Tag Archives: public relations

Be careful using Canva – nonprofit graphics are starting to all look the same!

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three cartoon people are jumping

I had never used Canva before August 2022. I’m not much of a graphic designer and would never be hired for such, but since I work mostly for nonprofits, I also usually don’t have a budget for a professional graphic designer, so I have to make due on my own. But my primary employer these days has an account with Canva and I’ve been able to use it.

Canva is really amazing and I use it often. BUT, I am also noticing something: a lot of graphics on social media produced by nonprofits and independent bloggers is starting to look the same. The drawn human images on Canva look very similar in style. And I live in a small community and I’ve seen one particular Canva design used by three different nonprofits for their galas – same image and colors.

Here are some tips for making your products produced via Canva unique:

  • Never use a template without a LOT of alteration. Add or change the graphics, change colors, change fonts, etc. Otherwise you risk having an image that looks almost exactly like someone else’s.
  • Never use photos from Canva. Use your own photos. Make sure your volunteers and staff have all signed photo releases, and use photos of them. Same for clients: make sure you have photo releases and, of course, that using their photos publicly is allowed.
  • Alter any ready-made images in your own designs. Flip some horizontally. Change the clothes colors for what the people in the drawings are wearing, for instance. Change skin tones. Change hair colors. If you can’t do this in Canva, use whatever graphic design software that came free on your computer to do it.
  • Follow nonprofits in your area on social media and read their posts regularly. This can help you avoid using similar designs.
  • Canva images tend to not be as diverse as you might need. It can be hard to find a family image with diverse members, for instance, or a family that might better represent a Latino family, a black family, a family where the mother is wearing a hijab or chunni, a family where the men are wearing a dastaar, etc. Or to find a classroom drawing with a diversity among students. I sometimes search for images representing a cultural group specifically so I can make sure my imagery of a family scene, a crowd scene, a classroom, etc. better reflects the community served by the local nonprofit I work for.
  • Standards in graphic design still apply when using Canva: you need to have excellent color contrast for text versus the text background, you need to have an overarching word, phrase or image, one that is bigger than everything else so that it draws in the viewer, you need to think about how you want someone’s eye to move across the graphic, the image should be easily and immediately understood, you need to make sure the graphic has all of the information needed or will be accompanied by the text of all that is needed, etc.

I’m not at all saying don’t use Canva. But don’t get complacent and confuse ease of use with good practice.

Web Sites Still Matter

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For the last decade – maybe the last 15 years – the web site home pages of nonprofits, corporations, even news outlets, were rarely the focus of most people’s regular attention; these organizations’ outlets relied on social media to distribute their information. Users read the information they wanted because they subscribed or followed or “liked” the entities or messaging they wanted to stay up-to-date about, and got more recommendations through algorithmically personalized recommendations. As The New Yorker put it:

News articles circulated as individual URLs, floating in the ether of social-media feeds, divorced from their original publishers. With rare exceptions, home pages were reduced to the role of brand billboards; you might check them out in passing, but they weren’t where the action lay.

But Twitter, now X, has imploded and is bleeding users. Facebook is overrun with ads and push marketing, burying the pages and accounts a user wants to see under a mountain of paid messaging. Social media infrastructure is crumbling, having become both ineffective for publishers and alienating for users. Social networks are overwhelmed by misinformation and content generated by artificial intelligence. 

Again, back to The New Yorker article:

Surrounded by dreck, the digital citizen is discovering that the best way to find what she used to get from social platforms is to type a URL into a browser bar and visit an individual site. Many of those sites, meanwhile, have worked hard to make themselves feel a bit more like social media, with constant updates, grabby visual stimuli, and a sense of social interaction. 

Things aren’t all good for the World Wide Web, as this article from The Atlantic notes:

Large language models, or LLMs, are trained on massive troves of material—nearly the entire internet in some cases. They digest these data into an immeasurably complex network of probabilities, which enables them to synthesize seemingly new and intelligently created material; to write code, summarize documents, and answer direct questions in ways that can appear human…. Just as there is an entire industry of scammy SEO-optimized websites trying to entice search engines to recommend them so you click on them, there will be a similar industry of AI-written, LLMO-optimized sites. And as audiences dwindle, those sites will drive good writing out of the market.

Another article in The Atlantic says that domain names (but not web sites) are no longer essential.

I believe that web sites still matter. I believe domain names still matter, because so many people, and so many organizations, and so many cities and regions, have these same name, so search engine results aren’t always all you need.

Back in 2012, I wrote a blog called Why Your Organization Probably Doesn’t Need A Facebook Page. I added in 2017 that I still believe 90% of what was proposed in that blog, and reading it now, I still believe that. That doesn’t mean you should NOT have a Facebook page, but you should think very seriously what you want it to do. For the Habitat for Humanity ReStore I support, Facebook outreach has been fundamental to sales; take it away, and I think sales would drop at least 25%, maybe more. But I also work for a nonprofit that is much larger, that is focused on technology and nonprofits, and if their Facebook page disappeared tomorrow, no one would notice.

Your organization, your program, your city – it needs a permanent home on the web, a place that all your other online activities point back to, the place that’s there when the latest social media trendy platform fades. When I join an organization, it’s so easy to become well-versed in what that organization does if they have a web site: I not only read that, I go back on archive.org and read past versions of their web sites. I find out if the ReStore is traditionally closed on a particular holiday. I find photos from past events featuring a former board member who I have learned has died and I need to create a tribute. I double -heck the dates of an event I will attend. A web site is also for your employees and volunteers, not just potential new supporters.

