Why Use Facebook for your Non Profit? Good question, well here are some facts that might get your attention.

• Facebook is one of the largest social media sites on the web:
• More than 200 million active users
• More than 100 million users log on to Facebook at least once each day
• More than two-thirds of Facebook users are outside of college
• The fastest growing demographic is 35 and older

And their users are very active:

• Average user has 120 friends on the site
• More than 4 billion minutes are spent on Facebook each day
• More than 30 million users update their statuses daily
• More than 6 million users become fans of Pages each day

(want some more demographics on users, check out Nick O’Neil’s Demographic Page)

So may want to take serious consideration about getting your NGO involved and engaged in this new media.

In this post I address two skill levels on Facebook for Non Profits: 

(Facebook 101) Basic for Non Profits and a more in depth part of the post (Facebook 102) Advanced for NGO’s for which I have Beth Kanter to thank for her deep and extensive coverage of the topic.

So if you already are an experienced Facebook user skip Facebook 101 and go to Facebook 102

Facebook 101 : How to get started on Facebook 

These nine points are meant to be a starting point for you to get your nonprofit on Facebook and into the social networking world. 

1. Sign up and create a Facebook Account

To get started, go to Facebook.com, click “Register” and fill out a short online registration form. Once you’re signed up, you’ll need to have a profile to share information and photos about your organization with others. What to include in your organization’s profile? Photos, links to your website and videos can all be added. 

2. Find friends and connect with your community

Now that you have a Facebook account, connecting to people in your community is easy. Start by using the search feature to find friends who are already using Facebook and request to be their friend. You can add just about anyone you can think of including your members, supporters, volunteers, staff and even your board members. Don’t worry if you don’t have a big list right away. Once you have two or more contacts, you’ll be able to expand your social network by locating mutual friends and contacting them.

3. Send and receive messages

Facebook offers a message board feature called “The Wall” that displays member profile pages. You can use it to post all kinds of messages to your network.

4. Create a group for your organization or event

Just like every other social networking site, you can create and join groups on Facebook. And there’s a growing number of groups dedicated to social change. Why create a group? Creating groups allows you to share information about pretty much anything. You can create groups for your organization or event to make announcements, join discussion groups or even to share pictures. There are two kinds of groups on Facebook – open and closed groups. So be sure to create open groups so that people can find it and your members can invite others to join.

5. Upload and share pictures

One of Facebook’s most popular features has been the ability to upload and share pictures. Facebook also offers an unlimited quota with their only restriction being a 60-photos-per-album limit. The process is very simple. Start by creating an album which you can then assign limitations to (e.g. visible to my members only) and upload photos within them. The album is then put into your profile, and other users can see and comment on them. You can also “tag” your photos with the names of people you mention and share the photos via a web link or by e-mail. What’s more is that you can order prints online!

6. Promote your events

Facebook is a great place to promote your organization’s events. Simply create the event, add pictures and invite your contacts to join. In addition to groups, you can post details of events in your profile so people can RSVP for an event. You also have the option to leave the event open to people in your network or open for everyone.

7. Promote your blog or newsletter

Facebook also helps you to promote your blog or newsletter. This feature allows you to share information beyond what’s in your profile in two ways. You can either post a note on your page or import your external blog. It is a nice way to communicate with your constituents and update them on your organization. You can also integrate an RSS feed in to your blog with notes. When you post it, the note is displayed in your profile and every one of your “friends” is notified and other members can add comments.

8. Keep in touch with your members

Facebook has a feature called “News Feed” that allows you to see all kinds of activity within your network. It’s very similar to an RSS feed, in that when you log in to Facebook you immediately receive an update of all of the actions your contacts have taken. And if someone posted a new photo album or RSVPed to an event, you’ll be notified right away.

9. Maintain some privacy

On Facebook, you are in control of what information is out there about your organization and who can see it. You can retain some privacy by blocking certain people from viewing your profile or by creating a limited profile to hide  information you might not want to share with your contacts.

Facebook 102

This includes a post from Beth Kanter, which is an extensive and exhaustive review of how to use Facebook for your NGO and a link to NTEN’s webinar on best practices for non profits and includes additional resources regarding how a non profit can setup and use Facebook.

