video would have a much greater impact on a prospect than the written word.
  5. Add a video library of important or powerful videos showing your organization serving its mission (may be you can call the list, "Your donations at work!") so that supporters can easily view them.
  6. Allow supporters to easily share your fan page, engagement initiatives, polls, fundraising events, etc., with all of THEIR friends by simply clicking one button ... "Like" or "Share".
  7. Add a "Supporter of the Week" promotion that automatically picks a supporter to highlight to all the other fans - this is a "call to action" and creates peer pressure.
  8. Promote fundraising events using a promotional tab and the "event" feature in Facebook.
  9. At all fundraising events, you could ask everyone to become a fan of your Facebook page; even if those people do not donate today, as long as they are fans on Facebook, they may donate tomorrow.
  10. Add a "donate" e-commerce button right on the fan page making it easy for fans to donate whenever they choose to; but give a choice for fans to "share" instead of donating.
But perhaps the biggest reason of all is that you can list yourself on Causes.Com and install their Facebook app to get campaign management capabilities PLUS an automatically generated spectacular tab about your cause along with a donate button right on your fan page!

It's really all about having an integrated marketing strategy that is aligned with the organization's "business" and fundraising objectives. Pretty simple, wouldn't you say?

What tips would you give non-profits for promoting the cause on Facebook? Please use the Comment feature below! And don't forget to share this article with your friends.




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Which Social Media strategies discussed in this article do you find most effective or least effective for your business and why?