Hear from Those Who Have Done It Well
By now, you have read all the theory and practical steps to take for a successful social media effort. However, if you are having trouble seeing what social media looks like on a practical level, you may want to take a look at these real-world stories of nonprofits, just like yours, that took steps to connect with others on social media and found that it paid off.
Nonprofits often don’t have social media experts on staff. They are built and run by people with a passion to make a difference and to help spread the word about a cause they believe in. We hope these examples give you inspiration and insights as you navigate the world of social media.
Here is a little snippet of what you can expect in this chapter:
• Kesem’s mission is to provide support for children of cancer patients. They know the unique difficulties these young people face, and they seek to create a community and support network that can support these children. Social media has served as an extension of the camp program they offer, helping students and staff stay connected throughout the year. Carrie Clemens, the engagement coordinator at Kesem, has seen a rise in engagement across their social media channels as they have focused their efforts on meaningfully connecting with families who are dealing with cancer and those who want to support them.
• Similarly, Small Heroes Foundation seeks to help individuals and families affected by Duchenne muscular dystrophy. Alison Joseph, co-founder and mother to two young boys with the disease, has dedicated her life to finding a cure. The way to get there, she believes, is by raising awareness to get the funding and support needed. This commitment led her to use social media to spread the word, where they continue to update followers on their fundraising endeavors and the health of her sons.
• Ms. JD is a national nonprofit that supports women in the legal profession. Their goal is to provide connection, learning, and encouragement. Katie Day, the program chair, has watched social media become part of fulfilling the mission of the organization, enabling them to reach women in the legal profession and help them connect with one another. Social media has also provided excellent publicity for their events.
• Northwestern Settlement House, a nonprofit that has existed in Chicago for over 125 years, has found a way to connect effectively with supporters and volunteers through social media. They have successfully drawn in more volunteers, attracted more attendees to their events, and gotten the financial support they needed to serve needy families. They now have over 3,000 followers and find that a growing percentage of their supporters hear about them primarily through their social media platforms.
Each of these nonprofits has been able to harness the potential of social media to advertise for and accomplish their cause, be it connecting people, educating their audience, or soliciting donations from them.
As you read the stories of these organizations, you may want to reflect on how you use social media. Or, if you haven’t built an online following, you may want to consider some of the potential benefits that would result if you did.
Is your nonprofit like any of these? Is there a way you can become more connected with your community, tell your story, and spread awareness, or learn how to network more effectively?
Carrie Clemens, the engagement coordinator at Kesem, knows the importance of the organization’s social media presence, especially since college students primarily lead the organization. Through social media, Kesem has been able to share and fulfill their mission to support children of cancer patients.
Clemens noted that when the team at Kesem shifted their strategy to focus on making their social media presence an extension of the support they provide through their camp, they saw a noticeable rise in the number of followers and level of engagement on their social media channels. They began sharing posts that reflected the voices and experiences of campers and leaders and invited those connected with the camp to do the same. They engaged with the posts of their leaders and camp families and began to get more engagement in return.
The team at Kesem also began to change their thinking to try to get in the mindset of those who would be on the viewing/consuming end of their content. They tried to think about what their audience might want to share or interact with and the types of messages or images they might want to see in their newsfeed.
The team members overseeing social media at Kesem have learned to practice active listening, noting which types of posts their audience responded positively to and asking what they wanted to see more or less of.
Clemens uses social media because she sees its potential to connect with Kesem’s national community. She uses Kesem’s social media as “a space to showcase the importance of our work and impact to donors, volunteers, partners, community supporters, and families.” The organization’s social media presence allows it to reach as many as 12,000 campers and their families, helping them to stay connected when Kesem’s flagship camp program is not in session.
Clemens’s favorite social media platform to use for Kesem is Instagram, where they have over 10,800 followers. They frequently use Instagram to recruit the college students to be leaders at their camp and use it as a platform to stay engaged with their leaders throughout the year “by showcasing and recognizing them for their hard work, by seeking their input and ideas, and by reflecting their experiences in [their] posts.”
Kesem’s Instagram posts often display funny, lively pictures of kids of all ages, quotes from campers, relevant statistics, and pictures of the camp counselors. Clemens hopes to use Instagram to continue to spread awareness of Kesem’s community and brand.
Clemens has connected Kesem’s Instagram to their Facebook page, where the organization has over 16,000 likes and over 17,000 followers. There are also numerous posts on the Facebook page of fundraisers, started by campers, who ask for donations to the camp for their birthdays. Kesem’s Facebook page gets a high level of engagement from videos and testimonials of campers. Clemens has also found that she can use Kesem’s Facebook group for student leaders, alumni, and camper families to support each other in meaningful ways, fulfilling the mission of the organization across the country.
Kesem uses LinkedIn to post videos of influential speakers, such as former alumni, to advertise open positions at the camp and to share videos of various camp activities. They have gained an impressive 3,000+ followers on this platform.
