#COMMUNICATIONS: Visualizing The Impact Of Social Media, Especially Email
Click To Enlarge
Human beings are wired to pick up visual cues before we pick up textual ones. Social media and the internet love visuals too, because visual communication can travel quickly through networks and beyond the original linguistic group. We did a story on the MKCREATIVEmedia Blog last week about the eBenchmark study of 2012 by NTen and M+R Strategic Services that highlighted the ongoing importance of email outreach. What better way to follow that up than with their infographic showing the power of email.
We call your attention to such metrics as the fact that 35% of all online giving in 2011 came through email, whereas all other platforms together made up the other 65%. Therefore, email remains the single biggest tool in a nonprofit’s outreach toolbox, but it should not be considered the only tool. But how to be successful with email?
Popularity: 1% | Category Advice, Campaigns, Cause Marketing, Communications, Crowdfunding, Development, Donor Acquisition, E-Mail, eBook, eNewsletter, Fundraising, Marketing, Marketing Budget, Marketing Skills, Measurement, Nonprofit, Nonprofit, Permission Marketing, Public Relations, Publications, Resource, Site Administration, Social Media, Social Networks, Video | | 0 Comments
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#TECH: Mac? Windows? Need Both Operating Systems? Use Both! (Part I)
Invest in software, not computers
In the primitive era of personal computing (any time before about 2004), one had to commit entirely to one of three platforms or operating systems: Mac, Windows, or Linux. Sharing documents created on one platform with a colleague on another platform was tricky at best. What could be shared was electronic information (emails or websites) or un-editable PDF files, all of which made collaboration difficult and pretty much locked any office, nonprofit, or even family onto one track.
Now with cloud computing and mobile devices and programs that create ‘virtual machines’ of one kind of operating system working within another (think: picture-in-picture feature on a television), individuals can pick their favorite hardware and OS, and be confident that they can collaborate with their less enlightened colleagues. We’d like to introduce the latest developments in virtualization and present a brief series on a few ways to set up many computers on one device.
Popularity: 1% | Category Desktop Apps, Hardware Review, How-to, Nonprofit, Resource, Reviews, Site Administration, Software Review, Technology, Technology for Nonprofits, Video | | 0 Comments
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#TECH: We Catch Up With Dropbox Collaboration Tool (With Nonprofit Pricing)
Sync files among your devices, whatever OS they run
We’ve covered collaboration tools in the past, and Dropbox is a favorite for its ease of use and inexpensive offerings (including a personal favorite price: free for 2GB of storage space). We wanted to return to the program this Tech Friday because Dropbox continues to develop and people are finding new ways to use it.
For a reminder on the practicals of Dropbox: individuals get 2 gigabytes of storage for free, which allows you to sync files and folders among your computing and mobile devices − the premise of ‘cloud computing.’ From there, rates go up by 50 GB increments up to the ‘Teams’ level that start at a Terabyte. But what’s really good news is that late last year Dropbox started offering 30% discounts to nonprofit organizations!
Once you get signed up for the account, what can you do with it?
Popularity: 2% | Category Desktop Apps, How-to, iPad Apps, iPhone Apps, Nonprofit, Resource, Reviews, Site Administration, Software Review, Technology, Technology for Nonprofits, Video | | 0 Comments
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#HOWTO: Get Guidance From Google On Simple SEO Success
Is your site worth searching for?
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is a social media buzzword: gotta have it, gotta work at it, gotta pack it in to your website or blog! And it is true that SEO needs to be a part of your nonprofit’s online and outreach strategies. Why develop a new site or even update your outdated one if people will struggle to find it, much less relevant information on it? The go-to standard for web searches (including images and videos) is, of course, Google. Even as the e-behemoth develops Android and G+ and even augmented-reality glasses, millions of us use it simply, almost exclusively, for web research.
So why not find out what the folks at Google recommend to bolster the searchability and discoverability of your website?
Popularity: 2% | Category Advice, Blogs, Cause Marketing, Communications, How-to, Marketing, Marketing Budget, Marketing Skills, Measurement, Nonprofit, Nonprofit, Public Media, Public Relations, Resource, SEO, Site Administration, Social Media, Social Networks, Storytelling, Technology, Technology for Nonprofits, Video, Web and Print, Web Design, Writing, YouTube | | 0 Comments
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#SOCIALMEDIA: Rise Of Micro-Networks Might Reconfigure Social Outreach
Online social networking is all about the sharing, even sharing stuff you wished the rest of the world didn’t see. The opportunities for outreach are expanded exponentially through a social network like Twitter or a blogging site like Tumblr. For businesses, to garner thousands of ‘likes’ or ‘followers’ can be testament to your product’s popularity in the market. But those thousands can also alter your message faster and farther than your company might like. The phenomenon of Kony 2012 proves that millions might watch, but many of those millions are also challenging the message. And how many of us have texted a work colleague meant for our significant other?
