How Charitable Organizations Continue to Grow through Social Media Engagement

In order for non-profit organizations or charitable foundations to grow and provide resources to those in need, they also need to be able to reach millions of people around the world while brining awareness, incoming donations and volunteer work back to the cause. Years ago, this would often be quite the tedious and time-consuming process, with manual outreach, local fundraisers and mail-outs being the only way to reach the masses. Now, thanks to the massive growth of the internet and social media, everyone is more connected than ever. Throw mobile usage into the mix, and now everyone is simply just a few seconds away from seeing articles, crowdfunded campaigns, social media shares and site content from charities throughout the world. And with more organizations now focusing their efforts on social media outreach and raising awareness, many of them are seeing improved numbers month after month. With all of this in mind, if you want to create a successful campaign and fundraising efforts for your organization, you need to make sure you have all of the necessary social media efforts in place. That is exactly what we will be covering in detail today. Let's get started.

Having a Consistent Brand Identity on Social is Key

For charitable organizations, a lot of time, money and effort goes into the startup and branding process. You need to make sure you have a great name for your organization, a logo that resonates with your audience and a website, blog and social media accounts to go along with it. However, the one thing you need to make sure you have in place across all of these mediums, is. standard look and feel. If you have a logo and specific colors for your organization, make sure you are using those same logo designs and colors across all of your social platforms as well. And the same holds true for your foundation name and account names. You want to make it as easy as possible for other people to discover and follow your content and cause as much as possible, while also growing your visual brand in the process. A perfect example of this can be seen with WE Charity, as they've built up quite the following through their websites and blogs, but also on social media as well. With more than 2.8 million fans on their Facebook Page and another 300,000+ on the We Charity Twitter page, you can see how they are doing an excellent job in creating content on different platforms, while also keeping their brand messaging on point. No matter how big or small your charitable organization might be, it's important to have a solid foundation in place when expanding your efforts to social media and multiple platforms.

Create Content that is Fun and Easy to Share with Others

With millions of brands, businesses and organizations actively using social media to grow their reach and engagement, it's important to remember that social media is a two-way street. While many accounts will just put content out there that leads to more clicks, sales and revenue, this will only perform for so long. Instead, it's all about providing value to your audience, showing why your account is worth following and giving audiences something that they might want to share with others. A perfect example of this can be seen with many retail food and snack accounts on Twitter. They aren't just putting stuff out there about their brand and products, they are doing it in a fun way to relate with world events or what's trending on social media right now. As reported by Benzinga, this is also something SlimJim and many other brands have been doing with #Dogecoin and all of the attention it's been getting lately. For charitable organizations looking to do the same, it's perfectly fine to create original content that relates with people on a personal level... while also not needing to be 100% about the cause and bringing in new donations or volunteer work. A great example of this would be creating and sharing small infographic stats on endangered animals, world hunger, housing efforts and getting help for those in need. And when creating such content, try to make sure they are visually pleasing and something that followers might want to like and share. The more engaging, visual and valuable you make your content, the more likely it is to get shared -- while also helping to grow your follower count in the process.

Cross Promote Content on Each Social Platform

Whether it's Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, Pinterest or Facebook... there are billions of social networking users out there just waiting to consume your content. And no matter what platform you are using, it's important to make sure the content you are creating and the engagement with your audience is always as high as possible. This means you should also be creating custom content for each platform. The image sizes and content that will perform best on Pinterest and Twitter will be different than what performs best on Instagram and Facebook. And the last thing you want to do is upload a bunch of the same content across every platform and having your images cut off or not looking the highest of quality. This will just make your organization look unprofessional and can lead to more unfollowers and less reach. It's also important to note that some platforms perform differently depending on the time of the day. As pointed out by Influencer Marketing Hub, the following times would be best to post to Instagram.

• between 2 PM and 3 PM – Thursday the best day (HubSpot )
• Wednesday at 11 AM and Friday at 10–11 AM (SproutSocial)
• 9 AM-11 AM EST (Later)

But as noted, each social platform is different, so you will want to set your post scheduling up to match the most popular times for each platform. And lastly, the best way to take advantage of your social growth on each platform, is to cross promote your content as well. During peak times on Twitter and Facebook, consider sharing an update on your recent Instagram and Pinterest content -- this way you can start increasing your numbers across all social platforms, making sure even more people are seeing your content at all times.

Improving Your Social Reach and Engagement Day After Day

At the end of the day, social media isn't going anywhere, and for charitable organizations and non-profit foundations of all sizes, this is a dream come true. With more people learning about the many different ways to help those in need, the more likely your organization is to bring in more donations, volunteers and resources. Outside of social media, there are plenty of other opportunities to reach new audiences and bring further awareness to your organization. Such methods consist of writing new content for your website or blog, getting interviewed on different podcasts, interviewing other industry experts related to your cause, and even the many different ways to raise additional resources and funding through online crowdfunding and auction events. No matter what you are currently doing to help increase engagement and awareness for your organization, know that every little step will help along the way. Stick with it, and just imagine the following and impact your organization may have in the coming months and years.