On Twitter, where Kesem has over 3,000 followers, Clemens likes to share about Kesem’s staff and to provide information about camp sign-ups. Parents of campers often tag them in testimonials. Kesem also shares stories from counselors, campers, and parents across their social media platforms. They have found these types of posts resonate with the experience of their audience and therefore get the most engagement.
To keep up with Kesem’s social media posting, Clemens has found they need to plan and strategize. At the end of each month, Kesem’s team divides up the work and begins to plan, using their editorial calendar and social media insights reports to help them learn from the previous month’s postings and to create the next month’s postings according to their findings. Then, they adjust their posts throughout the month based on how posts are performing.
In the future, they predict, based on the rise of TikTok and other platforms, that “DIY, short-form video platforms will continue to gain popularity and momentum.” They also think there will be more direct, conversational engagement between organizations and communities. They see the need for nonprofit organizations to continue to embrace social media as an extension of their services.
At Small Heroes Foundation, co-founder Alison Joseph is committed to finding a cure for Duchenne muscular dystrophy. For her, the cause is personal: Two of Joseph’s three sons have this genetic disorder.
From its inception, Small Heroes Foundation has had a social media presence. Joseph says they originally reached out on social media to ask friends and family to donate to their cause, to help raise funds for clinical research, and to spread awareness about Duchenne. They also used social media in a more personal way: “By posting about Small Heroes and the boys’ diagnosis on social media, we were able to reach many people at once,” Joseph recalled. They continued using social media to update followers on their fundraising endeavors and the health of the boys.
Small Heroes Foundation first gained a following when they organized a 12-week “Because I Can Challenge” designed to motivate others to accomplish a 12-week goal of eating healthier and getting more exercise. Joseph saw the challenge gain momentum locally, garnering interest in following and supporting the foundation.
Joseph and her husband have found that the posts with the most engagement are those with pictures of their boys that allow supporters to see how they are doing. Pictures of the boys living life, smiling and happy, make up the majority of their Instagram posts.
Joseph shares that she and her husband have relied the most heavily on Facebook to spread the word about Small Heroes. As friends and family have shared their posts, they have been able to expand their reach, gaining over 540 followers! They post thank yous for donations, advertisements about contest drawings, and promotions for their products with a Small Heroes logo on them.
Though they don’t have a planned schedule for their posts, they post more frequently at times when they are planning or hosting a fundraiser.
Ms. JD, a national nonprofit, supports women in the legal profession through providing a place for them to connect and learn with one another. Katie Day, the program chair, has found social media to be an affordable means for the organization to share upcoming events, opportunities, and articles. Social media provides a channel of contact for their community to stay in touch, which is one of the nonprofit’s goals to begin with.
Although, at first, their social media accounts were more of an afterthought in their marketing, now, when they start event promotion or have an announcement, they immediately strategize about how to share it on social media. They are glad they have been able to harness the power of social media as a communications tool by learning to use it effectively.
They took time to think about who their audience was and what types of posts would connect with them. As their audience is a bunch of busy attorneys, they found their content needed to be quick reads, powerful quotes, and web-based events, all with eye-catching graphics.
In particular, Day has found Instagram to be impactful, as they can share about their events to give people a taste of what is going on. From sharing graphics about upcoming events to posting vibrant photos from their sessions, Instagram has provided a way for Ms. JD to share a continual story about how they are encouraging and supporting women.
They have also been able to use Instagram to inspire women with quotes on taking care of themselves, dealing with stress, and the importance of having real relationships. The types of posts that have engaged people the most are such practical posts, in addition to how-to types of blogs. They always try to pack a positive emotional punch with captivating images to grab people’s attention.
On their website, their blog posts are informative, with real stories from authentic women in the legal field. People can and do share their blogs on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. To spread the word even more effectively, Ms. JD has had board members and staff share posts on their personal social media accounts. They have gotten people to interact with and share their posts by being relevant and informative, making people want to share their posts with colleagues.
From their inception, Ms. JD has continued to improve the impact they have on social media through trial and error. They continue to learn from what their audience engages with and try to change content that doesn’t get a response.
They will continue to use and improve on their social media presence because it is an important way for their organization to communicate with their community. They’ve found it to be more cost effective than other types of marketing and able to reach a broader network of people.
Day doesn’t think they could’ve grown their community as much without social media, and she’s glad they’ve taken the time to invest in it.
As a settlement dedicated to nurturing, inspiring, and educating children and families in need in Chicago for over 125 years, Northwestern Settlement House has a well-established reputation. It wasn’t until the last five years that they began focusing on their social media strategy, however.
Northwestern Settlement House’s social media presence has served them well, from bringing more attendees to their events to increasing donations and membership. A growing percentage of their followers hear about them primarily through their social media.
The team at Northwestern Settlement House found that social media has helped them inspire people to get involved, whether as volunteers, by joining an auxiliary board, or by making donations. It has provided a place for people to easily contribute to their various programs and has aided them in spreading awareness and garnering support. Social media has enabled the Settlement to build a buzz around their fundraising events and promote volunteering by thanking and recognizing their volunteers.
