Virtual Community

Re: Creating Nonprofit Facebook Page

MeganKeane — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 00:03:20 GMT

Addin' another one on this thread.

This is an interesting situation to consider...I was recently asked by @priyamaine on Twitter if there was a way to migrate fans from one page to another for the same org. b/c of a change in creator. I checked in with someone at Facebook and I found out that there isn't a way to do migrate fans from page to page. The easiest solution if possible would be to have the creator switch the admin to another admin. If that's not possible & you're in the situation of having to re-create a separate page, contact Facebook customer service so they may be able to help, esp. if you prove that you are the org. associated w/ the page.

It brings up the issue of an individual "creator" creating a page--what do you do if that person no longer works for your org. or someone else takes over the page? This is something I've seen come up on other social media platforms, not just Facebook. Definitely something to think about when you are setting up any kind of organizational presence on social media sites.

Re: Creating Nonprofit Facebook Page

MeganKeane — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 21:23:47 GMT

I wanted to add that I was recently asked how you go about connecting a Facebook Cause to a Facebook fan page. Here's how you do it:

You go to the Causes application and check the option, “Add to my page” and select your fan page and that will add the Causes application to your page. Then you can go to edit on your fan page and edit the Causes application with the cause(s) you want to add and decide where you’d like to display these on your page.

Causes are great for specific campaigns and you can have multiple causes display on your organization's page for different fundraising/programs.

Best,

Megan

Re: Creating Nonprofit Facebook Page

MeganKeane — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 21:20:15 GMT

A big "DITTO" to Andrew's point about the Page being the best way to support nonprofit with social media. I've found this is one of the best tools, given the sheer number of FAcebook users and the more "profile-like" options that Pages now have.

@tclaremont: I realized your question got lost in the shuffle and wanted to address it:

"I am considering setting up a Facebook page, but my lack of experience begs a question. If I set up this page, and I "friend" my personal page with my work page, will all of my personal content then be visitble to the people that visit the organization page?"

No, your personal content will not be viewable on the work page. When you become a fan of the work page, you show up as a fan on the work page, but none of your personal information will be visible to others, unless you've set your privacy permissions to allow them to do so. Facebook changed their privacy defaults recently (b/c of criticism I imagine) from sharing everything to stricter privacy as to what is shared.

The value of having fans for a page is that the activity from the fan page can show up in the individual's news stream. The individual's friends can then see the news stream and serendipitiously hear about the page. Hence the viral effect that Facebook can be.

HIH,

Megan

Re: Creating Nonprofit Facebook Page

aidsfundphilly — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 14:40:16 GMT

On the last two posts, I have some thoughts.

Re: cybercafe: As we start our Facebook presence, I've noticed that a Page is by far the best way to support our non-profit's mission. Your page is something permanent -- hence not being able to change it's name -- but by using some of the (free) apps available only for Pages, you can create an online community quickly and without committing too many resources to it. Additionally, Profiles are exclusively for real people and many FB users will be turned off by an organization trying to "friend" them. I think that Pages are the future for non-profits on FB (as opposed to Causes).

Re glamontagne: Do your research and decide whether or not FB will actually help your org. We are using it because we rely heavily on our community of supporters to organize and fundraise. We decided that a FB presence would help facilitate communication between supporters. Creating social networks is what our organization has always tried to foster, so this seemed a logical step into Web 2.0. We've already (in one week) had a supporter voice his long-standing disagreement with some of our policies. It goes with the terrain. As an admin, you can always erase any thread you decide are not appropriate. But I think that a FB presence is not necessary for all organizations. It takes valuable resources to run. Have a strategy and see if FB fits it.

Love this thread!

-Andrew

http://www.facebook.com/AIDSWalkPhilly

Re: Creating Nonprofit Facebook Page

glamontagne — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 13:56:19 GMT

I've been following this thread with great interest. Our org has yet to delve into social networking. I have been very resistant to this due to the nature of our org, (non-profit health care). If we have a patient that is following us, wouldn't they be able to flame us for not providing the care they expect (not giving them narcotics)? I've never used facebook, but I've used myspace. What kind of controls are in place for keeping the junk out?

Re: Creating Nonprofit Facebook Page

cybercafe — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 12:05:02 GMT

I see no value in Facebook pages at all. A Facebook account seems much more realistic, but I cannot figure out these FB pages at all. I have one for my personal business and now whenever I join certain things, they attach to that FB page rather than my FB account. I never check my biz FB page because I can never remember where to find it.

Also, you cannot change FB page names, only FB account names (in response to someone talking about the ability to change names). I think FB pages confuse things terribly; what is the value of a page over a group? I'm pretty tech savvy and still have trouble finding things because I might not remember if it's a cause, a page, a group...whatever.

