Online tools that connect people to real world actions in creative and accessible ways have the potential to rapidly accelerate social change.
Social Actions is a nonprofit initiative committed to making it easier for people to find and share opportunities to make a difference. A search engine on SocialActions.com helps users find ways to take action for the causes they care about from 50+ online action sources including Kiva, DonorsChoose.org, Change.org, DemocracyinAction, GlobalGiving, Idealist.org, SixDegrees, VolunteerMatch,Care2 and others. Social Actions creates incentives such as the Change the Web Challenge to encourage the distribution of their open API (Application Programming Interface) to websites, blogs, social networks and mobile devices and include everything from volunteer opportunities to micro-credit loans.
The overall goal of the SocialActions site is to make the web more action-oriented and to make it easier for people to make a difference.
Check it out.
Cheers!
Dave Sharp
Sharp Consulting Group, LLC
Showing posts with label website. Show all posts
Showing posts with label website. Show all posts
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
Tuesday, December 30, 2008
Rethinking the Concept of E-mail Marketing...
This might be the time for nonprofits and for-profits to completely rethink the concept of e-mail marketing?
Think about email as a marketing medium for a moment. On average an e-mail program inspires one out of every seven hundred recipients to make a donation or purchase something.
That’s right, the average email marketing letter achieves a 0.15% “purchase” response. In fact, only one in five individuals bother to even open an email pitch.
Maybe we should start redefining a successful e-mail marketing program on its ability to get a supporter or customer to visit a website, to "engage". Maybe the goal of e-mail marketing should be to train customers to regularly visit our website.
If the purpose of e-mail marketing is to train a supporter to interact with us, we would create different e-mails, wouldn't we?
E-mail marketers might market the organization Blog, encouraging the loyal supporters to interact with the organization by sharing a story or photos, taking a poll or posting a video .
E-mail marketers might educate a supporter or customer about how to use the products and services the organization offers. Offering cooking tips for the olive oil marketer as an example. The goal isn't to sell olive oil ... the goal is to tell somebody how to be creative with the olive oil they purchase.
E-mail marketers might share stories and photos about the loyal employees who serve loyal customers and donors.
E-mail marketers might share stories about loyal supporters and customers, helping loyal supporters feel special.
The goal of e-mail marketing could be about making people feel special. This could generate word of mouth, generating donations or sales with minimal incremental cost. This could also generate reasons for supporters and customers to visit your website.
Since only one in seven hundred customers are buying what we have to sell today. What do we have to lose?
More on this later.
Cheers!
Dave
Think about email as a marketing medium for a moment. On average an e-mail program inspires one out of every seven hundred recipients to make a donation or purchase something.
That’s right, the average email marketing letter achieves a 0.15% “purchase” response. In fact, only one in five individuals bother to even open an email pitch.
Maybe we should start redefining a successful e-mail marketing program on its ability to get a supporter or customer to visit a website, to "engage". Maybe the goal of e-mail marketing should be to train customers to regularly visit our website.
If the purpose of e-mail marketing is to train a supporter to interact with us, we would create different e-mails, wouldn't we?
E-mail marketers might market the organization Blog, encouraging the loyal supporters to interact with the organization by sharing a story or photos, taking a poll or posting a video .
E-mail marketers might educate a supporter or customer about how to use the products and services the organization offers. Offering cooking tips for the olive oil marketer as an example. The goal isn't to sell olive oil ... the goal is to tell somebody how to be creative with the olive oil they purchase.
E-mail marketers might share stories and photos about the loyal employees who serve loyal customers and donors.
E-mail marketers might share stories about loyal supporters and customers, helping loyal supporters feel special.
The goal of e-mail marketing could be about making people feel special. This could generate word of mouth, generating donations or sales with minimal incremental cost. This could also generate reasons for supporters and customers to visit your website.
Since only one in seven hundred customers are buying what we have to sell today. What do we have to lose?
Cheers!
