The July Net2 Think Tank provided an opportunity to look at some of the changes in our organizations, our messages, and even our strategies because of the impact of social media.   We know that the Internet in general, and social technologies especially, have greatly impacted the way social benefit organizations do their work.   To take a closer look at just how technology has impacted community engagement, we have four contributions from NetSquared Community members!

Evolution of Community Engagement

The topic of this month's Net2 Think Tank asked: How has engaging your community changed with your use of social media?

Claire Murray examines the changes in different communities, including Client Community, Peer Community, and Volunteer Community.   Claire also forecasts what's ahead for her in managing these different communities with technology:

What's Coming
As I develop better CMS (content management sytem) web developer skills, I'll be converting a bunch of my websites to ones where all 3 of these communities can interact more easily, which basically means sharing my networks more broadly. What I see happening as a result is that some of these will overlap.

I don't want to lose sight of the fact that sometimes we need to keep our client community somewhat distanced from our personal communities. So I don't want too much overlap. There are times when we need to close our door and have some time for ourselves. Client needs can be overwhelming and that's where I do need boundaries. Many of our clients don't have any boundaries. So expanding social networking to meet their needs will take some balance between meeting their needs and meeting my own needs for a separate space and some "me time."

Read Claire's full post, including the way she sees engagement of these different communities changing.

Pamela Hawley reminds us that the use of social media in our engement efforts provides a great opportunity to tell personal stories. She explains that, "posting and twittering should not always be about offers, discounts, or strict promotion of your organization. Try to find something of interest to users, and keep them engaged with thoughtful, authentic posts."   Real Pamela's full post and share your ideas.

Asalvesen explores the changing approach to engagement from a platform/provider perspective.  

"Although people have always been able to visit the "About Us" section of our website and learn more about who we are, what our goals and values are, social media allows us to have a more active dialogue with people.       Yes, people have been able to choose the "Contact Us" option to express their thoughts, their ideas, but social media allows us to respond in real time.   Social media allows us to extend the dialogue with our users, to connect with them on a personal level, on a people-to-people level rather than an organization-to-person one.     Additionally, it allows us to interact with people who have not yet visited our site but who might find it to be a useful tool."

Read the full post with additional exampls of social media's impact.

EKBullman offers up the IRC as an example of adoptiong new methods of "marketing" with social media, turning to tools like Facebook for outreach instead of traditional or face-to-face promotion.

"Killing two birds with one stone, this not only reaches a far greater number of potential donors in a shorter amount of time, but it also alleviates the discomfort that may come with face to face networking."

Read the full post and case study.

What do you think?

The contributions to this month's Net2 Think Tank all seem to point to similar points:

• Social media is great for personal connections, breaking down barriers
• Social media let connections and conversations happen in real-time
• There are still traditional issues to be considered (boundaries, messaging) etc.

So, what do you think? Do you have an idea or case study to share? How was social media changed your organization's community engagement?

About Net2 Think Tank:

Net2 Think Tank is a monthly blogging event open to anyone and is a great way to participate in an exchange of ideas.   We post a question or topic to the NetSquared community and participants submit responses either on their own blogs or on the NetSquared Community Blog.   Tag your post with "net2thinktank" and email a link to us to be included. At the end of the month, the entries get pulled together in the Net2 Think Tank Round-Up.