I have an entire section on my web site about nonprofit web sites: what should be on a nonprofit’s web site and how that web site should be designed and managed. I started it back in the 1990s and have updated it regularly. There was a time in the early part of this century when I thought maybe it was time to take the section down, that web sites weren’t needed anymore. I’m so glad I didn’t – the material is needed as much now as it has ever been.

Also see:

If you have benefited from this blog, my other blogs, or other parts of my web site 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. 

The delicate, peculiar task of promoting a charity’s gala

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A gala charity event is a sophisticated, upscale party hosted by a nonprofit. At a gala, guests dress up in formal clothes, enjoy what is supposed to be very good food, socialize and are entertained in some way. Gala guests pay a lot of money to attend and then are further solicited for donations or to bid on auction items, many of them high-end, with the money raised going to the nonprofit.

Most galas are considered successful if they break even financially – galas that raise large amounts of money after expenses are paid are quite rare. So why have galas if they don’t bring in much money? Because most board members and other supporters may want to socialize with each other and celebrate – they’ve sat through many meetings, they’ve shouldered a great deal of leadership responsibility, they’ve discussed and debated all year long, and now they want to have an enjoyable time. It’s a time to renew, reflect, and reward themselves for work well done. And it can also be an important social event in a community: this may be a chance for aspiring and current politicians to network and an opportunity for business owners to show they are interested in community affairs.

Gala events have been a mainstay of nonprofits for many generations. But galas have also always faced criticism from people who see them as inappropriate, especially for nonprofits focused on issues regarding poverty and inequity. And such criticism seems to be growing among younger people. As one article put it:

Why juxtapose calls to feed the hungry, house the homeless and cure cancer with champagne toasts and caviar hors d’oeuvres? As researchers who study charities, we understand why opulent bashes that raise money for good causes seem puzzling. These inherently contradictory events intended to help people in need double as vehicles for the rich and famous to show off their largesse.

Those feelings among at least some community members can make marketing a gala difficult – something I have been facing as I promote the annual gala for a small nonprofit focused on affordable housing and housing equity. I want to make sure I reach people beyond the board who might attend, but I also don’t want to do anything that reminds this nonprofit’s clients or thrift store patrons that we’re holding an “opulent bash” they probably can’t afford to attend.

Market a gala the wrong way and you could end up with not just a poorly attended event that costs money instead of earning it, but also a public relations problem.

The gala will happen, the board members and others attending will have a fun time and, hopefully, feel re-energized about their volunteering with the organization. We might even manage to introduce some new people to the organization. And we certainly hope to at least break even financially.

While galas may eventually be abandoned, for now, they still have an important role at many organizations, including the one I’m supporting. That’s undeniable.

That said, here are two comments about galas worth considering.

A gala is not major gift fundraising, nor does it really have anything to do with philanthropy… in rare cases, it provides enough net revenue to justify having one. A gala is almost 100% transactional in nature. In other words, it’s not about connecting a donor’s specific passions and interests with the need you’re addressing. To be honest, it’s creating an avenue for you to invite donors and their friends to, for one night, feel good about what you do.
That’s not Philanthropy.
Can it be useful for cultivating major donors? Yes, in some cases. Can it inspire some folks to become donors? Yes, in some cases. Is it possible to make more net revenue by doing a gala than by cultivating major donors? No.
From veritus group.com.

Use your galas as a chance to continue showcasing your work, but be mindful that they may not be the centerpiece of your fundraising strategy forever… Don’t let the changing landscape around events catch your organization off guard. Galas may not be going anywhere in the next few years, but they’re likely to lose importance as millennials take on a greater share of our donor bases. Now is the time to rethink your plan and get ready for those changing dynamics.
From Team Kat and Mouse.

Also see this article, Nonprofits turn to tech to court younger more diverse donors.

Are you also facing difficulties in promoting a gala? Do you face challenges in marketing at a nonprofit because of how certain activities could be, or are, negatively perceived?

And speaking of fundraising:

If you have benefited from this blog, my other blogs, or other parts of my web site 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. 

Executive Directors & Board Members: Get Out in Your Communities

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image of a panel discussion

The forum for candidates running for local city council or mayor, or county-level elected office.

The opening of the community farmer’s market.

The Spring musical by the community theater.

The rummage sale by the largest church in town.

The open house at the local mosque.

The Day of the Dead celebrations at the Hispanic cultural center.

The local Juneteeth celebration.

Your nonprofit MUST have representation at community events. Your executive director or a member of your board needs to be there, meeting people, shaking hands, listening to their program, showing your nonprofit organization is a part of the community.

I love the Internet, including social media. Yes, still. Any nonprofit that ignores its Internet presence, or doesn’t try to do something meaningful and collaborative online, is foolish and isn’t going to last. But the same is true for onsite, face-to-face community networking: you have to show that you care as much for other nonprofits as you want them to care for you. You have to look directly into the eyes of elected officials if you want your organization to matter to them.

What does this kind of in-person networking get you?

  • More donors.
  • More volunteers.
  • More and more appropriate client referrals and larger audiences for your programs and messaging.
  • More collaboration.
  • More community support, including cross-party political support.

