Posts Tagged ‘Twitter’

How to Host a School Supply Drive!

Wednesday, July 18th, 2012

This blog originally appeared on Create The Good.

We’re halfway through the summer, meaning it’s almost time for kids to begin preparing to go back to school! A new school year marks new beginnings for kids and parents; however, for those who lack the resources to purchase school supplies, this time of year can be filled with anxiety and stress.

As a solution, you can collect supplies for schools! You can help children in school by giving them the tools they need to succeed. Donate school supplies or, even better, organize your own Equipped to Learn school supply drive. Here’s How you can host a  successful school supply drive!

STEP 1: GET HELP FROM YOUR FRIENDS

Whether you organize the drive on your own or make the organizing a group effort, you will need to reach out to a lot of people in order to make the school supply drive a success. So go ahead and recruit your family, work colleagues, neighbors and others in your community.


STEP 2: ADOPT A SCHOOL AND DETERMINE WHAT SUPPLIES THEY NEED

If you know a teacher, principal or school administrator, you can talk to him or her about your idea and find out the school’s supply needs. Or you can call a local school or district and ask the principal what supplies the school may need.

STEP 3: MAKE A PLAN

  • Put together the list of supplies needed.
  • Determine drop-off dates and locations.
  • Determine whether supplies will need to be sorted and prepped. If so, schedule the drop-off deadline at least one week before the date you plan to give the supplies to the school. Consider keeping an estimated tally of collected supplies. It’s helpful to know what you achieved when you celebrate your success.
  • Divide your tasks — don’t do it all yourself.

STEP 4: PROMOTE IT

  • Develop flyers
  • Tell the local papers
  • Tell all of your friends — word of mouth is a great promotional tool.
  • Reach out to PTAs, community organizations, faith organizations, YMCAs, libraries, etc., and ask them to help you promote the school supply drive. They could do so through bulletins, email blasts, mention at public meetings and/or allowing you to post your flyer in their buildings.
  • Post the school supply drive on your Facebook, Twitter or other social media and send out messages to your network.
  • Post signs near the drop-off location to make it easy for everyone to find you. Use large construction paper or poster board so people can read the signs from their cars.

STEP 5: DROP OFF YOUR SUPPLIES

Work with the school principal and/or administrator to determine the best date and time to drop off the supplies. Consider asking the principal to present the school with collected supplies during an assembly time. Make sure you invite the other volunteers to join you in presenting the school with the supplies. 

After everything is done, it’s time to celebrate your success!

Give yourself a pat on the back for all of your hard work. And remember to thank everyone who helped you — it will make them feel great. While the school supply drive is still fresh in your mind, think about what worked well and what didn’t. That way you can build on your success, if you decide to do this again.

 

Time to Step Out and Get Social!

Tuesday, July 17th, 2012

Be the change through social mediaIf your organization is still resistant to utilizing social media tools, it is time to catch up with the times. Social media has risen to the forefront for businesses to reach consumers and dedicated audiences nationally and globally. Thanks to social media, you can now better inform others about your organization’s mission, recruit more volunteers, and humanize your organization.

Are you still not convinced? We have 13 reasons why you need to make a social media plan for your organization today, we promise you will not regret!

