How to mobilize yoursupporters to take action

JD Lasica @jdlasica Sustainatopia

A Socialbrite Bootcamp

Move the Needle!

Sloane Berrent@sloaneApril 4, 2011

What we’ll cover today

Part 1: Social media ecosystem

Part 2: Advocacy campaigns with impact

Part 3: 12 steps to activate your supporters

Part 4: Community tools for social change

Wrapup: Summary & next steps

Relax!

resources: http://bit.ly/movetheneedle

Creative Commons photo on Flickr by Nattu

Today’s hashtag

Tweet this talk! Hashtag: #moveneedle

Creative Commons photo on Flickrby Prakhar

Glossary for new terms

http://socialbrite.org/glossary

Any online technology or practice that lets us share

(content, opinions, insights, experiences, media)

and have a conversation about the ideas we care about.

”“ Social media:

8 color handouts! Be happy!

http://bit.ly/movetheneedle

• Blogs• Social networks• Microblogs (Twitter)• Online video (YouTube,

Vimeo, Viddler)• Widgets• Photo sharing (Flickr,

Photobucket, etc.)• Podcasts• Virtual worlds• Wikis• Social bookmarking• Forums• Presentation sharing

Types of social media 1 . E C O S Y S T E M

Social media: Dizzying growth77% US adults are frequent social media users.*

141 million active blogs (vs. 12,000 in 2000); almost 1 million blog posts created per day; over 346 million people globally read blogs

6 of top 10 websites in US are social sites (YouTube, Facebook, Wikipedia, Blogger, Craigslist, Twitter)

Flickr: 35 million people, 4 billion-plus photos

Wikipedia: 10 million users have contributed 18 million articles

YouTube: 2 billion videos streamed per day

Text messages per day: 4.5 billion (vs. 400,000 in 2000)

Whenever someone opens a computer, 60% of time it’s for social reasons.

*source: Nielsen Online, spring 2010

Revolutionizing revolutions

Egypt: 18 days from Facebook-organized protest to Mubarak’s fall

Facebook group One Million Voices Against FARC mobilized 10 million people to march against FARC in hundreds of cities in Colombia

Different outcome in Iran & Myanamar

Facebook: The social networkNearly 600 million members worldwide —

71.2% of US Internet users are on Facebook

Twitter: Steady growth

295% annual growth rate in U.S., 300,000 new users/day — and 30 billion tweets

Before we talk tools, technology or campaigns, do a self-assessment with your team.

Why are you doing this?

What core values drive your organization?

What change would you like to see in the world?

Is there clarity about what your organization is trying to achieve?

Why should people care?

Do you have an idea worth spreading?

Search your heart & soul

Types of cause campaigns1. Raise awareness, build authority for

your cause or enterprise

2. Sign up new members

3. Raise funds, solicit micro-loans

4. Sign online petitions

5. Spur offline action: enlist people to attend an event or call Congress

6. Find new volunteers or ambassadors

7. Grow a mailing/newsletter list

8. Attract new Facebook or Twitter followers

9. Ask people to create content for you

2 . A D V O C A C Y C A M P A I G N S

No on 8 Wedding Registry1,700 couples raised $1 million+ for Equality California

C A S E S T U D Y

SMA: Tweet for a Cure2,907 people have tweeted reaching 1.6 million followers

C A S E S T U D Y

http://gwendolynstrongfoundation.org/twitter

Grassroots MappingBalloon aerial images of Gulf Oil Spill funded by Kickstarter

C A S E S T U D Y

grassrootsmapping.org

charity:water & Twestival C A S E S T U D Y

charity:water: making a difference in Honduras

Causeitsmybirthday.com7 days, 7 cities, $19,347 donated for malaria nets

C A S E S T U D Y

Crisis mappingMembers of the Japanese OpenStreetMap community

launched an Ushahidi platform for Japan just hours after the devastating earthquake struck the country.

C A S E S T U D Y

Greenpeace & NestléBoycott Nestlé pages on Facebook

C A S E S T U D Y

Greenpeace & NestléNestlé Killer microsite

C A S E S T U D Y

Greenpeace & NestléGreenpeace bought Google AdWords for Nestle & Greenpeace

C A S E S T U D Y

Greenpeace & NestléNestlé waves the white flag

C A S E S T U D Y

Other dream campaigns

National Wildlife Federation raised $100,000 using social media after Gulf Oil Spill. Concert fundraisers raised nearly $50,000.

