Image courtesy of Wendi Gratz, Flickr Creative Commons

Note from Debra: Susan Perri (@wingrants) tweeted to me a few weeks ago that she was seeing a rise in self-promotional tweets on Twitter, and a lack of courtesy. I asked her to expand on what she was seeing, and what advice she might offer to those new to Twitter. Her advice may well make sense for all, whether you are new to Twitter, not yet using Twitter, or an old hand at Twitter. Twitter requires a two-way relationship to create engagement. In that spirit, Susan offers three basic Twitter etiquette tips.  What follows is Susan’s guest post:

Our social media experiences often boils down to one question: Do you want engagement? On Twitter, it’s going to require a two-way relationship, with communication that addresses questions and comments from your followers.

I should begin by acknowledging I do see lots of great folks sharing the compelling stories of their work, which is often interesting and sometimes even noble. I’m glad to hear those stories, and connect and engage. At its best, I believe this is what social media should be, and certainly these are my intentions for using my selected platforms and Twitter in particular. Lately though I’ve been noticing the sheer volume of self-promotion combined with a general lack of common courtesy I encounter on Twitter. Like any other social or community venue, not all folks have the same idea, which can lower the quality of the user experience for the rest of us. Just because you can self-promote on Twitter does not mean you should do solely that. While there are many ways to engage with others, some etiquette should apply. Fundraising blog Fundly and my fellow Twitterer Dave Boyce (@davidjboyce1) speaks about this issue via a great post titled “Spread the love with social media, but don’t forget to mind your manners.” In the post, Dave references the work of Dale Carnegie’s How to Win Friends and Influence People. According to Carnegie, the best leaders improve relationships with every word and action on a daily basis, and this kindness is contagious.

Let’s have some more kindness, please! Our increasingly digital age need not corrode the basic tenets of social niceties. Perhaps I’m hopelessly old-fashioned, but here are the values I (still) believe in, and would urge us all to follow while making our way around the Twittersphere:

1. Walk Your Talk

I’m looking for the kinds of leaders on Twitter that Dale Carnegie wrote about, especially as they relate to my work.  In my particular line of work, I see a lot of Twitter users who promote themselves as nonprofit, communications and/or fundraising professionals. Some of them use self-aggrandizing synonyms for professional, like maven or guru or genius. Many with really large followings put themselves out there as specialists on engagement – donor engagement, social media engagement, building relationships and communities. Surprisingly, these folks have been the most challenging to connect with or get some return engagement back from. Here’s an example to the contrary. Social media whiz (my label, not his) Robert Caruso (@fondalo) really practices what he preaches. This guy has almost 24,000 followers, and he still finds it in his heart to respond to and acknowledge promptly each and every mention, DM, and personal shout out on Twitter. If you’re looking for a best practice for engagement and Netiquette Twitter style, check him out.

2. Remember Your Manners

Think about what your mother taught you. There are really basic, simple acts of kindness that don’t require anything of you but carry tremendous social return on investment. When someone follows you, give thanks. A simple “thank you” goes a long way. Consider following back if that user fits your criteria for doing so. When someone mentions you or references your work, acknowledge it. It’s the right thing to do, and it may just inspire them to do so again in the future.  Don’t be afraid to mention back. It generates goodwill. Irene Koehler (@IreneKoehler) has a great post about Twitter fails of this ilk titled “11 Sure-Fire Ways to Get Me to Unfollow You on Twitter.”

3. Don’t Be Too Full of Yourself

Fellow tweep Matthew Smith (@MatthewSm1th), well versed in social media and philanthropy, recently wrote about the difference between sharing information and “shameless self-promotion” via social media outlets. Self-promotion may be the most common reason for using social media, but I submit there is a balance between self-promotion and respectable engagement that need not be shameless. Let’s begin by the way we put ourselves  out there. Another Twitter connection, Ephraim Gopin (@fundraisinisfun), very smart about all things fundraising, recently ranted about the overuse of the self-administered “social media expert” label. Remember what I said earlier about “geniuses” and “gurus”? This practice of self-proclaimed mastery is indeed overdone, whatever the profession or service. For example, it’s enough call oneself savvy – you need not have a qualifier like “incredibly” or “super” or “amazingly” before it. Sometimes less really is more.

