Twitter and the Social Entrepreneur

This weekend, I joined Mike Del Ponte and Rimas Silkaitis from Sparkseed for a teleseminar on "How to use Twitter for Social Entrepreneurship."  Rimas shared how to use Twitter for personal branding and what Twitter apps to use.  I focused on how organizations can use Twitter.  A full summary of the teleseminar will be posted on Sparkseed, but for now, here are my contributions to the discussion:

Twitter can be a great way for social entrepreneurs to reach a wide, yet targeted audience:
•    9.3 M Twitter (March up 131% over February and has passed up LinkedIn for reach.)
•    Nearly one-in-five (19%) online adults ages 18 to 24 have used Twitter/similar services, as have 20% of online adults ages 25 to 34.
•    Median age of a Twitter user is 31. Median age of a MySpace user is 27, Facebook user is 26 and LinkedIn user is 40. [Pew Research Center]
•    People are motivated by learning new things and getting information real-time as it’s developing. [Ann Handley, MarketingProfs, Mashable]

Twitter works best for organizations when your objectives are mission aligned.  Is education part of your mission?  Is activism or public policy change your goal?  Twitter can help you achieve your mission, as well as serving as a useful tool for marketing and communications. In the case of Social Edge, we are focused on helping social entrepreneurs start and scale their venture by connecting them with ideas, resources, and people that can help make them more succesful.  Deadlines for funding oportunities, relevant discussions, fascinating research, stories about other social entrepreneurs, and news from the field of social entrepreneurship can help them.  So those are the types of ideas we Twitter - it's a continuation of our mission in a different venue. Does it drive traffic to our site?  Yes, but only if they find the Twitter interesting and relevant enough to click on the link. 

So with your mission in mind, here are 10 ways to use Twitter to grow your social venture [and examples of folks who do it well]. The first three are focused on what your organization can learn and gain from listening, the latter seven are ways you can serve your community using Twitter.

10 Ways Social Entrepreneurs should use Mission-Aligned Twittering:
1.    Networking: find key influencers in your field to follow [http://tweepsearch.com]
2.    Knowledge: listen to keep up with latest events in your field(s) [#SocEnt, #prize4sc, ]
3.    Research: ask questions to gain insights, ideas, prioritize [@odemagazine, @McKQuarterly]
4.    Educating: highlight research, trends, and advances [@casefoundation, @knightfdn]
5.    Increasing Awareness: share accomplishments, beneficiary stories [@ashokatweets]
6.    Filtering: select the best information to retweet and save people time [@NetSquared]
7.    Events/conferences: increase reach and global participation [#swf09, @socialedge, "Twittered Conference"]
8.    Fundraising: raise small gifts, create “Epic Change” [@StaceyMonk, Tweetsgiving, Tanzania classroom, Charity:Water/Twestival, Mal Warwick]
9.    Announcements: post winners of contests, deadlines, milestones, etc. [@changemakers]
10.  Friendraising: build loyalty, make personal connections [@lend4health, "I've found that ppl I've tweeted with end up making a loan"]

Twitter Tips
•    Authenticity, transparency, and purpose are key to a good twitter presence
•    Ensure your twitterer(s) understand mission and brand personality
•    Make it personal and different from a blog, email, or RSS
•    Include links to full articles and use url shorteners with tracking
•    Use hashtags to be found and connect with others
•    Listen, respond, and retweet relevant information
•    Don’t repeat tweet
•    Add value

Twitter is the ultimate in permission marketing and viral marketing.  People can stop following you at any time, and they will only retweet what they find interesting & valuable. So your job is to ensure that Twittering is part of your operational programs, as well as part of your fundraising, communications, and marketing department(s).  The better the integration throughout your organization, the more useful your Twitters will be for your audience. Remember, it is not about you - self-serving marketing will soon lose it's followers, so keep your audience in mind and focus on the Twitters that they will find useful and entertaining.