Back-to-school is one of those times where we are bombarded by retailers to get shopping. But this year, there are more calls to give than ever before. The most obvious nonprofit tie-ins to back-to-school are, of course, clothing and supplies drives:

• Samaritan’s Feet: A mother who lost her son, an avid basketball player and shoe aficionado, in August 3 years ago partnered with the nonprofit to collect nearly 700 pairs of back-to-school shoes for children in her community in Charlotte, NC. This year, the org partnered with Office Depot and collected more than 40,000 pairs of shoes nationally and 20,000 internationally.
• DoSomething.org: This is the third year that DoSomething.org has partnered with Staples across the country to collect school supplies for kids in need. Staples catered directly to teenaged students through Facebook and an online game to raise awareness about the campaign. They also accepted monetary donations via text message. Additionally, DoSomething.org partnered with Macys this back to school season to urge youth to visit the website and volunteer through in-store promotions and email campaigns.

Both of these campaigns capitalize on activities donors are already doing and locations they are already frequenting, making it easy and accessible for people to give. Staples’ use of social media for DoSomething.org allowed them to speak directly to students with tailored messaging, a departure from the traditional direct mailers that target moms and parents.

But an interesting and new trend this year was that retailers embraced social causes and paired them with products at the front of their back-to-school marketing push. As with Staples, Office Depot and the following retailers, marketers now more than ever are using social causes to pull people into stores.

• Walmart’s Backpack Challenge: Walmart is presenting shoppers with the challenge of filling a backpack with all the essential back-to-school supplies. The catch? Spend as little as possible. Walmarts have shopping lists for local grades available in-store to guide shoppers in filling their pack. A search for this campaign on Google brings up quite a few blog posts from thrifty parents boasting how much money they saved and how much they were able to give.
• JCPenney’s Pennies from Heaven: JCPenney launched this initative, encouraging customers to round their JCP purchase to the nearest dollar to fund afterschool programs, as part of their BTS with their back-to-school campaign called “Daydreamer,” which promotes kids pursuing their creative dreams. As Penney’s corporate communications manager said, “Our customers tell us that cause-related programs that benefit kids are important to them.” [via DMNews]

With more businesses interested in promoting philanthropic causes than ever before, how can your organization take advantage of partnerships with local retailers this year?

1. Host Exclusive Hangouts: Hangouts are Google+’s video conferencing feature, and is a good way to have heads of your organization, celebrity board members or even current volunteers talk directly with your audience and bring an engaging, multimedia element to a testimonial or chat. Think carefully about who you will include in the chat – can you use it as a reward for volunteers, high level donors or sponsors? And if you’re nervous about one of your employees playing host to a videoconference, Mashable makes a good suggestion for the guest star to host the chat on their account.
2. Cater to your Circles: The unique value of Google+ is the circle feature, or the ability to strategically group followers and use targeted messaging. The article smartly suggests maximizing this feature and investing time and effort in grouping followers to determine what their relationship to your organization is and what their interests are.
3. Huddle or Hangout with your Coworkers: While it’s an option that may not quickly come to mind, Google+ can be a great tool for internal communication through chats and video-conferencing. I would even go one step further – how can you utilize Google+ to problem solve with board members, sponsors or partner organizations?
4. Unite Volunteers in a Huddle: Many nonprofits are already using other networks to unite volunteers such as encouraging the use of a dedicated hashtag or checking in to a location via Foursquare or Facebook Places. But Google+ unites all of these features – group all volunteer conversations about an event and easily send your own messages to all participants. Google+ enables users to send messages to people who may not even be signed up for the network, all you need is a volunteer’s email address to include them in the conversation.

Looking to get started on Google+? Check out the demo and dive in.

Click here to add me to your circles on Google+

[kudos to the article's author Zoe Fox]

A lot of beautiful connections in one 30-second spot – just one more proof point that videos don’t need to be lengthy to tell a deep story.

Beyond the stunning cinematography and visual simplicity of the film, the video appeals to audiences logically and emotionally. The success of the video comes from the story it tells, connecting audiences to a 5,000-year past, their present and the future of the planet.

An impressive message for an under two-minute video.

How are you telling stories for your organization?

Ever since I joined the microvolunteering network Sparked.com, one of the most common queries I see coming from non-profit orgs is:

We have a blog, but have no idea what to do with it or how to get people to read it.

