Jean Case Advises Alexandria Nonprofits to Take Advantage of Social Media

For those of you who attended ACT for Alexandria's 6th Annual Nonprofit Excellence Forum and had the chance to be a part of Jean Case's interactive keynote address moderated by David B. Smith of the National Conference on Citizenship, the overwhelming thread was the importance of leveraging social media for your organization.

Social media presents a unique opportunity for nonprofit organizations because many of the most popular tools and applications are free. The rub comes when we try to allocate time and staff to social media--always a challenge for resource-strapped organizations. It's also easy to feel overwhelmed with the array of social media tools and strategies out there if you haven't been spending the past few years friending, fanning, liking, tweeting, and retweeting. But Jean Case was right, it is easy to get started once you're wrap your head around the idea that starting can be as simple as posting a couple of Facebook updates.

That's really what social media is all about--it's another great opportunity to reach out to supporters and potential supporters. The important thing to remember about social media, and the reason why it's so different and exciting, is because it's a two-way street. You can post a Facebook update or a blog post and people can comment or even write their own blog post in response. In social media, asking is at least as important, if not more important, than telling. Social media is about sharing and organizations should be using social media to have a conversation, not just to broadcast their messaging in a new place.

ACTion Alexandria Can Help!

ACTion Alexandria can help local nonprofits broaden their reach through social media. If your organization has a Facebook page, a Twitter account, or if you post photos on Flickr or have a blog, we want to know. If you post updates on Facebook, we will "like" them. If you tweet, we will retweet you. We consider it our job to become your Facebook fan and Twitter follower in order to help you amplify your message and engagement strategy.

So please, reach out. Follow @ACTion Alexandria on Twitter and become a fan of ACTion Alexandria on Facebook. We'll do the same, and then, let's work together on developing a social media strategy that will help all nonprofits in Alexandria engage more citizens in what we're doing. Contact Tracy Viselli for more information: tracy.viselli @ actionalexandria.org

Photo courtesy of Fillmore Martin Photography