“But I don’t have time!” you whine.

No, the problem is you don’t MAKE the time. Of course, you can’t go to absolutely everything – but you must build a list of key events and decide at which ones someone from your organization needs to be present.

Your marketing director, the chair of marketing on your board, or a trusted volunteer needs to research upcoming community events EVERY MONTH. Get it on a calendar and let the Executive Director, board members, even the entire staff, have a look. Encourage those that could represent the organization to choose what they might be able to go to – some might already have plans to go and hadn’t thought about going as a representative of your organization.

Prep your staff and volunteers that go to events on behalf of your organization in how to present themselves as representatives:

Give them an opening statement, like, “Hi, I’m so-and-so, and I’m a board member of such-and-such organization. Great event!” It’s that simple. Who do they say this to? Anyone they think might have something to do with organizing the event.

Over time, this kind of engagement cultivates a familiarity with your organization. Your organization seems more approachable and collaborative. Someone might tell you about partnership opportunities, a great candidate for your board, even misinformation about your organization that is spreading. You may find out about a local funding opportunity you would not have otherwise. A candidate for office may decide the cause you address – affordable housing, the performing arts, domestic violence, recycling – is worth supporting as a policy or legislatively.

And don’t be surprised if your online followers increase and your online messaging starts to have a lot more reach as well.

If you have benefited from this blog, my other blogs, or other parts of my web site 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. 

GirlGuiding Attempt at Inclusion Raises Ire of Many

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graphic by Jayne Cravens representing volunteers

Last week, I blogged about the controversy at the Art Institute of Chicago per their dismissing their entire volunteer docent membership and their plans to replace the volunteers with paid staff, in pursuit of a more diverse corps of museum guides to interact with the public.

GirlGuiding in the United Kingdom, the UK’s version of the Girl Scouts, has also incurred the wrath of many for one of its efforts at volunteer inclusion: on October 28th, the organization sent out a tweet that ended with, a shout-out to all of our asexual volunteers and members – thank you for everything you do in Girlguiding.

More than 2000 people liked the tweet. But the tweets-of-outrage were swift and many: the complaints focused on a belief that GirlGuiding was sexualising children with such messaging. One response that was representative of most of the negative responses: Why do your guides need to know whether your volunteers have a presence or absence of sexual desire? A nonprofit in the UK, Safe Schools Alliance UK, which has worked against allowing children to use the bathroom that corresponds with the gender with which they identify and works against bans on gay conversion therapy, is pushing back hard against the GirlGuide messaging. This group promotes its agenda as part of responsible safeguarding, the term used in the UK and Ireland regarding measures to protect the health, well-being and human rights of individuals, especially children and vulnerable adults, better ensuring they live free from abuse, harm and neglect.

I offer this info on this controversy for two reasons:

  1. Creating and launching efforts in support of the diversity of volunteers your organization has, or wants, and in support of accommodation of that diversity, will always attract complaints, immediately or eventually. There may be just a few, there may be many. Some of the complaints will be sincere and from individuals not a part of any “movement” or organization, and some of the complaints will be from volunteers and paid staff of very well-organized groups. Either way, your organization needs to have thought about how to answer questions and comments like why are you doing this and why is this necessary and this puts young people in danger.
  2. People asking the question or making the comment aren’t all obtuse or rigid. Don’t assume everyone complaining is so when you craft replies. Provide a response that comes from the point of view of this person just needs more and better information in order to support this statement or decision. Will such a response convince everyone? No. But your reply is being seen by people who aren’t entirely sure how they feel about the situation. Perceived arrogance on your part can drive those people who are on the fence into the arms of people and organizations who are only too happy to provide carefully word-smithed, detailed responses to frame their point of view.

My perspective: I adore GirlGuides and Girl Scouts of the USA. I deeply admire the commitment of both to ensuring all girls feel they can be a part of their activities. This isn’t the first time they’ve done something that’s lead to controversy. But no one – NO ONE – can say the GirlGuides and Girl Scouts don’t put safeguarding at the top of their list of priorities.

I also know that change can be painful – not just for others, but also for me. Work regarding inclusion and diversity is not easy, because many societal norms are deeply held, and cherished beliefs are challenged by conversations around inclusion and diversity – and that’s uncomfortable. It’s easy for a person to feel attacked during such conversations. I’ve seen diversity and inclusion experts be angered at the idea that they need for their own web sites to meet accessibility standards so that people with disabilities and using assistive technologies can access their online information – in their talks about inclusion, they were focused on ethnic and cultural groups, not people with disabilities, and the realization is embarrassing and painful.

I assure you that, eventually, even if you consider yourself an advocate for inclusion and diversity, you will have a moment where your own deeply held principles are challenged, and you will feel anger and you will be incredulous. Maybe you will decide to hold on to those principles – I’m not here to say you should or shouldn’t. But remember that feeling the next time you are facing it from someone else.

We’re all on a journey. That includes me.

One last thing: a chastisement to all of the organizations and consultants touting themselves as volunteer engagement experts and as the leaders of conversations on volunteerism who are silent on this and other controversies in volunteer engagement. I challenged you to comment on organizations that charge big money from volunteers, to comment on organizations that say if a person that has been assigned community service will pay a fee, the organization will give them a letter saying they did the hours required by the court which assigned that community service, to weigh in regarding governments wanting to require welfare recipients to volunteer in order to receive benefits and to comment about the situation at the Chicago museum – so far, you haven’t. In addition to having upbeat conversations about how managers of volunteers can build their brand or raise their profiles in their organizations or get a hug for International Volunteer Manager’s Day, we need to be having these very difficult conversations and controversial subjects. In fact, we should be leading the conversations.