In this era where we are constantly creating new tools to connect, social media is an emerging and evolving platform for communication. Granted, we are learning as we go. We are increasingly interested with how we measure up, how many followers we can count, how much Klout we have. In the end, I think the old adage holds true – it’s quality, not quantity, and the same rules from your childhood playground still apply. Make friends, be nice, take turns, say please and thank you. Oh, yes, and have fun while you’re at it.

 Susan Perri is a grant writing specialist, philanthropic fundraiser & nonprofit social media strategist. She connects organizations with the resources they need to make a positive impact.

image courtesy of Shawn Campbell

The single most frequent question that I get from nonprofit professionals and organizations that want to use Twitter is “how do I get started?” The bottom line: always follow The Twitter Rule.

The Twitter Rule: Less Broadcasting, More Conversation

It is not intuitive to barge into conversations. It is not intuitive to talk with strangers. It is not intuitive to create conversation when you are used to broadcasting. It is not intuitive to be the personal representation of an organization instead of the mouthpiece behind the logo. Twitter forces you out from behind your logo, into conversations with unknown persons, and to initiate conversation in order to create deeper engagement.

I presented a free webinar for Nonprofit Webinars this week about The Twitter Rule, but more than that, about how to make sense of Twitter. The webinar covered how to develop a Twitter strategy that utilizes The Twitter Rule for success. Delving deeper, the slide deck (at the bottom of this blog post) includes:

• An overview of engagement theories (social technographics, participation inequality, ladder of engagement)
• Mastering the @tweet (who sees what when you send an @message…and who doesn’t)
• Strategies for following the Twitter Rule
• The Twitter profile – in front of or behind the avatar, or a mashup on both?
• Engaging Twitter practices
• Twitter etiquette
• Researching Twitter influence and networks to help you find the right connections
  
• Resource sheet of Twitter tools

If you fall back on the traditional (intuitive) marketing style of broadcasting (Webinar today! Call your representative! Save the whales!), then your Twitter strategy will fail. If you build friendships, conversation and trust, you are building up social capital.

If you spend the time to create relationships through conversation and passing along trusted and useful information, your Twitter followers will happily retweet, respond, and act. Why? Because you’ve built up your social capital first, through conversation, before asking your followers to do something for you. Those are the results of The Twitter Rule in action.

For more about getting started with Twitter, you might find these other posts useful: How the Jewish Agency Uses Twitter to Meaningfully Connect, Why Do You Participate in Twitter Chats, and The Case of the 4,000 Twitter Followers who Don’t Care.

Why is measuring reach important? The number of times an article is tweeted or shared on Facebook or dug on Digg represents the comparable value of the information to the public, your readers, and your target audience. It also represents potential engagement: if your target audience likes what you are publishing, they’ll come back.

Social sharing is the simplest form of public approval and feedback. Think of it as a feedback loop.

It’s incredibly easy to share an article on Twitter, “like” a Facebook article or link, or save an article to a social bookmarking or social news site. With a few analytics tools you also know exactly which type of information you are publishing that others value enough to share are save. And, most importantly, articles (or videos, podcasts, etc.) that are shared also expose your organization’s message to new audiences. Social sharing is a represents the feedback loop of potential reach, reaction, analytical feedback, and organizational learning.

It’s all the more important, then, to access analytical feedback in order to produce relevant content that extends your organization’s reach and message. Ideally, relevant content moves your readers to action!

Four “must have” analytical tools for your organization that offer social sharing insights:

1. Tweetmeme Widget and Analytics

Tweetmeme is a service that aggregates popular links on Twitter. It is also a widget with analytics. If you are publishing online content, and want to encourage your readers to share it on Twitter, the Tweetmeme button is just the powerful widget you need. The button can be displayed above or below the content, and offers a simple way for readers to tweet articles from  your website without leaving the website. (A pop up appears asking to allow Tweetmeme to access the user’s twitter and tweet the URL.) Most importantly, once you add the Tweetmeme button to your blog (or site), the Tweetmeme button publicly displays the number of times an article has been tweeted and you can see who has tweeted it.  Whoever tweets or retweets your organizaation’s content is a potential fan or stakeholder.

