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Category Archives: Facebook
December 14, 2012, 12:46 am
How Social Media Helped Livestrong Weather a Tough Time
As online community manager at the Livestrong Foundation, Brooke McMillan has been the social-media face for an organization that has spent months at the center of an unrelenting crisis.
Last month the organization announced that its founder, Lance Armstrong, was stepping away from the group’s board and that his name would no longer be part of the organization’s official identity. That decision came after the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency issued a detailed report about Mr. Armstrong’s use of performance-enhancement drugs and the Tour de France stripped him of medals he won.
Ms. McMillan says the constant storm of criticism of Mr. Armstrong meant she was spending time on social networks like Twitter and Facebook almost around the clock—largely working to nurture and protect an online community that still cared about the organization, despite its founder’s transgressions.
“We’re…
November 21, 2012, 4:33 pm
Nonprofit Fires Employees After Facebook Photo Causes Controversy
A small Massachusetts nonprofit has fired two employees who were involved with posting a controversial photo on Facebook.
The photo, which depicted one of the employees holding up her middle finger at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, sparked a social-media firestorm that engulfed their employer, LIFE Cape Cod, a Massachusetts nonprofit that provides residential programs for adults with learning and intellectual disabilities.
The photo, which was posted to the personal Facebook page of former LIFE employee Lindsey Stone, was taken while she and seven other LIFE employees were accompanying residents on a trip to Washington.
Ms. Stone’s posting has since gone viral, according to the Web site Gawker.com. A Facebook page called “Fire Lindsey Stone” was created Monday to pressure the nonprofit to take action.
The protest group, which has generated more than 7,000 likes, also…
November 2, 2012, 12:24 pm
Facebook Tests New Tool for Online Giving
Facebook users can now do more than simply click “like” to support charities on the popular social-networking site.
As part of its new Facebook Gifts feature, Facebook users can donate directly to an organization or let their “friends make the choice” about which organization they should support.
To start, the social network is accepting donations for 11 organizations: the American Red Cross, Blue Star Families, Boys & Girls Clubs of America, DonorsChoose.org, Girls Inc., Kiva, Livestrong, Oxfam America, Rainn, St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, and Water.org.
The effort is separate from Causes, a Web site that allows users to donate to charity through Facebook and other social-networking sites. It has 185-million users, according Matt Mahan, the organization’s president and chief executive.
Facebook Gifts is not yet available to all Facebook users, but it is expanding, a…
September 20, 2012, 3:49 pm
Are Online Philanthropy Contests Worth the Effort?
After this year’s Chase Community Giving contest closed after a troubled start, some nonprofit leaders debated the costs and benefits of participating in these type of vote-driven corporate philanthropy contests in The Chronicle’s LinkedIn group.
Some nonprofit leaders say they have had success with the contests, while others are skeptical of whether the campaigns benefit nonprofits or the corporate donor.
Here are some highlights from the debate:
“My nonprofit won a $25,000 grant via the spring 2011 Chase Community Giving contest… We are interested in a contest if there are good odds and no daily voting requirements, among other things. We did three contests spread through 2011, winning three grants, but we’ve done none this year.” —Anne Bowhay, director of foundation relations at the Chicago Coalition for the Homeless
“As development professionals, we need to remember…
September 10, 2012, 6:24 pm
Chase Online Contest Draws Ire for Technical Glitches
The prospect of winning a grant from the annual Chase Community Giving contest prompts many small nonprofits to aggressively encourage their supporters to vote in the online competition. Small charities that get the most votes from their online supporters are eligible to win up to $250,000, and a total of $5-million will be awarded through the competition.
But when some of those supporters attempted to cast their votes, they were turned aside.
A swell of visitors to the JPMorgan Chase’s contest on Facebook Thursday, the first day of the competition, slowed the system and made it difficult for some to vote for their favorite nonprofits.