A micro-networking culture is brewing that might alleviate some of these stresses through greater control and focus of who is ‘in’ and who is ‘out’ of your particular network. And developers are not thinking in ‘Circles.’
Popularity: 2% | Category Communications, Design, Geo-Location, iDevice, iPad/Tablet, Resource, Reviews, Site Administration, Social Media, Social Networks, Software Review, Technology, Technology for Nonprofits, Video | | 0 Comments
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#SOCIALNETWORKS: Kony 2012 Covered The Night. Did It Jump The Shark?
Youth cover some of the evening
The sensation that is/was ‘Kony 2012′ has been a part of the nonprofit social-media landscape for six-plus weeks now. The hundreds of millions who made the original video a viral sensation in March were not all supporters of the message, though, and challenges to the drive launched by the San Diego nonprofit ‘Invisible Children’ continue to be made. The original and ostensible goal is to have Joseph Kony and his Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) brought to justice by making Kony ‘famous’ enough that world leaders will be inspired or shamed to dedicate the resources to get him. The effort to make him famous has been done and the culmination of the effort was this past weekend’s ‘Cover The Night’ campaign. How well did it go? Whether the night got ‘covered’ probably depends on where you are and what you want ‘covered’ to mean, but Invisible Children have ratcheted up their campaign with, frankly, the oddest video yet.
Popularity: 3% | Category Blogs, Cause Marketing, Civics, Communications, Community, Crowdfunding, Event Review, Events, Fundraising, Marketing, Media Review, National/International, News and Current Affairs, Newspaper Article, Nonprofit, Nonprofit, Opinion, Politics, Public Media, Reviews, Social Media, Social Networks, Storytelling, Video, YouTube | | 0 Comments
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#VIDEO: Freelance Producers & Reporters Wanted for Brooklyn Independent Television
Brooklyn Independent Television (a division of the Community Media initiative of BRIC Arts | Media | Bklyn), makes TV programs for and about Brooklyn, NYC, covering news, arts, culture, sports, health, business, and what’s happening in Brooklyn’s diverse neighborhoods.
Marco Kathuria, Creative Director and Social Media Strategist at MKCREATIVE happens to be one of their freelance instructors, so when he heard that BIT was expanding their programming and were looking for talented filmmakers who want to tell stories, he felt it was something worth sharing.
Popularity: 2% | Category Community, Cross-Post, News and Current Affairs, Nonprofit, Opinion, Storytelling, Video, Video Production | | 0 Comments
Written by: mkcreative
#INTERVIEW: Michael Hoffman, CEO of See3 Communications, Discusses Why Nonprofits Need to Embrace Video
Michael Hoffman is co-founder and CEO of See3 Communications and a leading authority on online video for nonprofits and online fundraising and outreach strategies. After turns as a political consultant and developer of Internet startups, he founded See3 to bring together his vision of the web and his passion for nonprofit fundraising. The interview was conducted by Don Akchin, a principal of Nonprofit Marketing 360 and a frequent contributor to the MKCREATIVE blog.
MKC: What was the concept of See3 when you founded it?
MICHAEL: See3 was a coming together of my background, which was really on the web side in terms of Internet business and strategy, and that of my partner, Danny Albert, which is video. Danny has been a documentary filmmaker for 20 years. Around 2004-2005, we both saw some trends that we call our ‘your chocolate and my peanut butter moment.’ I was telling Danny about changes on the web and the development of broadband (It’s hard even to remember that only a few years ago, some 90% of people were still using dialup). Broadband was around the corner and Danny asked me, ‘What does that mean? What will broadband do?’ And I immediately answered ‘video.’ When you have broadband web, the web will become a platform for video, just as it is with us talking over Skype now on this interview.
Popularity: 7% | Category Campaigns, Communications, Community, Cross-Post, Facebook, Fundraising, Interview, LinkedIn, Marketing, Marketing Budget, Measurement, MySpace, Nonprofit, Nonprofit, Perspectives, Perspectives, Pinterest, Posterous, Scoopit, Social Media, Social Networks, Storytelling, Strategic Marketing, Technology, Tools, Tumblr, Twitter, Twitter, Video, YouTube | | 0 Comments
Written by: Don Akchin
#ADVOCACY: Kony 2012 Sequel Not Going Viral, Nor Ending Debate
Too little too late?
