5 Keys to Make the Most of Your Nonprofit’s Online Experience
September 30, 2011 | 
Author Today I’d like to share an article from Joe Boland at Fundraising Success, a great resource for maximizing your fundraising efforts.
When Jarid Brown
joined the Hope Institute for Children and Families 18 months ago as manager of online interactions, the Springfield, Ill.-based organization dedicated to educational, residential and health services to children with disabilities had very little in the way of online communications.
A year and a half later, the Hope Institute now has a fully integrated online strategy that has seen remarkable growth in e-mail and e-newsletter subscribers, social-media followers, website visitors, and e-philanthropy. It was such a remarkable transformation that FundRaising Success will be sharing the Hope Institute’s online metamorphosis in one of the two remaining cover stories (August and November) in our four-part case studies series this year.
Here, Brown shares his keys to getting the most out of your nonprofit’s online experience.
Read the full article at Fundraising Success >> 5 Keys to Make the Most of Your Nonprofit’s Online Experience
This was a great article on why you need to plan your internet ministry building and ensure that everything works together. Harvest Media’s Website Development Services division can help you to put together a plan that works. Call us today at 520-790-1222, talk to me, Joe Goodale about growing your ministry or organization.
New Changes at Facebook – What Does It Mean For You…
Here is some important Facebook information provided by Matt Rhodes and Fresh Networks.
The announcements at Sept. 22nd’s F8 conference included a few of the changes we expected from Facebook (the music service was a very poorly kept secret) and a few more radical changes that went further than we might have guessed.
For organizations using social media and working with Facebook, now is the time to begin to digest and understand what this means about how people will use the social network in different ways and what this means for you.
Here are three initial trends that I see having an impact on brands and organizations that use Facebook and suggestions about how to capitalize on them:
Read the full article at >> New Changes at Facebook – What Does It Mean For You…
Next Wednesday, we’ll take a look at – Twitter.
If you don’t have the time to wait for this series to complete and need to leverage the power of social media for your ministry or organization right away, Please give Joe Goodale a call at 520-790-1222 to schedule a complimentary evaluation of your needs. Find out how Harvest Media Ministry can help you build your organization through a variety of Internet based services.
HMM Producing new Raising Truly Great Kids DVD Study for Family Matters
The Harvest Media team was in Dallas, Texas over the weekend capturing the Raising Truly Great Kids conference for Family Matters, a non-profit ministry whose goal is to see families transformed by God’s grace into instruments of restoration and reformation by equipping families for every age and stage of life. Dr. Tim Kimmel teaches this humorous and informative conference, providing a grace-based, character-
driven model to nurture confident and cooperative kids.
We captured the live event with four cameras and will be putting together the new DVD study over the next couple of months. We had a great time working with the media team at Chase Oaks Church and enjoyed using their outstanding facility. Their team was super accommodating and easy to work with.
You can check out this promo for the Raising Truly Great Conference to learn more:
A Volunteer Communications Strategy: 13 Steps to Driving Recruitment, Engagement and Leadership
This is a partial re-post of an article at Engaging Volunteers from Nancy Schwartz’s Getting Attention blog and e-newsletter for nonprofits.
When it comes to recruiting and motivating volunteers to ever higher and more effective levels of engagement, no organization has its work more cut out for it than New York Cares.
In order to ensure that its massive and complex operation runs smoothly, the staff at New York Cares has spent considerable time developing and refining their volunteer recruitment strategies, whose lynchpin, not surprisingly, is communication.
Nancy spent some time talking with the folks at New York Cares recently and as you’ll see below, their strategies can be put to work to boost your organization’s volunteer recruitment, engagement and retention rates, no matter your size.
The 13 Principles Driving New York Cares’ Volunteer Communication Strategy Read the rest of this entry »
The “Social Media” Connection, Pt 2
Social media platforms will help you build a loyal list of followers as well as generate new visitors, volunteers and donation prospects if used correctly. Let’s take a look at the current leader:
FACEBOOK
It’s no secret that Facebook is crucial when it comes to ministry building. If your organization doesn’t have a facebook presence you are missing out on a LOT of potential traffic.
Many people today spend most of their time on Facebook. According to Hubspot’s blog,
In May, internet users spent more time on Facebook than Yahoo, Google, AOL, and MSN combined.
With 53.5 billion minutes spent on Facebook, the site continues to prove the value of being “Liked.”
While Google and other search engine rankings are extremely crucial for a company to get found, Facebook and other social media sites are also as important for companies to engage with their customers as well as prospects who can potentially be converted into sales.
You’ve probably also noticed that most businesses are quickly trying to establish their ground on Facebook.
