Tag Archives: marketing

Me in Europe in Fall 2014

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Happy New Year! (and Happy birthday, Elvis!)

I’ll be in Germany in the Fall of 2014 for a visit of a few weeks. I’ll make a trip to Barcelona, Spain as well for a long weekend in that time. I’m not sure if this will be in September or October.

I would love to combine my trip with presenting or consulting! I’m willing to go wherever German wings or any discount airline flies from Cologne (Köln) or Frankfurt Am Rhein, or wherever I can take a train in 5 hours or less, provided your organization covers airfare/train fare and accommodations. That means I’m willing to travel just about anywhere in Europe: England, Scotland, Ireland, France, Spain, Portugal, Poland, Turkey, Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, the Czech Republic, Slovenia, Slovakia, Bulgaria – and more!

I will do an onsite consultation or presentation pro bono, provided your organization covers all travel and accommodation expenses! 

Right now, my dates are flexible; if an organization really wants me to come in October then that’s when I would come to Germany.  My flexibility will change, however, around April 2014, when I have to make a decision about my dates.

More about me.

More about my consulting services.

More about my training areas.

Interested? Email me at jc @ coyotecommunications.com with what you have in mind.

How do international NGOs use Twitter?

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In the latest installment of the award-winning Twiplomacy study, global public relations and communications firm Burson-Marsteller looks at how international organisations use Twitter to promote their stories and how they engage with their followers. In November 2013, Burson-Marsteller analysed the 223 Twitter accounts of 101 international organisations and non-profit organizations. Over the past six years, all leading international organisations have set up at least one institutional Twitter account, and half of the 101 organisations analysed in this study have created a personal account for the head of the organization.

This is a terrific report. It not only looks at retweets, but also how many of these organizations are on other tweeters’ lists. I also like that the study looked at executive director’s tweets, not just the organizations, and that how often they interacted with others on Twitter was analyzed.

A great way to learn how success on Twitter can look – lessons for even small organizations, not just large, international ones.

Hire me in 2013 – let me help make your organization even better!

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Blunt headline, I know, but it gets the point across: I’m available as a trainer for your organization or conference, or for short-term consulting, for long-term consulting, and, for the perfect opportunity, full-time employment in 2013!

As a consultant, I specialize in training, advising, capacity-building services and strategy development for not-for-profit organizations (NPOs), non-governmental organizations (NGOs), civil society, grass roots organizations, and public sector agencies, including government offices and educational institutions (altogether, these organizations comprise the mission-based sector).

Capacity-building is always central to any training or consulting work I do. Capacity-building means giving people the skills, information and other resources to most effectively and efficiently address the organization’s mission, and to help the organization be attractive to new and continuing support from donors, volunteers, community leaders and the general public. My training and consulting goal is to build the capacities of employees, consultants and volunteers to successfully engage in communications and community involvement efforts long after I have moved on.

My consulting services are detailed here. I can deliver both onsite and online services. Also, I love to travel (especially internationally!).

In 2013, I would love to create or co-create an entire course as a part-time or full-time instructor at a college university within any program training nonprofit managers, social workers, MBA students, aid and humanitarian workers, etc. I am most interested, and, I think, most qualified, to teach courses relating to:

  • public relations (basic public relations functions, outreach to particular audiences, crisis communications, how to address misinformation / misunderstandings, how to deal with public criticism, etc.)
  • strategic communications (systematic planning and utilization of a variety of information flows, internal and external to an organization or program, to deliver a message and build credibility or a brand)
  • cross-platform media and electronic media (using traditional print, synchronous and asynchronous online / digital communications, and emerging digital technologies effectively, and integrating the use of all information flows)
  • public speaking
  • community engagement (involving community members as volunteers, from program supporters to advisers, and creating ways for the community to see the work of an organization firsthand)

Would I consider giving up the consulting life and working just one job, either as a full-time consultant for a year or a full-time, regular employee? Yes! In that regard, I am looking for opportunities to:

  • manage/direct a program at a nonprofit, university or government agency.

or

  • direct the marketing, public relations or other communications activities for a major project or program at a nonprofit, university or government agency – a corporation that matches my professional values.

I have a profile at LinkedIn, as well as details on my own web site about my professional activities. I’m also happy to share my CV with you; email me with your request. If you have any specific questions about my profile, feel free to contact me as well. References available upon request as well!

Looking forward to hearing from you! Questions welcomed!