And I love how the corporate world, which always has oh-so-much to say about how nonprofits should operate, are oh-so-silent during these conversations as well.

Also see:

Call for papers on Marketing to Cultivate & Retain Donors, Members & Volunteers

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Call for papers: special issue of International Review on Public and Nonprofit Marketing on marketing to cultivate and retain donors, members and volunteers. Submission deadline: June 15, 2020.

From the marketing blurb:

Charities and other nonprofit organizations rely upon marketing to cultivate and maintain relationships with supporters, without which most nonprofit organizations would not have resources to fulfill their missions.  Given the mission-critical need for effective marketing strategies and tactics in order to attract and retain supporters such as donors, members, and volunteers; this special issue is especially timely. 

Manuscripts that further our knowledge on cultivating and retaining support from donors, members, and volunteers are encouraged.  A wide variety of related topics are desired beginning with identifying prospects to deepening the commitment of supporters.  Theoretical, empirical, and literature review articles (including meta-analyses) are welcome.

Manuscripts should be prepared following the normal guidelines for the journal and should be submitted through the journal’s online system.  Please be sure to submit your manuscript for this special issue when submitting through the online system.

The guest editor is Professor Walter Wymer, University of Lethbridge, Canada and he can be reached at walter.wymer@uleth.ca – for more information, refer to the journal’s website at https://www.springer.com/journal/12208

How long should text be to communicate effectively?

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  • How long should a web page be?
  • How long should text on a brochure page be?
  • How long should a press release be?
  • How long should a blog be?

I get these questions fairly often from nonprofits, NGOs, charities and small government offices.

Tweets have a text limit. Facebook posts have a limit on the amount of text you can post that will be seen in your timeline at a glance, without someone having to click “more.” But other communications products, in print and online, don’t have such strict character limits. So, how long should they be when it comes to their text?

A lot of communications professionals will tell you to make web page text, blogs, brochure text, etc., no longer than what would fit into a social media post. I am NOT one of those communications professionals.

I’m hearing people say, “People don’t read. Don’t write long bodies of text EVER, especially online.” I am NOT one of those people.

People have different learning styles: some prefer learning by engaging in an activity, some prefer learning by listening, some prefer to learn by watching, and some prefer to learn by reading.

People have different reading styles as well, even just online: some prefer reading short bits of text and seeing some short videos. But some do still like prefer – and WANT – to read comprehensive text, even if it’s “long.” What is great about a website is that your organization can easily cater to both of those groups: you can have a web page with introductory, summary, “catchy” text, or a video that’s just a minute long and gives the overview you think certain groups want, but that page or video can then link to the more in-depth information for all those many other people that want more information.

It’s worth noting that some people may want a bit of information today, but may come back later for more in-depth information. People rarely stay in exactly the same categories when it comes to how they want to access or consume information.

It’s also worth noting that by having in-depth information on your website, you create the messaging that everyone on your staff can refer back to, and that better ensures everyone is saying the same thing – that everyone is “staying on message.” It means your Executive Director, your receptionist, members of your board, volunteers – EVERYONE – can find the exact wording to describe absolutely everything about your program.

Catering to just one group of people when you are trying to communicate a message is a mistake. Don’t let any communications consultant or marketing manager pressure your organization into creating communications products only for the people that supposedly don’t like to read. Don’t be convinced that you can eliminate all of your long-form communications – you absolutely still need those.

If you have benefited from this blog or other parts of my web site 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. 

Poverty porn, survivor porn, inspiration porn

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Sophie Otiende is a program consultant for HAART Kenya, a nonprofit that bills itself as the only organization in Kenya that works exclusively on eradicating human trafficking. In this podcast with The Nonprofit Quarterly, Otiende discusses her anti-trafficking work and why awareness campaigns fail to deter vulnerable women who are already suffering from poverty and abuse in their own homes. She also says donors must do a better job of providing emotional support to frontline staff. And she talks about the ethics around what The Nonprofit Quarterly calls “survivor porn,” which happens when survivors of trauma are asked by a nonprofit to provide an account of their causes, in a video, in an interview with the press, etc., to provide an emotional hook to attract donors to the nonprofit. The podcast asks some hard questions about the power dynamics between survivors and the nonprofits that have helped them.

On a related note is this article from March 2019 from the Thinking Person’s Guide to Autism: “Inspiration Porn: How the Media and Society Objectify Disabled People.” This article is about, specifically, someone film or taking photos of a person with a disability in public doing just about anything – eating, getting on and off a bus, going down the street – without that person’s permission, and then uploading it to social media with some sort of inspirational message, making the person with a disability’s experience a “feel good” story. Even journalists are guilty of this. Often, the stories are about someone helping the person with a disability – say, to push their wheelchair over a corner curb that doesn’t have a curb cut – which deflects from what should be the real story: why doesn’t the curb have a curb cut? As one person in the story says, “Inspiration porn makes us feel that everything is going to be OK.”

