See What’s Out There

I ran into Andrew Mason at his booth for The Point in the sponsor section of the Netroots Nation conference. I remember he caught my interest with a statement that began,

“If mankind and the internet were conceived today at the same time by God, we would not be pursuing change in the way we do today…”

He continued to explain that instead of complaining about certain companies or organizations, we should leverage our powers as consumers and cooperate as a group. He believes that the internet is the best way to mobilize that power.

Andrew Mason is the founder of The Point which uses the web to organize group actions. You can see a funny and instructive video about how it works here and read the latest on the company’s blog makesomethinghappen.net. In this video, Andrew talks about how to empower your readers and build community around your blog.

Blog Tip: How To Build Community - Call For Action!

Spread the word! See3 is building a community of bloggers who support good causes and are receptive to sharing worthwhile messages with their readers. Be the first to hear about new campaigns from organizations like the Sierra Club and receive resources specific to your blog’s area of interest. If you’d like to join the See3 Blogger Network, shoot me an email at Dorothee@see3.net with a short description of your blog or website. I’m sure your inboxes are as full as mine so I promise to only send things that are relevant to your interests!

I met comedian Lee Camp on the bus on my way to the Netroots Nation convention in Austin. And yes, he was very funny. I got a chance to talk with him later in the weekend about the easiest ways to make a video (or any online content) go viral.

Lee Camp is a comedian, blogger and activist who has performed standup comedy around the country and in various videos online. He writes for The Huffington Post, 236.com and performs with LaughingLiberally. He is most famous for punking Fox news as a guest on their show (you can see all his videos at YouTube.com/LeeCamp). In this fourth part of our blog tips series, Lee talks about why comedy is so effective online.

Blog Tip: How to Go Viral - Be Funny

Here’s the “Permission” video Lee mentions as an irreverent and clever take on the gay marriage issue:

Lee also mentions that it’s important to be topical if you want your videos to go viral. Shortly after the Larry Craig bathroom scandal broke, he wrote up a quick video sketch that was soon so popular, CNN was airing it in their coverage.

Blog Tip: How to Go Viral - Be Topical

Spread the word! See3 is building a community of bloggers who support good causes and are receptive to sharing worthwhile messages with their readers. Be the first to hear about new campaigns from organizations like the Sierra Club and receive resources specific to your blog’s area of interest. If you’d like to join the See3 Blogger Network, shoot me an email at Dorothee@see3.net with a short description of your blog or website. I’m sure your inboxes are as full as mine so I promise to only send things that are relevant to your interests!

Last week at the Netroots Nation convention in Austin, I got a chance to sit down with famous blogger OPOL who posts as One-Pissed-Off-Liberal on DailyKos. As the third in our series of blog tips, OPOL offers some advice for new bloggers. He talks about how to engage an audience with passionate writing and lots of multimedia. He notes that readers on the web aren’t looking for long, dense paragraphs of text and recommends colorful photos, videos and interactive elements to get readers engaged.

Blog Tip: How to Engage Readers - Be Passionate and Use Multimedia

Spread the word! See3 is building a community of bloggers who support good causes and are receptive to sharing worthwhile messages with their readers. Be the first to hear about new campaigns from organizations like the Sierra Club and receive resources specific to your blog’s area of interest. If you’d like to join the See3 Blogger Network, shoot me an email at Dorothee@see3.net with a short description of your blog or website. I’m sure your inboxes are as full as mine so I promise to only send things that are relevant to your interests!

As I mentioned in the previous post, last weekend I attended the Netroots Nation Convention in Austin, Texas. This is the second on a series of interviews I did at the event with prominent bloggers who share their tips for writing and networking online.

Here’s a tip from Gregg who blogs as Red Wind on The Seminal and capitoilette. He is also the author of Guy2K. In this video, Gregg shares his tips for making your blog stand out among the multitudes:

Blog Tip: How to Stand Out - Become an Expert

And as a bonus, here’s Gregg talking about the importance of social-networking sites (although he personally prefers to stick with email):

Blog Tip: How to Spread the Word - Join Social Networking Sites

Spread the word! See3 is building a community of bloggers who support good causes and are receptive to sharing worthwhile messages with their readers. Be the first to hear about new campaigns from organizations like the Sierra Club and receive resources specific to your blog’s area of interest. If you’d like to join the See3 Blogger Network, send an email to Dorothee@see3.net with a short description of your blog or website. I’m sure your inboxes are as full as mine so I promise to only send things that are relevant to your interests!

This past weekend I had the pleasure of attending the Netroots Nation Convention in Austin, Texas. Formerly known as YearlyKos, Netroots Nation was a whirlwind of over two thousand bloggers meeting, eating and twittering their way through panels and events (check out Garrett M. Graff’s great post about the event on the Capital Comment blog). This week, we’re posting a series of interviews with prominent bloggers who share their tips for writing and networking online.

To start us off, here’s a tip from Jill Richardson who led the panel, “The Recipe for Change in America’s Food System” at Netroots and blogs as OrangeClouds115 on DailyKos. She also founded recipeforamerica.org and recently started lavidalocavore.org. In this video, she shares her unique strategy for getting people to read about issues like the farm bill.

Blog Tip: How to Increase Your Readership - Gimmicks!

