Social media was once considered the great unknown to nonprofit communications specialists. New and old words were used to describe the actions on the strange platforms likes “tweets and walls.”
But that was over a decade ago when platforms like Facebook and Twitter were first being adopted by the general public. Today, more than 300 million people use Twitter, and more than 1.4 billion people people use Facebook each month.
That’s the combined population of the United States and China, the first and second largest economies in the world.
By maintaining a high profile social media presence your nonprofit is opening itself up to the possibility of being found by its target audience who is almost undoubtedly using the social platform. Having a targeted social media strategy is no longer a nice to have, it’s a need to have to survive in today’s world.
The right people are out there
With almost 1/4 of all people on the planet being connected to each other, and subsequently your nonprofit, through social media, having a strong presence on the various platforms is essential. And with so much of the developed world being engaged through social media, it’s almost a foregone conclusion that your nonprofit’s target donors, influencers, or the demographic you’re out to serve is on it too.Influencers amplify your presence
Perhaps because of social media and popular culture, we spend more time consuming information about a small subset of people than ever before. Because of this, if the right person gets a hold of a nonprofit’s message, and disseminates that information to the right group of followers, a movement can start. Sometimes all it takes is someone with more followers on social media than yourself to spark something magical.Cheap and effective communication
Getting the word out there about a specific cause is one of the hardest things for nonprofits to do. With social media posts, your message is hung on your wall for everyone to see.
