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Episode Transcription<\/h1>
David Pisarek: <\/strong><\/span>
This podcast episode is made possible by WowDigital.com, your trusted partner for non-profit and charity website and design. How are you using social media for your non-profit and charity? Hang out? Listen to this episode. I've got Sarah on the show, and we're going to talk all things social media, so pay attention. All right. We'll see if they can use that. I don't know.<\/p>Sarah Suarez:<\/span> <\/span><\/strong>
I thought it was great.<\/p>David Pisarek: <\/strong><\/span>
Welcome to the Non-profit Digital Success Podcast. I'm your host, David. And in this episode, we're going to be talking all things social media with Sarah Suarez:<\/span> <\/span><\/strong>. Sarah has nearly a decade of experience at small and large non-profits, including the Houston Humane Society Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. She's the founder of the Social Puzzle, which is a boutique social media agency that builds and engages digital audiences for non-profits and small businesses so they can focus on increasing their impact. Sarah, thank you so much for joining on the episode today.<\/p>Sarah Suarez:<\/span> <\/span><\/strong>
Thank you for having me. I'm really excited to chat with you.<\/p>David Pisarek: <\/strong><\/span>
Fantastic. And just like off the bat, you mentioned that you are an introvert. So this is like something really different and neat, and you're working on expanding your personal growth, I guess. How does this feel for you?<\/p>Sarah Suarez:<\/span> <\/span><\/strong>
It feels better than my first one. This is probably my third time sort of showing up in this capacity, and the first time I probably didn't sleep the whole week before, but this time I slept last night. So it's improvement.<\/p>David Pisarek: <\/strong><\/span>
Fantastic. And you're in a family of extroverts. So what's that like?<\/p>Sarah Suarez:<\/span> <\/span><\/strong>
Exhausting. They don't have a need for downtime or they recharge by constantly talking to me. And so as an introvert surrounded by extroverts, it's difficult to get that recharging time, but it's also helping me to sort of get out of my little introvert shell.<\/p>David Pisarek: <\/strong><\/span>
Yeah. Sometimes we need to do things that push our boundaries a little bit. And I find for myself, when you find that boundary, you're like, \"I feel a little uncomfortable.\" That's when you know you're growing. I think it's important for people to think about this idea of personal growth, but expand it to the organizations that they're working at. Right. If your manager, director, or executive director is like, \"I don't think we should be doing stuff on Twitter\", let's try it. Let's see what happens. Right. Let's experiment a little bit with that.<\/p>Sarah Suarez:<\/span> <\/span><\/strong>
Yeah, I completely agree. And really, there's not so much risk if you're being careful, if you're doing it thoughtfully, there's more to gain, for sure.<\/p>David Pisarek: <\/strong><\/span>
Speaking of gaining, what do you see as the biggest opportunity that non-profits might be missing out on when thinking about social media marketing?<\/p>Sarah Suarez:<\/span> <\/span><\/strong>
Right. So for the organizations that either have not yet found their place on social media, not created a presence, or for the ones that maybe have pulled back, the biggest thing I think that they are missing out on is reach. So the potential to connect with either donors or even strategic partners that could help expand their mission and maybe outside of their physical location. I have a client that, through relationship building on social media, established a strategic partnership that has allowed them to expand their reach globally outside of the US. And that's really been a game changer to them. They wouldn't have had that opportunity if they hadn't been active on social media.<\/p>David Pisarek: <\/strong><\/span>
I have a workshop webinar, that's all about how to get corporate sponsors for your non-profit or charity. And one of the things that I talk about is connecting with these potential strategic partners, potential corporate sponsors, and commenting on some of their posts, not necessarily just outreach. \"Hey, do you want to connect and donate and volunteer with us?\", but start creating some conversation with them in a space that isn't just about asking.<\/p>Sarah Suarez:<\/span> <\/span><\/strong>
Yeah, for sure. And I think obviously that's all part of being social. On social media is like building these, as authentic as they can be relationships with, whether it's other organizations or if it is a potential corporate sponsor. I volunteer for an organization, and I am the co-sponsorship chair for their walk, their annual walk. And I can't tell you how many times they ask, \"What platforms are you on? What's your handle? How many followers?\" Because it also provides them an opportunity to get in front of your audience. And they want to quantify that by seeing how much of your audience there is.<\/p>David Pisarek: <\/strong><\/span>