NTEN has a fantastic Webinar featuring Randi Zuckerberg, Director of Marketing at Facebook and Adam Conner from the DC Office on the emerging best practices for nonprofits who want to set up Facebook Fan Pages.

Here’s the description

This webinar will be a resource for non-profits and other organizations for social good. Expanding on the Non-Profits on Facebook page, we want to help you harness the power of Facebook and bring positive change to the world. Facebook empowers non-profits by enabling them to mobilize communities, organize events, increase fundraising, reduce costs with free online tools, and raise awareness through viral networks.

 There are  3 Categories on  Facebook

• Profiles: For Individuals  
• Groups: These don’t have to be official or registered organisations
• Pages: This is for organisations such as companies and non profits and when you set up the page you are supposed to be an official of that organisation according to Facebooks “Terms of Service”

“Profiles VS Pages”

• Profiles are for individuals,  Pages for Organizations
• Recently redesigned pages to be more like profiles
• Pages are optimized for mass communication
• Profiles are optimized for individual communication 

A question that everyone asks – “When should my group set up a Fan Page versus a Facebook Group?
Best Answer yet:   Set up a Facebook FanPage as your main presence or outpost and use a group for more adhoc, smaller organizing.

16 Tips for Setting Up Your Fan Page

1. Keep your page name short and accurate, can’t change after you create it
2. There is a day or two lag for it shows up in search
3. Content is lifeblood of your page
4. Start with information tab: be complete, accurate, and honest
5. Fan Page backend is like a cms and if you know a little HTML you can do some spiffy stuff
6. Not all applications are optimized for pages, visit the app page to check
7. All pages require ADMIN – designated FB profile – for security reasons because they want a real person
8. Admin are not public – add multiple admins -  always have multiples as a precaution so you don’t loose access to the page. 
9. Wall Tab – accuracy updates of information.  “Write Something” lets you post rich content”
10. More interactive content is better – the Wall is a history of interactive
11. Worst thing you can do with a page is dump an RSS feed into the Page – won’t be as successful
12. When you make updates to the Page, it appears in the streams of your fans or people who have joined your page.  This is very powerful viral marketing
13. When you start to write in the “write something” you get options to add links, photos, videos – post things that are beyond promotion content. Be interactive, make it interesting, provide behind the scenes content.  Incorporate events into your page.  “Exclusive content is good”
14. Shed the tradition PR schtick content and make it real.
15. Red Cross Fan Page is a great example.  So is One Campaign and Stanford University.
16. Lexicon on Facebook lets you track words and phrases 

Some Good References

www.facebook.com/facebookpages
www.facebook.com/nonprofits
www.facebook.com/influencers
www.facebook.com/help
www.facebook.com/advertising

Q&A Nuggets

• Nonprofits on Facebook set up as a mechanism to share nonprofit best practices on Facebook.  That’s the intent of Facebook.com/nonprofits so everyone can learn from it.
• Fan Pages have a metrics tool that has just been upgraded.  It’s called the insight tool — you can see better metrics for the Fan Page
• If you set up your Fan Page before the nonprofit category, don’t worry.  They are working on having the ability to change it, but not high priority.  Doesn’t control the search.
• Why can’t you invite Fans to your page?
• It’s intended to prevent spam. Nonprofits are nicely behaved, but others are not so nicely behave.   That’s why there is a limit 30 people to invite to your page
• You can send an update to your members, it’s like an email blast and encourage them get people to join.
• Yes, you can link Causes to your Facebook Page – Causes will be rolling out some new information next week, so be sure to check the Nonprofits on Facebook.
• It is useful to have a group for more intimate conversations, where a  page is more public
  You can have both.  Groups are good for small scale organizing. Pages are more public presence
• Nonprofits vanity urls are now here  (Don’t know what the heck a vanity url is?  Read Nick’s post) 

How to let people know how to join your page?
(1) Put the Name of page so when people search for it – they will find it
(2) No direct way to subscribe
(3) Fan of your page via SMS – text fan name of your page to the Facebook short code (FBOOK (32665))

Can we delete our group?
Deleting groups is difficult – there is a form you can fill out to have the group deleted – use the help page to do it.

The real scoop about a successful fan page.