Brag about it

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Once upon a time, I was the publicity director at the Williamstown Theatre Festival. I was in charge of all marketing and public relations for this major national summer theatre festival. And believe it or not, merely having Sigourney Weaver or Stockard Channing in a production wasn’t always enough to sell tickets. The Internet was far from mainstream in those days – there wasn’t even a World Wide Web yet (just newsgroups, gopher and what not) – so we were doing all marketing and PR by newspaper (remember those?), radio, TV, posters and postal mailings (oh, those bulk mailings…. I don’t miss those).

A tradition that started many years before I had this role was the brag board: one very large bulletin board in the hall way that lead to the costume department and backstage. I (and every publicity director before me) used it to post any newspaper articles about or mentioning the festival, as well as newspaper advertisements for the festival.

It’s one thing to get print outs of articles, neatly presented in a folder. But that board was a very powerful visual for the work I was doing (supported by some wonderful interns). Too often, people just see a full house and think it somehow happened magically. The brag board was my way to say, “Hey, this is what it takes to get those seats filled.”

That brag board not only reminded my co-workers and supervisors about what I was doing, it also reminded the actors, directors and other artists the importance of doing the press interviews I was asking/would be asking them to do. Some actors get annoyed by being asked to do interviews (Ms. Weaver never was, in case you were wondering). This was my way of reminding the artists just how vital it was for the festival that they say yes to publicity activities.

That brag board was internal marketing. And it’s why I had a great summer as publicity director – because everyone knew what I did, and they valued it.

For a few years after that, I forgot that important lesson about internal marketing: I assumed the head of the organization, the heads of other departments, the receptionist, and others knew what I was doing because it was so clearly presented online. It’s all there, on the Internet – everyone sees that, right? It took a woman I admired tremendously, who always made me feel valued at her organization, to take me aside one day and remind me of the importance of internally marketing yourself. It’s of vital importance that you communicate to everyone at your organization about your role, what you do, and what the results of your work are – otherwise, you will find your budget being reduced, your department staff getting cut – and maybe even see your job get eliminated.

Having your work so prominent online, or among your professional associations, is NOT enough to ensure your role is valued at the organization that employs you.

Create a brag board. Put up copies of newspaper articles, blog posts, emails, a compilation of tweet mentions – anything that shows your organization is getting noticed or lauded. Print out and post photos on it that your volunteers are taking while volunteering and posting online. Put the board in a break room or hallway – a high traffic area where employees, consultants, volunteers and visitors will see it – or, if that doesn’t get approved, in your office. Keep it neat, well-organized, and frequently updated!

Keep forwarding links and emails to all staff – hey, look at this! – but don’t ever let that be a substitute for a big visual representation of the work you are doing.

Why Your Organization Probably Doesn’t Need A Facebook Page

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An excellent blog: Why Your Company Probably Doesn’t Need A Facebook Page

I completely agree. And I think it’s true for many nonprofits, NGOs, community agenices and other organizations as well.

Shocked? Don’t be. Facebook is a great, appropriate outreach / engagement tool for many organizations – and a complete waste of time for others, as this blog explores.

Consider this: maybe all of your volunteers are on Facebook – but they don’t want to mix their Facebook activities with their volunteering. Offline, I don’t always feel comfortable talking about what I do as a volunteer at work with colleagues, or when I’m socializing with friends – perhaps I feel the same way online.

Having a booth at the local county fair might be a great way to create awareness about whatever issue your nonprofit is concerned with, or as a way to recruit volunteers – and might be a complete waste of time for others.

Same for putting an ad in the local newspaper.

Same for doing a PSA on a local radio station.

Same for putting a billboard up on a highway.

How do you know which outreach or engagement tool is right for your organization? Through knowing your potential audiences, through observing online activities by other organizations similar to your organization or also serving a similar community, and through asking your current clients, donors and volunteers how they heard about your organization and how they do or don’t want to use social media with your organization. Through experimenting. Through trial and error.

That said, if you are on Facebook, and want to use Facebook as a way to learn about effective volunteer / community engagement, about nonprofit / NGO management, about aid and development, or about my work, I would love for you to like my Facebook page. But it’s worth noting that a LOT of my friends haven’t done this, because they don’t like mixing work and fun (and they see their Facebook activities as purely for fun).

And if you are on Twitter, and want to use it for those similar reasons, I would love for you to follow me on Twitter. But, again, a LOT of my friends haven’t done this, because they don’t like mixing work and fun (and they see their Twitter activities as purely for fun).