Both of these are, like “poverty porn”, voyeuristic. As Skye Davey says in this article, “It captures human beings in vulnerable, deeply personal moments, and packages that trauma (and humiliation) for consumption.” All three over-simplify poverty, famine, human rights issues, sex trafficking, accessibility and challenges for people with disabilities, and other complex issues. It promotes a fiction that these issues can be fought with charity and message-promotion on social media, without structural change.

In this opinion piece in The Guardian, Jennifer Lentfer notes:

Poverty, disease, injustice, and conflict are all heartbreaking. But sometimes the work needed to tackle them is not new, innovative, or sexy. It might be citizens demanding fundamental services like improved healthcare or better roads; or governments better managing their budgets; or pressing local agencies to be more responsive to public concerns… We must highlight the grey area between our interventions and the reality of how social change occurs. Trust the public with a little more nuance – they can handle it.

The subhead on this Guardian piece says, “Our job is to tell compelling stories without trivialising people’s lives – and to promote a more nuanced narrative about how to achieve lasting change.” Without poverty porn, survivor porn or inspiration porn. It can sometimes be a difficult balance, but it’s a balance worth pursuing.

There are some good resources regarding ethics and photography in humanitarian work that have advice that can be applied for nonprofits working with vulnerable populations (people who are homeless, people experiencing addiction, people who have experienced domestic violence, foster children, people with disabilities, etc.) in their own countries, including:

I would love to hear from others about how they maintain this balance in their representation of vulnerable populations in public relations and marketing materials.

Also see:

If you have benefited from this blog or other parts of my web site 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. 

Factors for Success for a Neighborhood or Town-Based Online Community

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Back in the early 1990s, before the World Wide Web began dominating the Internet landscape, there were different platforms that various individuals, groups and communities were using to share resources, have discussions, etc., and some city governments, like Cupertino and San Jose in California, were quick to try to harness such to create more transparency regarding information and decision-making with their constituencies.

Now, 25 years later, city and county governments in particular avoid online engagement. They will post information to agency Web sites but rarely offer a way to comment or discuss such online. A municipality may have a Facebook page for city government, they may have individual Facebook pages for different departments (parks and recreation, health department, etc.), and they may have a Twitter account or two – but citizens are actively discouraged from using the comments on Facebook or replies on Twitter to ask questions, report an issue, express an opinion, etc., and government employees, even volunteer members of government advisory boards, committees & decision-making commissions, are discouraged from interacting with anyone on a public online forum (some go so far as to encourage interactions via email as well).

In April of 2014, Ashley Roth, a resident of Forest Grove, Oregon, population 24,000+, started a moderated Facebook group for the community. She is neither an employee with a government agency nor an office-holder in the city, and she has no affiliation with any newspaper, nonprofit or civic group. Her vision for this online community was similar to those early regionally-based online community efforts back in the 1990s: to create an online discussion space, “a watering hole of sorts for the community, a bulletin board, a place to share events and get involved with volunteering and with the city in an uplifting manner. To positively impact your immediate surroundings and to encourage others to do so, leading by example with what you would like to see from everyone else.”

I’m profiling her Forest Grove Facebook Community here in my blog because I think it’s a great example of the kind of online community those Silicon Valley government leaders envisioned back in the 1990s, and I think the way Ashley administers the group provides a terrific model for any municipality that might dare to buck the current fear-based approach to social media and decide to use it, instead, to engage with their constituency.

What’s also remarkable about Ashley and this group is that Ashley has no formal training regarding meeting facilitation or online community management – yet, her group and moderation style are, in my opinion, a model for others. I’m on or have been on more online communities than I can count, starting back in the 1990s with USENET – my perspective is from more than two decades of experience.

I interviewed Ashley in April 2019 via email for this blog. In the interest of transparency, please note that I am one of the volunteer moderators of this community.

Ashley noted in our interview, “When I first started FGC, I only anticipated reaching roughly 500 members. Little did I know that 500 would more than quadruple in the first two years.” In fact, as of the date of this blog post, there are almost 8000 members of the community. The group averages anywhere from 15 to 40 posts a day – and comments in one day can be just a few dozen to hundreds.

The Forest Grove Facebook community’s region is defined as all of Washington County west of Hillsboro, including the rural communities of Cornelius, Gaston, Gales Creek, Banks and Timber. The group is moderated, but neither posts nor comments are reviewed before they are published – posts and comments are removed only if a moderator notices a violation or such are reported by a community member. The rules for the community are posted on the “about” section of the community, and set the tone for what the community should feel like as well as detail appropriate and inappropriate behavior. Reminders about the rules are posted to the community regularly:

Welcome to the Forest Grove Community page. This page was created by citizens of FG and is not affiliated with the City of FG or its employees. The admins and mods are all volunteers and help to run this page out of the kindness of their hearts :-). Our goal is to keep the community informed on events, history, local meetings and happenings in our town, along with healthy and constructive conversations between all of us. It is always best to lead with respect, as these are your friends, neighbors, teachers, gas attendants, waitresses and business owners. Let’s be exceptionally helpful, we can make this world what we would like to be if we lead by the example we would like to see.