“We want to encourage you to experiment. Let’s be honest, takes an effort to build a community
Just because Facebook is free doesn’t mean it is easier to get a million fans.  Don’t start from scratch – look at the other groups that are already talking about your cause and experiment or piggy back or do cross promotion.”

Add Apps Strategically To Your Fan Page – at minimum you want video, photos, Causes, and a few others.  “Think like a user, what would encourage your to click through?  Your fans don’t think about you 24/7.  So for the few minutes they might visit you, what do you want them to know?” (Here’s some good nitty gritty how-to information on which apps to add to your Fan Page)
 

Facebook

• Facebook Pages versus Groups
• Intro guide to using Facebook from Master New Media
  8 Essential Apps for Your Facebook Fan Page
• Overview of FaceBook from HowStuffWorks
• Facebook Pages Best Practices – by Heather Mansfield
• How To Create and Promote Your Facebook Fan Page – by Mari Smith
• Why You Need to Make a Facebook Fan Page for Your Website NOW! 
• Why You Need to have a Strategy before you make a Facebook Fan Page NOW! byJeremiah Owyang
• Who, What, and Why of Facebook Fan Pages by Beth Kanter
  Tim Davies – Facebook Pages vs Facebook Groups Pros/Cons
• Social Media Today, Best Practices for Facebook Pages
• Jeremiah Owyang – Testing Facebook Pages
• Jesse Stay – Ten Things You Didn’t Know About Facebook
• Jesse Stay – What You Get From Facebook Pages Series
• App/Gap Blog – Should your business with Friends with Facebook? (analysis of using Facebook groups)
• Jenny Ambrozek, Ten Tips for Getting Business Value Out of Groups
• Heather Mansfield, Facebook Best Practices – Interview
• Shara Karasic, Setting Up A Facebook Page
• Facebook FAQ on Pages
• Five Lessons Celebrities Can Teach Us About Facebook Fan Pages from Mashable
• Five Elements of A Successful Facebook Fan Page by Mashable

So have you used Facebook or Social Media for your non profit or organisation? What were your experiences. Would love to hear from you.

I was watching a documentary on the “Child Witches of Africa”  the other night and it struck me how inhumane man is to man (or in this case innocent children). It is taking place in some of the poorest parts of Nigeria, where evangelical religious fervour is combined with a belief in sorcery and black magic, many thousands of children are being blamed for catastrophes, death and famine: and branded witches. Denounced as Satan made flesh by powerful pastors and prophetesses, these children are abandoned, tortured, starved and murdered: all in the name of Jesus Christ.

I was moved by the efforts of  one inspired, courageuos man to make a difference to this unfolding tragedy, their situation prompted Gary Foxcroft to devote his life to saving these children. He established the charity Stepping Stones Nigeria, in an effort to provide the refuge, comfort and the basics necessary for a child’s development. 

Stepping Stones Nigeria works in partnership with local organisations in the Niger Delta region of Nigeria to build sustainable futures for some of the region’s many disadvantaged children, including protecting, saving and transforming the lives of children who have been stigmatised as being “witches”. Channel 4 broke this story in the UK and consequently won a “BAFTA”

So what has a Website, Blog,  and Social Media (Twitter and Facebook etc) got to do with this. They are the tools and enablers to help get people involved. To get them talking, to  help them find out more, to help get your message out. You might have the greatest cause in the world, but if no one knows about it, then its like that saying “If a tree falls in the forest and you didn’t hear it, did it fall”

I would like to go over some basics for Websites and Blogs for assisting a non profit organisations engage efficientlyand powerfully with their community. In future blogs, I will cover the basics of using “Social Media Tools” like Twitter and Facebook and YouTube for communicating with and empowering your community.

Some Website Guidelines for Non Profits.. 101 

Websites have traditionally been written by programmers in software languages and programming codes like HTML, that required specialist skills, but over the last few years “Open Source” (read free… no license fees ever!!) Content Mangement Systems also called CMS, have been developed that allow companies, NGO’s and individuals to maintain and update websites easily. These are second generation website development tools, that provide cost effective tools to allow people to put up websites and blogs at a fraction of the cost of what it used to be. So what are the basic guidelines for designing a website. You should consider the following.      

