I like examples.  Whether they’re of successes or failures, a keen administration can learn multitudes from examples.  A recent example of a modern non-profit engaging a community by leveraging pre-existing communities is www.dosomething.org’s presence on myspace.com.  This clever maneuver may not be as unique as a Dali painting, but the layers of successes wrapped into this effort is impressive and worth study.

I’m going to list these in order of what I see as their most potent tactics. 

I nerd out with Diane Hatz, founder of Sustainable Table, talking about the difference between Slow Food and sustainable food, the secrets behind making a viral video, and why she believes "you can tell people there's a problem, unless you can offer a solution."

I recently wrote about Tu Diabetes' use of Twitter and the strategies the online community has employed to find and engage with new people.  Today, I want to take a look at another social media tool Tu Diabetes is using successfully: YouTube.

Just a very quick post this time to draw your attention to the latest Digital Makeover video in which Danny from SYFAB provides an update on SYFAB's progress over the last month or so.

We very recently took a look at what is and is not getting read on the NetSquared blogs and figured that the information we came upon will be as useful to your content development strategy as it will be to ours.

Here are a few things that jumped right out at us (the bold is straight from the report, followed immediately by my commentary):

There comes a time, usually if you’re working remotely or have no office, where you really need a way to share files, documents, messages and pictures online between a lot of people for free.

Easy, I said at my last Amnesty International meeting, we’ll just set up a Google non-profits account - all their project management tools are free. No thanks, they said, we refuse to use Google because of their human rights record.

To promote a new gorilla habitat, the London Zoo came up with a virtual gorilla. You download it to your desktop, then make sure all its needs are taken care of: food, water, etc. In time, the baby gorilla will grow into a mighty silverback. (I’m waiting for a virtual Jane Goodall to show up and park herself in the corner of my monitor, taking notes on my gorilla.)

Basically, this is a retread of the Tamagotchi phenomenon. It’s a cool toy that hooks kids in, educates them a little, and clutters up mom’s computer.

I was going to write about all the excellent non-profit blogs out there that there are to be read, but Beth’s Blog already made a fantastic entry to get you started on this (granted it focuses exclusively on Gen X/Y/Millennial blogs - but we’re Gen X/Y and it’s just to get you started).

A confession is that I don’t actually read a whole lot of non-profit oriented blogs and sites, mostly because it’s hard to find ones that don’t oversimplify their advice to the point of it being useless. Consider a recent example I came across on the subject of online fundraising:

Greetings NetSquared citizens. My name is James Vito Palazzolo and I’ve just joined the blogging team that brings you relevant content about tech tools, interviews with non-profit personnel leading the charge merging tech and communications, theoretical concepts regarding the past/present/future of non-profits, and many more topics.

Join one of 10 Net Tuesdays next week! Net Tuesdays are free monthly gatherings for social changemakers and web innovators to network, socialize and share ideas about how nonprofits and social benefit organizations can use the social web for social change. If you don't see a Net Tuesdya near you, start your own!