There are rules implemented to make everyone’s life here easier, they are as follows:

  1. No spamming FGC with multi-level marketing posts or click bait. We DO have a weekly Friday post where you can add your MLM business.
  2. Slandering a specific person or small local business is highly frowned upon and can/will result in a muting or a ban. We understand rough days but follow protocol with the person/business first, then go ahead and vent.
  3. Small businesses in our area, feel free to post once per day if it applies to you. Local farms included. While big box stores are fine to share, let’s keep them to a minimum of one per week.
  4. Please refrain from publicly shaming people unless you have filed a police report and are actively searching for the vehicle/person.
  5. Politics are fine if they are local to our area. If you have a political discussion you would like to have with the group that is not local to our area, find an admin and run your idea by them first.
  6. Make it a goal to positively impact your community online, and in person.
  7. PLEASE feel free to share history, stories, photos, events in town, and any other information that may be beneficial to the community.
  8. Look at the list of admins, find one you are comfortable with, when it comes time to tag an admin, use your tagging power if you think a post should be examined.
  9. PM your admin of choice if you are iffy on what it is your posting, they can reassure you if it is appropriate for the page or not.
  10. Garage sales are totally fine to post, but personal sales (like classified ads) are not. If you have something for free you are giving away to a family in need, those are typically okay to post as well.
  11. Freedom of speech does not apply to facebook groups, If you want to freak out about free speech and censorship this can and will result in an immediate ban. Private FB groups do not have to cater to your opinions on how the group should be run. This does not make anyone a communist, you were invited into our living room and if you start breaking stuff you don’t get to stay.
  12. Try to keep the content FG related or related to our general area (Gaston, Cornelius, Banks, Timber, Gales Creek, Vernonia, Cherry Grove, Manning, Buxton, West Hillsboro, Dilley, Laurel) Thanks all! ~FGC Admins

People are added to the community by requesting to join through the Facebook function for such and then answering three questions:

  • Do you currently live in FG/Banks/Gaston/Gales Creek/Cornelius/Timber/Vernonia? What is your zip code?
  • Are you capable of maintaining civil discourse even in heated discussions?
  • Do you agree to check out the “about” section upon joining and agree to the rules posted?

Before approving a member, Ashley can see their answers to these questions as well as the name they use on Facebook, how many friends they have, how many groups they are a part of, when they joined Facebook, and any information they have chosen to share in their profile, such as where they live, where they work, where they went to school, etc. If they haven’t made their posts private, Ashley – and anyone else, for that matter – can see those too. Requests for membership are rejected if the person doesn’t answer the questions, joined Facebook only recently, has no obvious ties to the community, or has a page filled with especially volatile messages, such as tirades against various religions or ethnic groups, insults against ex spouses or ex employers, promotion of violence, etc.

“Profiles with no pictures, no friends, brand new profiles, and covered with troll pictures (yes this is a thing) are not accepted. I have to find at least 1-2 things on your personal profile or by your answers that ties you to our area. If you aren’t very clear, you don’t get to join.”

One of the keys to the community’s success is that Ashley adds new members slowly – just a few each day. “I try my best not to overload the community with new members, because let’s face it, not everyone interacts the same way, and if you add 100 people at a time, all at once, you’re going to have problems immediately.”

Ashley doesn’t manage the community alone: she has anywhere from 4 to 12 volunteer administrators and moderators at any given time. Deleting and banning members is still left entirely to Ashley, but the other resident volunteers help introduce topics, review posts and comments that have been reported by community members for review, delete inappropriate content and remind users of the group’s rules.

Moderators have also begun tagging posts so that certain posts can be more easily found in using the Facebook search function. Tags include:

#event

#government

#police

#volunteer

#fundraise

Ashley identifies and reaches out to potential moderators based on behavior she sees on the community.

“I look for people who are passionate about specific things. Whether it be animals or small businesses, local politics or are really good with laws. I find one trait that stands out above the rest and have them kind of make their presence in that area. I appreciate someone that can use their presence on a post to turn the post from a seemingly negative, into a positive as well. That is very hard to do, but once you get it down, it’s an amazing tool to have in your back pocket.”

The community has helped with recruiting volunteers for various agencies, such as a local homeless shelter, gathering items for a school or art project, rehoming dogs and cats, finding lost pets, educating each other about scams, coordinating ride shares, finding various resources and turning out a large audience for various events. Recently, a woman looking to borrow a sewing machine for a project ended up getting an old but useable machine donated to her. The kindness of someone in line at a grocery store, in a parking lot, or at any customer service situation is a frequent subject. There is a monthly photo contest to choose a new cover photo for the community and a regular Thursday thread for complaints on any subject. Ashley sometimes issues challenges to the community, such as describing their day in meme-form. One of the most memorable threads on the community was a debate about whether or not heavy cream and heavy whipping cream were the same thing, a debate still joked about among long-time community members.

A particularly satisfying moment for Ashley was at a forum for candidates running for the local city council. The organizer asked attendees to raise their hands regarding how they had heard about the event. Just a few hands went up regarding NextDoor. A few more went up regarding the local newspaper. More than half the room raised their hand when Facebook was mentioned – and most were referring to posts on the Forest Grove Community. At least two of the candidates mentioned the group specifically in their remarks.

“What a confidence booster it has been to know roughly 7,000+ of our community members have such a massive amount of trust in me, in what I’m capable of doing, what I bring to the table, and how well I maintain a healthy platform for civilized discussion. Of course, those rewards are typically met with just as much opposition, but I tend to side with light heartedness, it has taken me much farther than misery ever has :-)”

Even with the community continuing to grow and being relied on by so many residents for their information about events in the city, no public officials or only a few city employees will post to the group – and most such posts are in response to a specific incident that is leading to a lot of online speculation.  

