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What is the Attention Economy and What Does it Mean for Nonprofits?
This month's Net2ThinkTank question is, "How can nonprofits and NGOs succeed in the online attention economy?"
A few folks have contacted me to say, "I'd like to participate, but I don't really understand what the attention economy is," so, here is a little more info:
Wikipedia defines attention economics as,
"an approach to the management of information that treats human attention as a scarce commodity, and applies economic theory to solve various information management problems."
In his ReadWriteWeb post, Attention Economy: All You Need to Know, Richard MacManus writes:
"A key point is that The Attention Economy is about the consumer having choice - they get to choose where their attention is 'spent'. Another key ingredient in the attention game is relevancy. As long as the consumer sees relevant content, he/she is going to stick around - and that creates more opportunities to sell."
In the case of nonprofits, organizations are trying to keep supporters and potentional supporters' attention in order to "sell" the opportunity to make a difference in the world through the channels and services their organization provides (information, donation, membership, volunteering, advocacy, media creation etc.).
In his post, Why Words Matter in the Attention Economy, Steve Cebalt of the Nonprofit PR blog writes:
"In today’s Attention Economy, where every nonprofit message must compete for attention with every other message that your audience sees or hears, does it matter much how effectively you communicate? Does it matter whether you make yourself clear with donors, funders, board members, and the people who use your services? I’m sure universally the answer would be 'Yes.'
In the Attention Economy, people want a return on their investment when they invest attention in something you have written. They want something interesting, or useful, or stimulating, or inspirational."
As more nonprofits, businesses and individuals create blogs, podcasts, rss news feeds, wikis, social networks, YouTube accounts, Twitter feeds, fundraising widgets, mashups, etc. what do you think nonprofits need to do to attract and maintain people's attention online?
Share your ideas in a blog post on your own blog, or here, on the NetSquared Community Blog. Here's how to post on the NetSquared Blog.
Please tag your post, "net2thinktank" and send a link to it to me at bbravo@techsoup.org by Friday, April 11th 5 PM PT.
Flickr Photo Credit: Captivating Eyes by Ibrahim Lujaz.
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Attracting the Tech-Resistant Sm. Business Owner
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.
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.