UNICEF Sweden’s Ad

It’s almost impossible to avoid ‘slacktivism’ these days, with people changing their Twitter pictures to represent a cause or issue and liking nonprofit organizations on Facebook with the best of intentions. But how much does that really help? UNICEF Sweden put out an ad and video last week, admonishing those people who just post on social media about their support for a cause. In an article about the campaign, The Atlantic wrote:

Now, UNICEF Sweden is the first major international charity to come right out and say that people who actually want hungry, sick children saved need to donate money and supplies — not just virtual support.

“We like likes, and social media could be a good first step to get involved, but it cannot stop there,” said UNICEF Sweden Director of Communications Petra Hallebrant. “Likes don’t save children’s lives. We need money to buy vaccines for instance.”

UNICEF’s might be an extreme perspective, but it does raise interesting questions about how charity organizations should spread their messages online without allowing their potential donors to get stuck in slacktivist land, retweeting links and changing profile pictures without ever opening their wallets.

The article goes on to cite a study from Georgetown University and Ogilvy Worldwide, which found that “social promoters were just as likely as non-social-promoters to give money, but they were slightly more likely to volunteer their time (30 percent, versus 15 percent for non-social-promoters).”

Is ‘slacktivism’ really a problem or should organizations enjoy the awareness and buzz, and try to raise money another way?

Started the year with a resolution to get more involved in your community but still need that small push? Here’s your chance.

On March 10, more than 1,000 people across the globe will do something good. Or so they say.

Over the past few months, they’ve sworn on social media to participate in the quickly approaching Good Deeds Day, a five-year old event created by Israel-based volunteer foundation Ruach Tova.

Whether it’s making someone laugh (the promise of Mexico’s Valeria Blanchet) or adopting a pet from an animal shelter (Tennessee-based Steve Carter’s vow), the hope is that each deed will better their community, environment, or personal well-being.

I know these one-time promises often have the best of intentions  (“I’m going to do this EVERY weekend!”) but can peter out after the excitement of the day is over. So I spoke with a few folks to see how they’ll be defining their good deeds and sticking to them – both this March and beyond.

People across the globe have pledged their good deeds on the event’s site. What’s yours? (Photo via rosefirerising on Flickr’s Creative Commons.)

Cindy Anapolsky is about to participate in her second Good Deeds Day in Washington, D.C. (the U.S. headquarters for the event) with her husband and two children. Instead of doing a good deed on their own, Anapolsky’s family plans on joining others: Making thousands of sandwiches to hand out to the local homeless population.

“My son hasn’t stopped talking about it since we volunteered last year,” says Anapolsky, who brought her family to a similar sandwich-crafting event last March. “I think it was an important lesson for both my kids and myself.”

Since last year’s Good Deeds Day, she’s been inspired to pitch in on a variety of volunteering opportunities in her area.

“The day is an example of how we should act throughout the year, “ she says. “Not only as an individual, or a family, but as a community. It’s really lovely.”

Toni Gage plans on spending her Good Deeds Day with her synagogue congregation, making food, packaging snack packs for kids, and painting the nails of residents of a local rehab. Like Cindy, she sees the day as an important model for the youth in her community.

“Spending a day helping others keeps kids grounded,” Gage says. “When they deliver food or work with those who are less fortunate then them gives them a whole new perspective.”

Over the past few years, her synagogue has participated in the day together, and continues to host charity and volunteer opportunities throughout the year. And it’s not just the kids that benefit.

“Many of the adults in our congregation don’t even realize how needy our community is,” Gage says.

Ruth Lamberty, who helps manage Good Deeds Day, may be too busy with running the event on March 10 to participate. So, she and her staff organized a trial run in February where they committed an entire day to everything from painting a neighboring preschool to volunteering at a local furniture donation shop.

“It’s important to practice what we preach,” Lamberty says. “Because, if we don’t, what’s the point?”

Ultimately, Lamberty says, the day is meant to trigger good deed-doing in its participants throughout the entire year.

“It’s always the hope and goal,” she says. “But even if it’s just a day, it’s a commitment to something good. It’s a start.”
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Inspired to get in on the celebration? Pledge your good deed here in this colorful box conveniently linked to Facebook. Don’t forget to also browse over 13,000 volunteer opportunities worldwide listed on Idealist.  

Today is Nelson Mandela’s 94th birthday. There are various conversations and events happening online and offline celebrating his life and impact. What stood out to me is the above video which chronicles Nelson Mandela’s life via social media.