“The presence of a city official on the community is rare, but it is huge. It helps us as admins to have someone with clear answers to come forward – their official answer shuts up the pitchfork wavers. This is especially true if the community needs an answer that no one else else can seem to find.”

Since city officials and most nonprofits and civic groups are reluctant to use the community, some volunteer moderators make a particular effort to share official news they see on the city and county government’s official Facebook pages, on the pages of local libraries, civic groups, community centers, churches, youth groups, etc. – far more resident volunteers share this information on the community than actual government or nonprofit employees. But since no one has a mandate to share this essential, public information on the community, many events and resources are overlooked.

Moderators delete posts that are only meant to insult (She’s stupid!) or that encourage violence or other criminal behavior (I think you should shoot that rooster that’s waking you up!). Criticisms of businesses are allowed but only if the person first talked to the business in question and tried to get a resolution, and only if the complaint is fact-based, with dates and a description of what happened, rather than out-and-out-opinions about what happened. Posts that show police work in progress in real time – like police with lights flashing outside of a residence – are also not allowed. Political news is allowed – announcements of legislators having a town hall, dates of a public hearing on a local issue, encouragement to vote, links to position papers about upcoming legislation, summaries of what happened at a city council meeting, etc. – but political discussions and debates remain difficult to manage and comments for such often get turned off, or even entirely deleted, when insults, accusations without sources cited and misinformation starts flying.

The busiest days on the community are probably when it snows and the group is flooded with questions and reports about road conditions and school closures.

“I was pleasantly surprised to see that I spend only an average of 1.7 hours on Facebook every day. An average no drama day I search for events to share, or a location/local business to highlight while I’m out running errands for the day.”

But what about a day when an argument breaks out about a new housing development or the closure of a beloved, or controversial, restaurant? “A high drama day, causes massive anxiety and underarm sweat, and I can stare at the page every ten or so minutes for the majority of the day.”

“I check the community page as I would a newspaper every morning, except now, everyone is their very own columnist, and some of them flunked out of basic English long ago and didn’t seem to learn about basic etiquette. You have to constantly add the content you want to see or you end up fighting battles against keyboard warriors all day and night. I think it’s important for moderators to be consistent, to be honest, to be fair, to be transparent about decisions and rules, and to show up. “

But it’s not always easy.

“There are new people added every day. These new people don’t understand the history of the page or why it is the way it is, so they come in and often will beat a dead horse, write angry messages, and belittle other people. Half the time they come around after a little one on one convo with me. The other half of the time I’m given a middle finger emoji and a threat of violence. That’s a reflection of them, not me. We go our separate ways or find a way to work together. Most members understand why it is all unicorns and rainbows, but there is a specific demographic of people that will never be okay with this way of thinking.”

“Every once in a while we have ‘rage quit the page’ posts, where a person feels so personally offended by having their commenting turned off on their post, or by being put in their place by someone sharing facts against their opinion. They make a list to bash the entire page, the admins, and the people of the town before leaving, after the bashing bandwagon shows up to play. The funny thing is, they tend to want to come back a month or two later. The irony of rage quitting is equivalent to just having a bad day and freaking out on anyone within earshot willing to listen. We move on pretty quickly and hope the domino effect doesn’t take place. Once one person starts, it tends to go haywire for a little while. “

“If you come in guns blazing and are VERY set in your ways and ideas, and won’t hear what anyone else has to say? Those are the most inappropriate for the community page. If your personal biases and what you stand for can be presented in a way where there is wiggle room for conversation, then, and only then is it appropriate for the community page. See also: politics, parenting, schools, restaurant blunders.“

And how does she try to calm someone down online?

“95% of it is just throwing a compliment at the most angry person on the post. They tend to either hush up or calm down. 🙂 “

Moderators will end commenting on threads if the thread turns into speculation or overly-negative commentary, or when the person who started the thread with a question has had that question answered.

There are many online communities set up for people working in a particular profession or people who have a particular hobby, but online communities set up for neighbors in a community can have a much more personal quality – for better or for worse. I asked Ashley why she thought people can get so emotional on or regarding this particularly online community:

“Every post hits home cause it is our home! Community pages are emotional because it is personal. Every change, every tree cut down, every new establishment and closing establishment. We feel it cause we ARE it. As much as I would love to have everyone on the same page emotionally, I certainly wouldn’t try to fill the ocean with a paper cup.”

It’s that personal nature of the community that can make moderation most difficult: people know each other, their spouses, their children and their extended families offline, face-to-face. They will encounter each other at school functions and city events. They may work together. They may be neighbors. That means a heated online argument isn’t something abstract: it’s with a real person in your actual, physical community. This can be particularly taxing for the moderators – especially the founder:

“I have had death threats, I have been hacked and had to change my phone number, email address and even my Facebook profile for a bit to ‘hide’ from people who hated that I took their ‘rights away’ from them because I have removed them from the group for violating our rules. And they stay off until they calm down and apologize and want to join the group again, of course, I am a sucker for second chances. A blessing and a curse. The ONLY thing that prompts threats are people assuming I am taking their basic rights away, freedom of speech, in particular. The threats can be unnerving. To say I am fearful is not true, but to say I am very careful is. To be a great admin, you must take shape, stance, and emotions similar to a robot :-)“

Ashley makes a screen capture of every post, comment or direct message to her, on Facebook or via another platform, that is especially insulting or is threatening, in case a situation with someone escalates to the point of needing a legal intervention which, so far, has not been necessary. Ashley has also taken breaks from moderating for weeks, even months at a time.