• A Content Mangement System (CMS) that allows companies and non profits to easily upload text, images and videos easily instead of getting a programmer in every time to write new code for the website. (see  MSF .. Doctors Without Borders which was developed in Typo3, an Open Source Code CMS ( Content Management System) by Infinity Technologies
• This system should allow multiple users (approved of course with User ID an password)  to update information anywhere, anytime.
• Trained and educated evangelists that you can elicit, to devote time to add content to your Website, Blogs, Facebook and Twitter so you can have high levels of two way communication with your community
• Search Engine Optimised (SEO) so people can find you on Google (maybe even think about Google adwords..Google apparently will consider helping non profits with some assistance)

Blog Guidelines… 101

A blog is where you can put up the latest news and content, that you want your community to read and hear about and they can comment on it ( two way communication). You can upload text, images and videos (eg YouTube) and have it published in minutes. So what are the basics to consider when putting up your non profits blog.

It should include

1. Menu with the link to pages such as.

• About us
• Home (back to your website)

2. Subscription to the Blog by

• RSS Feed as well as
• Email

Note: Put these in both the top menu and right side

3. Search feature for the different blogs on the site

4. Include the following links to each of the following at the top of each blog post (to create some SEO Juice)

• Digg it
• Reddit
• Delicious
• Stumbleupon
• Facebook
• Twitter

5. A Text Box in the right panel to include

A” One ” sentence description of  who your organisation is and what it stands for.

 6. A “Connect with us Box” on right panel that includes connecting via the following means

“Your Organisation on Facebook, Twitter and Subscribe to Blog RSS”

 7. Multi User Blog.. so different users can contribute updated content

 8. Popular Posts Box

 9. Browse by Tag Post Box

 10. Browse by Category

These are some ideas to get you started. So how do you get heard above all that noise ?

 Social Media has been in the news a lot, about how it can be used by business to make profits. What is quite often not realised, is that social media can be utilised to enable non profits and charities to raise money for good causes because NGO’s are all about community, and this raises passion and involvement. Some non profits have worked out early that the power and passion that social media evokes in people can be harnessed for the good.  Other NGO’s have taken a bit longer to realise that social media can be harnessed effectively because it doesn’t cost money it just takes time, a lot of the supporters of charities and non profits are more than happy to spend the time, devoted to helping their favourite charity make a difference. So to help those supporters on the learning curve here are some tips and examples to get you inspired and started. 

“ 20 Social Media Tips and Techniques for Charities, Non-profits, & Philanthropies ” by “Creative Fusion Media” throws a lot of different resources together to assist Non Profits to learn about and use social media, for their causes.

 Nine of my Favourites in this blog include

1. Create a Niche . Oceana’s blog shows great use of dividing their blog into the specific issues and campaigns they deal with, so that you can very quickly see what the causes are about on the very first page
2. Listen, Read and Learn productively using  Google alerts and/or Google reader is a great way to access information. Check out Nonprofit Alltop and Fundraising Alltop to check out what kinds of content does well and to hear interesting new and relevant non-profit news.
3.  Use Social Media Photos. Get a profile on Flickr and create a group for your staff and supporters.
4. Get a social media crash course. Chris Brogan’s Fish Where the Fish Are is a great ebook and a quick read that can help introduce you and your team to social media.
5.  Make it Delicious. Del.icio.us social bookmarking is a great productivity and organizational tool. You can also use it to share info with coworkers, collegues, and funders. The tagging function allows you to separate, segment, and organize your web research and data.
6.  Utilise Blogs such as  WordPress and Typepad to keep the faithful informed, with the latest news and information and resources
7.  Using Twitter For Generating, Managing and Informing Followers for The Cause.  Check out Guy Kawasaki’s tips on getting more Twitter followers,  Tweetdeck helps you manage it, and Darren Rowse’s blog Twit Tip educates you all about twitter and being a better twitterer (is that the word? Perhaps a better twitter citizen, or twitter-zen)
8.  Make Your Own Network or “Tribe”. Make Your Own Social network on Ning. A great example is the Classroom 2.0 group. It only takes 60 seconds.
9.  Using PR to promote the Cause Using Social Media Of course I mean personal relations (as arcane, trite, or banal as that might sound). You can also network on Peter Shankman’s Help a Reporter Out or Wanna Press  (this service just started, so there may be hiccups).