Find yourself asking a similar question? Here’s a few tips to get your blog on the right track:

1. Identify your audience.

Get to know your existing blog readers:

• Who are they? Do you have any subscribers or repeat visitors?
• What are they doing (viewing multiple posts and pages, searching for a topic)?
• Where are they coming from (directly to you, or from another source)?
• When are they coming and how long are they spending there?
• Get into their heads – why would they be coming to your blog?

Think about your blog readers and how they fit into the larger audience of your non-profit’s marketing and communications. Who does your organization want to connect with: donors, investors, community stakeholders, media, volunteers…?

Brainstorm. Create a vivid picture of who your audiences are, including their larger interests, why they care about your organization and what will make them take action. Keep this picture in mind each time you write a post. It should be easy to make the connection between what you are writing and who you are writing it for. If not, don’t press publish.

WordPress users, click here to learn more about using WordPress Stats.

2. Tell a story. Better yet, let someone else tell it.

Whenever possible, use your blog to tell a story. That means engaging your reader with a hook, introducing characters and a plot, presenting a problem or conflict and how your organization is a solution.

Just because you may be responsible for managing the blog doesn’t mean you should be the only one writing it.

Ask others to share stories, and encourage them to write in a conversational way. Always maintain the human voice in your blog, even when you are speaking on behalf of your organization. This is not the place to paste your brochure text or mission statement.

If you have the resources, interview volunteers or those who have been influenced by your organization’s work and gather quotes and testimonials from the field.

Serve.gov is one organization that uses their blog to showcase the stories of their volunteers.

3. Tap into the power of visuals, interactivity and digital trends.

No one wants to visit a blog and be confronted with a wall of text. You should always have at least one visual element in each post. This could be an embedded video or a slideshow of photos. YouTube and Flickr are two commonly used sites that have easy-to-use embed tools.

If you have a powerful video or a powerful photo to share, let it speak for itself.

The American Red Cross Blog is an excellent example of highlighting powerful visuals in every post.

Another good example of utilizing visuals: the Greenpeace blog.

4. Bullet and edit, edit, edit.

Make it easy on visitors: organize your text. Tell them where to look and what the main points are through bullets, numbering and bolding. Having trouble condensing your message? Use hyperlinks whenever possible (to another related blog post, your organization’s website, etc.) to support your content so you can avoid repeating information.

5. Hyperlink

All of your web properties should support one another. Link to your website and social media properties in every single post. 

If you’re referencing an event or another organization, always link to where visitors can learn more information. If it’s a third-party website, make sure the link opens in a new window, so that people won’t leave your page.

After posting, the work isn’t done.

• Drive traffic to your post. Share the link internally with staff and volunteers, and externally through your website and social media properties.
• Respond to comments. Time is of the essence. Respond to comments (whether they are positive or even negative) quickly and professionally. If a visitor has a question, refer them to the answer or contact them directly to gather more information.
• Analyze your data. The first 24 hours that a post is live will tell you a lot about who is reading your post, but continue to check back on your data periodically. If you have written a post rife with keywords, your blog may get picked up by search engines and continue to receive hits long after it is posted. Learn from your data – if your post has very low reads, think about why that is and what you can learn for the future.

While I was in Orlando this weekend, a place at the top of my list to visit was the Orlando Museum of Art (OMA). The reason? Their succinct and visually beautiful website left a lasting impression on me from when I Googled “Orlando Museums” a few weeks ago.

It is rare to find a website that is well designed (read: minimalist), easy to navigate and that gives me the info I’m looking for. The OMA website, omart.org, is one of those rare sites, especially rare in the museum world and event rarer in the non-profit world when there are so many details and visuals to share.

A few seconds of searching on the OMA website revealed the story behind their 2008 rebranding:

Working with advertising, branding and design agency Push, the new brand was developed after the arts museum (OMA) determined that it needed a more modern brand, reflective of its vision as well as its commitment to arts and arts education.

The rebranded OMA logo uses timeless, geometric shapes, evoking the essence of art itself, and can be found in varying forms of new OMA collateral.

“We worked closely with the OMA to rejuvenate their graphic identity and create a brand that shows the institution’s aspirations,” remarked Chris Robb, chief creative officer and partner of Push. “In particular, the new Web site we produced for the OMA is unlike any other museum site. Through its unique functionality and educational content, the OMA site will increase awareness of the museum and its programs, as site visitors from around the world come across it.”