Red Cross’s Text Haiti campaign raised $32 million. Oxfam UK received $50,000 via link in YouTube video posted day after Haiti quake.

Salvation Army text2give donations in 2010: $17,000. Mobile donations in 7 days after Japan quake: $130,000.

12 steps to mobilize your cause

1. First, listen and observe 2. Set clear goals & define metrics 3. Define a clear theme4. Frame it with a personal story 5. Create lightweight media6. Create a simple call to action7. Create a conversation hub for participants8. Generate an Attention Wave9. Find your champions! Turn influencers into evangelists

10. Use immediacy & urgency: Headlines & deadlines11. Consider a mobile component 12. Create real-world events

3 . 1 2 S T E P S T R A T E G Y

1. Create a listening post

Set up a listening post (monitoring dashboard) to track what’s being said about your organization or cause. Listen before engaging. Deputize folks to do this.

Supplement with a social media dashboard.

Engage before the Ask

Deeper dive—monitoring: http://bit.ly/movetheneedle

2. Set goals, map metricsGoals

Grow email list of supporters

Increase comments on blog

Increase website visibility

Increase positive mentions of brand or cause

Have visitors stick around

Make our content more viral

Get people to take action

Get people to attend event

Metrics to measure

# newsletter, RSS subscribers

avg. # comments/post

increase in traffic or linkback #s

mentions in social networks

stick rate, bounce rate

# of shares

# of petition signatures

# of registrants, year over year

Deeper dive—metrics: http://bit.ly/movetheneedle

3. Define a clear themeBoil down your cause to a strong, single sentence

Vittana:Help anyone go to college

Alter Eco:Support fair trade

ActBlue: Elect progressive candidates

DonorsChoose: Support public classrooms in need

Break!

Creative Commons BY photo on Flickr by Tom@HK

4. Find the emotional center Tell a personal story — use videos or photos to make us feel

invisiblepeople.tv

Stories of hope

Ed Givens, 30 years on Skid Row ... ... and today.

100khomes.org from Common Ground

Credit: Skid Row Housing Trust / Project 50, Los Angeles

100,000 Homes

Donna, on the streets ... ... on now on her apt’s coop board.Credit: Project H3, Phoenix

5. Create lightweight mediaRoom to Read: Winner of TechSoup Storytelling Challenge

Deeper dive—media: http://bit.ly/movetheneedle

6. Create conversation hubWhere will you engage with supporters?

Your blog

Facebook

Twitter

Community site (WiserEarth)

Social hub (Change.org)

Contest site

Deeper dive—community: http://bit.ly/movetheneedle

Enable conversation anywhere

Avoid BugMeNot Syndrome!

Lower the barriers to people talking about your cause by using third-party authentication services.

Left: SpokenWord.org with multiple log-in options.

Top: The new Facebook Comments on HowStuffWorks.

Conversation, not marketing

7. Create a call to actionInspire people to act with clear, motivating steps

Use social love handles to socialize your campaign

8. Generate an Attention Wave

9. Find your champions!

Use your listening post to identify high-value influencers in your subject area. Then, influence the influencers

Establish a rapport and only then reach out to try to convert them into evangelists & ambassadors for your cause

Scope out Twitter Lists that intersect with your organization or social cause

Connect with other social media influencers through their blogs and other networks

Deeper dive—community: http://bit.ly/movetheneedle

10. Use urgency & immediacyHeadlines & deadlines: Play off the news & use a hard stop date

11. Consider mobileMobile lists: Text 'JUSTICE' to 69866

E X E R C I S E

Fair Immigration Reform Movement

Calls to actionAlertsFeedback loop

Is your site mobile-ready?Low-cost server-side solutions

E X E R C I S E

Attract a swarm!Create a Foursquare flash mob to unlock the coveted Swarm Badge

12. Meet up in the real worldMeetups, Tweet-ups, concerts, fund-raisers to deepen ties

Build an active community

here’s an amazing difference between building an audience and building a community. An audience will watch you fall on a

sword. A community will fall on a sword for you.

— Chris BroganAuthor,“Trust Agents”

Partner with smart people. Use volunteers.Use free: Twitter, Flickr, YouTube, Creative CommonsUse open source: WordPress (and its plug-ins), etc.

Flickr photo by Jason Means

Use your community!

Don’t do all the heavy lifting!

4 . C O M M U N I T Y T O O L S

WordPress & its plug-insOpen Office, Google docsDrupal, Joomla

Free content! Free resources!

Free services!

Free photos Free videos (eg, TED talks)Free music & audio

Socialbrite.org/sharing-centerCreativecommons.orgTechsoup

Free expertise!

BarCampPodCampWordCampSocial Media Club

Tap into the sharing economy

Free software & platforms!

Google GrantsYouTube for NonprofitsGoogle Earth for Nonprofits

E X E R C I S E

flickr.com/creativecommons

Creativecommons.org

• Rich source of free commercial & noncommercial images

• Flickr: 156 million Attribution, Noncommercial, No Derivatives & ShareAlike licenses

• Use them for your blog, website, email or print newsletter, presentations, etc.

• Don’t just take. Share!

Video + chat = engagement

This is the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, student journalism channel.

Community video at events T O O L S

Grassroots ambassadors100x100: Estrella Rosenberg & Big Love Little Hearts used

Foursquare & social media to raise $25,000 in 24 hours to give life-saving screenings to 12 newborns with congenital heart defects

T O O L S

The power of 1-to-1 givingvittana.com, jolkona.com

kiva.com, donorschoose.org

T O O L S

Foursquare & nonprofits

Waze integrated check-in functionality from Foursquare to benefit hunger-relief charity Feeding America during Thanksgiving 2010.

T O O L S

Tap into the geo wave T O O L S

Strategic storytelling Nawaa uses geotagging & Google Earth in Tunisia

T O O L S

Darfur & Google Earth T O O L S

Crisis in Darfur: Using Google Earth

Google Earth’s historical layers

Historic Centre of Warsaw, 1945 & today

E X E R C I S E

Fundraising: Going socialgive2gether.com

E X E R C I S E

Fundraising: Discrete chunksgive2gether

Leveraging social networksgive2gether

Numbers reflect network effect

Social action hubs

Download 12 Social Action Hubs flyer: http://bit.ly/12socialhubs

T O O L S

Citizen Effect

Care2

TakePart

WiserEarth

Change.org

Meetup.com

Kickstarter

Idealist

DoSomething

Do-good widgets T O O L S

Create a widget on Causes.com or create your own

Other tools you can use

Social Actions: Open API enables organizations & bloggers to volunteer or take action on the causes they support, can tailor it to your cause.

The Extraordinaries: Use the power of community for micro-volunteerism in people’s spare time.

Word visualizations: Free at-a-glance visualizations from Wordle.net & ManyEyes (manyeyes.alphaworks.ibm.com)

OpenStreetMap: Open source “Wikipedia of maps”; community builds own maps using GPS & donated satellite imagery.

T O O L S

Open data, open APIs

Illustration by Mike Lemanski for Google

Use open gov data T O O L S

Data tools, data sets at data.ed.gov

Data visualization & transparency

http://dashboard.imamuseum.org/

Indianapolis Museum of Art

“We have to change our entire corporate-industry behavior. We’ve got to stop overplanning and over-analyzing and turn our battleship into a speedboat.” —J. Todd Foster, managing editor, Bristol (VA) Herald Courier

Dare to fail. If you’re not failing at something, you’re doing something wrong. (“Fail often, fail fast.”)

"Rocket Man" on Flickr by Dave-F

Innovate!

Move the Needle toolkit

24 online fundraising sites

Top cause organizations

Free reports

Free photo, music, video directories

Collaboration & project management tools

Geolocation tools

Free tutorials on the best way to use Facebook, Twitter & blogs

How to use mobile strategically

Tons more. All free & shareable.

What you’ll find at bit.ly/movetheneedle

T O O L S

Biggest resource: Your supporters

JD Lasica, Socialbrite.orgjd@socialbrite.orgTwitter: @jdlasica

Sloane Berrent, Answer With Actionsloane@thecausemopolitan.com Twitter: @sloane

Let’s continue the conversation!

Presentation, resources at http://bit.ly/movetheneedle