The 501c3 Blogosphere

Recently I came across a metaphorm for the blogosphere, Blog-poly: a game of monopoly.   I started to wonder about what an appropriate metaphorm for the nonprofit sector of blogosphere might be.    But, before I could even begin to play with that idea, I need to blog some examples of nonprofit blogging.

While browsing the blogher schedule  , I came across Lisa Meyers Brown's blog "The Rhetoric of Me" which is focused on: "What I think about everything...especially nonprofits and social network technology."    I found this entry "Nonprofit Successfully Using Blogs"   The post describes the American Lung Association of Minnesota's new blog written by staff member Bob Moffitt.  Lisa is curious and raises some excellent questions:

Go Bob for blazing a trail!  We could all learn from what he's doing and I'm hoping he will provide additional comments/posts about the effort (Bob - do you have a personal blog? If not, please comment here). I'm curious to know about management of the blog (from a time/resource perspective), having a blog that's driven by the organization versus unsolicited supporters/volunteers (the pros and cons, the opportunities and challenges of posts coming from the organization), adoption by the local and national organization, feedback from bloggers/traffic, any measured ROI, etc.  Anything you can and will share, I would love to know.

In the comments section, Bob answers her post.  He describes how the blog got started, that he doesn't have a personal blog, and that one challenge is: "Always remembering that I am speaking not just for myself, but for the respected nonprofit health charity I work for, is sometimes a challenge" He also describes how he has established a habit of blogging daily or almost daily and the audience for blog is growing. "Visits on this new blog have steadily grown from approximately 400 last month to 900 this month."

Seems like the American Lung Association of Minnesota has discovered the right tool for the job as per  Deborah Finn's recent musings on nonprofits and blogging.

I also have some questions:

Bob, how do staff and the leadership within your organization view the use of a blog as a tool for the organization's communication strategy?  How did you introduce the concept of blogging to your ED?  What did you lay out as the benefits/risks?  Or did you just do it?

And questions for both Lisa and Bob -- What are your impressions of the nonprofit blogosphere?  What does it look like?

 

Technorati Tag: nptech

Comments

[Bob from the American Lung Association of MN]

Thanks, Beth. Having noted how pro-smoke activists in Minnesota were using blogs to communicate their views (mostly to like-minded bloggers, but also to anyone trolling for information on the new smoking laws in the Twin Cities), I felt we also needed a voice in this emerging new medium.

Our IT director Dave Larson, who already had a personal blog, gave me a quick overview on blogs and encouraged me to establish one. An hour later, our blog was born.

As luck would have it, our directors were meeting with our new CEO, who will take charge on July 1. Much of my presentation time at the directors meeting was spent explaining (with Dave's help) what a blog was, and why we need one.

I did not have a formal "blog communications plan" developed -- an important step I would recommend all other nonprofit bloggers -- but I had developed some overall guidelines that I shared with both CEOs and the fellow directors before I made my first posting:

1) This blog will be a communications tool of the ALAMN, the same considerations for content and tone made for print or website communications will apply to the blog.

2) This blog will be a tool for all divisions of the ALAMN, not just tobacco control. While much of the content is about smoking, we also have postings on asthma, fundraisers, outdoor air pollution, indoor air pollution and our clean fuels program.

3) We will not allow (as many blogs do) unedited comments to be posted on our blog. While this decision may seem to run counter to what a blog is supposed to be, I felt it was important not to allow our new site to be highjacked by critics of Minnesota smoking bans. As I mentioned before, these pro-smoke bloggers are well-organized (they have several formal blogger organizations and meet weekly at a local bar) and are very sophisticated and experienced in the blog-o-sphere.

I was certain the one thing that would certainly kill this new communications tool was having to explain to the CEO, National Office or a Board member why an official communications tool of the ALAMN is being used as a pro-smoke forum. So, no comments.

At Dave's urging, I did add my email address (which is how Beth reached me). Other than a couple of messages from pro-smoke activists in NY and PA (I had no idea our blog was beeing monitored outside of MN!), I have not had many site-related contacts -- untill I heard from Lisa and Beth.

At this time, Dave and I are the only two individuals authorized to post on the ALAMN blog, I have encouraged other managers to send me items (a few have). Another blog was established for our clean fuels program staff, but they have not yet made their first posting -- it is not quite on their radar screen as a worthwhile communications tool.

The jury is still out on the value of our site as well, but I will do a report next month on its purpose, its rapid growth and its potential for the future.

Meanwhile, I promote it whenever I can, encouraging other bloggers to add it to their blogrolls as Lisa has.

Robert Moffitt
Communications Director
American Lung Association of Minnesota

[Beth]

Thank you so much for sharing your experience! I'll add you to the blogroll ..

[Bob from the American Lung Association of MN]

Beth emailed this follow-up question to my earlier comments:

"My question is: How will you measure value/success?"

We will employ "the usual suspects" to measure success of the ALAMN blog, including counting visits, links, etc.

Determining the blog's value to the organization and its mission is a little more challenging. Here I will look for any direct actions taken as a result of a blog posting -- a donation, a new volunteer, a media story, etc.

I will also be asking myself and others in the organization tough questions about our blog, such as:

Is this taking more time than its worth?

Is this the right medium for our message?

Are we reaching the people we need to reach?

Are we using this communications tool to its best potential?

I'm not sure we will have all the answers. But as long as we keep asking ourselves the right questions, and keep focused on our mission, I think we will find many new uses for New Media that we haven't even dreamed of yet.