We’re writing to share some exciting news about our plans to spend the month of October surveying the community so we can better understand your needs. The aim is to re-evaluate our strategy and goals for the NetSquared program moving forward.

As changemakers in our communities, it's important to take the time to learn from the communities that we serve about their impressions of our services. Whether your community is of volunteers, members of the public, internal stakeholders, or international organizations, it is valuable to ask them what they think of your work and invite them to help shape the future of your programs. For this month's Net2 Think Tank, we asked you to share your tips and examples from surveying your community!

As changemakers in our communities, it's important to take the time to learn from the communities that we serve about their impressions of our services. Whether your community is of volunteers, members of the public, internal stakeholders, or international organizations, it is valuable to ask them what they think of your work and invite them to help shape the future of your programs. In this month's Net2 Think Tank, we look forward to learning from you about surveying your community!

Using the social web to market your cause, communicate your services, and interact with your audience is an important part of the communication function for many socially-foucused organizations. One thing that many of these groups have found is that the internet allows us to not only tell our story, but also get an honest understanding of the perception of our organization.  With that in mind, we asked you for your advice for monitoring online feedback as part of this month's Net2 Think Tank:

One of the great things about the social web is that it allows us to listen-in on the conversations people are having on topics that interest us. For organizations or enterprises with audiences that use the web, this means that they can monitor and respond to conversations about their products, services, and wider industry with a couple of clicks of the mouse.

As social media tools like Twitter and Facebook become core components of nonprofit communication strategies, there is a corresponding need to assess how well programmatic messaging and organizational identity are propagating in those channels: “We Tweet; is anybody listening?”

In addition, nonprofits have an increasing need to know on what blogs, websites and other online venues they and their issues are being mentioned and discussed, both favorably and less favorably.

This month's Net2 Think Tank question asks, "How do you stay up-to-date online?"  There are so many blogs, news sources, and conversations happening at the same time, every day, and the chances that you'll be able to find them all without trying is pretty unlikely.  There are hundreds of millions of blogs according to Technorati, and that's just blogs! Think of all the places your organization's name, staff, projects, programs or focus area could come up in the news, in campaigns, or in online conversations. 

To stay on top of it all, I suggest you create a listening dashboard for your organization - and here's how to do it!