For as long as nonprofit groups have used social-media tools, they have faced the perplexing problem of Internet money math: How do all of those supporters and friends add up to real dollars in the door?

But Zachary Sniderman, an assistant features editor for Mashable.com, suggests that money shouldn't necessarily be the object of nonprofit groups' social-media efforts. Social good, after all, is also about the process of bringing people together.

Take the Livestrong campaign. The group behind the ubiquitous golden wristband, the Lance Armstrong Foundation, recently started a Facebook campaign that encouraged fans to share their personal cancer stories on the social-networking Web site. The foundation wasn't trying to raise money through this effort. It was trying to bring people together behind its cause.

In this case, Mr. Sniderman writes, "the community is the end goal." The...