January 5, 2017 update

I still believe 90% of this blog – and the blogs I link to in this blog. My only change is this: your nonprofit does need a page on Facebook, just to “own” your organization’s online real estate – the name of your organization on Facebook. This will mean people can find you on Facebook –  yes, they are probably looking for you, and are angry when they cannot find you – and it will also prevent someone else from creating a page for your organization without your knowledge. But if you aren’t going to publish a status update on Facebook at least once a week, if you aren’t going to mark “like” on every single comment made on your status updates, if you aren’t going to respond to questions and criticisms made on your status updates, then say so: publish a status update that says your organization does not regularly update its Facebook status update, and the best way to know what your organization is up to is… what? Check the web site regularly? Follow you on Twitter instead? Also, publish your email address in that one-and-only status update, and note that it’s the best way to reach you. Finally, set your privacy settings so that no one can post on your Facebook page, and so that if anyone mentions your organization on their own Facebook status update it doesn’t show up on your page.

learning from a campaign that went viral

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Sweeping the Internet this week: a viral video campaign by Invisible Children to make Joseph Kony, a terrorist leader in Uganda, a household name, and thereby get the media and politicans to pay attention. Viewership is through the roof, #KONY2012 is trending on Twitter, and the press is all over it. Even Lord Voldemort is on board:

voldemort protests kony

The video is here; jump to 10:30 on the video if you want to get to the heart of the video, and watch until 27:00, to get a sense of what the campaign is trying to achieve and how it will do so, without having to watch the whole thing – it’s 16 or so minutes of your life worth spending, both to learn about an important human rights campaign and to see how to make a campaign go viral.

This is already a wildly successful activism / digital story-telling campaign – but it’s not a campaign that can be easily replicated by *most* nonprofits.

Here’s why it is working:

  • it’s an easy-to-understand cause
  • it’s a cause that gets an immediate emotional-response by anyone who watches the video
  • it’s a slickly produced video – very well edited, compelling imagery, excellent script
  • it offers both simple and ambitious ways to get involved: at the very least, you can like the Invisible Children Facebook page, share the video with your online social network, and help get the word out further. At the other end of the spectrum, you can organize an event on April 20, per Invisible Children’s guidelines for such, garnering press coverage and participation on a local level for an international issue.
  • it builds up to a specific day – April 20
  • it has a wide range of items for sale for activists to wear and display on April 20, which will help publicize the event and help make participants easy to identify the day of the event, and the sale of those items helps fund the campaign
  • there are Invisible Children staff engaging with people on Twitter and Facebook for hours at a time – not just tweeting one link to a press release and hoping it catches on
  • it has an easy-to-remember Twitter tag that isn’t in use by anyone else: #KONY2012

It’s having that specific day of action and a video that creates in-depth awareness about a specific issue that, IMO, makes this go well beyond slacktivism/slackervism.

What did it take for this campaign to be successful:

  • money. Yes, I’m sure a lot of things were donated and a lot of expertise was give pro bono, but it still took money to pay for people and their time and knowledge to make this happen.
  • wide-ranging, deep relationships with key people (media, corporations, celebrities, politicians, communications strategists). These relationships took many months, even years, to cultivate – more than some tweets and email.
  • a very detailed, well-thought-out strategic plan. Somewhere, this plan is in writing, no matter how spontaneous the feeling this campaign is conveying.
  • a LOT of people to undertake the necessary outreach activities via traditional and online media. This isn’t just sending press releases; this is also engaging with people on Twitter and the phone for hours at a time. It took people to design the web site, to design the materials, to distribute those materials, to talk to the press – and it took those people MANY hours of work to do so, and it’s taking even more time to respond to all of the press and critics now focusing on the effort.

But while there is a lot to learn from this campaign for nonprofits and NGOs, this is not the campaign most should aspire to.

  • Most nonprofits and NGOs do NOT have the resources to make something like this happen – and never will.
  • Your nonprofit is probably engaged in something that’s only local, or that is a more complex issue to explain, and that doesn’t garner an immediate emotional response.
  • Your nonprofit might not be able to survive the incredible attention and scrutiny that a campaign like this would bring.

That doesn’t mean your nonprofit is less worthwhile than Invisible Children – it just means that having a video go viral nationally or internationally might not-at-all be what is best for YOUR nonprofit.