As an illustration, you can view my blog’s Tweetmeme button at the bottom of this post. Below is a sample screen shot illustrating who tweeted my blog post entitled “Is Bureaucracy the Enemy of Social Media?” You can view more at Tweetmeme.com.

2. Facebook Share Widget and Analytics

Facebook rolled out a share widget in late 2009 that counts shares and offers analytics. Not surprisingly, there is a WordPress plugin as well (which I added to this blog). The button works exactly like the Tweetmeme button: readers don’t leave the page, the widget uses permission-based Facebook sharing, and the it offers powerful analytics. In fact, the analytics are incredible: see below.  The only thing it does not show is who shared your article, liked it, or clicked on it.

Below is a screen shot of the Facebook analytics overview, as viewed in WordPress Plugin Settings:

3. Add This Share Button and Analytics

There are a lot of social sharing buttons around, but AddThis offers exceptional value. Each week, AddThis offers site administrators detailed sharing analytics about where readers shared your information, total number of shares, sharing trends, and geographical sharing by continent. I think that most interesting feature of AddThis is the different methods that readers used to share content. You can use it to look at trends and understand how your readership prefers to share. Be sure to incorporate this feedback into your website. For example, if the most frequent type of share from your site is via email, then be sure to offer an email subscription service and an RSS feed via email.

I changed my website’s sharing button to AddThis on January 21. Here is a screen shot of my AddThis sharing analytics from January 21 -30, 2010:

4. Google Analytics Firefox Extension

The Google Analytics Firefox Extension offers a number of additions to Google Analytics, including social media metrics. This extension integrates the shares from your website to Sphinn, Mixx, Reddit, Digg, StumbleUpon, Delicious and Yahoo into your Google Analytics, displaying shares by content. I wish that it revealed shares to Twitter and Facebook, but the sharing widgets mentioned above more than make up for this.

One specific issue: I know that some of my blog posts have been “stumbled,” but have not shown up in here.  The extension displays StumbleUpon reviews, but not “likes” or “stumbles.” As far as I can tell, it’s the only fault with the extension: if a post is “stumbled” but not reviewed, it does not appear in this set of analytics.

How do you measure social media sharing? What other tools analyze online sharing activities? What have you learned from your use of them?

Image courtesy of Paurian

This is the Case of the 4,000 Twitter Followers Who Don’t Care - and why 4,000 followers means nothing without engagement.

I recently took on a new client that wants to leverage its existing social media assets (Facebook Page/Fans, Twitter followers) to drive more visits to the website. This company has been building a social media presence for over a year, and is unhappy with the lack of website visits resulting from social media.

I was told that the Facebook Group was active with almost 500 fans, and that the Twitter account had over 4,000 followers.  I was also briefed that, though there was not a lot of online fan feedback, the Twitter account included some committed followers. The highest priority for the client was to figure out why social media was not driving more people to the website – and come up with a better strategy.

I took on this challenge, and want to share a few observations about why social media isn’t working for this client:

Case Observation #1:

The most important number isn’t the number of followers, it’s the number of engaged followers.

4,000 Twitter followers seems like a lot. But how many really care about your organization? How many are willing to act on its behalf?

I evaluated “the 4,000 followers” on Twitter and “almost 500 fans” of the Facebook Page. I used Twerpscan, Twittalyzer, Twazzup, and Tweetmeme to analyze the Twitter asset, and discovered:

• almost 400 of their Twitter followers were pure spammers
• no one cared what the client was tweeting, and…
  
• most of the retweets were from twitter profiles related to the company
• the company did not engage in conversation online, and rarely thanked retweeters
• there was absolutely no Twitter strategy
  

What I discovered was that, of the 4,000+ followers, only three were truly interested enough in what the organization was tweeting. Three.

Twitter utilizes the concept of social media karma: give and give and then others will give back. This company didn’t offer help, advice, support or anything else personal.  Obviously, Twitter did not drive people to the website – no one cared enough about the company to go there.