Exactly. There's a reciprocal relationship that needs to happen there in order for it to be successful.<\/p>Sarah Suarez:<\/span> <\/span><\/strong>
Right? Yeah.<\/p>David Pisarek: <\/strong><\/span>
Non-profits typically operate, I hate this saying, but on a shoestring budget, usually understaffed, usually well overworked people are doing the job of two, three, four people sometimes. What do you recommend for smaller non-profits who might not be able to afford an employee or even find a volunteer to kind of manage their social media? What do you recommend for them?<\/p>Sarah Suarez:<\/span> <\/span><\/strong>
Well, I think a few things. One, it's so important to show up, and really, if you have no social media presence, it doesn't, in my opinion, reflect well on your organization, saying that you're a modern non-profit. The other thing I would say is the person who is running your social media really needs to have an understanding of your organizational goals and use those goals to create and implement a strategy on social media. And so that may not always be possible when a volunteer or an intern is managing your presence. But I think what I would recommend in that situation is that the organization make a small investment, a one time investment with a social media professional that either provides an audit so you can see what's working, what's not, and get suggestions for improvement, or even better, a customized strategy which will serve as a roadmap for the volunteer or intern. And the best thing about that is in the case of turnover from volunteers or interns, there is going to still be a consistency in your presence. It won't be like the tone changes or the vision changes. It will always hopefully maintain the same feel because it's based off of this roadmap, this strategy.<\/p>David Pisarek: <\/strong><\/span>
And that ties into something that I've spoken about on a number of other episodes, which is branding. When you think of your brand, you think of your logo, maybe you think of your colours. Quite often you don't really think about your font or your tone or style of messaging. And when I meet with our clients, I talk about maybe you should create a content style guide or an editorial style guide. Create a social media style guide, have things like what is okay, what isn't okay, right? I've seen in the past some flame wars where I think like Dairy Queen tries to go after Burger King across the street and they post signs up trying to challenge each other and stuff like that. If something like that is okay for your organization, that needs to be documented. So whoever is managing the social knows what those boundaries are that are maybe okay to push a little bit further.<\/p>Sarah Suarez:<\/span> <\/span><\/strong>
Right? Yeah, I agree. And as an example, I have a client and their tone is just very upbeat, positive, encouraging. They would never experience sort of, I have never seen them experience trolls. And then I have another Organization that have experienced trolls. And so after talking and running the possibilities by everyone, what we come to the conclusion of is that we want our social media space to be a safe place. And so if there is any negativity towards other followers or audience members, we just basically delete it because it's not worth bringing that to the forefront. But that was an important decision to make at the beginning, so that there was an understanding of how it would be and an expectation of how it would be.<\/p>David Pisarek: <\/strong><\/span>
And things like that would be covered under, let's say, an acceptable use policy or guideline document that you might have on your website saying that you reserve the right to remove X, Y and Z without notification, for example.<\/p>Sarah Suarez:<\/span> <\/span><\/strong>
Right.<\/p>David Pisarek: <\/strong><\/span>
Okay. So potentially hiring somebody as like a one-time shot, get some clear strategy for your organization, and potentially doing some outreach, finding somebody that cares, that's passionate about your organization, maybe leverage them and see if they are comfortable helping you with your social media. I think those are some interesting opportunities, but being very clear on what's okay, what isn't, and the tone is super important.<\/p>Sarah Suarez:<\/span> <\/span><\/strong>
Right.<\/p>David Pisarek: <\/strong><\/span>
All right, so I've had conversations with guests before around this topic. I'm curious what your thoughts are. What is the best platform for a non-profit to focus on?<\/p>