Anyone else out there who isn't ready to jump on this "page" bandwagon and would prefer to set up a full account for an NPO?

Re: Creating Nonprofit Facebook Page

tclaremont — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 13:59:30 GMT

I am considering setting up a Facebook page, but my lack of experience begs a question. If I set up this page, and I "friend" my personal page with my work page, will all of my personal content then be visitble to the people that visit the organization page?

I have "friended" a few of you on TechSoup, and I am sure you would agree that some content on our personal side would be ummm.... inappropriate fodder for our organization's page.

If a random person comes along and wants to "friend" our org, can we effectively control what content that person contributes to our page? Is there a moderator function that allows us to "approve" content before it is visible?

I am sure I am missing how things work, but due dilligence dictactes that I firm up my understanding of how this would play out.

Re: Creating Nonprofit Facebook Page

barbeire — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 18:40:08 GMT

I haven't used Facebook yet, but MySpace has a fundraising widget as part of their IMPACT program.

Re: Creating Nonprofit Facebook Page

MeganKeane — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 06:46:15 GMT

Yes, the naming thing is the case but recently Facebook allowed users to set custom urls/names for their profile or page (for example, we changed the URL of the TechSoup Facebook page to be http://www.facebook.com/techsoupglobal. I did a similar thing with my personal profile to http://www.facebook.com/penguinasana.

At first the custom urls for pages was limited only to pages that had 1,000 or more fans. Facebook has since lifted this restriction, so it is possible for smaller orgs./pages to also set custom urls by going here. Definitely worth doing for your org's fan page so you are easily findable.

Best,

Megan

Re: Creating Nonprofit Facebook Page

ucbstudyabroad — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 17:09:25 GMT

According to Facebook, once you create a name for your page, it is not possible to change it. http://www.facebook.com/help/search.php?hq=change%20name

I have noticed that in the Facebook search, it can be difficult to find a page unless you include keywords which are included in the actual page title (not the description).

I would prefer to create a page with simply our organizational name, but do folks recommend adding additional text or tagline to the title to make it more searchable?

Re: RE: Creating Nonprofit Facebook Page: Does seeing other nonprofits on Facebook create a pa

Arenzi — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 21:13:10 GMT

Thank you, Megan. We've got a Facebook group page for End Violence Against Women (EVAW) International, but it never occurred to me that we could also have a Facebook page. I'm going to bring this up to our committee at our next meeting. It is just one more way to get our name out there. Plus I really like the fact that posts become more visible, henceforth drawing more potential visitors and/or donors.

Re: Creating Nonprofit Facebook Page

MeganKeane — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 20:15:35 GMT

Great, so glad the FBML worked for you! Would love to have a link to your page so others can see what it looks like.

Facebook has a built-in option that will let you create a badge for your personal profile. However, I noticed there are several applications for doing so for a Facebook page.

I tried using PageBadge application for our TechSoup page and it looked like this.

You could also try a badge tool w/o all the strings attached like SpringWidget or SproutBuilder (more complex, but very nice looking).

Best,

Megan

Re: Creating Nonprofit Facebook Page

aidsfundphilly — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 18:19:10 GMT

Thanks! Put up my first (very basic) FBML box on the Philly AIDS Walk and Run page. Very useful, very easy.

I didn't want to use a Charity Badge -- they have too many strings attached. Eventually I'd like to have our Fans be able to simply post their support (and a link to our website) on their profile page with a simple click of the mouse. I'll keep investigating the widget articles.

But thanks again for the links!

-Andrew

Re: Creating Nonprofit Facebook Page

MeganKeane — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 22:11:54 GMT

No need to re-invent the wheel--the FMBL application on Facebook can be used to do this. Here's some snazzy icons you can use and this post let's you know how. You can also use this on Change.org and your MySpace profile.

I also recommend joining the Nonprofits.org Facebook group., as they are a terrrific resource for these kinds of tips as well as other nonprofit happenings.

Also, if you are looking for a badge that users can use on their own profile pages, I suggest creating a basic widget at a site like SpringWidgets and then putting this on your Facebook page using the above application. This TechSoup article has more about creating widgets.

Best,

Megan

Re: Creating Nonprofit Facebook Page

BeckyW — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 21:31:23 GMT

I'm not personally aware of how to do this, but Facebook has a Developers wiki with documentation as well as community forums where you might find a developer who can point you in the right direction. http://forum.developers.facebook.com/

I don't doubt that others have done something similar and may be able to show you how. If you find a solution, we'd love for you to share it with other nonprofits here!