By Monday, those issues had been resolved, said Erich Timmerman, a Chase spokesman. But many nonprofits are nonetheless using the contest’s Facebook page to post complaints about the competition and raise questions about its fairness, which has…
June 15, 2012, 10:45 am
Facebook Fans Increase by 70 Percent at Some Nonprofits
A new report delves into the Facebook activity of 37 large and medium-size nonprofits, including Earthjustice, Easter Seals, and Oxfam America. The organizations in the study had a median of 31,473 Facebook fans, which represented 103 fan-page users for every 1,000 people on their e-mail lists.
The report, which is a follow-up to the 2012 eNonprofit Benchmarks Study, was published by M+R Strategic Services, a fundraising consulting company, and the Nonprofit Technology Network.
In 2011, the number of Facebook fans at the charities grew by a median rate of 70 percent from 2010. Growth was highest for wildlife and animal-welfare groups, which had a median growth rate of 129 percent. And only 0.5 percent of fans opted out of receiving the organizations’ messages—either by “unliking” the groups’ pages or by choosing to hide the groups’ posts in their news feed.
The…
June 13, 2012, 10:58 am
How Young People Learn About Nonprofits Online
To reach people in their 20s and early 30s, the most important thing nonprofits can do is to make sure their Web sites are easy to read on a mobile device and not overly cluttered, says a survey of more than 6,500 young people released Tuesday.
About 65 percent of respondents said they liked to learn about a nonprofit through its Web site, compared with 55 percent who said they turned to social networks, e-mail newsletters (47 percent), print (18 percent), and face-to-face conversations (17 percent).
Other findings from the survey, conducted by two consulting companies, Achieve and Johnson, Grossnickle, and Associates:
Keep e-mail newsletters short and to the point. Members of focus groups conducted with the survey said they were more likely to read short, focused e-mails than long messages. About 65 percent of young people said they wanted e-mails to give them news about the…
June 7, 2012, 5:03 pm
Private Social Networks Connect People With Personal Problems
Social networks like Facebook and Twitter are not built for discreet conversations. People who are dealing with health issues or trauma, for instance, probably don’t want to use Facebook to associate themselves with a nonprofit that specializes in such matters, even though they may want to find a good online connection to information and peers.
The Wounded Warrior Project, a charity that works with veterans who have been injured in combat, has solved that probably by starting WWP Connect, a private social network just for the people the organization serves.
“A lot of the issues our warriors and their families deal with are personal. It’s not something that they’d want to walk up to someone on the street corner and tell what they’ve been through,” says Jen Boyce, the organization’s social-media manager.
But in the group’s private social network, wounded veterans can share…
May 10, 2012, 4:26 pm
A Facebook Promotion Connects a Charity With a Loyal Donor
David Levis poses with Dixon, a Ugandan youngster he and his wife supported through ChildFund International. They hold the first photo Mr. Levis received of Dixon. (ChildFund/Jake Lyell)
It was a television commercial that first inspired David Levis and his wife, Stacie, to donate money to ChildFund International in 1999 and become “sponsors” of a needy child–and it was a Facebook post that helped send Mr. Levis to Uganda to meet five of their sponsored children this April.
Mr. Levis, whose family sponsors 13 children through the charity, was the winner of the organization’s “Experience of a Lifetime” promotion, held on Facebook last year. He was selected from five finalists by public vote to win the trip to meet his sponsored children.
“It was one of those things you’re hopeful about, but you…
November 23, 2011, 5:25 am
Facebook Contest Aims to Give Nonprofits Technology Makeovers
Toshiba, the electronics company, is using Facebook to give away a $100,000 technology makeover to one U.S. nonprofit and smaller prizes to four other charities.
The company is asking nonprofits to “like” its Toshiba for Good page, then submit a short video explaining why their organization would benefit from a technology makeover. The $100,000 prize includes consulting services, printers, computers, video equipment, televisions, and more. Four other groups will receive technology packages worth $28,500.
The deadline to submit a video is January 7. Winners will be announced February 20.
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