Tag Archives: smex09

A day at the Social Media Exchange – 3

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I’m at the third masterclass of the day and it’s not even lunchtime!

Dave Briggs is running this session on “WordPress for good”

WordPress is an open source blogging platform -

  • open source means that it’s “free as in beer and free as in speech”
  • it produces rss feeds as a standard – helps people to keep in touch with what you are saying
  • WordPress has in built commenting facility and loads of other cool tools

Before setting up your WordPress account, you need to decide if you want it to be .com or .org? – .com is a bit limited in what it can do and how it can be personalised

Some examples of typically bloggy type blogs

And some not quite bloggy blogs

What else can you do with WordPress?

  • You can categorise your posts as “news” or by project to make it more like a regular website.
  • Plug ins add cool stuff to WordPress blogs.
  • WordPress can be easily themed around corporate colours, type faces etc.

http://www.wordpressforgood.com has some useful resources for setting up your WordPress blog.

… so, lunch! …

A day at the Social Media Exchange – 2

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So, into the second session and i still haven’t digested the learning from the first – i think i’m going to be exhausted tonight!

“using the mobile channel to your benefit – the what, why and how”

I’m slightly worried that i’ve just been asked for my mobile number but i’ve been reassured that it’s all part of the session, fingers crossed!

Apparently the four most used features of a mobile phone are:

  • phone (obviously)
  • sending text messages
  • use as a torch
  • use as an alarm clock

80% of people will carry a (web) connected mobile device within 5-10 years

What do you need to think about when launching a mobile fundraising campaign?

  • People want a quanitifable object for their money
  • They want an instant response
  • getting something back
  • reward/gratification

What is the journey that people go on when giving through text?

  • Receive a call to donate
  • Text a keyword to dedicated number
  • Acknowledgement of the donation – this may include a link through to a website but be careful as you may lose people
  • Money is taken off your monthly bill or pre pay credits
  • Mobile companies can take 50% of the donation but work is being done to try and reduce this

Things to remember:

  • Pick the right moment to send your text as you can only contact people once or twice before losing them altogether
  • Make it as easy as possible for people to give – and include the option to opt out
  • Think viral – get people to share with their peers

Some examples of text campaigns:

Text can be used for more than just fundraising, it could be used to keep in touch with activists, renewing membership, recruiting volunteers for an event or thanking people for taking part in something.

Bulk sms is easy to do and not very expensive – use someone like http://www.itagg.com/, http://www.bulksms.co.uk/or http://www.textmarketer.co.uk/.  Search for bulk sms in Google.

I think i’m just about to be texted in the session … waiting … message received.

Off to the next workshop … when’s lunch?

A day at the Social Media Exchange – 1

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I’m spending the day at the Social Media Exchange, an opportunity for people to come together and learn more about social media tools and how they’re being used in the sector.

The day is packed full of practical sessions, the first one i’m going to is from Kate Fox from the Mersey Basin Campaign (MBC), looking at how they use blogging, pod casts and other tools to engage people (both locally and internationally) with their campaign.

The MBC’s early approach to new media was much the same as other people in that they heard about blogging and decided they wanted to give it a go.  It wasn’t until Kate arrived as the new media manager that they started to look at what they wanted to achieve and then matched the available technologies to that.

MBC started their journey with blogging, using the blogger.com platform.

Some of the useful snippets that came from Kate’s session …

  • To encourage people to blog who have never done it before, get them to pretend they’re writing a postcard to a friend
  • Once they started the blog they made sure it linked to others using through the blog search engine Technorati
  • It’s important to take time to comment on other people’s blogs – it lets them know you’re there and drives traffic to your site
  • Use other blogs to get your posts out to a new audience, they may get picked up by local news agencies
  • Regular posts to blogs keeps people interested and coming back
  • MBC eventually replaced their staff newsletter with a blog, forcing people to use the blog and familiarising them with the blogging format
  • The success of the event focussed blog prompted MBC to create a more general blog – hosted on typepad.com for a cost of £7 a month

What worked well for Mersey Basin Campaign?

  • Blogging worked really well when it was linked to a specific awareness raising campaign
  • One example was the adventures of sammy the salmon, celebrating the fact that salmon had returned to the Mersey for the first time since the industrial revolution
  • Contributors in particular felt to write in the persona of Sammy the Salmon
  • When Samantha the Salmon (Sammy’s sister) went missing on an international journey, she turned up again at www.travellingfishy.com – the further adventures of Sammy!
  • MBC started using their blog for consulting with people on issues that affected the mersey and then used comments from the blog to feed in to formal consultation responses

Next up for MBC was using audio

  • MBC was involved with www.riverthatchangedtheworld.com, a project featured audio content from local people
  • The audio has been showcased at local museums, on BBC Merseyside and it also led to further interviews and exposure

Tips for creating audio content

  • choose the right interviewee
  • plan your interview – give people a copy of the questions
  • take stock of your surroundings – are there any background noises?
  • get people to answer questions in complete sentences
  • double check that the recording has worked!
  • keep hold of your raw audio
  • get your podcasts transcribed so that everyone can benefit from it
  • why not issue talking  press releases? – ready made content that can be used on local radio

… right, off to another session …