And of course log into one of the top bloggers in the world (Beth Kanter) and she just happens have a blog about non profits which I personally use for inspiration.

Beth’s Non Profit Powerpoint Presentations are on Slideshare

So to wrap it up, once you have learnt some of these skills, you can use it to raise money for your non profit or favourite charity. To inspire you, here is a Post from Mashable by Gradon Tripp that shows how “5 Events That Have Used Social Media for a Good Cause” raise nearly $300,000

But, what we’ve also seen, is social media bringing together people to lend their time to important causes on a global level. By using the sites we LIVE on every day (don’t tell me you haven’t realized you’ve been spending about 30% of your day tweeting)–why not use all of these friends and followers to do something good?

While many people have ideas to start a charitable program or event, actually doing something isn’t as easy. There is planning, event scouting, logistics, food, drink—you name it, it’s tough. Typically, this process can take weeks or months to come together. But, with the help from online communities this process can become even easier, and the results can be nearly instantaneous.

See how (got to love some of these names) Twestival, Tweetsgiving, Tweetathon, Well Wishing and “The Daniella Project” used Twitter to motivate organise and open the pockets of people who cared.

So tell me, what are some of your stories that you can share on how you have used social media for your charity or good cause?

Here are some of the best blogs and posts that I came upon last week on my web journey, that I managed to tweet about. I hope you find them useful and enlightening 

1. “How Companies and Non Profits are Monetizing Social Media”

This article by Laurel Papworth  is about the various social media monetization strategies and the powerpoint presentation (embedded) shows some case studies and examples, including social network size, the revenue streams, valuations and profits.

2. ” 10 Twitter Best Practices For Non Profits ”

This Blog by DIOSA Communications discusses how non profits who are most successful at utilizing social networking Web sites like Twitter, Facebook, and MySpace and how they know from trial, error, and experience that a “marketing and development approach” on social networking sites does not work.

It’s about community building around your mission and programs. Just having profile on Twitter (or MySpace, or Facebook) does not magically produce any results. You have to work these profiles. Find the person on your staff who loves Web 2.0 and enjoys working the sites and/or find a marketing/pr intern from your local university that needs to do a senior project! If they are getting college credit, then you know they have to stay around for at least a semester.

3. “8 Non Profit CEO’s That Tweet”  

Beth Kanter reveals some good advice and  insights along with 8 Non Profit CEO’s that tweet

Recently, BusinessWeek published a slideshow of CEO’s who use Twitter, noting the dramatic rise of CEO’s who use Twitter to clue customers in on new services, help them with questions about their products, and generally get a little bit personal with customers, business associates, and the public.

There are some other benefits to having your nonprofit’s CEO be on Twitter, these might include:

• Source of news
• Brand Building
• Focus Group/Research
• Networking Tool
• Monitoring
• Drive Traffic to web site
• Humanizing your communications

Of course, if your CEO is going to Twitter, they have to be keep a consistent schedule and be authentic.    There’s been a bit of debate about celebrity Twitter users who have “ghost” twitterers or simply people helping them tweet.

She did a brief scan to see if there any nonprofit CEOs who Twitter.  Here’s a few that she found:

4. ”26 Great Social Media Presentations For Non Profits”

This post by Rebecca Leaman lists 26 great new presentations on social media with more coming out almost daily, now that we’re deep into conference season, and many are directed specifically to the needs of non-profits. If you’ve been thinking of launching or expanding your organization in social media, Slideshare is a good starting point for information and advice. But it can be time-consuming to pick through a wide range of slideshows to find those that are up-to-date, actionable, and appropriate to nonprofits.

Here’s a hand-picked selection of presentations to get you started.

5. ” 7 Tips For Effective Call to Action – For Your Web Site or Blog”

This Blog by “Hubspot” highlights 7 tips on a calls to action and how nearly every website should have a goal and some action they want their visitors to take. The goal may be to generate leads, buy products, click on ads or even just subscribe to an RSS feed.