“Being a leader on a small town community page comes with much more heartache I can’t even begin to explain to you, but alas, the good is worth it in the end. I also had no idea that you CAN help people change their way of thinking, and to encourage mature conversation, and then watch it executed out of someone you never in a million years thought would be able to calm down and make sense. That was all just wishful thinking that has become reality, for the most part.“

Other, rival Facebook communities for the city have been attempted by those that do not like that the Forest Grove Community is strictly moderated. Two have survived – one with about 1700 members and about eight posts a day, another with less than 200 members. A group that is supposed to be just about “what’s happening” will go weeks with no posts at all. For whatever reason, the Forest Grove Community has not only lasted, but continued to grow.  

Ashley won’t be the moderator forever – but also hasn’t been able to find an agency or organization willing to assume responsibility for the group when she wants to step away. No matter who is in charge of the group, whether someone entirely on their own or someone representing a program or agency, that person will change the group with his or her own interpretation of the community’s mission and rules. It’s natural for online communities to change, evolve, splinter or even die off. But without a strong, community focused newspaper and/or local radio station, it’s hard to say what would keep so many residents informed and engaged to discuss local issues.

What is Ashley’s advice for other moderators of such regionally-based online communities, regardless of the platform used?

“Have a clear reason what the community is for and state it, repeatedly. Have a clear purpose for every message. Have facts to back up comments. Have patience to deal with folks from all walks of life and with a variety of communication levels. It’s all about what you say and how you say it that generates responses. I could piss everyone off in the same sentence as picking everyone up in the group, but they WILL remember the negative thing I said 10 times more than the positives. To put yourself out there, you have to be ready to do so. Remember that no one has the same heart as you. No one has the same interests, ideas, or opinions as you do. No one is superior or inferior to you. We all live here together. Sometimes shifting our own thinking is key to being an all inclusive community.

And don’t push yourself farther than your mental health can handle. ♥️”

Are you interested in starting an online community for a neighborhood, town, city, county, school, or other small, defined region, one that’s meant to promote civility, promote civil society and build understanding? Please see this resource to help you.

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If you have benefited from this blog or other parts of my web site and would like to support the time that went into developing material, researching information, preparing articles, updating pages, etc., here is how you can help.

What is your social media manager doing?

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This happens a lot. Too much, in fact:

I find a Twitter account for a subject in which I am very interested. I look at who the account follows, so I can see other, related accounts on the subject. Instead, I see a long list of celebrities that whomever the social media manager follows: movie stars, athletes, bands, reality show celebrities, etc. Sometimes, I even see the account follows adult entertainment stars and highly-controversial political figures. And I wonder: how much time does this social media manager spend on Twitter doing what personally interests them rather than activities that benefit the organization?

It’s not just what you post on social media that sends a message about your organization: it’s also who you follow, what you “like”, what you retweet, etc.

The accounts that your Twitter account follows should be related to your organization’s mission or subjects your organization needs updates about, such as nonprofit financial management, corporate social responsibility, volunteer management, etc.

This isn’t to say your organization can’t follow a celebrity via its social media accounts. If a celebrity is vocal in supporting the issue that is central to your nonprofit’s mission and posts about such frequently, by all means, like that celebrity’s posts that relate to that – in fact, leverage them: reply to and retweet their messages with your own organization’s congratulations or point of view.

This isn’t to say your organization shouldn’t follow a politician: you absolutely should follow your area’s elected officials, even if you don’t agree with them, because what they do can affect your organization and clients. And again, reply to their posts, even if you disagree with them, if your message relates to what your organization tries to do as a part of its mission.

If a social media manager reports to you, you need to be supervising them! You do that by:

  • Following your organization’s account on Twitter via your own, personal Twitter account – an account you never, ever have to use to post anything at all – and reading that account regularly, certainly every week
  • Following your organization’s account on Facebook and reading the posts regularly
  • Asking how many people are coming to events or activities as a result of social media posts (and if they say they don’t know, tell them they need to start finding out)
  • Asking how many people engage with the organization’s social media (comment, ask questions, etc.), not just how many people “like” a social media post
  • Asking what the manager is doing to attract new followers on social media
  • Asking for an overview of who is following the organization on social media. People interested in attending events or obtaining services? Elected officials? Other area organizations?
  • Asking the social media manager to break down by percentage the categories posts might fall into: posts that are about marketing activities, posts that are about attracting donors, posts that are about promoting the organization’s accomplishments, posts meant to educate regarding the organization’s cause, etc. If 50% of posts are asking for money, should this be reduced, and the number of posts about accomplishments be increased?
  • Asking the manager how he or she engages with other accounts on their feeds: what posts are they “liking” or commenting on, and have those interactions lead to anything – new followers, questions, criticisms, etc.

On a related note: please put the FULL name of your organization in your Twitter description, not your mission statement! I don’t want the only way to find you on Twitter to be to look on your web site – most people just give up rather than trying to hunt you down.

If you have benefited from this blog or other parts of my web site and would like to support the time that went into developing material, researching information, preparing articles, updating pages, etc., here is how you can help.

Also see: