The Charity Place

Mohammed is free!

Earlier in the month, I logged into Facebook - as I seldom seem to do these days - and was delighted to see this message:

If you read my post back in May, or saw the story elsewhere, you'll know that Mohammed had been missing since the 13th of April, after he was arrested by the Egyptian authorities during a public protest.

It's wonderful news that Mohammed's whereabouts is now known - although it has been reported that he was subject to beatings and electric shocks whilst in detention, so I hope that he is safe from any further repercussions.

I can't help wondering whether James Buck's efforts to publicise Mohammed's plight helped to secure his release?

There is no doubt that, through his clever use of social media, he managed to mobilise a huge amount of support and - most effective of all in this case - make some considerable noise about the issue.

And now, apparently, Twitter has been in discussions with James about developing an emergency network, linked to their service, that could be used by activists and in crisis situations.

When you consider how quickly news about the earthquake in China spread via Twitter earlier in the year, it makes absolute sense to promote the ability it has to spread messages, globally, in 'real time'. Although, as users know only too well, Twitter will have to become a lot more stable to cope with the increased traffic for this to be the really powerful tool it has the potential to be - otherwise, another of the up and coming social media channels will simply pick it up and run with it.

Is this the tipping point for UK charities’ adoption of social media?

I had planned to attend, and to tweet from, this year’s Institute of Fundraising National Convention.  How brilliant it would have been to be the first to do it...

However, as things turned out, I was needed at my desk more and I was pipped to the post by Jon Waddingham from Just Giving.  The considerable upside of this was that I was able to keep track of some of the buzz from this year’s Convention by following Jon's tweets, even though I wasn’t able to be there.  It was the next best thing – thanks again, Jon.

What I was really interested in – if you hadn’t guessed – was whether the speakers this year would be tuned into social media, whether the charities and agencies would be presenting any useful insights into how they are using them, what they have learned and what’s been working for them.

I gathered from Jon’s tweets that quite a few people were waxing lyrical about social media over the three-day event – and rightly so – including:

• Joe Saxton, presenting a session entitled, 'Will online fundraising ever be better than paper-based DM?'

• Sue Fidler, of Sue Fidler Ltd, and Richard Brooks, Director of Marketing from Compassion in World Farming, presenting 'Online fundraising - How to make it work'
• Tom Mansel-Pleydell, head of client services at Just Giving, whose session was entitled, 'Social Media: Join in or miss out'.

Here’s a couple of Jon Waddingham’s tweets sent during that session:

You can visit Jon's profile for more. And you can compare and contrast with this piece published shortly afterwards on the Guardian website.  Both provide some very useful insights.

I’m only hoping that enough charities will have attended at least one seminar where social media was on the agenda during the Convention, and that this will have opened the UK sector’s eyes up to the potential of these platforms and removed some of the barriers in people’s minds about giving them a try.  In the words of Tom Mansel-Pleydell, tweeted by Jon Waddingham (!):

1.       Assign resource

2.       Get out there

3.       Observe

4.       Take part

5.       Review and measure.

And I hope it’s not lost on those who are still reluctant, that this post would not exist without social media, and people using them to connect around a common interest.

How can your organisation capture supporters' attention with social media?

It's been a while since I've posted, and there's a list of things brewing up that I haven't got around to writing about - yet.

However, there's one organisation that can grab my attention at the moment, however busy I am (which, let's face it, is the challenge all of us face when trying to get our marketing messages through these days).  It's Mara Triangle.

While I was sitting, working at my desk today, I suddenly had a flurry of tweets from Mara Triangle pop up in Twhirl (my Twitter client of choice).  This was the first:

And, following hot on its heels was, this:

Then this:

The story continued to unfold at breathtaking speed - live, in real time - and Mara Triangle were answering questions from Twitter users throughout; providing donors and prospective donors with unique insights into the challenges they face and the incredible work they do.

Here's the entire thread from their twitter profile:

 Brilliantly, they didn't miss the opportunity to make a direct ask.  Perfect timing.

And, yes, I donated.  Wouldn't you?