Last Thursday, Invisible Children released their tepidly anticipated sequel to the stunningly viral video Kony 2012 (over 100 million views). The sequel, “Kony Part II – Beyond Famous,” was almost destined not to make as big a splash in the nonprofit/video/social-media ocean because the impact of the message had already been made, and those millions who responded − positively or negatively − probably don’t need to see a sequel to be re-convinced. Since the first video came out, just over a month ago, the ‘media packages’ people were asked to purchase to support the campaign were quickly sold out and the video’s director/narrator, Jason Russell, was arrested and committed to hospital for mental and emotional fatigue.
We still await the climactic ‘Cover The Night’ campaign of 20 April, but what all this has done to bring Kony to justice remains to be seen. What we want to focus on today, though, is how social networks inspired the explosion of interest around the original, and how those same networks might be dampening the responses to the sequel.
Popularity: 3% | Category Advocacy, Blogs, Campaigns, Cause Marketing, Civics, Communications, Community, Crowdfunding, Fundraising, Marketing, National/International, News and Current Affairs, Newspaper Article, Nonprofit, Nonprofit, Opinion, Politics, Public Media, Social Media, Social Networks, Storytelling, Video, YouTube | | 1 Comments
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#TECH: Google Now Designing Glasses And Giving Us A New ‘Play’ Service
Are these Google Glasses?
The good people at Google have been busy releasing new aspects of their services that are meant to augment our muti-media experiences. As is often the case, one’s first blush of these technologies might appear a bit overwhelming or a bit far out on the bleeding edge for most of us. But one of our goals at MKCREATIVEmedia is to keep our readers up-to-date on that bleeding-edge technology and to keep apprised as to how that technology is adapted and adopted by the nonprofit, charity, and small-business communities.
The first, Google Play, will likely seem pretty familiar to anyone using a cloud-based media service like iCloud or Amazon Prime. But Google Glasses seems so far out there that even some tech fetishists are wondering about its appeal. Of course, people scoffed at the notion we would want to travel in a noisy open-air flying machine as well.
Popularity: 3% | Category Communications, Dashboards, Design, Hardware Review, How-to, iDevice, iPad Apps, iPad/Tablet, iPhone Apps, Marketing, Media Review, News and Current Affairs, Public Media, Reviews, Social Media, Social Networks, Technology, Video | | 0 Comments
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#SM4NP: Kony 2012 Will Get A Sequel & More Context Today
Today is the day. Probably.
As any Hollywood mogul will confirm, when your movie is watched by 100 million people, you need to make a sequel. That market is just too big to pass up. And the renown viral video Kony 2012 has been viewed well over 100 million times. Nevertheless, the reasons the San Diego based firm ’Invisible Children’ will be releasing a sequel to their 30-minute wunderkind seem not really about tapping a market so much as explaining the phenomenon. It has not been released as of this posting, but one can’t help but wonder if we need the prequel/context-setter any more than we needed Star Wars: The Phantom Menace.
What do we know about a movie that has not yet appeared?
Popularity: 3% | Category Campaigns, Case Study, Cause Marketing, Civics, Communications, Crowdfunding, Design, Events, Fundraising, Marketing, Media Review, National/International, News and Current Affairs, Nonprofit, Nonprofit, Opinion, Politics, Reviews, Social Media, Storytelling, Video | | 0 Comments
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#HOWTO: Facebook Timeline Goes Public Tomorrow! Ready?
Are you ready? It goes live tomorrow!
Facebook has been rolling out its new ‘Timeline’ feature for a few months now, and we hope we have given you a helping hand with the changes. Timeline redesigns your social interaction into a chronological sweep that is also distinguished topically and physically (that is, by being placed in different sections of your FB home page). It allows an individual, a nonprofit, or a company to present a visual banner or ‘Cover’ to introduce themselves, and it offers greater opportunity to control the ‘Story’ on the page by giving users means to ‘back fill’ their histories.
And the fact is, Timeline becomes the default interface of all Facebook accounts tomorrow! If your charity is on Facebook, you need to be prepared. We found a couple of great sources to help you tidy up your page in preparation of the final stages of implementation.