  1. Expose yourself: It should be your goal to consistently expose your organization’s mission to an ever increasing audience. Social media can help target specific individuals to your organization by providing brand resources and information to a social following. For example, if your organization wants to attract volunteers, you can begin announcing volunteer projects through social media.
  2. Add more customer service: Support the unanswered questions requiring customer service with the use of social media. Social media allows your organization to show the communities where it serves while providing immediate answers to questions.
  3. Start a conversation: Start a conversation with those who truly care about your organization. Ask your friends and followers what they like, what needs to be improved, etc. By opening this conversation up through social media, you will have the ability to improve the overall function of your organization.
  4. Be an open book: Social media opens the door to letting the public know what everyone thinks about your organization, use this to your advantage! When someone makes a negative comment about your organization, respond to it professionally and provide resources to better serve that individual. Others will tend to look more favorably upon your organization when they see how you handle business.
  5. SEO, SEO! Pages that utilize social media tend to have higher search results on Bing and Google. This feature will allow new users to find your organization more easily!
  6. I’ll scratch your back, if you scratch mine: Social media is the new word of mouth. When your page starts to get likes and retweets, new potential volunteers are only a click away. When others see what their friends interact with on social media, their interest is more likely to be sparked.
  7. Provides great brand exposure: Use social media to build a community. Allow users to start conversation and share resources, so that they will turn to your page when they need help or want to serve.
  8. The fans will flock: When more people share your organization’s content through social media, the more popular those resources will become across the internet. It is important to promote your organization’s events, resources, service opportunities, etc. through social media in order for its popularity to grow.
  9. Everybody is doing it: Believe us, your targeted audience already knows about social media and they are probably using it. Get on the train too and interact with them.
  10. Your partners are using it: Most businesses and nonprofit organizations are now using Facebook and Twitter on a daily basis. Join them! Social media becomes easier to use everyday with its frequent improvements and user friendly tools.
  11. Build your influence: Get to know the people who interact with your social page the most; they will be more likely to influence others to visit your page and utilize your resources. You may be able to attract and reach more volunteers through this influence.
  12. Allow your organization to be more relatable: A business or organization becomes more human when it participates in social media. Users can feel more connected to your organization because they can provide their feedback and communicate with actual employees. It allows users to see the behind the scenes of an organization.
  13. It’s a full proof plan: New users are more likely to trust your organization when they see it on social media and can understand the purpose. When users see interactions and engagement, it allows them to trust the overall reputation of your organization.

We hope these 13 reasons convince your organization to jump on board with social media! You will only benefit from starting a social media plan at your organization.

How does your nonprofit organization use social media? We would love hear your comments and tips in the section below!

How to be a Social Media Rock Star at NCVS

Thursday, May 12th, 2011

Today’s post originally appeared on the National Conference on Volunteering and Service blog. Follow the NCVS blog for news about the conference!
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The 2011 National Conference on Service & Volunteering (NCVS) is nearly here!

It will be held June 6th – 8th in New Orleans – The Big Easy!

Thanks to social media, there are lots of ways you can participate online – whether you’re there or not!

<-strong>Facebook

“Like” the so that the official wall posts show up in your Facebook news feed.

You are welcome and invited to post thoughts, ideas, etc. to The National Conference on Volunteering & Service Facebook page. Especially if you know a good place to eat in New Orleans!

This year, we’ll be sharing the opening and closing plenary on Livestream, and you’ll be able to watch them on your Facebook page! Keep an eye out on the NCVS Facebook page for a link that you can share on your wall and watch!

Eventbrite

This free tool will allow you (or anyone) to organize an event around conference and invite anyone.

Want to host a breakfast to discuss the topic of your dreams?

Want to organize an affinity group meetup?

Want to suggest an after-hours meet up spot?

You can do all of this with eventbrite.

Check out what your fellow conference attendees are organizing so far.

Blogging

You are invited to write a blog post (for your own blog or as a guest post on ours) about a session you’re excited about leading up to conference or reviewing a session you attended afterward.

Blogging is a great way to share what you’re excited about and/or what you’ve learned.

The HandsOn Blog editorial guidelines are here and the National Conference Blog editorial guidelines are here.

If you write a post for your own blog, send us a link to it at and we’ll be able to share it

Twitter

to hear all the official conference tweets.

Additionally, follow the conference conversation by . (The search bar is located in the right sidebar of your Twitter homepage.)

Each NCVS workshop session and forum is assigned a unique session #hashtag.

While the overall conference conversation will take place on the #NCVS hashtag, you can follow individual session twitter streams by searching on the unique session #hashtag.

