Social media is a whole different animal than it used to be and has a lot of potential impact on your online presence. It seems as if now, if you don’t have an active social media presence, you’re often forgotten about. Nonprofits already have a hard enough time gaining traction; we don’t need to be forgotten about!
Here are three of our favorite social media tools to not only help make your job easier, but to spice up your feed as well. We dare you to try one!
Boomerang
It’s not a photo, it’s not a gif and it’s definitely not an Australian toy that you throw. Boomerang is a video app for Instagram that lets you turn an ordinary post into something exciting. Boomerang takes a burst of photos and stitches them together into a high-quality mini video that plays forward and backward. Shoot in portrait or landscape mode and share it on Instagram. Boomerang automatically saves it to your camera roll. With looping videos, you can experiment with motion in new and exciting ways.
Timelapse
Time lapse is great for squishing together a long video and making it easily digestible. Using this tool allows you to give a behind-the-scenes look to your followers. Take a time lapse video of something you do everyday, or record a special occasion. It can be a “day in the life” video of you and your staff, or you at your fundraiser. In any case, choose something that will give some insight to your followers. Better yet, since time lapse videos are typically pretty short, you can share it across all social platforms.
Ripl
Ripl is a free iPhone app (free if you don’t mind their watermark at the bottom right of your images or animations). The paid version is $9.99 per month. Basically, Ripl allows you to add animated features to your photos. It’s perfect for Facebook, Instagram or Twitter. There are various templates available which you can customize for your brand. It’s easy to choose an animation or design style that you like and plug in your own images, text and logo. It’s a new way to engage and it’s super user-friendly.
Our friend John Haydon, author of “Facebook Marketing for Dummies,” says social media lets you become a trusted member of your community:
“Make a sincere effort to become a trusted member of your community—to become one of them. What this means is pouring sweat, tears and love into listening and demonstrating how much you care, with replies on blogs, Facebook and Twitter. It means expressing appreciation for your community to the point where it almost seems like the community and the cause comes way before your organization. When this is done correctly, it always results in increased donors, volunteers and revenue. All that’s required is time, consideration and trust.”
Social media is one of the most powerful marketing and engagement tools, but only if you use it effectively. Whether you are just starting or looking for a new way to do things, try these three tools and we know you’ll be spicier than ever.