Of the 400+ Facebook fans, most didn’t care enough to “like” a Wall post. The ones that did comment or “like” a post were often friends of the CEO or employees. All the posted was to its Facebook Page was company stories or related news. Of the 400+ fans, only one was an (unrelated to the company) engaged fan! Facebook drove little traffic to the website, which again is not surprising.

Case Observation #2:

Be wary when the CEO or Executive Director isn’t using social media on behalf of the organization.

This CEO was absolutely unwilling to be personally involved in using social media for the company. This is indicative of a CEO that does not understand the basic principles of social media. It’s critical that everyone in the organization have some direct contact with social media. An Executive Director that isn’t directly responsible for some piece of the social media is missing important information by not connecting with stakeholders directly. Not every CEO has to be responsible, but he/she should be intimately involved with the social media activities, and understand the basic principles of social media.

This CEO was using social media to “drive numbers to the website,” which completely misunderstands the basic fundamentals of social media. They are:

Engage with people first, create relationships, then move them to act.

Case Observation #3:

Their social media sites offer no real value to fans and followers

The company hadn’t taken the time to figure out what people were interested in reading on their social sites. Since the organization was not actually creating individual relationships with its fans, then it had to offer compelling and relevant news and data.  However, it wasn’t giving followers information that mattered to the followers. Not surprisingly, no one wanted to visit the website to find out more.

Case Observation #4:

You need a strategy for each and every social media platform.

Their overall social media strategy consisted of posting news and information. This is an appropriate strategy for social bookmarking sites like StumbleUpon and Digg, but not at all for social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter. Additionally, the company usually posted the same information on both Twitter and Facebook. Fans of both sites were not even receiving unique value or reward for following the company in two places.

It’s important to realize that no two communities are the same online. Each has its own rules, expectations, and needs. You need an engagement strategy for each one of these communities. The strategy should consider the qualities of each social media platform, the needs of followers, how to best engage, and what your organization can offer its followers in terms of both engagement and value.

It’s Elementary, My Dear Watson

Social media is a tool to help your company meet its goals. But it’s more than that: if you aren’t using these tools properly, then it doesn’t matter how many fans, followers, or linkedin connections you have. They won’t care enough to do anything for your organization or company.

This case illustrates that it’s not about the number of fans and followers. It’s about the engagement. Create a strategy that brings your organization engaged followers and real relationships.

4,000 followers means nothing without engagement. And it never will.

Really engaging with stakeholders is critical to creating stronger organizational relationships, but it is relatively difficult to really engage followers on Twitter. Having a conversation with followers is one of the easiest way of engaging, but it is hard to have a conversation with every one of your followers (especially if you have more than 100). Here are five ways that nonprofit organizations are creating spaces for real engagement on twitter.

1. Engage Followers with a Live Chat

Hebrew University joined Twitter a month ago and wanted to find a way to connect with their followers. Two days ago they held their first live twitter chat with Maya Sigal, a victim of the 2002 Hebrew University cafeteria bombing. The live chat coincided with an anniversary ceremony honoring the victims of the bombing to be held the following day.

According to Molly Livingstone of Hebrew University’s Public Relations and Development Department,  “we wanted to take the academic institution and make it a more personal place. We want to engage and have a community.  We decided that a live chat is a great way to reach out to people. We wanted our first live chat to be with Maya Sigal because the terrorist bombing was personal attack on the University itself.”  According to Livingstone, the live chat resulted in many new followers, and more direct messages to the University. Livingstone views direct messages from followers to mean that the University has created a  more intimate relationship with a follower.

2. Ask people to sign a petition

Several online platforms enable people to create and start petitions on Twitter. Act.ly and tiny petition are among the most popular of the platforms. Greenpeace USA has started a petition to get Trader Joe’s to adopt a sustainable seafood policy.

