Have you ever learned a new language? Almost twenty years ago I learned to speak Polish while living in Wroclaw, Poland. We learned by being totally immersed in the culture and in the language. While it was painful and stressful at times we learned to speak Polish.
Once again I feel like I am back in Poland trying to learn a new language as David’s Refuge enters the world of social media. Words like blogging, crowdfunding, crowdsourcing, Facebook, Flickr, hashtag, hosting, podcasting, RSS, SMS, social capital, tag, cloud, tweet, Twitter Twitterverse, web analytics, widget, WordPress, and YouTube are circling through my mind and causing me to feel a little off balance.
Some of you are thinking, “Why waste your time telling people what you had for breakfast or reading someone’s report about how many fur balls their cat barfed up?” That is a great question and a little hint that you may not really understand the power of social media. Let me give you a few stats. Did you know…
1 Billion people use Facebook?
800 Million use YouTube?
200 Million people use Twitter?
77 Million people use tumblr?
2.7 Billion searches are made on Google every month?
That the number of text messages sent everyday exceeds the total population of the world?
1 out of 8 couples that married last year met online?
Social media is influential, it is powerful, and it is here to stay!
Last month I hired Hill Communications to help us strategically enter the world of social media. They are based out of Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Public Communications. Hill Communications is a student-run PR firm that has been at the forefront of providing individualized communications services for over a decade. When I interviewed them I asked them how they could help David’s Refuge. Here is a summary of their response.
- Social media is a great way to promote an organization for free.
- It can be used to network and grow a support base by sharing information that in turn others can share with their friends and followers, whereby casting a wider net.
- Social media can spread not just the message of an organization, itself, but the overall message and cause. We can use social media to inform others about what it is like for caretakers who care for children with serious illnesses and share that information with people. This puts David’s Refuge into perspective for people who didn’t quite understand the cause or truly understand why it is so worthy to support.
I love the power social media gives us to share our story. I have met people in Wisconsin, Texas, Iowa, and Virginia who share a passion to serve and love parents of children with special needs that I would have never met if it weren’t for being on Twitter and Facebook.
I would love to have you join us in sharing our story. If you have a Twitter account go to @DavidsRefuge and follow us. If you are on Facebook search for David’s Refuge and like us. Share our story with your friends. Retweet our tweets. Follow my blog. Share my blog with your friends. This will allow us to serve more families. This will allow us to discover people to join us as volunteers and supporters. This will allow us to share the story of David and remind people that there are people and businesses and communities who care.
Join us and make a difference!