Spread the word! See3 is building a community of bloggers who support good causes and are receptive to sharing worthwhile messages with their readers. Be the first to hear about new campaigns from organizations like the Sierra Club and receive resources specific to your blog’s area of interest. If you’d like to join the See3 Blogger Network, send an email to Dorothee@see3.net with a short description of your blog or website. I’m sure your inboxes are as full as mine so I promise to only send things that are relevant to your interests!

What is this video? It’s a story. A dramatic story. And it’s told using only words, almost. No pictures. You will pay attention because you won’t want to miss something. Now, sit down and write the story of your cause this way. What way? Draw a straight line from your tactics to the huge potential impact you can have if successful. Bring someone along from the very small — one person — to the very big — changing the whole world.

Join us tonight as we host the Sierra Club party to fight global warming. This party is sponsored by EarthFirst in cooperation with the Sierra Club.

Find out more about a party in your area at LightBulbs To Leadership

Link [YouTube]
Link [EarthFirst]

Thanks to the hard work of John Kenyon, the nonprofit technology community now has a professional code of conduct. In the next few months look for the launch of a logo and way for all nonprofit tech professionals, like us here at See3, to formally adopt this code.

Non-Profit Technology Professionals Principles/Code of Conduct

We, as technology professionals serving nonprofit organizations, pledge to:

1. Do No Intentional Harm to Data or Devices Containing Data

2. Appreciate, Respect and Adapt Our Approaches Appropriately an
Organization’s Culture, Mission, Context and Resources

3. Focus On Solutions Appropriate in Both the Short and Long Term
to An Organization¢s Culture, Mission, Context and Resources

4. Explain/Demonstrate Technology Strategies and Tools Using Clear,
Non-Technical Language

5. Understand and Communicate the Applicable Excellent Practices,
Legal and Technical Requirements Related to Our Work

6. Engage in Continuous Learning Practices to Maintain Our Skills
and Knowledge

7. Regularly Participate In and Share Our Knowledge With Our Community

8. Maintain Ethical Practices and Declare Any Conflicts of Interest

9. Provide Recommendations and Not Directives, Communicating the
Reasoning Behind those Recommendations, Ensuring the Decision is
Always the Clients

10. If We Charge for Our Services, to be Transparent About Product
Pricing and/or Project Costs

1. Tell a story.
If you want your audience to identify with your mission, you need a compelling story that connects your work to real people. If a story moves you, it will likely move others as well—and become the foundation for deeper involvement.

2. Be relevant.
People respond to what’s going on around them, so try to relate to the news or the calendar as much as possible. You’ll also have a better chance at success if you’re pitching your video to bloggers or other websites—they’re always looking for something current and fresh.

3. Tell them what you want.
You have their attention, now tell your viewers how you want them to engage, whether it’s donating money, visiting a website, or volunteering. They won’t know to give unless you ask for it.

4. Be brief.
Few people are watching your 7-minute online video—that only works when you have them locked in a room. Try to get everything out in 2 minutes or less.

5. Videos don’t raise money by themselves.
Your organization should think of online video as one of many tools to fit into your fundraising program. Adopting video into your organization is critical, but it has to be a means instead of an end.

6. Embed video on your donations page.
The distance between the “play” button and the “donate” button should be short. Also, give your viewer the right web tools. Can the viewer forward the video to a friend, subscribe to your RSS feed, get involved, and sign up for your newsletter right there on the spot? If not, they should.

7. Put video at the center of a campaign.
Video is often best used in the context of a campaign. A campaign can be raising money for a particular village, trying to reach a specific goal, or giving limited to a specific timeframe.

8. Empower your viewers.
Ever heard of peer-to-peer fundraising? Encourage your audience to pass your videos along. Make the embed code easily accessible within your page so your video can reach a broader audience.

9. Create a media library.
Start gathering your footage now—you might have all the ingredients already! Building a media library is a valuable long-term asset for your organization. Have a camera ready for every important event. Ask volunteers to document their work and make it available for future events, trainings, and online use. Using existing footage you get more bang for the buck.

10. Test.
You don’t know if something works unless you test it. Send out emails with video and some without, and measure the results. Each nonprofit will have different nuances, and you’ll want to know when using video is most effective.

11. Know when not to use video.
Truth is, your strongest donors will likely donate with or without online video. They have been already, right? They don’t need any extra convincing. Use online video for attracting new audiences, for driving specific campaigns, for empowering your membership to spread your story or for deepening or expanding existing relationships.

The next big thing in nonprofit marketing will be mobile. But it won’t be the only big thing. Gaming platforms are becoming home entertainment centers and these centers will have all kinds of content. I can imagine PSA’s from nonprofits while games load or before movies play. I can imagine nonprofit messages built into the games themselves.

Here’s a blurb on the gaming system as a platform for video from Reuters.

Sony, the once dominant market force, showed how the PlayStation 3 could do more by introducing a new video service.

The company said it would rent and sell movies and TV shows over the Internet for the PlayStation 3 and double the hard drive capacity of its main PS3 model.

The new video distribution service will attempt to close the gap with Microsoft’s Xbox Live service and feature movies and TV shows from major studios, including its own Sony Pictures, Warner Bros. and News Corp’s (NWSa.N: Quote, Profile, Research) 20th Century Fox.