As you read about this campaign and see it get so much attention, think about what you really want from donors, volunteers, the press, politicians, clients and the general public regarding your organization.

Think about local celebrities, local policy makers, local leaders (both official ones, like elected officials, and unofficial ones, like prominent business people or local leaders of religious communities) and local activists – what do you want them to say about your organization, and how might you get them to?

Also see this TechSoup resource on Digital Storytelling.

Another lesson to learn from this campaign: don’t spam celebrities. I’ve seen a lot of celebrity Twitter feeds over-run with tweets from people begging for that person to follow or mention this or that nonprofit or cause. George Clooney probably gets 100 of those tweets in just one day! Don’t make George Clooney dislike your organization because you keep tweeting him, begging for a mention.

One of the things that has been amusing to see is the stampede of smug aid workers and other smugsters to condemn the campaign – the theme of the pushback falls into four categories:

Here’s why a lot of these criticisms are bogus:

Americans are some of the most globally-unaware people on the planet. I moved back to the USA in 2009 and have heard things every day by neighbors, people I volunteer with and people on TV that have reminded me of this every day. And this ignorance about the world leads to some profoundly ridiculous statements and actions by my fellow Americans. Maybe this campaign will help make a few people, particularly young people, aware of the world beyond the borders of the USA. BandAid/LiveAid did that for me once-upon-a-time – don’t laugh, but it did. I was a teenager in Kentucky as ignorant as a box of hammers. That record and that concert set me on a path for a lifetime.

Also, in the USA, no human rights movement has ever succeeded without a lot of outside pressure and support – and anyone who thinks apartheid was removed as an official policy in South Africa only because of pressure and evolution from within South Africa isn’t paying attention.

Some of the arguments I’ve heard about why the USA should not be focused on Uganda are the same arguments I’ve heard from China and Russia about why the world needs to not “interfere” with Syria.

Compassion for one thing breeds compassion for other things. No one – NO ONE – is saying, “Don’t be focused on local issues – instead, care about what’s happening in Uganda!” As this campaign ends, the people that have gotten caught up in it, particularly young people, are going to have a taste for advocacy and wanting to make a difference. If your local nonprofit is jealous, then start thinking now about how you are going to leverage what’s happening. Is there going to be an anti-Kony event at your local schools or in your local community? Then start designing the handbills you are going to give out at anti-Kony-related events to tell those energized young people about your local cause and how and why they can get involved.

By all means, offer legitimate criticisms of this campaign and Invisible Children. But some people are trying to kill this campaign – and I question their motivations in doing so.

Also see:

Use Your Web Site to Show Your Accountability and To Teach Others About the Nonprofit / NGO / Charity Sector

How to Make a Difference Internationally/Globally/in Another Country Without Going Abroad

Ideas for Leadership Volunteering Activities to make a difference locally

Advice for volunteering abroad (volunteering internationally)

What really happens when someone wants to volunteer with you?

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graphic by Jayne Cravens representing volunteersWhat really happens when someone calls, emails or stops by your organization and says, “I want to volunteer!”? Maybe you know what should happen in theory, but what’s the reality?

When I’ve consulted with organizations — both nonprofits and schools — regarding this challenge, the results are always a shock: it turns out that many volunteers are turned away, because the message from the potential candidate rarely gets forwarded to the right person, because the information given to the potential volunteer is incomplete, uninspiring or even incorrect, or because followup with the volunteer doesn’t happen quickly or at all.

How to find out what’s happening at your organization with potential volunteers? Here are some ideas;

  • Sit down with each and every person who answers the phone and have a checklist they must go through for every person who calls, emails or stops by to express interest in volunteering (be sure to get approval from that person’s supervisor before you do this). An example of the checklist could be:
    • The person who talks with the potential volunteering fills out a log sheet with the candidate’s name, phone number, email address and the date of their call, email or site visit. This log sheet should be reviewed regularly by the volunteer coordinator or other manager to see what has happened with each of these people in terms of communication by  the organization regarding how to volunteer.
    • The person who interacts with the potential volunteer on the phone, via email or in-person gives that candidate the volunteer coordinator’s name, phone number and email.
    • The person who interacts with the candidate directs the person to the organization’s web site to download and complete an application

Just these three very simple steps — none of which are any significant burden on the person answering the phone or the organization’s email or greeting people at the front desk — are enough for you to find out what’s happening to people who inquire about volunteering with your organization: How many people inquire about volunteering versus how many people come to the first volunteer training? Is there too much time between a person’s inquiry or application and when they get to come to a first meeting or get placed in an assignment? This checklist, particularly the log sheet, will tell you, as will calling people on the login sheet later to survey them about their experience.

