Today’s Tips for NGOs

It was a murder of historic proportions. A dozen journalists killed for fulfilling freedom of expression. If you have ever doubted the promotional power of the Twitter hashtag, you can now join the believers. The first tweet, #JeSuisCharlie, went out at 12:52 p.m. Paris time, a few hours after the attacks. By the end of the day it had become a hashtag that accumulated 2.1 million tweets. In the 72 hours that followed the deadly attacks in Paris, over 5 million.

On a different note, the hashtag for the 65th UN DPI/NGO Conference in August 2014, #UNNGO2014, had a reach of nearly 11 million after about 10 days.

As I’ve said, Twitter is too powerful of an outreach tool to be left merely to teenage updates about their parties. Used tactically, Twitter can boost your NGO’s visibility, which boosts results in fundraising success because tweets breed faster than rabbits. Don't overlook Twitter in boosting your outreach.

A useful suggestion about fundraising that I heard about from Brandon Granger: 9.5% of all donations for non-profits come from mobile devices. Perhaps you can benefit from that as well. Remember, the mobile device is no longer for calling the office or your family.

Contact me for more ideas and guidance.