Join the conversation by adding “#NCVS” to your tweets — adding that hashtag in your tweet is the way to have your tweet show up in the conference twitter stream.

You can also follow HandsOn Network ; Points of Light and CNCS

It’s super easy to follow twitter conversations using your cell phone so before conference, you might want to download a cell phone application for managing Twitter.

Want to follow conference speakers? How about conference speakers by focus area? No problem. Check out the and follow those that match your interests!

Foursquare

Foursquare at conferences can be fun. Want to know who’s savvy and in the room with you at any given NCVS session? Check-in using Foursquare and you’ll be able to see who else is at conference, and who you might want to meet!

Maybe you’ll even unlock a special badge!

Delicious

Delicious is a social bookmarking web service for storing, sharing, and discovering web bookmarks.

On Delicious, users can tag each of their bookmarks with freely chosen terms.

A combined view of everyone’s bookmarks with a given tag is available; for instance, the URL http://delicious.com/tag/ncvs displays all of the most recent links tagged with NCVS. You don’t just see the bookmarks that you’ve tagged, though. You get to see what other people have found that fits the same topic!

See all the great NCVS content saved to Delicious and add your own!

Flickr

Share your NCVS photos with everyone using the . You can upload your favorite conference shots photos by joining the group pool and then clicking on the link that says “Add photos.”

If you don’t have a Flickr account, it only takes a minute to sign up for one. All you need is a Yahoo!, Google or Facebook ID

YouTube

YouTube isn’t just a place for piano playing cats – why not record a video of yourself talking about your experience at NCVS, or Send links to your favorite NCVS videos and we’ll add them to our NCVS playlist on !

Send your video links to .

We can’t wait to see you in New Orleans – or online!

Storify

Storify is a way to tell stories using social media such as Tweets, photos and videos. You search multiple social networks from one place, and then drag individual elements into your story. You can re-order the elements and also add text to give context to your readers. At the end of each day, we’ll be sharing highlights from the conference. You can make your own social media story and share it, too!

WiFi
Unfortunately, there isn’t public wifi available in the Convention Center. If you have a smart phone, you’ll be able to use most of these tools from your phone. You might be able to use your phone’s connection to drive your computer’s wireless internet, but you’ll have to check with your service provider to find out if you have this option.

If you have a personal portable wireless internet hub it can be a great way to stay connected at conference, and meet some new friends!

Updated 5/18/11:
The National Conference on Volunteering and Service offers complimentary wireless service in all meeting rooms and lobbies. Please look for the SSID NCVS2011 on your wireless device.

In the exhibit hall, Starbucks has provided complimentary wireless service for all attendees and exhibitors. Look for SSID “NCVS” on your wireless device.
The National Conference on Volunteering and Service offers complimentary wireless services in all meeting rooms and lobbies. Please look for the SSID NCVS2011 on your wireless device.

In the exhibit hall, Starbucks has provided complimentary wireless service for all attendees and exhibitors. Look for SSID “NCVS” on your wireless device.

Social Media for Social Good Camp

Tuesday, May 10th, 2011

Whether you want to grow your membership, raise funds or loans, recruit more followers, gather petition signatures, find volunteers for your cause or connect with your community, Social Media for Social Good: How to Mobilize Your Supporters to Take Action will offer guidance that will help your organization create impact for years to come.

This special 3-hour workshop at the National Conference on Volunteering and Service will dive deeply into strategy, tactics and tools available to volunteer organizations and nonprofit managers. NCVS has no tech track this year, so get up to speed on the mission-critical social tools in your sector from two of the nation’s leading nonprofit tech leaders.

You have the passion, now learn the latest techniques in this power-packed interactive workshop!

The camp is the Sunday before the National Conference on Volunteering and Service, June 5, from 2 to 5 pm in the New Orleans Convention Center. When you sign up, the room number will be emailed to you before the workshop. There is an additional fee of $99 for the workshop.

When you register for the National Conference on Volunteering and Service, register for session 5638 to sign up for the workshop.