According to Mashable,

Happy Birthday, Nelson Mandela

“To commemorate the occasion, Prezence Digital Production created an information-packed but easily digestible video detailing the events of Mandela’s life. The four-minute video is a quick tour of Mandela’s timeline, told through a combination of hypothetical Facebook status updates, tweets, Instagram photos and Foursquare check-ins. It contains archival photos and actual quotes from Mandela, relatives, friends, political figures and media outlets.

The video, backed by the Nelson Mandela Centre of Memory, runs on the premise that Mandela may not have spent 27 years in captivity if social media platforms were available back then.”

While the video is meant to be a fun way to explore the life and impact of Nelson Mandela, it also made me wonder: what role does social media play in moving social movements forward?

Do you have examples or thoughts on this? Share them below.

How will you carve out time to learn and reflect? Photo: US Army (Flickr/Creative Commons)

Need professional development, but don’t have a budget for travel or tuition? Here are a bunch of free or relatively affordable upcoming trainings we’ve spotted recently – ones you can join from the comfort of your own desk or couch.

Special thanks to Ben Hastil for his contributions to this roundup.

Telling your organization’s story

• Creating Compelling Member Stories as Part of Your Outreach and Recruitment Strategy: A free webinar from the National Service Inclusion Project (NSIP), Jan. 25 from 3-4pm EST.

• The Four Keys to Pitch-Perfect Messaging: Nancy Schwartz brings you this free webinar, Feb. 7 from 1-2pm EST.

• It’s Not You, It’s Your Stories: How Your Fundraising Appeals Can Tell Better Stories: Presenters from M+R will share insight in this free NTEN webinar, Feb. 8 at 2pm EST.

Show me the money

• Grantseeking basics, fundraising planning, nonprofit sustainability…find trainings in these topics and more at your nearest Foundation Center.

Social media

• Social Media for Social Good events: Heather Mansfield of DIOSA Communications and Nonprofit Tech 2.0 has lined up one-day intensive social media trainings in conjunction with the launch of her book. They aren’t free, but they do benefit local nonprofits in the host cities.

• Using Social Media to Build an Active Base of Donors: Another from NTEN. This one is Jan. 26 and costs $35 for NTEN members, $70 for nonmembers. NTEN has several upcoming webinars at this price point; peruse the whole list here.

• Social Media for Nonprofits has events coming up in seven cities.

Become a better manager

• The Management Center’s upcoming “Managing to Change the World” trainings are sold out, but you can access tons of free worksheets to strengthen your delegation skills, hiring practices, organizational culture, and more.

• Management Assistance Group offers several publications, including free-for-download workbooks such as Advancing Your Cause Through the People You Manage.
  

Image via Gavin Llewellyn, http://www.onetoomanymornings.co.uk/ (Flickr/Creative Commons).

12.12.2011: The bullets in this post have been updated to include the percentages of social media jobs (out of all jobs posted on Idealist) each year.

Fellow Idealist Jeremy and I recently ran a little test to see how frequently “social media” appears in job postings on our site. Here’s how many listings have included the phrase over the last several years:

• 2007: 25 jobs, o.01 percent.
• 2008: 125 jobs, 0.27 percent.
• 2009: 507 jobs, 1.67 percent.
• 2010: 2,115 jobs, 4.98 percent.
• And in 2011 so far, 3,467 jobs, or 7.7 percent of all jobs posted this year.

Curious what the very first jobs to include “social media” were? Reaching all the way back to November 2006, we found four jobs from three trailblazing organizations: a Content Producer at WGBH Educational Foundation; a Social Network Designer-Manager at Games for Change; and two web developer jobs at Feminist Majority Foundation.

When I was hired in 2006, there are at least a few people on staff who were creating social media, but I don’t think they would have called it that. For example, our editor Eric checked all of the copy on our site, but he also served as a curator of news about the nonprofit sector and posted articles from around the world every day. He was blogging before we had a blog. Now social media weaves naturally into the jobs of many folks here, whether they’re writing emails for multi-channel campaigns, blogging here, or using social networking sites to learn about and grow our community.

Questions for you, dear readers:

• What has this evolution looked like at your organization? Is your organization so new that the majority of your work takes place through social media, or have you spent a lot of time convincing people of the value of this type of engagement?
• Are blogs, social networking sites, and other social media included in your job description? How much of your work time do they consume?
• If you’re a hiring manager posting one of those 3,400+ jobs, what matters to you with regard to filling those roles? How do the best candidates showcase their experience in this area?

This is the third in a three-part series for job seekers. You might also enjoy Can social media help you land your dream job? and Applying for jobs? Four free tools to keep the process simple.

Job applicants prepare for mock interviews. (Photo: DC Central Kitchen, Flickr/Creative Commons)

The headlines about jobs are very doom-and-gloom, but this summer the number of jobs posted on Idealist has actually increased (knock on wood, there are currently more than 7,000 jobs listed on our site). If you’ve found yourself saying “there just aren’t enough hours in the day to stay on top of everything,” here are some tools to help you save time and keep your search organized and on track.

