One of the best ways to keep in touch with your supporters is through Social Media platforms such as Twitter, Instagram and Facebook among others. Donors have stepped over the threshold and use Social Media to engage with charities just like they do with every other aspect of their life. Social Media is ubiquitous in our daily life.
Twitter is perhaps one of the easiest and most widely used platforms. Here are some quick guidelines to help you use it well:
- First, make your Twitter handle recognizable. The best way to do this is by relating it back to your organization’s name and ideally identical across other social platforms. In addition, make your profile picture something that is unique to your organization and also consistent across the online experience – from the website to Twitter to Facebook make the imagery cohesive.
- When actually tweeting, present your organization with a human voice. You can be serious, funny, excited—social media is an emotionally loose world; users appreciate businesses with a dose of humanity but you don’t want to be childish or too quirky (unless of course that’s your brand). Feel free to incorporate visual elements, including videos and photography, in your Twitter updates that provoke emotion in your viewers and demonstrate your work.
- Tweet to your followers, not at them. Whether they donate to your organization or perhaps volunteer, your Twitter followers care about your cause and want to know what your nonprofit is doing to achieve its goals. So, keep them well-informed with a unique perspective on your mission and accomplishments. Very often, a nonprofit’s attitude will change a potential donor’s opinion from casual interest to actual giving.
- Bear in mind that Twitter is a noisy place and that your audience can be fickle and will move on after a few seconds. So be concise and informative. Keep your tweets at 120 characters or less. Use relevant hashtags. Encourage retweets. Direct followers to your website.
As a nonprofit on Twitter (or any social media outlet), it is important to position yourself as a voice of authority. Your Twitter audience follows you because your organization says it will make a difference. So, show them that you can.
To read more n this topic visit: Nonprofit Quarterly.