  • Have five friends or colleagues from outside your organization call or email your organization on different days, at different times, to inquire about volunteering, and afterwards, interview them about their experiences. Also look at the log-in sheet to make sure their inquiries were recorded. What are they consistently told by your organization? What are they not told but should have been? Were they logged in properly by the person they talked with? Do they walk away with a feeling of, “We really want you involved with us!” or “We’re really busy and we don’t know when we will get back to you”?
  • Survey all people who have applied to volunteer in the last three-six months. How do their rate the experience of when they asked to volunteer? What do they remembering being told? Did they walk away from that initial inquiry with a feeling of, “We really want you involved with us!” or “We’re really busy and we don’t know when we will get back to you”? What do they think could be improved about the experience?

These activities may lead to a very harsh reality staff may be reluctant to face: you may find out that your organization is regularly turning away people who want to volunteer. Talking about this with staff can be a challenge: people may become defensive about their actions, or lack their of (“I was really busy that day” or “I’m doing the best I can!”).

With those answering the phone or the organization’s email or greeting people at the front desk, emphasize that none of the checklist activities are any significant time burden; you may even want to do a skit to show just how quickly the activities can be undertaken. Make sure their supervisor’s agree that this is an appropriate and necessary use of their time.

The harder part will be to convince staff that everyone has a responsibility to make potential volunteers feel energized about the organization. Do you believe this yourself? If so, talk with senior management individually to get each of them on board with this idea and ask them to bring it up with their own direct reports. Also, talk about it when you meet with individual staff in formal meetings and informal settings, and present on the topic formally in staff trainings. If you aren’t convinced of this yourself… I think that’s something I’ll have to address in a different blog.

For trainings for staff on dealing with potential volunteers, skits can really help. For instance, present one as a worst-case scenario, in a humorous way, of someone asking about volunteering and being turned away with lack of enthusiasm, and then present another to show how easy it is to make a potential volunteer feel excited and welcomed. These can each be just a couple of minutes. The more outrageous or extreme these skits are, the more fun they will be and the more likely that staff will remember the lessons and take them to heart.

In reading this and the earlier blog entry about this challenge, you were probably assuming that I was thinking the volunteer coordinator would undertake all of the above investigation activities. But that may not be the case for all these steps; the Executive Director or an outside consultant may be that person instead. If you are that executive or consultant, what if you discover that the problem regarding volunteer recruitment is the volunteer coordinator herself/himself? What if you discover that the volunteer coordinator is not getting information in a timely manner regarding people who want to volunteer with your organization, or isn’t exhibiting an enthusiastic, encouraging attitude with potential volunteers?

I’ll address that in a blog later this week…

A version of this blog first appeared in October 2009.

Also see: 

If you have benefited from this blog or other parts of my web site or my YouTube videos and would like to support the time that went into researching information, developing material, preparing articles, updating pages, etc. (I receive no funding for this work), here is how you can help. 

Can potential volunteers find you?

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How Easy Is It to Find This Online: Your Organization’s Volunteering Opportunities?

Let’s find out…

Go to Google or Bing.

Type in the name of your city (and, perhaps, your state too, if there are many cities in your country with the same name) and the word volunteer. Or the words volunteers.

For instance:

Portland Oregon volunteers
Henderson Kentucky volunteers
Austin Texas volunteering

Or add a keyword (or words) related to your organization:

Portland Oregon animal shelter volunteers
Henderson Kentucky children volunteers
Austin Texas computer volunteering

What comes up? Does YOUR organization show up in the first page of results? On the second page of results? If it doesn’t, look at your web site: does your web site use the name of your city and state and the word volunteer on the home page, on the page about supporting your organization, on the page about volunteering with your organization, etc.?

Also try this with Twitter: type in the name of your city and the word volunteers into the search function. What comes up? Are people looking for volunteering opportunities (meaning you should contact them!)? Does anything your organization has tweeted recently come up?

In short – how easy is it for people using the Internet to find volunteering opportunities at your organization? If it’s not easy, then is it any wonder you are having trouble recruiting volunteers?