Popularity: 4% | Category Advice, Blogs, Branding, Cause Marketing, Communications, Facebook, Facebook, Facebook, Fundraising, How-to, Marketing, Marketing Skills, Media Review, Nonprofit, Public Relations, Resource, Reviews, Site Administration, Social Media, Social Networks, Software Review, Storytelling, Study, Technology, Technology for Nonprofits, Video, Web Design, YouTube | | 1 Comments
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#SM4NP: ‘Kony 2012′ Still Stirs Engagement, Controversy, And Embarrassment
Director's breakdown raises further questions
The controversy surrounding the viral video ‘Kony 2012′ continues even as its views on YouTube surpass 85.4 million as I write. The director, Jason Russell, had something of a mental breakdown a week ago, when he was arrested for indecent exposure while ranting almost incoherently about support and friendships. As reported by ABC.com late last week, “According to the National Institutes of Health, brief reactive psychosis is triggered by extreme stress, such as a traumatic event or the loss of a loved one. The symptoms, which include delusions, hallucinations and strange speech, can last up to a month, and the person may be completely unaware of them. … Alan Hilfer, chief psychologist at Maimonides Medical Center in New York City, said the backlash over Russell’s “Kony 2012″ campaign could have been traumatic enough to trigger the meltdown.”
How might disconcerting behavior of the video’s producer shift the discussion of the video and the appeal by ‘Invisible Children’ to raise awareness of Joseph Kony’s ‘Lord’s Resistance Army‘?
Popularity: 4% | Category Advertising, Campaigns, Case Study, Cause Marketing, Civics, Communications, Crowdfunding, Fundraising, Marketing, Marketing Skills, Media Review, National/International, News and Current Affairs, Newspaper Article, Nonprofit, Opinion, Politics, Public Media, Reviews, Social Media, Social Networks, Storytelling, Technology, Video, YouTube | | 3 Comments
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#COMMUNICATIONS: Plan Your Nonprofit’s Story, Then Shoot The Video
Making a video is all the rage in the nonprofit world – and it should be. Videos can engage the eyes and ears and hearts of your audience in ways that can and should complement other means of outreach. Videos can also be presented in a myriad of ways: posting it on YouTube and Vimeo is a given, but with ever faster networks your organization can email them to donors, it can be shown on the big screen of a fundraising gala, and your charity’s website should include a copy as well.
But as video becomes the buzzword-du-jour, remember that it is one tool in the box and the point of all the tools is to expand outreach, interest, donations, and volunteer pools. What will make the video tool successful is not the fancy technology but the careful construction of a meaningful and touching story. Video should be perceived as a chapter of a larger book of outreach, and perhaps not the first chapter.
Popularity: 4% | Category Advice, Campaigns, Cause Marketing, Communications, Community, Fundraising, Marketing, Marketing Skills, Media Review, Nonprofit, Nonprofit, Public Media, Storytelling, Technology for Nonprofits, Video, Video Interview | | 1 Comments
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#PHILANTHROPY: Google Can Give Time, Resources, & AdWords To Nonprofits
Google is the great behemoth of web searching and video hosting. Google.com is default homepage in millions of browsers and YouTube has inspired citizen journalists in war-torn Syria and video mashups of cute kittens in suburbia. Google.org is perhaps not as well known, but its philanthropic outreach is huge, and it offers that money and support numerous ways – some of which your organization can surely take advantage of!
Popularity: 4% | Category Advertising, Advice, Blogs, Campaigns, Cause Marketing, Civics, Communications, Community, Crowdfunding, Desktop Apps, Development, Donor Acquisition, eNewsletter, Fundraising, Grants, Grants and Funding, How-to, Major Gifts, Marketing, Marketing Skills, Measurement, Nonprofit, Nonprofit, Public Relations, Site Administration, Social Media, Technology, Technology for Nonprofits, Video | | 0 Comments
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#INTERVIEW: Christopher Davenport, Founder of 501 Videos, A Company That Makes Videos Exclusively For Nonprofit Clients
Christopher Davenport is the founder of 501 Videos, a company that makes videos exclusively for nonprofit clients. His experience includes years in Hollywood working on commercial films and, later, making documentaries. His website is home to Movie Mondays, a weekly series of short films featuring fundraising professionals in action. The interview was conducted by Don Akchin, a principal of Nonprofit Marketing 360 and a frequent contributor to the MKCREATIVE blog.
MKC: Did you always know you wanted to make movies?
CHRISTOPHER: Not always. When I was 5 I wanted to be a fireman, and then when I was 5 and a half, that’s when I knew I wanted to make movies.
Popularity: 4% | Category Communications, Community, Donor Acquisition, Grants, Interview, Major Gifts, Nonprofit, Nonprofit, Perspectives, Sponsorship, Storytelling, Video | | 0 Comments
Written by: Don Akchin