Homework
From GrassrootsPedia
In order to make the most of your NOI training experience, there are a few homework assignments that we'd like you to complete. The first two are due by Wednesday morning -- the second two are due by Thursday morning.
Homework Assignment #1: Organizational Scavenger Hunt (due Wednesday)
What is your organization currently doing with new media and online organizing? Many organizations are already utilizing some core online tools, like email or donation systems – but you may not know about them or they may be used without an articulated strategy. This scavenger hunt is your excuse to ask questions of your co-workers – after all, it’s been assigned to you as homework!
Answer the following questions in order to better understand what your organization is already doing with online organizing and new media:
1. Who edits your organization’s website? How often? How much time does this person (or do these people) spend editing the website per week?
2. How does your organization’s website function? Is there a Content Management System (CMS) such as Democracy in Action, Blue State Digital, Convio, or the like that runs behind it? If so, who has access? If not, how are edits made?
3. Does your organization have an email list? How many people are on it? Are they segmented into groups? Who maintains those groups? How regularly?
4. How often does your organization send emails? Who sends them? Who has to sign off on an email before it’s sent out? What types of emails does your organization send (i.e. action, fundraising, newsletters, etc.)?
5. Does your organization have an online fundraising program? How much money has been raised from it in the last six months? In the last year? Compared with your offline fundraising efforts, how has your online fundraising program fared?
6. Does your organization have a blog? How often are blog entries posted? Has your organization ever reached out to bloggers? Which ones and why?
7. Does your organization have a Facebook, MySpace, YouTube, or Twitter page – and/or any other presence on social networking sites? If so, which ones? Who maintains or updates those pages? How often?
8. Is your organization working in coalition with any other organization(s)? If so, which ones and what do those partnerships look like? When was the last time the coalition worked together on a project or campaign?
Homework Assignment #2: Write an Email (due Wednesday)
Take just 10-15 minutes to jot down answers to the following questions:
What is the campaign you'd like to GO BIG this year? (issue/advocacy/membership)
If you don't have one, use your imagination to make one up – give the name and a very brief description of the campaign
What's your goal for this campaign?
Put numbers/specifics to it: Advocacy goal [policy]? List growth goal [#]? Fundraising goal [$]?
Imagine there's a breakout moment in the campaign. It could be one you create, one generated by the news cycle, or other external circumstances.
What is it? (Use your imagination... You can make up "news.")
Then, take a bit more time (max. 1 hour) to:
Draft the email outreach that could set the spark to the breakout moment.
It can be a fundraising ask or a call to action – whichever is most useful in spurning energy during your “breakout moment” above.
Homework Assignment #3: Write a Blogger Outreach Email (due Thursday)
Bloggers are an interesting bunch – and reaching out to them is different than reaching out to a journalist by issuing a traditional press release.
Take 10-15 minutes to write an outreach email to a blogger in order to either a) ask her/him to write about something your organization is working on, or b) feed information to her/him in the hopes of using it in a post.
You can choose any issue, action item, or piece of legislation you’d like – just make sure to balance distributing information with building relationships.
Homework Assignment #4: Create a (Short) Social Networking Strategy (due Thursday)
For most organizations, it makes sense to have a social networking strategy, whether that includes presence on a social networking site, the use of video, “forwardable” or “viral” emails, or other ways of empowering your supporters to pass information among their friends, family, and colleagues. However, it is always smart to think strategically about where and how you’re investing organizational resources (money, time, staffing) to ensure that you’re focusing your efforts.
Answer the following questions in order to outline an abbreviated social networking strategy:
Think about the campaigns your organization will be running over the next two to three months. Pick a campaign that you think might lend itself easily to being “social” – i.e. friends might be interested in talking with other friends about the issue/campaign.
What could you accomplish through social networking among your supporters and their friends that you couldn’t accomplish otherwise – i.e. are you trying to create buzz, encourage masses of people to take a targeted action, build your list, etc.?
Then pick a tool on which you could focus some attention in order to hone your strategy.
Does this campaign lend itself to a video campaign – are there emotionally compelling or funny images you can make use of? How about continual updates – does it make sense to use a tool like Facebook, which would require constant updates in order to adequately use the News Feed?
Next, think about who you work in coalition with in order to increase your reach.
What other organizations are invested in the success of this particular campaign? Who have you worked with previously? Who have you never worked with, but should? What other organizations might pitch in by reaching out to their list about this issue? What do you foresee as the potential results of that outreach? What do you foresee as the potential drawbacks?
Finally, think through the timing and results of this campaign.
When would you start this campaign? When would it end? How will you know that the campaign is over? How will you know whether the campaign is successful?
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