Just Who Do You Think you’re Talking To?
Tuesday, January 12, 2010 at 4:50PM NFP Pulse Social Media Survey Suggests Non-Profits Focus Social Media Efforts on External Stakeholders
There has been a lot of discussion in the blogosphere and among not-for-profit circles about why and how NFP’s are using social media...but I haven’t heard a lot of chatter about just who it is NFP’s are trying to target with their social media efforts.
The ARC’s December 09 edition of the Not-for-Profit Pulse focused on a survey conducted with 81 Canadian not-for-profit organizations about their use of social media. A summary of some of the highlights of this research is available here. If you are interested in more information on this exciting new initiative and how you can involved, click here.
As part of this initiative, we included a question about the intended audience of participants’ social media efforts.
I found it really interesting that a majority of the social media efforts undertaken by the NFP’s in this study target external stakeholder groups, such as members, donors and the public. In contrast, internal stakeholder groups such as the board and staff do not currently appear to be a primary target of NFP social media initiatives.
When examined in context with the rest of the survey results, I think this makes a lot of sense. The main reasons why survey participants use social media in the first place are to facilitate communication between the organization and its members or donors and to facilitate networking between these same individuals. Promoting, marketing and education of an organization or cause to the public was also seen as a primary reason for using social media. These key motivators fit quite nicely with the target audiences identified.
It will be interesting to see how this focus evolves as increased convergence and mobility entrenches social media even more firmly into the way we work, live and play. There are so many social media tools already in existence that can help to facilitate communication within organizations that I wonder if it is simply a matter of time before not-for-profits begin to adopt this medium in their day-to-day operations.
What do you think? Am I completely off the mark? Why do you think there is relatively little focus on using social media for staff, board members and internal volunteers? I’d love to hear your thoughts.