Here is a screen shot of the petition on act.ly:

3. Integrate Tweeting Into Your Organization’s Programs

The National Wildlife Foundation’s Wildlife Watch program is “a citizen monitoring program where the public reports animal, plants and natural phenomena sightings online to NWF.” These tweets help the scientists that study wildlife track animals around the US and monitor their activity and health.  The NWF asks people to send a tweet to @wildlife_watch with the hashtag #NWF whenever a person sees wildlife. According to Danielle Brigida, the program gets about six tweets a day. Now that’s engagement. Here is a sample of recent Wildlife Watch tweets:

4. Involve Followers in Program and Organizational Improvements

The Peery Foundation has invited its funded organizations, partners, and enthusiasts to participate in their strategic planning process on Twitter. Anyone can tweet ideas, at any time, or participate in a Twitter dialogue about the Foundation’s future using the hashtag #PFWhiteboard.  Here is a screen shot of tweets from a recent online strategic planning session of the Peery Foundation, run by @davepeery and @jessamynlau:

For more examples of philanthropies that crowdsource, check out this article from Modern Giving.

5. Find and Interact with Volunteers

ActionAid Australia is seeking volunteer bloggers to travel to a remote area of an ActionAid country and train locals to use social media (blogging, Twitter) to end poverty. Better yet, they’ve set up a challenge, the Toto Challenge (The Overseas Training Operation) and tweeted the heck out of it. They’ve asked people to nominate bloggers via Twitter, they’ve asked the nominated bloggers to interact with them on Twitter, they’ve asked people to vote, and they keep asking. They have taken this idea from the blog to twitter and back. It’s a great concept of how to promote your program on Twitter, and also use Twitter for engaging people in the program. Here is the list of volunteer bloggers that have been nominated to take the challenge.  Action Aid Australia has used the challenge to find and interact with volunteers on Twitter, as shown here:

These are but five ways that organizations have used Twitter to meaningfully connect with followers. Twitter offers so many possibilties for conversations and engagement. How has your organization used it for real engagement?

image by kopp0041

How do you drive traffic to your Facebook page, You Tube video, blog or other social network site? New February data released by Hitwise Intelligence, a web measurement company, reveals that Twitter drove one in five visitors from Twitter to social networks. That’s impressive.

However, if you compare that with how the search engines drive traffic to your social network site, the information is even more impressive:

Twitter drives more people directly to social networking sites than the search engines

Concretely, Twitter drives 20% of its visitors from its site to social networks. (This is called “downstream clicks.”)  The search engines drive less than 10% of downstream clicks to social networks. And to which social networks does Twitter drive the most traffic? Facebook, followed by MySpace, Twitter Search and You Tube.

But let’s not forget blogs, either. Twitter drove visitors to blogs and personal websites a little more than 7% of the time, which is not insignificant. Hitwise’s clickstream data shows that Twitter drives a much higher percentage of downstream clicks to blogs/personal websites than either search engines or email services. The chart below compares downstream visits from Twitter, Google, Social Networks and Email Services.

image from Hitwise Intelligence

What does that mean to you now?

• If you have a social network profile and activity (on Facebook, My Space, You Tube, Flickr, Twitter, Orkut, Slideshare, etc), you should be on Twitter. The Hitwise analysis shows that Twitter users are more likely to drive traffic to your social network sites than either Google or email services.

• Search engine optimization is important, but so is Twitter optimization. What is “Twitter optimization”? Making your Twitter profile and usage as interesting and relevant as possible to drive traffic back to you and your business or organization. This means a good Twitter background, a photo, an interesting and catchy bio, a good link to an appropriate landing page of your website, and open settings which allow anyone to follow and contact you.  However, it also means utilizing Twitter strategically to drive traffic back to your networks, website and blog. (And yes, I know, I’m looking for an interesting Twitter background now.)

• Make sure that your social network profiles and blog also include Twitter contact information. If you have a profile on a lifestreaming site such as Friendfeed or Brightkite, you should have a Twitter tweet stream there. If you have  blog or website, you should display your “follow me” Twitter button on the front page. Don’t forget all the others, too.

