If you’re working on behalf of a nonprofit, foundation, NGO, university or cause organization, you know that you don’t move the needle unless you have a marketing plan in place that propels people to take action on your organization’s behalf. And today a big part of your marketing toolset involves social media.

Because most people participate in at least one social media platform, nonprofits now have an easier and less expensive way to target and reach your stakeholders and constituents.

But before you jump in, make sure you have a concrete plan on how to get the message across to your target audience. If you’re planning to jump-start your social media presence for your organization, here are 15 tips you might find useful.

Set goals

1Before you start tweeting or Facebooking away, you need to identify your goals. What are you trying to achieve, and how do you measure success? If you’re trying to increase your organization’s engagement rate on Instagram, say, you should first set out a goal that’s specific (50 IG interactions), realistic (is it really possible?) and timely (in a month?). Once you establish a goal, you should track how you’re doing and adjust your processes to improve your results.  

Know your audience

2One of the most important steps in boosting your social media presence is knowing your audience. If you know who they are, you would know what their interests are and what type of content you need to share to reel them into your social media pages and your website. You’ll be better positioned to effectively engage them if you know what their proclivities are.

Know the platforms

3Knowing the audience gives you an idea what social media networks they spend time on. If, for example, your audience members are the “visual” types, you’re going to be more effective in engaging them through Pinterest or Instagram.

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Be consistent with your content

4Post content regularly to build your social media presence. You don’t need to devote a full-time staffer to this, but your updates should be regular and not sporadic. Also, make sure your content is consistent with the services you offer so that your audience won’t get confused with what your organization is offering. Your social media team members need to be on message with your nonprofit’s mission and goals.

Create targeted content

5By “targeted content,” we mean posts that your target audience would find interesting. As the saying goes: content reigns supreme. That holds true with social media marketing as well. Make sure you’re not regurgitating boilerplate mission statements — you need to find human stories that represent what your organization is trying to achieve!

Repurpose top content

6Yes, recycling or repurposing content is not a bad idea — especially if the content garners a lot of attention the first time you posted it. If a blog or a video gets a lot of attention from one social media platform, you can use it to get more mileage in another platform that is not doing as well.

Make sure it’s not all about you

7As long as you stay consistent with your updates, you can increase your social media engagement if you share external posts that your audience might find useful or interesting. In other words, it shouldn’t be all about you. Post about your sector or interesting things happening in your world, not just about official organization business.

Influencing via influencers

8“Influencers” are experts or public figures who have large social media followings. Wooing them to promote your services would help in making your cause, fundraising appeal or big event known to a wider audience. Does anyone on your team know any figures with large followings? Ask them!

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Engage your audience regularly

9Take time to reply to queries or solicit suggestions posted by the public to your Facebook page or other social media comment sections. Your followers should know that you spend time there and care about what they have to say.

Create a social media calendar

10There are lots of tools on the Internet that will help you manage your social media accounts more easily. (See Socialbrite’s Tools section.) This will also help in making sure you post updates on a regular basis.

Connect with other marketers

11Building relationships with other social media marketers can help foster a virtuous circle. This also makes it easier for you to get more ideas on how you can boost your social media presence.

Put more effort on visuals

12People are visual animals, which means that more people will likely check out your content if it looks great. So make sure to put more effort on the images you’re posting to attract your target audience.

Use hashtags

13Hashtags are a useful tool to make your content easier to find. This will also help with your branding. Did you now that Socialbrite has a free downloadable flyer on the subject?: 45 hashtags for social change (PDF).

Join communities

14Joining communities that are in the same niche as yours will make it easier for people to find your content, as communities usually allow their members to share posts on community walls. Also, you’ll be able to get the latest trends and news in communities.

Measure the results

15Last but crucially: Constantly check to see if you’re on track to achieving your goals. Are your efforts paying off or are they falling short? Only by measuring can you adjust course to be more in sync with what your audience wants and needs. The number of followers, likes, shares, comments, clicks and/or leads should be able to tell you if you’re achieving your goals or not.

There’s no denying social media is now a part of the modern landscape. Whether you work at or with a nonprofit, foundation, university, NGO or social enterprise, you should take advantage of this fact and use the free tools available to you. Over time, if used properly, social media can help advance your organization’s mission, and that’s the bottom line, isn’t it?

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Tried & true techniques — plus a conference discount code

Target audience: Nonprofits, cause organizations, foundations, NGOs, social enterprises.

Guest post by Ritu Sharma
Social Media for Nonprofits

As Social Media for Nonprofits, the country’s only conference series devoted to social media for social good, plans its Oct. 5 return to the nation’s capital, we thought it would be helpful to share three of the simplest, most practical tips some of our 100+ presenters (including Socialbrite’s JD Lasica and John Haydon) have shared with the 3,500+ nonprofits we’ve educated and empowered to date.

Optimal times for email and social media posts

1With email, the guiding rule is that you don’t want to be unread message number 38 of 62 when someone gets back to work from the weekend, so the best time to blast your list is mid-morning or mid-afternoon Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday.  On the other hand, with social media, your Facebook posts and tweets should be timed to catch people in their downtime. 8:45am when they’re on their way into work, 12:30pm when they’re checking their iPhone eating a burrito, 5:30pm on the bus ride home, and according to research, the single best time to post during the week is 9:30-11pm, after the kids go to sleep.  Of course you should experiment with your own unique base and see what works, plus bear in mind what time zone(s) they’re in and try out on weekends.

Ask questions to stoke a conversation

2Simply put, if your tweet or Facebook post ends in a question mark vs. a period, you can expect about five times the amount of likes/comments/shares, retweets, etc. Why?  Well, social media isn’t about monologue — it’s about dialogue.  So instead of just making a statement, ask a question and invite your audience into a conversation!

Become a content curator

3Imagine going to a cocktail party and winding up chatting with someone who only talks about themselves, their work, and their needs. Time for an imaginary call or text to provide cover while you excuse yourself, right?  The same is true with social media. As Kay Sprinkel Grace noted, “People don’t give to you, they give through you.” Your audience may care about your organization a bit, but what they really care about is the kids, cause or animals you serve, and the impact you have in the world. So try and balance your posts by ensuring that at least half of them don’t just talk about your needs and updates but rather about the issue you represent. Establish yourself as a thought leader and the followers and dollars will follow.

At Social Media for Nonprofits, we like to say we’re not doing our job if our conferences just leave our attendees inspired. Our job is to inspire them to action.  The real question is, after a one-day event, what can you do differently tomorrow that makes you more effective and more efficient at advancing your cause?  Hopefully these three simple tips are something you can put to work immediately to drive better results online.

We hope you can join us in DC on Oct. 5 to see top speakers from Facebook, LinkedIn, Change.org, Salsa, CARE, Blackbaud, and Constant Contact, or that you can make it to San Francisco on Oct. 11, Austin on Oct. 23, Seattle on Nov. 5, or later on in New Delhi, NYC, Silicon Valley, Vancouver, LA, and Chicago.

Follow us on Facebook or Twitter to stay tuned. Tickets cost $95 for nonprofits with budgets under $500K, including access to the full-day program, breakfast and lunch.  Larger nonprofits, consultants, and for-profits can save $20 off the normal registration fee with the “Socialbrite” discount code. Thanks to the generous support of our sponsors, there are a limited number of scholarships available for small nonprofits not otherwise able to attend.

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