J.D. Lasica is a social media strategist, nonprofit consultant and author who is considered one of the world’s leading experts on the social Web. He is founder of Socialbrite.org, a learning hub & global consultancy that works with nonprofits and NGOs, and Socialmedia.biz, which works with major brands. A blogger since 2001, J.D. co-founded Ourmedia.org, the first free video hosting site, a month before YouTube.

He has spoken at or given workshops at Harvard’s Berkman Center, Stanford, MIT, NYU, SXSW, the Cannes Film Festival and at events in Paris, Milan and Seoul. J.D. was named one of the Top 40 Silicon Valley Influencers and one of CNET’s Top 100 Media Bloggers. Follow him on Twitter at .

George Weiner is chief technology officer of DoSomething.org. a not-for-profit that uses communication technologies to empower young people to take action. Under his leadership, the organization has become an innovator in social media, mobile technologies and causes. He oversaw the complete overhaul of the site, landing a People’s Choice Webby Award in the Youth category.

George is a self-taught techie and graduate of the University of Pennsylvania. He is a frequent speaker on nonprofit tech issues at forums including the Google Grants Conference, U.N. Youth Summit, National Conference on Volunteering and Service, NTEN and BlogWorld Expo and has guest lectured at NYU and NYIT. Follow him on Twitter at .

Agenda

Social Media for Social Good Camp will focus on practical, down-to-earth tactics and strategies that busy professionals can immediately take to engage supporters. The emphasis is on actionable takeaways. You’ll be introduced to several examples of nonprofits and volunteer organizations that are creating impact – with real-world examples you can learn from.

We encourage interaction and questions during our sessions! what you’d like to see covered, and tell us if you have any lessons learned that you’d like to share.

Some of the questions we’ll cover:

  • What strategies & tactics will motivate supporters and newcomers to take specific actions on behalf of my organization or cause?
  • What are the essential elements of a successful advocacy campaign?
  • How can I successfully use social tools to mobilize volunteers, spread awareness, enlist supporters, raise funds and drive action?
  • What metrics are critical to measure? (To drive social media decisions, ask, “What does the data say?” instead of “What does my gut say?”)
  • How can storytelling and video advance the mission of my organization?
  • Which organizations are creating impact, and what are they doing right?
  • What are some of the cutting-edge tools and resources available for change agents looking to make a difference?
  • What do you want to know? in advance.

Where possible, we’ll use a roundtable approach and a short small-group breakout session that encourages dialogue and interaction.

This is part of Socialbrite’s nationwide series of social media bootcamps. It has been presented to positive reviews at Personal Democracy Forum in New York and at Sustainatopia in Miami.

Hear what Jeff Pfaff, founder & CEO of mtbMobile, said about taking the bootcamp in this 60-second audio:

Jeff-Pfaff.mp3

Bonus materials!

In addition to this 3-hour live training, during the bootcamp you’ll also be able to access these full-color handouts and guides at no additional cost — and share them with your team!:

  1. 12 Steps to Mobilize Your Cause – Summary of all the action items you need to conduct a successful campaign.
  2. Team Collaboration – Tools to help you work with other organizations or your own team members in multiple locations.
  3. 15 Best Practices for the Social Web – High-level principles to help you succeed in social media.
  4. 12 Social Action Hubs – Selectively plug into some of these online communities and crowdsource platforms to promote a social cause.
  5. 40 Hashtags for Social Good – Use these Twitter hashtags as you tweet for your cause to gain wider visibility and viral help from the community.
  6. A Mobile Activism User’s Guide – A 16-page guide introducing you to the world of mobile activism and showing you how you can take your organization mobile.
  7. 10 Mobile Apps for Social Good – Apps for your iPhone or Android.
  8. 6 Twitter Tips for Change-Makers – A series of tips to help your organization use Twitter more strategically.

We’ve never had a disappointed attendee! Please register now!

