Tweeting for Dollars?

There's an interesting blog post on Chronicle of Philanthropy, about the use of Twitter as a tool for fundraising. Interesting isn't always a good thing. There's an old saying, "May you live in interesting times." It's not an ancient version of "have a good day." It was meant as a curse.

In this case, the curse may be the amount of time and resources organizations spend thinking, researching, and generally ruminating on the value of social media. If you're wondering about the value of Twitter in fundraising or in spreading the message and mission of your organization, you should read the post.

Central to the article is the following:

...the number of people who use Twitter at least once a month is leveling off.

The numbers show that only about 7 percent of the U.S. population uses the social-networking site at least once a month.

And that has fund-raising experts like The Agitator's Tom Belford advising charities to ignore the medium. 

The post raises questions, more than it gives answers, and there are a number of comments. Here's my comment on the topic:

Younger and more educated readers [using Twitter] is great. Study after study indicate that this demographic is more likely to donate time (volunteer) than donate money. If an org is most interested in getting volunteers on board, Twitter seems like a good solution.

The same goes for "friendraising." As the old marketing saw goes "Get'em young, keep 'em long" -- the idea being that eventually they will tire of volunteering and start giving dollars.

Spreading the word is great, too. But spreading to whom? Spreading the word to other members of the same demographic might bring more volunteers, more future givers. But are the 45-54 demographic and the 55-64 demographic getting the message? Are the "younger and more educated" being followed on Twitter by these prime givers? From a fundraising perspective, it's a valid question.

We've seen a ballooning of the use of social media. Every .org is eager to get on board with every form of social media. But keeping the organization's brand straight across multiple platforms is near impossible. Likewise messaging strategy.

But, if you're after volunteers, and the idea is friendraising rather than fund raising, get someone on staff to tweet regularly, with a strictly monitored message strategy.

But there's another old saw: "Don't put all of your eggs in one basket."

What do you think?