A call-to-action is the copy or graphic you use to entice and persuade your readers to take that action. Well-designed calls to action can dramatically increase a site’s rate of conversion to its goal.

So what’s a well-designed call to action? Here are 7 Tips.

As I promised in my last post, here are 6 more great resources on using Facebook, for companies, personal branding and NGOs (Non Profits). What you will find in fact is that there isn’t 6 but a “Bonus” which makes 7, which is about “5 Tips for Enhancing Your Brands Presence on Facebook”.

A lot of people end up being passionate about one type of media, like Facebook, Blogs, Twitter, YouTube and MySpace, to communicate, interact and market themselves and their organisations. What you have to keep in mind is that they all work together and provide synergies.   Remember that your communityand the Web is made up of  individuals and they all have different ways of taking in information. Some like reading, others listen to a podcast, the younger generations may want to watch a video, and maybe even an email from time to time. I am sure you have contacted people and left a voicemail and there was no answer but send an sms and hey.. you get a reply.. so what is great about the evolutionary social media space and especially Facebook is that almost all the different types of communication can be found in one location. So communicate in different ways in different places and you might be surprised by what happens. The only thing is that we all tend to have is limited resources, especially time.

So have a look at these resources, hopefully they might save you some time.

1. “Why Is Vin Diesel So Popular on Facebook?”

With all due respect, I wouldn’t put Vin Diesel in the upper echelon of movie actors. But on Facebook, the Fast & Furious star is second to none among the Hollywood elite.

He’s currently adding hundreds of thousands of fans daily, and with more than 3.4 million of them at the moment, the only “person” bigger than Diesel on Facebook is President Obama. How’s he doing it?  Simple: Authenticity.

It’s really one of the first lessons you hear over and over again when talking about marketing your brand in social media – whether it’s a company or a person – but so many stars still put their brand in the hands of professional managers on sites like Facebook, MySpace, and Twitter.

Diesel appears to have been doing this too – up until about a month ago when his updates went from standard fare – clips of TV appearances and an event schedule – to authentic updates and interaction from the star.

2. “Building Your Online Brand With Social Media Tools”

Social Media tools have an enormous power to put you in contact with thousands of people. Attention on its own is useless, what are you going to do with that attention?

If you want to build your online brand you have to know how all your activities work together. You need a consistency and congruency. Each part of the social media puzzle builds into a picture people have of you, how they imagine you to be relates to how you really are to the degree you get this stuff right.

If you are approaching social media in a haphazard way, do not be surprised if things do not work out exactly as you hoped or imagined they would.

3. Basic Facebook Strategy: 5 Simple Steps

Facebook is my #1 favorite social networking website. I have done so well with facebook that it took me many months to even look at another social media website.  I suggest that you start with facebook and dedicate more time to mastering it than the other social websites.

Many marketers are exclusively focused on Twitter right now and forget about Facebook.  Facebook has it’s own rules and you can get banned if you don’t follow them.

Here’s the basic Facebook strategy in 5 simple steps.  You don’t want to do too much at once, or you get banned. Doing  a little bit at a time adds up quickly.

4. 10 Ways to Use Facebook to Increase Traffic to Your Website

More than 115 million people login to Facebook every month. It is the largest social networking tool and a great place in the web for building your brand and driving traffic to your site. However, if you are not familiar with the viral techniques that work in the Facebook platform, soon you will find your brand tarnished. You can gain quick exposure to your businesses using the techniques discussed in this article.

5. “9 Great Facebook Resources and Posts”

Mashable has provided resources and analysis of Facebook from building a better Facebook page to making a truly viral Facebook meme, They have served up articles from expert guest writers and Mashable team members that aim to educate, inform and help build your business or personal profile on the popular social network.

6. “30 Applications for Doing Business on Facebook”

Think  LinkedIn is the only place for business? Facebook is growing rapidly and it’s becoming a destination for businesses and business professionals alike to establish a presence. Here are over 30 Facebook applications to help promote, network, communicate, collaborate and accomplish more with your business.

Which apps do you use?  Please feel free to add them in the comments.

7. “5 Tips for Enhancing Your Brands Facebook Presence”

So – you’ve set up a Facebook public profile for yourself, your brand or your company, or your non profit  and you’re starting to post content. Now what?

