Community Tool Box opens new online guide to using social media

The Social Media Shift

Hashtags, tweets, pinning, tagging – it can be overwhelming just learning the lingo of social networking, let alone developing an effective plan for using social media as a tool for digital advocacy. But here at the Community Tool Box, we recognize that social media is a dynamic tool that can transform a community organization or grassroots movement. With this in mind, we have just published a new section on Using Social Media for Digital Advocacy, a guide for developing a simple, integrated plan for using social media.

Social media has exploded in popularity in recent years, and it’s easy to see why – it’s free, easily accessible, provides instantaneous results, and each post has the potential to reach millions of users. But as with any tool, it isn’t enough to simply use it – you have to use it well. Our chapter offers tips on just that - how to not only use social media, but use it effectively and efficiently.  Don’t join social networking sites just because you can: instead, evaluate which platform is most closely aligned with your interests – what are you using social media to accomplish? And use the built-in tools provided to measure and evaluate your progress. Facebook offers “Insights” to track your page’s activity, and Google Analytics and similar sites offer ways to monitor traffic on your website, and track which social media sources are engaging the most users.

Social media has a potential to reach a wider audience than traditional communication, but with 60 million Facebook status updates occurring daily, it is important to keep your messages from getting lost in the shuffle by making them unique and meaningful. Our section provides tips on when to send messages for maximum reach, how to balance promoting your cause with engaging in conversations about topics that are relevant to your supporters, and how to coordinate your online and offline efforts.

And if you’re still not sure that social media can really transform your organization, simply check out the examples of organizations and grassroots movements that are already using social media in new and innovative ways. One organization, Big Love Little Hearts, used check-ins through Foursquare as a fundraising tool, raising $25,000 in 24 hours. And of course, without Twitter, who knows if the Arab Spring of 2011 would have gained the momentum it did, or captured the international attention and support that it did. Social media is changing the world, and the Community Tool Box wants to help you be ready to change with it.