How To Use Social Media In Fundraising

Here’s How To Use Social Media In Fundraising:

Determine your goals.

Determine your target audiences.

Select your social media.

Create your content.

Pay attention to positioning, systems & messaging.

Identify the unique message that will help you promote your nonprofit.

Figure out what’s unique about it and your message.

Strategically use social media to initiate engagement among your donors.

Combine this with engaging activities to help donors align their values with your charity’s cause and become more connected to it.

Use social media as part of a larger plan to meaningfully engage donors.

Within that, have a comprehensive social media plan.

Have a social media policy.

Have a great hashtag readily identifiable with your nonprofit.

Write blog posts.

Share stories & anecdotes.

Follow other charities on your social networks.

Post volunteer opportunities.

Organize social media happenings such as tweetups & tweet-a-thons, Facebook contests, etc.

Post videos.

Join & be active in social media groups.

Have engaging headlines.

Use vivid visual images

Make your content rich.

Be brief but not too pithy.

Grab the attention of your readers from the start.

Build social media connections.

Learn to talk about things other than yourself or your company.

Provide information of value and substance to your donors and prospects.

Strive to show some personality.

Choose the right social media platforms for the audiences you want to reach.

Post unique, informative and valuable content on every different social media channel you use.

Remember to post only what is consistent with your brand.

Ask readers for their feedback and input.

Use great graphics and visuals.

Consistently build your personal brand and your following.

Create a great experience on your website.

Become readily found through directory listings.

Use social media ads to deliver the right messages to the right persons.

Supercharge your brand with compelling content.

Cultivate and build relationships.

Provide consistent relevant and accurate information across the internet.

Engage with users.

Promote your key marketing messages.

Monitor and manage your online reputation.

Review and respond to reviews.

Influencer marketing is another way that your brand can reach new audiences.

Cultivate the top voices online.

Reach out and ask about collaboration opportunities with influencers

Make sure your social media strategy talks about you and your nonprofit enough.

Determine your social media target audiences.

Choose your social media.

Create compelling social media content.

Remember that social media is a conversation.

Be very active & very responsive.

Be truly personal and highly authentic.

Encourage lots of sharing.

Make social media a part of your organization’s culture & key activities.

Create a social media policy to make sure everyone is on the same page. Determine your goals.

If people are happy with your content, donations will come!

Create visual stories.

Establish a volunteer social media corps.

Teach your volunteers how to amplify your social media messages.

When asking them or the public for help always leave gaps.

Ask your volunteers to attend events and report on them for social media by writing about them & shooting photos or videos.

Invite your volunteers to blog.

Have a meeting of your volunteers from time to time in which you ask for their social media ideas.

Always have a visual focus when it comes to marketing your social media content.

Remember that social media is social.

Invest if you can in great design. Or get art students from local universities to create it for you pro bono.

Humanize your charity’s mission and vision.

Add interacting and storytelling into your social media marketing initiatives.

Bring in new volunteers & interns to help determine how best to approach social media.

Make your social media show how you are changing the world.

As often as possible, do video stories as well as audio stories & do photos with texts.

Let the public choose the formats they want to read & to share.

Make it as easy as possible for the public to share in whatever way desired.

Learn the art of telling real, compelling human stories.

Tell your stories with a blog.

Also make it very easy for others to share your stories.

Put sharing buttons on all your posts and your blogs so that it is very easy for your readers to share your stories with others.

Also make it very easy for readers to subscribe to regularly receive your stories.

Use a video to tell your charity’s story.

Create a Facebook page & a LinkedIn company page & a twitter page for your charity.

Create a group on Facebook for your charity.

Promote your special events.

Ask everyone to retweet your charity’s posts.

Share your charity’s presentations online.

Focus on being a resource that’s useful and/or entertaining to your core audiences.

Identify the unique message that will help you promote your charity.

Determine what’s unique about it and your message.

Use social media in addition to traditional media to let the world know about your charity..

Customize your charity’s messages to appeal to your various specific audiences.

Determine the best ways to reach those audiences.

Make your charity’s messages media friendly.

Build a great strategic narrative for your charity.

Show why your charity exists and what makes it unique.

Develop a narrative that energizes your supporters, staff and volunteers, inspires and excites strategic partners, and attracts new donors.

Create a posting schedule.

Engage your audiences.

Be consistent in your approach.

Harness the amazing energy of your followers.

Be social.

Humanize your organization.

Be open to inputs.

Tell your story.

Use anecdotes.

Create a positive unforgettable donor experience.

Have interesting projects.

As often as you can, do video stories and audio ones as well as photos with text.