RSS feeds: For those who aren’t familiar, RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication. You can set up a reader to serve as a one-stop website that automatically fills up with the personalized content you’re looking for.

All you need is a free RSS reader (like Google Reader) and a job site that supports RSS feeds (like ours!). To get started, run your favorite Idealist search, click the orange RSS button, and paste the URL into your reader. You’ll no longer have to constantly visit unique sites and run unique searches. All of your content will be in one place that’s easy to scan.

Google Alerts: Let’s say you’ve done some self-reflection and right now you’re motivated mainly by the desire to support a specific organization’s mission, by filling a specific type of role. (The “five lens framework” exercise can help you figure this out.)

If you know you want to be a Development Associate at the Alzheimer’s Association or a Program Officer at Room to Read, for example, create a Google Alert using those keywords. Then you’ll get an email whenever there is content posted on the web that matches. Even if you’re less sure about the exact job title you’re after, you can easily tailor alerts that pull in new jobs based on your area of interest or expertise.

Idealist Email Alerts: Similar idea, but specifically built into Idealist to help you stay on top of your searches there. They’re really easy to set up.

Social media: If you know you want to work at The Nature Conservancy, for example, be sure to like their page on Facebook, follow them on Twitter and LinkedIn, and connect to them on Idealist. Organizations will often reach out to their networks first before publicizing positions on major job boards.

Your turn! What other tools do you use to simplify your job search?

Social networks can help you with your job search. Photo by Dean Meyers (Flickr/Creative Commons)

Remember when people said you should hide your social media profiles during a job hunt? Now I would argue the opposite. Become active in social media – just remember that the person reading your tweets, blog posts, etc. could be your future manager! Here are some tips.

Twitter: Follow the organizations that you’re interested in working for, and the causes that you’re passionate about. Tweet about topics that are relevant to the job you want to land. Interested in fundraising? Follow, RT, and engage in conversation with people already in fundraising. Staying on top of new developments in your field, and being public about it, highlights your growing expertise to future employers.

Facebook: Stop reading and go check your privacy preferences. Put up a photo that’s at least semi-professional and make sure to include your past work and education experience in your profile. Unlike pages that might scare away a potential employer and replace them with the pages of the organizations that you’d like to work for. Engage with their posts when the opportunity presents itself; it will help demonstrate that you’re knowledgeable about their work if and when the time comes for them to hire.

LinkedIn: I’m not even job hunting and I’ve received offers for interviews just because I have an up-to-date LinkedIn profile. Take the time to make your LinkedIn profile as beautiful and informative as your résumé. Keep it up to date with your accomplishments and find and connect to everyone that you know professionally. It can definitely pay off, especially when you’re applying to jobs and looking for someone in your network at a company or organization.

Google profile: For whatever reason, you may have something showing up in a Google search that you don’t want employers to see. Cultivate online content that you control by creating a free Google profile. (And read my last post to learn more about how free Google tools can help you manage your job search.)

Idealist: Create a free profile and let hiring managers see your skills, interests, experience, and the causes that you’re passionate about. You can also connect directly to the organizations that you’re interested in so that you’re in the know when they post new opportunities.

Free blogging tools: If you’ve got a skill, a talent, or a passion for something that is related to your career, start a blog on a free blog service like WordPress. A well-maintained blog is an awesome way to show off your expertise, writing skills, and personality to potential hiring managers. (Not sure where to start or how to maintain your blogging mojo? Lots of folks have written about these topics, including Rosetta Thurman, Badi Jones, and Allison Jones.)

And finally: Put the networking back into your social networks. Whenever you apply for a job, check your social networks for contacts that you have at the organization, or even friends of friends of friends at the organization. If you’re looking for a job, be proactive and message your contacts on all of your networks to let them know what you’re looking for. People usually want to help, and if they know what you’re looking for, they’ll think of you first if something similar opens up at their organization. Knowing someone that can vouch for you to the hiring manager is the easiest way to land an interview.

Your turn to weigh in! What other ways can you use the social web to make your job search more successful?

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Other posts you might enjoy:

• Career Corner: What if you’ve just joined “Club Laid Off”?
• Career Corner: Don’t search for jobs, search for people!
• Five New Years’ resolutions for job seekers

Recently at the Social Media for Nonprofits conference in NYC, as Andy Steggles talked about developing mobile strategies for nonprofits, I tweeted: “Is your nonprofit using QR codes? How?”

