Social Media: Getting the Word Out in the New Information Age Reference and Resources

The Social Media Landscape

Panel Contact Information

Connie Reece, Every Dot Connects − Organization/blog: everydotconnects.com − E-mail: connie.reece@gmail.com − Twitter: twitter.com/conniereece − LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/conniereece − Second Life: Reece Llewellyn, FrozenPeaFund Magic

Heidi Adams, Planet Cancer − Organization: planetcancer.org − E-mail: heidi@planetcancer.org − Blog: planetcancer.org/blog/heidiblog.html

David J. Neff, American Cancer Society − Organization: www.sharinghope.tv − E-mail: David.Neff@cancer.org − Blog: fispace.org − LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/davidneff − Twitter: twitter.com/daveiam

Tim Wilson, Bulldog Solutions (Moderator) − Organization: bulldogsolutions.com − E-mail: tim@gilliganondata.com − Blog: gilliganondata.com − Twitter: twitter.com/tgwilson − LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/tgwilson

Social Media: Getting the Word Out in the New Information Age Reference and Resources

Crossroads Conference – September 25, 2008

http://delicious.com/crossroadsconf

Getting Started with Social Media

Getting Started with RSS?

RSS is a great way to stay up on a lot of different content coming from a lot of different sources without spending a lot of time visiting web sites:

1. Learn the basics of RSS: watch the 4-minute video at www.commoncraft.com/rss_plain_english

2. Pick an RSS reader: Google Reader, My Yahoo!, Netvibes, Bloglines, Newsgator, etc. (or…you can use the built-in functionality in Microsoft Outlook or Internet Explorer)

3. Start subscribing to feeds!

Publishing RSS? From a blog you create: wordpress.com, wordpress.org, blogger.com, or others (you can also add RSS to your existing web site, but the best tool for that really depends on your site).

Some Blogs to Check Out

No list in one small section on a resources page will be comprehensive, so we are sticking to a brief list of blogs / blog aggregations that are good, varied, and cover different nonprofit-oriented interest areas:

• Social Media and Technology for Nonprofits – beth.typepad.com

• Greenlights – greenlightsnonprofit.wordpress.com

• Nonprofit blogs -- nonprofit.alltop.com

• Technology resources for nonprofits -- TechSoup.org

• Nonprofits in Second Life -- nonprofitcommons.org

Some Real, Live, Face-to-Face Social Media Resources • Social Media in Austin – austin.socialmediaclub.com email: socialmediaclubaustin@gmail.com

• 501 Tech Club Austin – Google “501 Tech Club – Austin”

Getting Started with Twitter…for the Adventurous!

1. Go to twitter.com and create an account.

2. Follow Omar L. Gallaga’s (Austin American-Statesman) “Austin Twitter Starter Pack:”

− kimhaynes − pzriddle − conniereece

− mikechapman − lpt − sheilas

− silona − LaniAR − jettek

− mcchris

3. Follow some non-Austinites who are working with social media and nonprofits:

− kanter − techsoup − netsquared

− bbravo − afhill − philanthropy

− beautifulthangs − littlelaura − tet3

− ntenhross − webb

4. Find a Twitter application you like: Tweetdeck or Twhirl (desktop), Twitterberry or Twitterrific (mobile).

5. Go to search.twitter.com, set up a search for keywords in your area of interest – subscribe to the resulting RSS feed (See Getting Started with RSS? above) and follow anyone who shows up.

Refer to the link at the top of the page for a much more comprehensive list