Mobilizing Volunteers with Social Media

Wednesday, July 14th, 2010

by Chris Noble Originally published on What Gives and republished here with the author’s permission.

There’s a lot of “activity” in social media.  More people are embracing social networks every day, and more organizations are using social channels to reach their audience. But in all this “activity”, is there any real action?  How can nonprofits and others use social media to mobilize volunteers and get things done in the real world?

That’s the question put to a panel of social media luminaries at NCVS, the National Conference on Volunteering and Service, held by HandsOn Network and Points of Light in New York City a few weeks back.  Maybe “luminaries” isn’t exactly the right word… how about superstars?  These folks have been on the front lines where social media meets social change:

, who headed up President Obama’s social media strategy and action in 2008, now Founder and Creative Director of Blue State Digital.

, Founder of Craigslist, who’s been championing social media as a way to make government more accessible, accountable and efficient.

, Co-founder and Chairman of , who has his own social venture launching in the fall.

, who, as Manager of Public Policy Communications handles some of the tougher policy and community organizing issues for on a daily basis.

We’ve got lots of coverage coming your way from NCVS over the coming weeks, including more from this group and fifth panel member, social media marketing strategist , as well as individual interviews with an incredible range of activists, CEOs, authors, and other leaders in the nonprofit space.  This segment is a great start, because these guys have some solid advice for nonprofit organizers based on real-world experience.

Not only valuable content, but actually fun to watch.  Joe does a great job describing why you should treat volunteers like gold, and how to do so in a social framework. There’s also a great analogy in there for those of you who need to explain to your parents why all this “social media stuff” is relevant to social change – just go to Craig’s Gutenberg/ Luther shtick about 5 minutes in – I’ve used it 5 or 6 times since hearing it.

Enjoy!

10 Tips for Conducting Effective HandsOn Webinars

Saturday, June 19th, 2010

by Tricia Thompson, Volunteer Leader Training Manager, HandsOn Network


1. Be Prepared –
There is nothing worse than getting online to attend a webinar and having the presenter not be prepared. Make sure you practice with the technology and understand how to use all the tools. Note the amount of time it takes to use tools and accommodate for this in your webinar.

2. Remember the Venue – Conducting or meeting in an online format has been commonly referred to as a “radio show.” Remember to avoid silence. When attendees/participants hear silence they tend to think that there is something wrong with the technology. Keep the webinar/meeting moving forward and always keep people in informed.

3. Set Timing Milestones – Always think about and prepare for time. Set those expectations with the participants by communicating how much time will be give to each topic and when you will cover what information.

4. Be Aware of Noise – Make sure you are in a quite setting. If you have a desk in an open area, relocate to a quiet space so that attendees/participants can better concentrate.

5. Be Mindful of Content and Frequency of Slides – When in an online environment you need to have frequent transition of slides and not have too much content on each slide. The content should be spread out and remember to use picture and images that are more appealing to the eye.

6. Expect the Unexpected – Always plan for something to go wrong and have a backup plan. Change your voicemail message and give people details for how to connect and whom to call if they have issues with technology or connecting to the webinar. Have generic responses prepared for frequently asked questions so that you can quickly respond to emails.

7. Get Support– It is best practice to have at least two people leading a webinar. You need one person to focus on presenting the content and one to focus on answering questions in the question and/or chat function, manage technology issues, etc.

8. Create an Interactive and Fun Environment Smile and use humor whenever possible. Tell descriptive stories to illustrate points and make time for interactivity. Use tools like polling or the chat feature and incorporate social media whenever you can. See below for a list of social media tools.

9. Know Your Audience – Ask your audience questions that will help you better target your presentation. You can do this by asking questions during the registration process or making time in the first 5-10 minutes of the session to ask questions and get to know the audience.

10. Use Social Media Tools – Whenver possible before during and after your webinar, use the following tools to engage your audience and make sure they get the information they need in addition to providing a space for the learners to connect with each other The following are some tools to think about using:

10 Ways to be A Social Media Rock Star at NCVS

Sunday, June 13th, 2010

The 2010 National Conference on Service & Volunteering (NCVS) is nearly here!

