A new study highlights the realities of donor behavior and how organizations can redesign their outreach strategies to be more effective.
Until recently the models that nonprofits used to find, engage, and cultivate donors, volunteers, and other supporters were reasonably straightforward. The first step was to use direct mail, phone calls, or other techniques to bring in large numbers of potential supporters at a low level of engagement. These supporters were sorted into neat groups, and the most promising people were continually moved up the pyramid or ladder and cultivated for larger and larger donations. It was an orderly and linear process. Today, the Internet and social media have permanently disrupted the traditional donor-engagement process. Online competitions, viral video campaigns, mobile giving—with each new way for organizations and donors to interact come increasingly complex entry points into the traditional models of donor engagement, greater variation in movement along the pathway to deeper engagement, and more opportunities for a person to be influenced by forces outside an organization’s control.
To better understand the impact that social media is having on donor engagement, we conducted a nationwide research project. We learned that donor behavior and communications preferences have changed because of social media. And as a result, the traditional donor engagement models are no longer sufficient. In their place we need to create a new model of donor engagement, one that is more fluid and continuous, and that better reflects the growing importance that a person’s influence (and how she uses it) plays in the process.
Via
Kimberly Flaherty
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This is a groundbreaking study in understanding how social media, and Twitter in particular, might impact public opinion. I think many of us in communication would have assumed that the Twitter-verse is younger and leans more Democratic. Therefore it is not surprising that the trending on any given topic on Twitter would not always mirror public opinion.
However, the researchers were also able to dig up a number of other interesting factors that contribute to the disconnect between Twitterites and the general public. One is simply numbers: there are far fewer people on Twitter relative to the voting public as a whole. Twitter also reaches beyond voters to people under the age of 18, non-U.S. citizens and others. It is also clear that Twitter records nearly instant reaction to a given issue without the benefit of the further reflection. Reactionary might be the right word.
The question I have is how much do these knee-jerk pronouncements on Twitter actually shape public opinion. One might suggest "not a lot" based on this study.