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Cultivate 2011

by admin on February 1, 2011 · 2 comments

Most of you know that my company helps non profits and social enterprises develop effective communication strategies.  We also help with the implementation of those strategies.  So I was pretty excited when the organizers of Cultivate 2011 reached out and asked me to be a part of their very unique conference.

Rather than just getting experts to talk up front, they are bringing in a panel after each short talk to discuss implementation and contextualization. This is really a passion of mine and I am excited to help lead those discussions. Many friends and folks I really respect will be either speaking or a part of various panels including Charles Lee and Mark Horvath.

The line up appears to be geared towards the faith based sector but it is being marketed heavily towards the general non profit market as well.  Regardless of which camp you fit into, if you are looking to better communicate, market, fund raise, etc I am quite certain that this will be a rewarding experience.

If you will be there, please let me know so we can be sure to grab a cup of coffee or some tequila.

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Below is a presentation I gave at the Unleashing Beauty Conference in Irvine, Ca this last week.  I have embedded my slide show and put my notes, expanded and with links to various websites and webapps mentioned through out.  If your organization would like to talk about a more personalized solution lets set up a time to talk.

Unleashing Beauty Online: the power of social media for social justice

1. Welcome

A. Who Am I?

a. freelance marketer and social web developer for the last year and a                      half

b. in process of launching intersection creative strategies

c. site lead for laundry love santa ana

d. husband, father of 2 kids under 3

B. What we are not discussing

a. philosophical or theological implications of social media

b. philosophical or theological implications of social justice

c. politics

C. Presuppositions I am starting with

a. Social Justice is a good

b. Social Media is ok (moral, legal, ethical, permissible, etc.) for                                    churches, NPO’s and NGO’s to use

c. Social Media is a powerful tool for influence

d. You are here to learn HOW to use social media for social justice (ie:                       not to debate these other items)

2. Format

A. Not So Great Examples

B. Great Examples

C. Practical Steps

D. The Vision

E. Q&A

3. Not so great examples

A. Motrin

B. Social Media Gurus

C. Ning communities (w/ some exceptions)

4. Great examples

A. Invisible People

a. Mark Horvath

b. Invisible People

c. Road Trip

d. Impact

B. Twestival

C. Laundry Love Santa Ana

a. a quick mention

b. a simple website

c. a few well placed mentions

d. press, npo’s and gov’t notice

5. Practical

A. The Right Platforms

a. Website/Blog

b. Facebook

c. Twitter

d. Other

B. The Right Tools

1. Ping.FM

a. Status updates to 30+ sites

2. Posterous

a. blogs, pics, links to 10+ sites

3. TubeMogul

a. video to 40+ video sharing sites

4. Twitterfeed

a. posting of rss feeds through twitter or ping.fm

5. TweetDeck

a. multiple saved twitter searches

b. keep track of conversations on twitter, facebook, even myspace

c. multi account posting and listening

d. columns for keeping track of friends, family, best donors, etc

6. Other

a. niche sites, geographic specific sites, etc

C. The Right Content

1. relevant

a. to your topic

b. to your demographic

c. to YOU

2. funny

a. funny spreads fast

b. funny gets people talking

c. funny keeps people coming back even when the big picture is bleak                      (ie sex trafficking, gang violence, etc)

3. personal

4. unique

a. not found elsewhere

5. shared

a. point people towards orgs, links, articles that are interesting or                               useful in your space.

6. universal

a. low cost of entry. if you want to get people to rally around                                         something, make sure it is something they can rally around.  don’t                         ask them to agree to a set of theological or philosophical                                             propositions to join your movement.  Don’t make it cost too much.  6. Vision

A. Worldwide Scope

B. Little Regulation

C. Little Cost of Entry

D. Viral Potential

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Image representing Facebook Connect as depicte...
Image via CrunchBase

I recently added Facebook Connect to this site.   I have heard many arguments for and against this move so I thought I would take a few minutes to discuss my thought process.

First the negatives:  Facebook has made it very clear that they own the data that sits on their servers.  This is a HUGE negative for a lot of people.

Beyond that it also encourages people to pick up conversations off of your site.  For ad driven or ecommerce sites this means, in some folks eyes (though not mine), less revenue for site owners.

The positives:  Facebook is growing like a weed.  Its at around 200 million users world wide and one of its fastest growing segments is women in their 30′s and 40′s, who are the primary decision makers in almost ALL household purchasing decisions.

Thats a lot of eyes.

Thats a lot of eyes.

It encourages people to keep talking about your content, to share your content with their friends, many of whom may have never heard about or seen your site otherwise.  Not all will click through to your site, but some will.

Armed with this information, I decided to implement Facebook Connect.  Have you?  Why or why not?  Feel free to plug your site if you have it.  I would love to see how you integrated it.

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My social Network on Flickr, Facebook, Twitter...
Image by luc legay via Flickr

As I play with things on my site occasionally I actually do have a purpose and goal. It may seem random, but I am trying out new things to see what works best for small businesses, non profits and other organizations who I write this site to help as well as those who I advise in a consulting role.

With that I unveil my brand new commenting system. What follows are a few thoughts as to why I am making this switch.

This site had Backtype Connect implemented to pull in Diggs, FriendFeed comments, and any Tweets containing links to a given post. It worked very well, and I highly recommend it if you are looking for a quick and easy social media integration to your comments section.

That being said, when it came time to add Facebook Connect and Twitter OAuth, I have to add TWO MORE plugins. By swapping out WordPress‘ default comment system with Disqus I was able to get Comments, Social Media Comments, Facebook Connect, Twitter OAuth all in one relatively simple plugin.

The transfer process is in the works and we will see how smoothly the previous comments transition over, but for now it looks like I may just be a Disqus man.

So what does this mean for you and your organization?  Well, it seems like Disqus could be a good way to go if you want to encourage social interaction around your content off site.  If your primary goal is to drive traffic to your site only, Backtype Connect may be the way to go.  It really boils down to your objectives for your site.  It seems like both work incredibly well at intregating social media and your site.  

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