Also see:

REQUIRED Volunteer Information on Your Web Site

Your flow chart for volunteers
(example of an effective volunteer in-take process)

Learning, learning everywhere

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I find ideas about marketing to specific groups, and regarding community / volunteer engagement, everywhere. I can’t stop looking. It’s like an obsession.

  • While riding through Kabul and seeing so many young men wearing t-shirts featuring stars of World Wrestling Entertainment, all I could think was, why doesn’t USAID get these people to make public service announcements on the Internet and TV, targeted at Afghans, about immunizations, HIV prevention, girls education, alternatives to poppy growing – really, whatever!
  • At a dirt track race in Indiana: I looked around at the audience and thought, wow, this would be a great demographic to recruit for volunteering. I’d put my information booth right over there…
  • At the senior apartments where my grandmothers live and where I’m staying this week to care for them: every day I’ve come up with new ways volunteers could be helping here (all of which I’m adding to this resource as they come to me).
  • At a Triumph motorcycle riding day: this corporate event involved volunteers NOT to save money, but because volunteers were the BEST people for the jobs.
  • While driving on any highway, I glance up at billboards and say, in my head, “Win” or “Fail” based on whether or not I know what the billboard is saying at a glance. If it is packed with text, or what text it has (like the web address), is too small, FAIL.

It’s sad, I know… but it’s cheaper than going to conferences or paying for access to academic studies!

And now you know where I get so many of my ideas… be kind…

 

Get your 2012 events on Facebook NOW

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Facebook continues to be the most popular online social networking tool, and while that will surely change eventually – just as it did for AOL and MySpace before it – right now, and for the next few years, Facebook cannot be ignored as an effective communications tool for nonprofit organizations, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), schools, government agencies and other mission-based programs to get the word out about events.

A terrific microvolunteering assignment for an online volunteer is to have them input all of your organization or program’s public or semi-public events for the coming months on the Facebook calendar. He or she should input the name, date, time and a short description for each event. Events you will want to share include conferences your organization is hosting or organizing, an open house, a class your organization is hosting, all volunteer orientations, or any other public event or semi-public event, such as an annual volunteer meeting (making it clear that a person would have to be a currently-registered volunteer to attend).

Even if you invite people to events in other ways – via email, via a special meeting web site, via whatever online calendar you use, etc. – put your events in Facebook as well. This will serve as a reminder to people about the event, as well as potentially attracting more attendees (as appropriate).

Here’s an example of what an event on Facebook looks like; note that the example is a virtual event, one that doesn’t require physical attendance. However, you will want to also post events where people will be in a particular time and place, onsite or online, in order to participate.

Once the volunteer has completed the assignment of posting your 2012 events on your Facebook page, invite all of your organization or program’s Facebook friends – volunteers, donors, partner organizations, clients – to each event via Facebook, as appropriate. If they mark that they are attending on Facebook, all of their Facebook friends will be able to see that intention, and they may decide to attend as well (as appropriate).

Make it clear if RSVPing via Facebook is or is NOT the official way to RSVP; attendees may still have to RSVP through traditional channels (filling out an online form on your web site, calling the organization, paying a registration fee, etc.). Also make it clear how public the event is; if someone needs to already be a volunteer that has gone through an orientation, or a season ticket holder, or a registered student, note that on the event.

Be explicit about any fees or costs associated with attending!

If the event is not fully public – if children will be present, and the only people permitted to attend are registered, screened volunteers and employees – then leave out the location of the event, and note on the event description what an adult has to do in order to be able to attend.

Don’t invite people to more than two events at a time (say, within one week); people don’t want to receive invitations to all of your events in 2012 in one afternoon.

Encourage your employees and volunteers that use their Facebook accounts for work or volunteering to do the same – but do NOT require anyone to use their Facebook accounts in this way – many people keep work or volunteering activities off their Facebook account. Recognize those that do by thanking them on Facebook, or at your next staff meeting.

Monitor your Faceobook account, and respond to comments made on the Facebook event, as appropriate. It’s imperative that you respond to comments the same day they are posted!

This is all easy to do – and a great way for an online volunteer to help your organization if your current staff or onsite volunteers don’t have time to do this. The only requirement for you is that you provide very detailed information about your events for the year, and you review the information after the volunteer has uploaded it, to ensure the information is correct. If you need to make changes, you can do so, without going through the volunteer – and you can easily take away administrator privileges you have to give to a volunteer to undertake this assignment.

Get busy! And keep your info up-to-date!