Determine what your nonprofit aims to accomplish with social media & be certain you have a clear understanding of your goals.

Figure out who your target audiences are that you’re marketing to.

Determine what types of people would likely donate to or volunteer for your cause and tailor your messaging towards them.

Choose your social networks wisely as well as choose your messaging wisely.

Figure out what social media metrics you’ll use to track success. Include donations & volunteer acquisitions in those measurements.

Create a short, memorable, unique & catchy hashtag readily associated with your nonprofit

Show integrity and transparency and responsiveness.

Always provide rich, emotive & compelling content.

Look at what other nonprofits have done successfully.

Use a blog to regularly communicate using text, photos and videos to tell stories of the people you’ve helped and the impact you’re having on the community or the world.

Make sure anything you post is shareable.

Make it easy to subscribe to your blog & your email newsletter.

Use videos to tell your story with donate links embedded right in the videos.

Create a Facebook page, a LinkedIn page & a Twitter account for your non-profit. Also a Facebook group & a LinkedIn group.

Tagging volunteers shares their involvement with their friends.

Also use Facebook events and LinkedIn events to further spread the word

Find potential board members through LinkedIn.

Strive to serve as a resource, and to be useful and/or entertaining to your key audiences.

Make people happy with your content & donations will come.

Use visual stories.

Create a volunteer social media corps.

Teach your volunteers to amplify your messages.

When asking for help always leave gaps.

Ask volunteers to attend events and report on them for social media by writing about them & shooting photos or videos.

Invite volunteers to blog.

Have a meeting of your volunteers from time to time in which you ask for their social media ideas.

Have a visual focus when it comes to marketing your content.

Remember that social media is social.

Invest in great design.

Humanize the mission and vision of your cause.

Become a leading part of your local community

Incorporate interactivity and storytelling into your social media, PR, marketing and fundraising initiatives.

Recruit new volunteers or staff to help determine how best to approach social media.

Show how you are changing the world.

Stay focused on understanding your donors, and creating a positive unforgettable donor experience.

Take risks and do interesting projects leveraging technology in innovative ways.

As often as you can, do video stories as well as audio stories.

Frequently also do photos with texts.

Let the public choose which formats they want to read & to share.

Make it as easy as possible to share in whatever way desired.

Master the art of telling real, compelling human stories.

Tell your story with a blog.

Make it very easy for others to share your stories.

Put sharing buttons on your LinkedIn posts and your blogs so that it is very easy for your readers to share your stories with others.

Make it very easy for readers to subscribe to regularly receive your stories.

Use a video to tell your nonprofit’s story.

Connect with Facebook’s news feed page.

Utilize QR codes.

Use hashtags.

Tag people in photos.

Create a group on Facebook for your nonprofit.

Promote your organization’s special events.

Use geolocation tools.

Ask everyone to retweet your nonprofit’s posts.

Share your organization’s presentations online.

Always be visual.

Always be mobile-friendly.

Always engage your audiences.

Always be consistent in your approach.

Strive to harness the amazing energy of your followers.

Be open to inputs.

Tell your authentic story & use anecdotes.

Try to create a positive unforgettable donor experience.

Develop interesting projects.

Let the news media and the world at large know about your organization.

When you interact with social media, focus only on what you’re passionate about.

Customize your messages to appeal to your various specific audiences.

Determine how best to reach those audiences.

Make your messages media friendly.

Build a great strategic narrative.

Have it say why you exist and what makes you unique.

Create a context of human connection, collaborating around a shared purpose, and connecting with your organization’s DNA.

Create a narrative that energizes your supporters, staff and volunteers, inspires excites strategic partners, and attracts new donors.

Establish a posting schedule.

Be visual.

Be mobile-friendly.

Hire a fundraising and social media expert to advise, guide and inspire you.

P.S. Anything else that YOU would add?

The author, Dr. John B. Charnay, CEO of Charnay and Associates in Greater Los Angeles, is a top nonprofit leadership coach and strategic fundraising advisor who has raised over a quarter of a billion dollars during his distinguished career. He has been in charge of numerous major fundraising special events. He often strategically advises board chairs and facilitates board fundraising retreats and has trained numerous boards and development directors and their staffs in fundraising. He is also a leading and award-winning public relations consultant and publicist...and a top social media advisor. He has been a strategic PR advisor to many famous celebrities and Fortune 1000 CEOs. A former attorney and journalist, he is also a writer and editor...and a movie and television producer. Additionally, he serves as a trusted strategic philanthropic advisor to numerous high net worth individuals & families & family offices. To meet him and ask for his assistance, invite him to be LinkedIn (email in profile) and contact him today!