It will be held on June 28th – 30th in New York City.

Thanks to social media, there are lots of ways you can participate online– whether you’re there or not!

1. Facebook

“Like” the so that the official wall posts show up in your Facebook news feed.

You are welcome and invited to post thoughts, ideas, etc. to the The National Conference on Volunteering & Service Facebook page.

2. Crowdvine

In order to help you meet and connect with as many people as possible, we’ve set up a conference social networking site where you can see who’s coming, find out what they have to share and make plans to get together.

Create your own NCVS attendee profile here and see who else is coming.

Meet up before you even get to New York!

3. Eventbrite

This free tool will allow you (or anyone) to organize an event around conference and invite anyone.

Want to host a breakfast to discuss the topic of your dreams?

Want to organize an affinity group meetup?

Want to suggest an afterhours meet up spot?

You can do all of this with eventbrite.

Check out what your fellow conference attendees are organizing so far.

4. Blogging

You are invited to write a blog post (for your own blog or as a guest post on ours) about a session you’re excited about leading up to conference or reviewing a session you attended afterward.

Blogging is a great way to share what you’re excited about and/or what you’ve learned.

The HandsOn Blog editorial guidelines are here and the National Conference Blog editorial guidelines are here.

If you write a post for your own blog, send us a link to it at

5. Twitter

to hear all the official conference tweets.

Additionally, follow the conference conversation by .  (The search bar is located in the right sidebar of your Twitter homepage.)

Each NCVS workshop session and forum is assigned a unique session #hashtag.

While the overall conference conversation will take place on the #NCVS hashtag, you can follow individual session twitter streams by searching on the unique session #hashtag.

For example, the Social Media for Social Good Forum hashtag will be #SM4SG and, if you follow that hashtag from 2:30 – 4:00 p.m. on Tuesday, June 29th, you’ll hear what everyone in the forum is saying about it.

Join the conversation by adding “#NCVS” to your tweets — adding that hashtag in your tweet is the way to have your tweet show up in the conference twitter stream.

You can also follow HandsOn Network as well as our NCVS Featured Tweeps list.

Here’s a hint from Chris Jarvis of Realized Worth – If you want, you can cut & past twitter list name in to Tweepml.org and follow everyone on the list with one push of the button.

(Make yourself an NCVS Featured Tweep by tweeting “Make me a featured tweep “)

It’s super easy to follow twitter conversations using your cell phone so before conference, you might want to download a cell phone application for managing Twitter.

See all the conference tweets organized by session on our Tweet Notes page.

6. FourSquare

FourSquare at conferences can be fun.

Want to know who’s in the room with you at any given NCVS session?  “Check-in” using FourSquare and you’ll be able to see who else is there.

Maybe you’ll even unlock a swarm badge!

7. Delicious

Delicious (formerly del.icio.us, pronounced “delicious”) is a social bookmarking web service for storing, sharing, and discovering web bookmarks.

On Delicious,  users can tag each of their bookmarks with freely chosen term.

A combined view of everyone’s bookmarks with a given tag is available; for instance, the URL “http://delicious.com/tag/ncvs” displays all of the most recent links tagged “NCVS”.

Its collective nature makes it possible to view bookmarks added by other users.

See all the great NCVS content saved to Delicious and add your own!

8. Flickr

Share your NCVS photos with everyone using the HandsOn Network Flickr group.  You can upload your favorite conference shots by clicking on the words “add something.”

9. YouTube

Send links to your favorite NCVS videos and we’ll add them to our NCVS playlist on .

Send your video links to .

10. LinkedIn

Start a LinkedIn affinity sub-group on .

You can hold forum style discussions here on topics before conference and / or continue discussions that were initiated at NCVS.

See you in New York – or online!

#NCVS!