The OMA’s rebranded…easy-to-navigate Web site brings the OMA into a contemporary setting, with an artistically simple appearance. Its innovative filtered calendar functionality is a first of its kind for any main interface of a museum Web site.

An unfortunate but true fact for NPOs: there is so much information to share, so many stories to tell, and so many different audiences to communicate with through a website that the user experience  often becomes one of frustration.

There were over 1.97 billion Internet users as of 2010 – how will you make your website a must-visit? 

The OMArt.org Homepage

(Note: Although its from 2009, this article has great tips for non-profit web design)

Sparked.com gives me that second kind of feeling. Described as “the microvolunteering network,” Sparked is an online volunteering site that unites nonprofit organizations with online volunteers who provide consulting and expertise on a specific issue or topic, including marketing, technology, research, social media and SEO.

Within minutes of signing up, plugging in my own areas of knowledge and selecting the issue areas I’m interested in (hunger, children, animals, etc.), I received my volunteering opportunity of the week and was providing pointers to a nonprofit looking to improve engagement on their Facebook page.

The great thing about Sparked is how easy it is to become involved – you can opt to spend all day responding to nonprofits on a forum-type thread, or you can respond to one challenge once in a while that you connect with. Its a low-commitment brainstorm session, a way to stretch your skills and build your own personal brand, whether your background is in nonprofits or elsewhere.

Need a dose of inspiring do-good? Visit Sparked.

The appeal was clear to me once I actually got on Quora and started looking around, not at the questions being asked but at the people who were answering the questions. This wasn’t just your average social community with people speculating on what the answers might be – this was a place where experts were flocking and their answers honest and clear.

There are of course the self-described “opinionated students” and “everyday social media users,” but there are also real influencers in the social media space, entertainment industry and government, speaking frankly about what has inspired them or why certain decisions were made.

It made me wonder what was being said about nonprofits, volunteering and fundraising on Quora. Given that the demographic on Quora is young college educated professionals who are socially aware and involved, it makes sense that there’s buzz surrounding these topics. I noticed a few themes to the questions being asked:

• Searching for volunteer opportunities
• Questions about volunteer motivations
• Inquiries about nonprofit recruiting, policies and best practices

Although Quora does not allow businesses to answer questions under a company profile, Quora is a great way for your employees to directly interact with consumers, volunteers, other non-profit professionals, educators and to interact with those who are already actively seeking information about your industry, and like most social media outlets, an outlet that requires little commitment, no money but could yield a big return in impressions and conversations.

How your organization can start on Quora: Keep an eye on what questions are being asked – and who (if anyone) is answering.
You may find that there is room for you or someone at your organization (a development staff member? A recruiter? A stellar volunteer? A donor?) to have a voice, build their own personal brand, network and provide the answers that people are looking for.

What do you think of Quora?

A standout organization that allows people to customize donations for holidays (including Valentine’s Day) is charity: water:

“Give the gift of clean water in the name of your sweetheart, then print a card to let them know about your gift.”

There are a few things I love about the charity: water donate page/blog, and their special features for Valentine’s Day:

• Customizable, printable and well-designed cards that you can gift to recognize the donation
• Slogan: “Inspire Your Valentine This Year”
• Staff videos (like this video from last year) sharing why these cards are the way to go; these videos add a relatable, human dimension beyond the stories of those in need – and a touch of humor

I think it’s a real missed opportunity that more organizations aren’t tailoring giving campaigns to holidays like Valentine’s Day. What do you think – would you consider making a donation in your significant other’s name?

And yes, it has been quite a few months since I’ve blogged – but I’m back!

I came across this new campaign by Publicis Modem on Osocio.org for Ad Council and the US Army called Boostup, centered around Boostup.org

A “boost” is a text to an email sent to a high school student to encourage them to stay on track towards graduation. Site visitors can choose to contact a friend, or a student selected by the Boostup campaign who is at-risk for not graduating due to obstacles in their life such as illness, family circumstances or outside employment. The site also provides an extensive list of outside resources for students and parents.

So far, 40,809 boosts have been sent through the site. And the campaign’s targeted 10 at-risk students who received boosts all graduated in 2009.

I’ve seen these type of “support your student” campaigns elsewhere lately, including Hallmark’s free kid’s card offer. I appreciate the way that the Boostup campaign goes beyond just print or TV ads – it empowers and encourages parents and current students (or even just concerned people) to help reach high school students in the ways they use the most. Thoughts?

for more info, please visit Osocio