Just about every website, TV commercial, flyer, and any other advertising methods include a statement such as, “Like Us on Facebook,” or “Connect with Us on Facebook,” or “Find Us on Facebook.”
According to official Facebook statistics, there are currently more than 750 MILLION active Facebook users and 50% of them log in EVERY DAY. A majority login more that twice a day and most stay for over 30 minutes.
People spend over 700 BILLION minutes per month on Facebook. Not only that, but more than 2.5 MILLION websites have been integrated with Facebook!
Are you starting to see the big picture here… Facebook is HUGE. Read the rest of this entry »
Into My Arms – A Harvest Media Video Production for Restoring The Heart Ministries
Over the last several months, I’ve been working on a project called ‘Into My Arms’ for Restoring the Heart Ministries. ‘Into My Arms’ is a 10 part counseling series accompanied by a curriculum, targeted at counseling professionals and lay people to help them lead women through the forgiveness journey after an abortion. Throughout this production, many women discuss the trauma they have gone through due to an abortion experience.
Something I learned while producing this series is the fact that a large percentage of women who know that abortion is wrong, have one anyway. Some of those women never wanted to have an abortion in the first place, but were coerced into having one. Unfortunately it’s very common for a boyfriend or husband to coerce their girlfriend or wife into having an abortion, threatening them that they’ll leave if they don’t have one.
What’s even more unfortunate is the fact that many of these women, who very much want to keep their baby, end up having an abortion, only to find that their significant other ends up leaving them anyway. Other women have abortions, thinking nothing of it. Sometime later when they realize what they have done, they have a hard time forgiving themselves, and they don’t believe that God will forgive them.
This series is meant to help them realize that God has already forgiven them, and that they can experience freedom again. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Counseling Series, Video Projects | 
Tags: abortion, abuse, counseling, forgiveness, healing, heart, into my arms, restoration | 
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Five No- or Low-Cost Ways To Sustain Fundraising Momentum…
With the fall event season coming into full swing, it’s likely that many of your fundraising campaigns are already under way. Whether your organization is hosting a gala, an intimate cocktail reception or a large community event, you know these events are the best chance to increase awareness, strengthen relationships and inspire involvement for the coming year.
Of course, events with your donors, volunteers and the community at large often only happen a few times a year. The big question is how to harness those face-to-face interactions to continue to build the relationships you develop and keep your constituencies engaged throughout the year.
One way nonprofits do this is by changing how they communicate with their constituents. Read the rest of this entry »
The “Social Media” Connection
The “Social Media” Connection
Today we continue to look at how you can connect with your local volunteer and donor prospects using social media outlets like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.
As a fellow ministry director, I know that it is very easy to get overwhelmed with everything that it takes to be successful in meeting goals and objectives. Ministry directors are very busy running their organizations and usually have little or no time to dedicate to all of the different marketing channels available to help you grow your ministry.
However, social media is definitely one that should not be ignored.
With this extremely popular and effective form of ministry building, you can connect and form relationships with like minded people… keeping your ministry or organization at the top of their minds when they, or someone they know, needs your services or when they themselves want to get involved with what your doing.
Regardless of whether your organization has a website or not, you can benefit from social media. Read the rest of this entry »
HMM Launches Redesigned Site For Gospel Rescue Mission Tucson
Web Development Dept. Update
On Friday, September 9th, HMM made the switch over to the recently redesigned website for the Gospel Rescue Mission in Tucson, AZ.
The new site has a cleaner look and feel, and the navigation makes it much easier to find what your looking for. We invite you to visit the site at http://GospelRescueMission.com.
Gospel Rescue Mission has been serving the Tucson and Southern Arizona community for over 50 years, providing emergency and long-term shelter and addiction recovery services for both men and women. Read the rest of this entry »
Top 10 Things Donors Want from Your Nonprofit’s Web Site
On Fridays, Ill be sharing with you some of the best articles from leading Fundraising writers and authors pertaining to growing your ministry or non-profit organization.
Today I want to highlight an article from Gail Perry Associates Fired-Up Fundraising Blog:
Top 10 Things Donors Want from Your Nonprofit’s Web Site
Did you know that most donors check out your web site before they make a gift? – whether they are giving on line or through the mail.
A Kellogg Foundation study found that potentially up to 50% of your donors are going to want to check you out before they give, whether they give online or not. Here are questions you should ask about your site to see if it is hurting or helping your fudnraising campagin.
First, “your web site is now your front door,” advises Ted Hart in the 09 Year-End Strategies Telesummit. I interviewed Ted last week as part of the Telesummit and he shared a long list of things donors are looking for on your web site.
Raed the full article at: http://www.gailperry.com/2009/10/top-10-things-donors-want-from-your-nonprofits-web-site
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