Change Points: Girl Power

Monday, June 7th, 2010

We are beginning our countdown to the National Conference on Volunteering and Service in New York City June 28-30, and this is the first of a number of highlights from the upcoming great gathering of nonprofit, government and corporate leaders.  Just to give you a teaser, this year’s conference includes White House leaders such as Cabinet Secretaries Arne Duncan and Shaun Donovan; CEOs such as Jamie Dimon from JP Morgan Chase; social media rock stars , the co-founder of ; Craig Newmark, the founder of craigslist, and Joe Rospars, the social media guru behind President Obama’s election campaign.

A special summit on June 28 focuses on Girl Power, inspiring action and celebrating the extraordinary efforts of teenage girls to create meaningful change.  After all, a majority of young girls say that improving their community is their favorite activity, and consistent young volunteers are significantly more likely to be girls than boys. With the help of such special guests as civic entrepreneur Lauren Bush and WE tv President and GM Kim Martin, the “Girls. Power. CHANGE: Girls Summit on Civic Engagement” will focus on how school and work can reinforce the value of service, and how citizens can self-organize and mobilize to address social issues.   In addition, three girls will be awarded $1,000 WE tv Power Grants for their innovative Changemaker ideas.

This is a generation of young girls who grow up understanding their own ability, and responsibility, to change the world around them for the better. They are answering President and Michelle Obama‘s calls  to service, and we celebrate their  commitment, energy, and creativity.  Imagine the power of girls unleashed to create change!

Sincerely,

Michelle Nunn
CEO, Points of Light Institute

Social Media for Social Good at NCVS

Friday, June 4th, 2010

I’m excited about all the social media content coming up soon at the National Conference on Volunteering & Service!

I’ve already revealed how I attained Service Nerd Nirvana through the development of the Service Nerd Fantasy Panel Discussion, but wait… there’s more!

Social Media 4 Social Good: A Social Media Fair
Tuesday June 29th at 8:30 – 10:00 AM
Hilton New York Mercury Rotunda

Join this session for an opportunity to learn more about a myriad of social media topics by joining one of many small group discussions led by a fabulous host!

Discussions

Setting Social Media Policy & Strategy
, New York Cares
Deciding how your organization should use social media.  Learn how to tie social media tools to real organizational goals and objectives and how to release control to staff, volunteers and supporters.

Online Listening
Zack Brown, HandsOn Network
How to find out what the online community is saying about your organization & your issue – Using & Google Alerts and other tools to monitor the online conversation.

Engaging in the Conversation
, ETR Associates
Once  you’re actively listening to the online conversation about your issue and your organization, how do you know when and how to join the conversation?  What are the rules of social media etiquette?  Learn how to join in without making basic gaffs that make you look like a newbie.

Measuring Return on Investment for Social Media
Ken Cho, Spredfast
Jessica Kirkwood, HandsOn Network
How to track and measure the impact of social media efforts.

Twitter 101
Melissa Leibe, Volunteer Center of Bergen County
Getting Started – How to set up an account, how to use tools like Hootsuite, TweetDeck, , who to follow and how to use Lists (your own and those created by others).

Twitter 201
, Chicago Cares
Maximizing your account.

Facebook Fan Pages 101
Samantha Garrett & Lisa Gregory, New York Cares
The basic steps to starting a Fan Page.

Facebook 201
Sharon Tewksbury-Bloom, Volunteer Arlington
Making the most of your Facebook fan base and fan community.

Blogging
, Volunteer Maryland
Getting started, finding your voice, storytelling and community building.

Making the most of You Tube & Flickr
John Afryl, Hands On Greater Portland
How to make the best use of a Channel and a Group

Using Social Media for Events
Katie Stearns, Chicago Cares
Best practices for integrating social media into events

Time Management & Social Media
Whitney Soenksen, AmeriCorps Alums
How to survive the tidal wave of tweets, blog posts, wall posts, etc.

