How long is it since you’ve taken a good look at your social media usage?

Imagine you come across an NFP organisation or small business you don’t know anything about – what is your expectation about their social media activity? According to the statistics, people tend to have more trust for brands that have profiles on at least three social media. However, when you visit an NFP’s website, you probably don’t connect with them in all possible ways – instead, you choose your most preferred social media platforms and follow them there. To put it in other words, the online image of your really depends on the decision how many platforms you will (and can) maintain and below is what you need to take in mind before deciding.

First of all, you need to know your target audience. If you have not determined yet, take the time to do so before you decide which social media platforms you are going to use. Here is some statistical data about the demographics of social media users:

Now, having in mind these basic stats (and you can find much more online for any particular social media you are interested in), you will need to figure out which social media will be worth it for your NFP. If you are targeting mainly young people, you should go for Facebook, Instagram, Tumblr… If you need to attract the attentions of adults, your place is LinkedIn, Twitter, again Facebook, perhaps Google+. If your NFP works with women, don’t forget Pinterest. In all cases, a YouTube account will be of a great use as well, as long as you have videos to post on it.

Once you have selected 2 or 3 social media platforms that are suitable for you and your audience, you will need to make sure you post the right content. You can’t post whole news on Twitter – you will need a catchy title or quote and a link to a post on your website or blog. On Tumblr, the preferred content is images and videos, Pinterest is all about images as well. You will also need to take into consideration the formal atmosphere of LinkedIn and the not-so-formal spirit of Facebook. And once you start building your social media presence and posting relevant content, make sure you interact with people. If they comment, comment back, if they share your post, thank them. Nobody likes to see a brick wall responding to their actions – showing activity will help you build trust among your prospective audience.

To cut a long story short, you don’t need to be on every social media platforms in order to be noticed online. In fact, it is advisable to stick to 2-3 platforms that you have carefully chosen – you won’t have the time and opportunity to maintain accounts in all platforms anyway. So, just take your target audience into consideration, pick your content carefully and be active – that’s the way to success!