Have you seen a compelling campaign that involved QR codes? (Photo: Brian Suda, Flickr/Creative Commons)

For those who aren’t familiar, QR (short for “quick response”) codes are those pixel-y little boxes you might have seen popping up on store windows or in magazine ads. If you have a smart phone, you can use it to snap a picture of the code and it will take you to the web address of, say, a coupon, a video, or any number of things.

My pal Emily Goodstein wrote a long post about QR codes for Convio’s Connection Cafe blog recently. Check it for a much better explanation than mine, and for an example of how the National Partnership for Women and Families used a QR code to occupy conference attendees as they waited in a long security line. There’s also a helpful intro post up at Nonprofit Tech 2.0.

I was curious about the ways that organizations like yours might be using this technology. Here are some of the responses to my tweet, from folks with lots of different goals.

Spread awareness

• CAMBA Inc., a Brooklyn-based human services organization, recently included QR codes on transit posters for an HIV anti-stigma campaign. (Click that link to see the Facebook note that accompanied the campaign as well as the poster.)

Inspire an action

• Hope & Heroes, the children’s cancer fund at Columbia University Medical Center, is considering adding a QR code to a save the date postcard for an upcoming walk event. Anyone who sees the postcard could scan the code and go straight to the registration page.

• Miss Representation, a documentary film and nonprofit aimed at raising visibility of women leaders, tweeted: “We used QR codes to help spread a petition! Check it out: http://j.mp/mOBrgV.” They posted the codes around San Francisco and, though it was hard to track, found that it increased the number of signatures.

• Larry Schooler of Austin, TX, noted: “We’re a city government, not nonprofit, but we use QR codes to send people to websites where they give input on city policy.”

Share a video

• Independence First, an organization that serves people with disabilities in greater Milwaukee, WI, said: “Honestly we use them on almost everything now. Ads, flyers, event invites, brochures. Love em!” A second tweet clarified that for each of those examples, the QR code takes you to a video – one might be an invitation to a big event; another a more general “About Our Work” video.

• Small Change Fund, a collective giving campaign based all over Canada, added a QR code to the backs of their staff business cards. The code “links to video of our founders explaining who we are & why we exist!”

More ideas, plus a caveat

• Rebecca Saidlower, Associate Director of Marketing and Communications at The Jewish Education Project, wrote “we discussed using them on conference badges as mobile business cards.”

• And finally, a word of caution from social media manager Josh Ness, who says that if you’re thinking about developing a QR code, you should “try to avoid these QR mistakes!”

Your turn! Have you ever bothered to snap a photo and see where a QR code might take you? Has your agency or organization incorporated QR codes into your campaigns? I’d love to hear about it.

“Forget concepts and theory,” say the organizers of Social Media for Nonprofits, “this is all about practical tips and tools.”

Beth Kanter and co-author Allison Fine speaking at an event last year. Photo: Marc_Smith (Flickr/Creative Commons)

The conferences are coming up in seven cities—San Francisco, Washington, DC, New York, Los Angeles, Seattle, Chicago, and Atlanta—this summer and fall. They’ll feature workshops and panels, plus keynotes by (depending on your city) Beth Kanter, Guy Kawasaki, Alexis Ohanian, our own Ami Dar, and many others. Each conference will be followed by a book launch for Darian Heyman’s Nonprofit Management 101 (read Ami’s foreward here).

And if you decide to attend, you can use the discount code “idealist” and get $20 off registration!

Visit http://socialmedia4nonprofits.org/ for more info. And let us know if we should keep an eye out for you at the NYC event!

The friendly team at Idealware.

Idealware‘s tagline is “helping nonprofits make smart software decisions.” They make good on that promise through books, webinars, and other resources. And starting next week, they’ll offer a free monthly training, too!

The first webinar in their monthly series will cover Optimizing Your Website for Search Engines. When people search sites like Google with keywords that relate to your work, does your organization’s name come up on the first page of results?

There are lots of techniques you can use to make this happen, and Idealware’s Executive Director, Laura Quinn, will break them down in this free training. Learn more and sign up here.

Other free eLearning courses include The Technology Pyramid (“Does your organization have its technology priorities in the right order?”) and Facebook vs. Twitter (see also: The Nonprofit Social Media Decision Guide).

And you may remember that last year we reviewed Idealware’s Field Guide to Software for Nonprofits. Now they’ve released a 2011 edition, packed with new insight about topics from productivity and collaboration to constituent management, fundraising, and outreach.

Go forth and make informed software decisions, nonprofit techies!

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Note: despite the similarity in our names, Idealware and Idealist are two separate entities. We like Idealware, and we like to promote free and cheap resources that can help you do your work better! Let us know if there are other organizations or resources we might want to share here.