Last week I gathered three of Austin’s best nonprofit social media practitioners for a panel discussion titled “Why Nonprofits Must Do Social Media or Just Die Already.”
Actually, Sam Woollard chose my other title suggestion, “Straight Talk About Social Media,” for the panel. Big thanks to panelists Jan Gunter of Ronald McDonald House Charities, Lisa Goddard of Capital Area Food Bank and Amanda Quaraishi of Mobile Loaves & Fishes.
We presented to One Voice Central Texas, a membership organization consisting of executive directors of health and human service nonprofits. Almost all of their organization already engage in social media, so we were able to move on to things like ROI, metrics, investment and conversion. Not that those terms were used. I think the audience’s overarching question was, “Is it worth it?”
Social media can be as useless as RSVPing to an event and not attending. Or it can be as useful as taking that big donor to lunch. As Amanda said, it’s less about media and more about social. Not all social media interactions can be followed to a donation or volunteer sign-up, but all of us can think of examples where social media allowed fans/friends/ followers to share a post, express admiration for a nonprofit or click-through to the website.
Still, it seems like with so many people online and so much work to be done, can’t we do more to make social media and technology lead to real change in Austin?
Next week, as all-day summit in Austin aims to answer that question.
The Mashable Social Good Summit is a three-day conference taking place across multiple cities. Held during UN Week, the Mashable Social Good Summit unites a dynamic community of global leaders to discuss a big idea: the power of innovative thinking and technology to solve our greatest challenges.
On Monday, Sept. 24, Austin will host its own Social Good Summit, bringing together our own thinkers, do-ers and innovators. Right now they’re looking for more nonprofits to participate.
We’re looking for nonprofits interested in engaging directly with attendees (and streaming viewers) of the event about pressing social problems that deserve attention in our community, how technology or social media can play a role, and share examples of how technology or social media helped solve a problem in the past.
This is a great opportunity for participating NPOs to meet potential volunteers that are tech and social media savvy, and inform the public about the most critical social problems we face here in Austin. Interested NPOs are encouraged to contact conference organizers at austinsocialgood@gmail.com.
Tickets to the Sept. 24 Austin event are limited, and are available at socialgoodsummitaustin.
Hi There!
Just saw this great article and wanted to reach out about possible collaboration. I’m the former E.D. of Craigslist Foundation and author of Nonprofit Management 101, and more recently I co-founded the country’s only conference series devoted to social media for social good, Social Media for Nonprofits (see http://www.SM4NP.org). We’re coming to Austin on 10/23 and would love to explore collaboration, so drop me a line and looking forward to connecting.
In Community,
Darian