As of right now, NGO’s and politicians are allowed to create groups in Facebook. However, they can only message the first 1,000 supporters in the group. So if a group has 50,000 supporters, you’re leaving out 49,000 every time you send a message. TechPresident is reporting that they are rethinking this strategy. I for one say it’s about time! This move will be another step for Facebook to catch up with MySpace. With the recent opening of the platform and now this, it might only be a matter of time before Facebook moves to #1 in social networking.

The netroots have yet to establish themselves as a voting force. Not one netroots candidate has won state-wide election to date. In 2004, it was Dean, in 2006 it was Ned Lamont. Neither came close to winning. Yes, Lamont won the Democratic nomination, but that doesn’t really mean much when all you’ve done is remove the D from the winner and made him show his true colors (which probably led to a more conservative voting record as well). In 2008, the candidate is either Obama or Edwards, and both are trailing Hilary in the polls.

With this being said, I don’t think the netroots are irrelevant. The netroots have proven to be a fantastic resource for fundraising. It’s probably because of them alone that John Edwards is even in this race. They have funneled a lot of money to a lot of candidates, and that has made a difference. They are also excellent at spreading outrage about the Republicans. Yesterday, they jumped all over Rudy’s $9.11 fundraiser, and have helped bring Bill O’Reilly’s latest outrages to the mainstream.

Of course I’m overly simplifying this issue, but at the end of the day, the netroots are not in control of the Democratic Party, but they clearly are a force any Dem must (and should) deal with when running for office.

After a very busy summer, I’m back and ready to start writing again. There is just too much going on online not to comment. Hopefully there are still some people out there who might be waiting in anticipation for me to say something. Well, I’m working on a post about David Brooks netroots column in the NY Times yesterday. You might be surprised to hear what I think….

More posts coming soon. I am going to write about the new Facebook app that allows you to raise money for your favorite causes. Looks like Facebook is bringing out some cool tools in the near future.

Just a little self-promotion. NTEN just released the top ten speaker ratings at the recent Nonprofit Technology Conference. Guess who made the top ten? You’ll have to click here to find out.

I wonder how much care and feeding it takes to get an ROI? What has been your experience? Do you think the choice of myspace might also be directed by the audience segment you want to reach?

The reason I picked MySpace as the social network for nonprofits to start with, was that it was the most accessible and easiest to start. It also relatively easy to measure ROI (or return on investment). By starting a MySpace page, you are giving your supporters a way of showing their friends that they support you. In most cases, your supporters friends will be like-minded. So it’s a cheap and easy way to reach out to new supporters. Also, the bulletin tool is extremely important. By putting a source code and the end of any action alert links, you can tell who has signed up for your email list from MySpace. Some groups are finding that these people are becoming good activists for their causes. Plus, people will forward your bulletins to their friends.

However a downside is that most groups seem to be having trouble fundraising through MySpace. It is strongly suggested to look at the site as an advocacy tool and not for fundraising at this time.

We won the straw poll at the Anderson County convention in South
Carolina last night! 63 hunter, 33 romney, 9 mccain, 7 guiliani, 5 thompson,
4 brownback, 4 newt, 3 tthomson, 2 huckabee, 2 cox. This is a
significant win!

Really? That is significant? Also, note that Fred Thompson’s (or is it Tommy Thompson?) name is spelled wrong and all are in lower case letters (plus there is an extra space in there).

In some of the other emails they actually include attachments. Unless it’s really important, never do this. It most likely will look like spam to your supporters, take longer to send out, and no one really wants a .pdf from a campaign anyway.

Sloppy and careless messaging like this will drive people away from you. Whether you are a candidate or non-profit, professionalism is key. So to round up:

Sometimes it’s good to see examples of what not to do in order to develop stronger messaging.

A quick tip for all nonprofits. Sometimes something is cool, but not worth doing. Second Life would fall into this category.

tim,
I attended some of the same sessions you did - heard you on 2 panels. If you were to give advice to a web 1.0 np about advancing into the 2.0 world, what would you pick as the starting point? blogs, videos, rss, tags … Or should they just start on their e-Newsletters and use social networking to “create their community.” Am excited about the tools but don’t know where to start.

I actually don’t think there is a right answer to this question. However, if it were my decision I would start a MySpace page first. This is probably the one that takes the least amount of time to set up and maintain. To have a successful page, make sure you have strong action alerts. MySpace users seem more compelled to action than anything else, and this is a great way to get people to forward your alerts (in the form of a MySpace bulletin), and get them to join your friends list. Your MySpace page can also serve as the main part of your social networking strategy as it can host your blog, pictures, videos and action alerts in one place. Some groups have found MySpace users will join your email list, and some will even donate.