If you’re like me – a tinkerer and tweaker – you might be interested in ways to fine-tune your profile for maximum affect.  So here are five tips to optimize your activities on Facebook, including the right way to create profile and thumbnail graphics, how to show different content to Fans and non-Fans, creating DIY vanity urls, and how managing what and when you post can lead to greater success.

Facebook  has been adding new functions and features that enable Companies, Non Profits and Individuals to promote their brand, raise money and increase sales and have conversations with their communities and networks. The following posts are some of the latest reviews and studies of what is unfolding in “Social Media” in the Facebook space, that I have come across and provided updates on my Twitter site . Facebook’s user base is reportedly  approaching 300 Million and still growing fast. Twitter is becoming mainstream. Online video usage is up 53% in the last 12 months on sites such as YouTube as Social Media continues to revolutionise the Web. How to use this fast emerging media is a constant challenge. These are some posts from bloggers such as Beth Kanter, John Haydon and others that will help you develop your own strategies for working and enabling this technology.  

1. Facebooks Application Profile Pages Might Give Brands a Boost  

This post covers how pages are valuable in helping brands? Similar to users’ own profile pages, these public pages feature a stream of information about the brand, including notes, photos, or items from other applications. Users can comment and like items that brands share, such as a video, and see activity about the page in their own home streams. And, in terms of applications, brand owners can already integrate third party applications — a video application could be used to feature a brand’s video in the page, for example.

 2. 5 Lessons Celebrities Can Teach Us About Facebook Pages

 This post covers some of the “good and the bad” that celebrities who are on Facebook can teach us about promoting Your “Personal Brand” including lessons on being authentic and offering fresh content. It includes examples of  how the celebrities use Facebook including Britney Spears, Ashton Kutcher, Vin Diesel, Michael Phelps, and Lady GaGa

3. Here is The Low Down on How Non-Profits Can Use Facebook… from Facebook   

This Page is a resource for non-profits and other organizations for the social good. It  The page was built to harness the power of Facebook and bring positive change to the world according to Facebook. This is facebooks own hints and recommendations to use facebook for NGO’s. 

It includes What can other non-profits learn from ONE? ONE is an advocacy and campaigning organization of over 2 million people and growing, from all walks of life all around the world, uniting as one against extreme poverty. It is a non-Profit with 84,464 fans

If you go to http://www.facebook.com/ONE you’ll see that the default tab you land on is a tab called “JOIN ONE” rather than the tab “wall.” This provides a more customized experience and also promotes sign-ups for ONE’s email list, something that is important to many organizations.

 4.” So you Want a Facebook Fan Page for Your Nonprofit? Here’s the Scoop!” 

 A question that everyone asks – “When should my group set up a Fan Page versus a Facebook Group?
Best Answer yet:   Set up a Facebook FanPage as your main presence or outpost and use a group for more adhoc, smaller organizing. Some great examples of how Non Profits are using Facebook check out these 3 NGOs use of Facebook.  Red Cross Fan Page,  One Campaign and Stanford University.

 5. “How To Create A Powerful And Engaging Facebook Page”

 Facebook is undoubtedly one of the most popular social media services used by individuals, businesses and non-profits to connect with people. Groups and Pages are excellent options to leverage the large network and reach of this popular platform. Lately, Facebook Pages have become quite popular among businesses to show their presence in a much better way building engaging and long lasting relationships with users and fans. Let’s see how to make an interactive Facebook page that gives a reason to your fans to stay, interact and promote your cause.

 6. “New Facebook Pages: A Guide For Social Media Marketers”  

As more and more marketers use Facebook as a key conduit for brands online, it is important to note some of the new changes to their Business Pages. Following last fall’s overall redesign, these pages will now migrate to the same Wall and tabs design that personal profiles have used.

7. “How To Build Your Personal Brand on Facebook”

 With over 200 million active users, Facebook has become a personal, product and corporate branding hub. Every brand that exists on Facebook  has the same core features and benefits, such as the ability to create a page, share resources, add multimedia and much more. You have a unique opportunity to leverage this platform for career success or as a playground for you and your closest friends.

Look out for my next post which will have another 6 more great resources on using Facebook, for companies, personal branding and NGOs.