• Twitter users are very prone to look at another Twitterer’s post/profile/picture, so utilize Twitter self-referencing to achieve your goals. A lot of Twitter downstream clicks are to Twitter itself or the Twitter-related picture site, Twitpic.  (Twitpic was the third most popular downstream click, and Twitter Search was the fifth.) Take advantage of this knowledge:  create interest by posting your latest event photos on Twitpic and your blog, encourage your organization’s followers to search for and follow each other, refer to other Twitter users that have great info for your followers.  Don’t forget to tweet your blog posts periodically, too. These strategies will strengthen your brand and public awareness.

When I look at the incoming clicks to my blog, at least half are from Twitter. The Hitwise analysis rings true in my case, and is prompting me to reconsider how I use Twitter.

How has this information changed the way you think about Twitter and traffic? I’d love to hear your thoughts (and tweets)!

What do we want out of Twitter? Can the Mr. Tweet help non-profits Twitter better?

I recently signed up for Mr. Tweet, a personal assistant of the robot sorts, who facilitates my search for Twitter connections. A day after signing up, I received a personal email: “Hi there! Mr Tweet, your personal Twitter assistant is ready for work” with a hyperlink for me to follow. After clicking the link, I viewed this screen:

My Twitteristics

Mr. Tweet analyzed my Twitter profiles according to a few key measurements:

• number of links tweeted
• number of conversation tweets
• if I usually reply to non-followers, and
• if I usually follow someone back

In addition, Mr. Tweet also recommends people that I should follow based upon who I am already following.  Recommendations include the “Twitteristics” of each person, and a list of who I also follow that follows the recommended person.

It made me think a bit about what the non-profits I work with want out of Twitter. It’s engagement.

For a non-profit organization, there are a few key reasons to use Twitter:

• to connect with key donors, foundations and their influencers
• to deepen stakeholder commitment
• to publicize your organization and bring in new stakeholders
• to listen for key words and respond
• to meet and connect with potential collaborators
• to converse with colleagues in the same field, and cross-pollinate ideas through Twitter

The National Wildlife Federation’s Danielle Brigida recently elaborated on its Twitter strategy and successes here. It is a fascinating, well-thought out interview with Social Ch@nge. The NWF uses Twitter to listen to conversations, repair reputation issues, publicize articles and events, nudge people towards their social media hubpage, and increased online activism. That’s quite impressive, and shows the potential of Twitter for non-profits.

How can Mr. Tweet help your non-profit? Mr. Tweet can help non-profits find people to follow who might become collaborators, who are colleagues, or possibly donors/investors. Mr. Tweet can help you find key influencers as well. What Mr. Tweet does best is recommend people based upon who you follow — its algorithms are set to analyze the types of people on Twitter that you already follow.  If you mostly follow social media thought leaders, then Mr. Tweet will recommend more of the same. Likewise, if you mostly follow people in your industry. If you want to publicize your organization and bring in new stakeholders, Mr. Tweet’s suggested “influencers relevant to you” could re-tweet, make introductions for you or provide relevant connections.

However, If you are looking for non-profits Twitterers, in general, then you might want to check out Chris Brogan’s creation, Twitter Packs to find others with your specific industry interests or in your specific location. The non-profit Twitter Pack list is here. Or, quite simply, look at the people you consider important colleagues/stakeholders/collaborators and with whom they converse regularly.

Mr. Tweet is a fine robot assistant, but not perfect. If you use it after you’ve been on Twitter a while, then the application will have more information to draw upon. However, it can’t do it all. It can’t find those quality influencers and connectors that everyone you know mentions, but Mr. Tweet may not know. It can’t recommend people outside of your areas of interest, and it doesn’t make introductions.

What would I love Mr. Tweet to do? Add a section showing the websites people in my network most often recommend or link. Show me conversation circles: what are conversational clusters and who usually participates?  Lastly, who (not in my network) most often tweets about others in my network? This information would be valuable to me for finding new connections, new websites and information about my industry, and enhancing my ability to participate in relevant industry conversation.

You have to do all that work yourself. What Mr. Tweet is, is  your general research assistant. And that’s a good beginning. I look forward to hearing if non-profits are finding Mr. Tweet useful, and other suggestions for finding non-profit Twitterers.

And…I look forward to making connections!

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