While brainstorming for a school project involving a non-profit needing to target and keep the attention of the illusive small business owner in a 10 town area, many of which are tech-resistant, I have run into many questions but also come up with a few ideas.
Having the sm. business create a profile on a SN site would be difficult enough. I would probably attempt this by a combination of direct mailings and help from local undergrad volunteers via phone or office visits. The NP has already partnered with the university and these volunteers are younger and tech-savvy. The NP could also connect to small businesses through the chamber of commerce.
To keep the content on the social networking site fresh and engaging, NP staff could blog, promote frequent small local events that the sm. business could sponsor along with silent or even 50/50 auctions that the sm. businesses could donate products or services to. Maybe even an area where the sm. businesses could vote upon which local needs should get funding or at least help persuade the NP to steer donated funds.
I think trying to create a place where these donors would hang out, like Facebook, is unrealistic, they have limited time. But, just relying on the emotional factor would not be enough for these specific donors. They are used to writing a check once a year when contacted. You would have to have something that adds value for them to even occasionally frequent the site. The ability to have an outlet to advertise, and network among other local businesses, might bring in some. Frequently updated content by the NP staff with media on where donated funds have been provided might bring in some more.
Within the small amount of data collected by our class, the reoccurrence of the sm. businesses wanting to see results of their donations to local needs was prevalent. Some examples of what the sm. business owner might like to see in a social networking site (once explained) were the ability to have a profile page listing company info and logos, photos, lists recent sponsorships, links to their own company site, both public and group only areas where these small businesses could list some company info that was more focused towards other small businesses in the area.

Most of us, myself included, need to plug-in and learn more before we can be truly effective in addressing this net2thinktank challenge.

Join and participate in an Attention Data meetup, like the San Francisco Bay Area Attention Data group, which meets this coming Tuesday at Google in Mountain View. Unfortunately, this particular occasion is at the same time as Net Tuesday, and the group has been meeting infrequently during the past six months.

Another good point-of-entry to the AD community is the AttentionTrust organization.