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Best practices for building a MySpace profile for nonprofits and cause marketing.
There are many reasons to have a MySpace profile. It’s a means of socializing, marketing, and organizing. It’s a creative outlet and mode of self expression. For nonprofit organizations and cause marketers, it can also be a powerful tool. Since the platform is so highly flexible, though, one can be overwhelmed with options for customizing their pages. Not to mention the general chaos that is the sixth-visited site on the Internet. So it helps to get some expert advice.
Heather Mansfield of Diosa Communications specializes in Web 2.0 consulting for nonprofit organizations. Her Nonprofit Organizations profile is both a portfolio of her work and a network of 31,400 friends, many of which are clients such as Conscious Consuming, Fair Trade Resource Network, and Smiles Change Lives. Mansfield clearly knows what she’s doing in this space, offering regular webinars on all sorts of Web 2.0 marketing tactics. In the spirit of social media, she is also quite generous in making quality information available for the DIY set. One of these is her ongoing list of MySpace Best Practices. From design to fundraising to blogging, she spills about it all and continues to add new entries each month. Below are a few highlights.
(2) Center your “Friends” and “Comments” section
MySpace is all about interactivity and the ability of your friends to participate actively in your MySpace community. Your friends post comments and images of support in your comments section. Often these images are large in width and can easily throw off the design of your MySpace. Centering your friends and comments section allows more leeway for image width. To center your friends and comments section, copy and paste the following html code into the bottom of the “I’d Like to Meet” section: </table></tr></td>
(6) Invest the time and energy in acquiring “Friends”
Friends are the heart and soul of MySpace.The more friends you have, the more successful your MySpace. In the beginning, it is important that you take the time and make the effort to send out 50-100 (or more!) friend requests everyday. Successful MySpace communications and marketing is really a numbers game. The more friends you have, the more people there are to read your bulletins. The more friends you have, the more likely others are to find your MySpace and send you a friend request. The more friends you have, the more people will visit your organization’s website. It’s not about being popular on MySpace for vanity’s sake, but rather being popular to share your organization’s mission with large numbers of individuals on MySpace.
When the Nonprofit Organizations MySpace hit the 5,000 friends mark,a critical mass occurred. The number of friend requests received on a daily basis grew very quickly and I no longer needed to send out friend requests. So, I suggest that your organization find a volunteer or intern who can spend the time necessary in the first few months reaching the 5,000 friends benchmark.
(12) Be thankful!
Sometimes we overlook the most obvious. If someone makes you a top friend or supports your MySpace efforts in a special way and lets you know about it by either sending you an e-mail or comment, be sure to thank them for their support. If you don’t thank them, you won’t be in their top friends for long! A simple “Thank you!” will easily earn their long-term support. Your supporters want to feel appeciated for their efforts.
I have experienced this first hand. In the past, I have sometimes neglected to say thank you when an individual or nonprofit organization has made the Nonprofit Organization MySpace a top friend. I wasn’t in their top friends for long.
(13) Post 1-2 bulletins per day
Bulletins are by far the most powerful feature on MySpace. Unfortunately, many nonprofit organizations are overzealous in sending out too many bulletins. The great majority of your supporters who actually take the time to read the bulletin board have 300 friends or less. Sending out more than 1-2 bulletins a day completely overtakes their bulletin boards and begins to give the impression that you are spamming.
That said, plan your bulletins in advance. They should have a wide variety of themes and subjects. Some should be informational, some should be calls to action, and every once in awhile, something fun like a funny video or article. If you are going to post two bulletins per day, then post one in the morning and one in the afternoon. Most importantly, your bulletins should drive your supporters to your organization’s website.
(19) Put your donors in your top friends
You can now have 40 top friends on MySpace. Make your Top 8 your MySpace allies (other nonprofits, musicians, etc.) and save the other 32 top friend spots for donors. Through the use of bulletins, ask people to make a donation through your fundraising widget and let them know that you will make them a top friend if they donate. Once the donation is made, contact them through Change.org or MySpace and let them know you want to make them a top friend!
(38) Use MySpace to build your e-newsletter mailing list
This is one of the top three reasons your organization should be using MySpace! As I have mentioned many times before, the beauty of MySpace is that you can customize your organization’s profile using html. On the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund MySpace you’ll see a sign up box for their e-newsletter. The html code for that sign up box was taken directly from their website.
If your organization has the html code for an e-newsletter sign up box, be sure to embed it on your MySpace! Also, since bulletins on MySpace are compatible with html, be sure to send around the html sign up box via bulletin with an “ask” to subscribe at least once a week. You can also insert a “Subscribe” graphic on your MySpace that is linked to the e-newsletter sign up page on your website. See the left side of the American Refugee Committee’s MySpace for an example.
(46) Add the iThink App
MySpace launched Apps in March 2008. Be sure to Add the iThink App and post opinions and comments relevant to the mission of your organization. This application is a great way to get your logo and profile out there on the MySpace community which could easily lead to increased friend requests. Be sure to pay special attention to the “Catagories” relevant to the work of your nonprofit!
1 response so far ↓
1 Lynn from Organicmania.com // May 28, 2008 at 6:24 pm
I found this very helpful. Thanks for the great insights! I’m working with a few non-profits and hope to put some of these tips to good use!
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