Dave
Monday, December 08, 2008
Why you need a Blog....
Your organization needs a blog. What I really mean is, your raving fan stakeholders need you to have a blog. Recognize from the start that not everybody reads it, just those nutty people who love what you and your organization does. Your blog keeps them informed and lets them interact (amplify, disagree, share, comment) with you.
Blogs are free, but they do require time and commitment. So before you start, you should sit down and outline an editorial schedule and commit to posting on a regular basis.
Make your blogs more interesting by adding photos and videos of events and members. Sign up for a photo/ video sharing site like flickr or youtube. And Make sure to add sharing functionality to your blog so that readers can email their family and friends as well as bookmark your blog to the major sharing sites (digg, stumble,technorati, etc. Go to sharethis.com and register your blog and get a "Share This" button.
Once you start blogging you will see that people will find your website easier (make sure to link your blog to your website and site to your blog). Additionally you will also find that your organization will move up in search engine ranks.
Share your thoughts.
Cheers!
Dave
Blogs are free, but they do require time and commitment. So before you start, you should sit down and outline an editorial schedule and commit to posting on a regular basis.
Make your blogs more interesting by adding photos and videos of events and members. Sign up for a photo/ video sharing site like flickr or youtube. And Make sure to add sharing functionality to your blog so that readers can email their family and friends as well as bookmark your blog to the major sharing sites (digg, stumble,technorati, etc. Go to sharethis.com and register your blog and get a "Share This" button.
Once you start blogging you will see that people will find your website easier (make sure to link your blog to your website and site to your blog). Additionally you will also find that your organization will move up in search engine ranks.
Share your thoughts.
Cheers!
Dave
Sunday, November 30, 2008
What’s all the buzz about?
The big buzz in marketing for nonprofit organizations and government agencies these days is all about social networking, viral campaigns and Web 2.0 tools. Organizations of all sizes are starting to ask…Do we start a Facebook page, set up a new blog, start using Twitter, Flickr and YouTube?
Before you start using the latest and greatest social networking tools, take a moment to review your strategic business plan.
Keep it simple. Who are you trying to contact, what is your message and what benefits do you have to offer?
After all, if you just start using web 2.0 tools just because you don’t want to miss out on the latest technology or popular website, you can end up wasting a lot of time, effort and money…
So with this in mind, you may want to ask yourself three simple questions prior to starting a big, new marketing effort using the latest and greatest social networking tools:
1. Is this tool going to help us reach our target audience(s) with the appropriate message?
2. Do we have valuable information to provide via these networking venues?
3. Are the resources available to regularly update and enhance our new, social network marketing campaigns so we experience the best results?
If you answered “Yes” to these questions, then please move forward and plan how you are going to incorporate these social networking tools into your marketing and development plans.
But if you answered “No,” it may be best to do some more research about the tools and trends. This way, you’ll be able to focus your efforts on the marketing activities that will give you the best results while still being aware of new tools and technologies that are available.
Cheers!
Dave
Before you start using the latest and greatest social networking tools, take a moment to review your strategic business plan.
Keep it simple. Who are you trying to contact, what is your message and what benefits do you have to offer?
After all, if you just start using web 2.0 tools just because you don’t want to miss out on the latest technology or popular website, you can end up wasting a lot of time, effort and money…
So with this in mind, you may want to ask yourself three simple questions prior to starting a big, new marketing effort using the latest and greatest social networking tools:
1. Is this tool going to help us reach our target audience(s) with the appropriate message?
2. Do we have valuable information to provide via these networking venues?
3. Are the resources available to regularly update and enhance our new, social network marketing campaigns so we experience the best results?
If you answered “Yes” to these questions, then please move forward and plan how you are going to incorporate these social networking tools into your marketing and development plans.
But if you answered “No,” it may be best to do some more research about the tools and trends. This way, you’ll be able to focus your efforts on the marketing activities that will give you the best results while still being aware of new tools and technologies that are available.
Cheers!
Dave
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