This is a simple first step to test the waters and see how things work. You’ll find you become more brave with Web 2.0 after trying one or two things.

Of course the other thing you could do is hire me:)

Day 1

The first session I attended was one on eNewsletters. This is always a tough topic, but one that is vitally important to all nonprofits. It was interesting to hear the panelists all say the same thing. Make the newsletter fun an interesting to read. This is always tough for nonprofits, as we all want to make every supporter know everything about what we do. While it might be against our nature to make things fun, it will go a long way in increasing the readership of eNewsletters. They also stressed the need for dynamic content. Overall the session was pretty interesting and told me that most nonprofits have a ways to go before we see compelling eNewsletters. For some good examples, check out the link here.

Up next was a panel I participating in on how nonprofits are using YouTube to broaden their audiences. My favorite (other than the Oxfam one) was one done by Amnesty International. If anyone says you can’t make an amusing and engaging video about a serious situation, this video proves that wrong.

Day 2

On Friday morning I attended a fundraising session, which showed that email is still the best way to raise money (something I highly agree with). The session showed that creating different and unique appeals can help raise money. It also showed that using segments of your list is a much more effective way to raise money than to blast your entire list. While I didn’t learn much new in this session, it helped to solidy a lot of what I already thought, which is useful in itself.

Finally in the afternoon I added a session on social networks and how they can help nonprofits. They did something in this session I have never seen at a conference before: they brought beer. Since it was 3:30 on a Friday afternoon, this seemed to make sense and brought a laugh out of the attendees. Again, nothing earth shattering here except if you’re not on social networks, you are missing out as an organization.

Overall I really enjoyed the conference. If I had one negative to say, it is that there were too many consultants speaking and not enough people with real-world examples of how they had used certain tools to further their message. That being said, I hope to be at next years NTC in New Orleans!

Still waiting on Barack Obama’s online fundraising numbers. I expect to be impressed.

Now back to the hack. Campaigns are going to have the be extremely careful in using MySpace. The high profile candidates can expect to have this happen to them. MySpace is not known as the most secure site on earth, so it is a prime target for hackers. That being said, it is certainly still worth each having their own page.

It’s the end of the fundraising quarter, and political analysts are watching closely to see how much money candidates can raise by March 31st. That’s why people like me are going to be flooding your inbox this week with a plea for those last few dollars that could push them over their quarterly goal.

Great system we have here, huh?

The message goes on to explain why he was asking for money. It is explained in very simple terms how they will spend the money. I think this email is great. Since the first fundraising reporting deadline is the end of this month, I have received tons of emails asking for money. This is the only one I remembered. Why? Because Al Franken spoke to me like a human and not some fundraising machine. The tone was light, he explained how he would spend the money, and he treated me with respect. The email didn’t drown on and on, but was a highly interesting read. Do you think most politicians would include this quote?

And, I promise, I won’t ask you for money again. (For at least a couple days.)

The reason I write about this is that it can also serve as a powerful tool for non-profits. They have their own deadlines (year end giving), and this is a reminder that in order to stand out in the crowd, you need to be engaging, interesting and make a compelling argument about why your supporters should give you their money.

it is certainly much better than what he had before, but for a frontrunner, I was expecting more.

Overall Grade: B-

I say that because of the hysteria surrounding the video. Who made it? Were Republicans behind it? Did Obama do this on purpose? The greater impact is that ANYONE could have made this. Someone in their basement in Kansas or a guy in a studio in LA. Video editing software is so cheap and easy to use now, many people have it on their home computers. This is only the beginning everyone, these videos are going to start popping up everwhere (in fact, they already are). This is going to change politics forever. So many ads will be floating around, I would argue that the most interesting and compelling ones will get attention. This generally means it won’t be the ones coming from the campaigns, but individuals themselves. With YouTube and other video sharing sites viewed by millions a day, it is going to be a lot tougher for campaigns to compete. Plus, how will campaigns respond to all these new ads? How will campaign finance laws make sure campaigns aren’t hiding behind fake user names? This video has raised a lot of questions, and not many answers to this point.

If you think campaign attack ads are vicious already, just wait until everyone with a computer can make one.

The message is simple. If MySpace wants to give you free publicity TAKE IT.

Barack Obama’s team just sent out an email to his supporters with the embeded video below. It’s a powerful reminder of Obama’s consistent opposition to the Iraq war. More importantly, it highlights the differences between some of his Democratic rivals who originally voted for the war and are now against (Edwards and Clinton most specifically). YouTube has allowed for easier access to what cadidates have said in the past. Maybe it won’t be on the same level as television ads in ‘08, but clearly YouTube is going to play a vital role in the next election.