Northwestern Settlement House has found that Facebook helps them engage a greater number of people than they could reach on their own, as it’s easy for supporters to share their posts. Most of their target audience is on Facebook, where they’ve gathered almost 3,000 followers. They post regularly, sharing pictures of volunteers working in the food pantry, videos of volunteers packing trucks with items to deliver to families in need, advertisements about their volunteer needs, and thank you messages to their donors.
Northwestern Settlement House is also on Twitter, where they’ve gained 500 followers. There, they share links to their newsletters and advertisements for fundraising events. On Instagram, Northwestern Settlement House regularly shares photos of people volunteering or attending their meetings or events.
The Settlement House has also been able to effectively use Nextdoor, a neighborhood-based social networking platform, as a recruitment tool for their auxiliary boards.
Northwestern Settlement House has found that people engage the most with their thank you posts, which feature candid photos of volunteers or children. People also respond well to their photos from board events and activities and their event announcements, which drive the most click-throughs to their webpage. Additionally, they’ve been able to gain more followers by posting links to news articles or from posts their supporters have tagged them in. They are currently considering doing more paid advertising through Facebook and Instagram, as well as using FB Live posts.
Northwestern Settlement House has become adept at social media scheduling by using an annual editorial calendar and weekly content plan, regularly posting two to three times per week. They review their Facebook Insights and plan their posts based on the days and times the insights indicate the highest level of engagement. They attribute their success on social media to their social listening, their engagement with their members, employees, and patrons there, and to the regularity of their postings. They always post with their audience in mind and appreciate the organic support they get, but are willing to use advertising campaigns on Facebook and Instagram when needed.
When Northwestern Settlement House has asked members, patrons, and employees to follow them on social media, it’s helped spread the word about them. They place social media icons on all their e-mails and their website, with links to like and follow them. They make sure they tag people in photos and thank yous on their social media pages. They’ve found that when members share posts, their engagement spikes exponentially (+1,000–3,000%). As members have shared Northwestern Settlement House’s social media posts, the members’ friends and family have become engaged followers.
As a result of all their social media efforts, Northwestern Settlement House has seen a greater comfort level with financial donations. They will continue to use social media as an effective tool for their organization in the future.
Juliet Bond, executive director of Piven Theatre, has been able to use social media to spread the word about their programs, designed to encourage positive creativity among youth. Social media has enabled them to keep people updated about what they’re up to, to share uplifting messages about the arts, to advertise their shows and classes, and to build brand awareness.
Bond has primarily used Instagram and Facebook for Piven Theatre, as those are the platforms most of their students use. On Facebook, Piven Theatre’s page has amassed over 3,200 followers. Bond posts regularly there about upcoming events, shares video lectures, gives updates on rehearsals, publishes stories of what their alumni are up to now, posts inspirational videos, and provides links to positive, artistic content.
On Instagram, Piven Theatre has over 1,200 followers. Their posts include pictures of performances, advertisements for classes, and pictures of the theatre’s teachers.
Piven Theatre also has a presence on Twitter, where they have almost 1,000 followers. They use this platform to advertise classes with pictures of students, provide information for tickets to their events, and advertise the types of classes they are offering.
Bond has found that the posts that receive the most engagement are celebrity related. She’s also noticed people are more likely to click on videos. Piven Theatre’s short videos, which share about something positive or about a celebrity alum, have also received a lot of attention.
Like many arts organizations, Piven Theatre sometimes struggles with funding to support their programs. In the future, Bond hopes to use their social media presence in creative ways to connect with people who want to donate and support them.
Winnetka Community House serves as a local center for physical activity, events, classes, and art and enrichment programs. Gina Gooden, a board member, found that their social media presence began to expand when members shared their page with others.
Winnetka Community House has gained their largest following on Facebook, with over 1,800 followers. They post event and registration information, advertise their classes and programs, and share about their staff.
On Instagram, Winnetka Community House has gained nearly 1,000 followers. They regularly share pictures of their staff and information about their programs there. When they host plays and dramatic productions, they post announcements about them, sharing videos and thanking their supporters after the show.
Gooden has appreciated how Twitter allows Winnetka Community House to share quick updates with their 809 followers about events, fitness programs, and various classes.
Gooden has found it is important to post frequently to keep people engaged, without overdoing it and crowding their feed. Before big events, Gooden increases the frequency of her posts to make sure they reach as many people as possible. She tries to schedule her posts to make sure advertisements for the events at the center are timely and they recognize their sponsors. Occasionally, Gooden tries to ask questions and survey people to get more engagement. Overall, Gooden has found social media to be helpful in engaging the community and will continue to use it.
After reading this chapter, what should you understand?
1. Any nonprofit can learn how to harness the power of social media to grow their reach and their brand.
2. Many different nonprofits have found success in sharing funny, relatable posts featuring photos of their staff or audience interacting with their products.
3. Posting regularly on your chosen platform(s) keeps you top of mind among your followers and encourages them to be part of the conversation.
4. Have a consistent voice and message to grow your audience organically.
5. Experiment with different types of content on various platforms to learn what sticks with your followers.
Figure 11.1 Social marketing plan for Ms. JD