Why Nonprofits (Still) Aren’t Using Social Media to Fundraise

Last Spring I had the opportunity to sit on a social media panel at the Phoenix Business Journal’s Annual Non-Profit Business Summit. After a strong Q&A from peers in the industry who were either eager to begin or expand on their own .org’s social media efforts, Jaime Casap of Google, proceeded to tell the lunchtime crowd of over 800 business professionals that Twitter was a just a “fad.” With the average age in the room pushing 45-50 years of age, Casap’s message was exactly what this crowd was waiting to hear. I left knowing that Phoenix nonprofit leaders had been handed a takeaway: online community building should be met with a certain degree of skepticism.

So, when UMASS / Dartmouth Center’s nonprofit social media usage study was summarized on online last week, I was relieved to learn that the nation’s nonprofit leaders have, in fact, taken bold moves to collectively leverage social media. It’s not hard to see why 89% (up from 75% the previous year) of charities studied in 2008 make use of social media. After all, social media represents the well-established offline community outreach efforts so indicative of nonprofit organizations. But what really jumped out to me was the revelation that 45% claim social media is “very important” to their fundraising strategy – flat and slightly down from the 46% claim recorded in 2007.

With all the numbers heading north, why then is social media not more critical to the fundraising efforts of organizations?

• Nonprofits stifle themselves when it comes to changing their fundraising strategies. And why should they? Most organizations have been raising money the same way for decades, if not centuries. Simply posting a Facebook Cause page won’t replace the work of resource development (not to mention that Cause pages don’t work). Rather, nonprofits need to integrate social media into their current fundraising efforts – using the combined efforts of development, community outreach and marketing to open a two-way dialog with donors.
• Because nonprofit structure tends to favor both political and information silos, donor data can be disparate resulting in both substandard and redundant communications. Last year my wife and I donated to an organization that sent the exact same “thank you” letter to each of us individually no less than three times. This certainly made us wonder where our dollars were going. Wouldn’t it have be easier (and cheaper) to find us online?
• Nonprofits need to centralize their donor communications so they’re left in the hands of the professionals. IT and data management staff are not communicators, nor are they incentivized to communicate with donors. Today’s donors demand two-way dialog. No other medium is suited to do this more effectively than social media. Nonprofits should consider taking note of companies who are successfully utilizing social media as a customer service engagement tool – this recipe can work for them too.

One thing is for certain: this economy is re-writing the rules for everyone. Nonprofits are no exception. Social media is playing an increasingly larger role in how organizations do business - including maintaining and fostering new revenue streams. Charities would be wise to catch-up and take inventory of their fundraising strategy, operations, culture and communications to identify opportunities for social media to support their financial goals.