Leveraging Social Media for Disaster Response
Brian Williams, Hands On Nashville
Learn how social media helped HandsOn Nashville mobilize the city’s residents in an amazing volunteer flood relief effort.

New Ways to Tell Your Story
, Cause Global
Ms. Stepanek teaches a course on storytelling for nonprofits as well as a segment on “cause video” at NYU.  She also specializes in basic mobile social media-and-fundraising.

Make sure you’re registered for this amazing session!   The ID # for this session is 1293.

Change Notes: Creating A Civic Hub

Tuesday, June 1st, 2010

Friends,

I want to tell you a great story of how necessity created serendipity for us at Points of Light Institute. After the merger of the Points of Light Foundation and HandsOn Network in 2007 and the resulting move of the organization’s headquarters to Atlanta, the Washington, DC, office of Points of Light faced the challenge of excess office space.

During this time, a vision around creating a “Civic Engagement Hub” in the Points of Light DC Office emerged.  The thought was that co-locating organizations with a common mission around civic participation could be both advantageous financially and programmatically for Points of Light and its subtenants.

The hope was this hub could be an environment where ideas could be exchanged, where partnerships around cutting edge advocacy and service initiatives could be formed, and where field-advancing summits could be held to highlight the evolving ways people are empowered to advance change in their communities.  On top of this, we aspired to create new cost and operational efficiencies.

Through both informal networking and a dose of luck, our Washington office realized a portion of this vision earlier this year. In January, the National Conference on Citizenship became an official subtenant along with Mobilize.org, whose mission is to enable “democracy to work better by investing in solutions driven by the Millennial generation”.   In addition, the Washington office is home to America’s Service Commissions, Be the Change‘s Washington staff, ServeNext and the Association of Nutrition Services Agencies.

Besides the natural conversations and visioning that occurs when like organizations coexist, this nascent civic engagement hub has had the first in a series of brown bag discussions which we hope to host quarterly. In March, we convened a discussion of the recent Supreme Court decision on campaign finance and its implications for our civic life as a nation.  We offered this opportunity both to subtenants and to their partner organizations.

Later this month, Politics Under 30, whose mission is to help the young people of today become the political leaders of tomorrow, and Public Allies – DC, which advances new volunteer leadership to help communities, will join us, adding to the creative and service mission-driven mix. Let us know if you are interested in being a part of this Service and Civic Hub!

National Conference on Volunteering and Service

In just a few short weeks we will be creating a virtual civic hub of thousands in New York City at the National Conference on Volunteering and Service, the world’s largest gathering of volunteer and service leaders from the nonprofit, government and corporate sectors. From CEO roundtables to forums on social media for social good, from Secretary of Education Arne Duncan to co-founder , attendees will find inspiration, thought leadership, and solutions, not to mention world-class entertainment at our gala evening event (after all, this is the home of Broadway!).   We hope you can join us June 28-30! The conference Web site is here.

HandsOn Nashville Update

The numbers of volunteers mobilized by HandsOn Nashville for flood recovery continue to astound. In one month almost 16,000 volunteers have donated more than 66,000 hours, which are worth a projected $1.4 million. The action center has coordinated 881 project sites in that time.  On May 26, The Tennessean, Nashville’s major newspaper, published a story headlined “HandsOn Nashville Rises to Challenge” about the tremendous efforts.  Please click here to link to the story.

In addition, for the Congressional Record, Tennessee Representative Jim Cooper and Senator Lamar Alexander praised the volunteer effort coordinated by HandsOn Nashville. Rep. Cooper in particular saluted the HandsOn team and its “crucial contributions to the Nashville community.” We are gratified to see the amazing and sustained efforts by HandsOn Nashville recognized so prominently.  The accomplishments of its volunteers for the Nashville area exemplify what our HandsOn Network is all about – equipping and mobilizing citizens to make a significant difference.

In Service,

Michelle Nunn

CEO, Points of Light Institute

Co-Founder, HandsOn Network