Online excellence ahoy! | Weekly Roundup

• If you’ve spent any time in the nonprofit blogosphere this week, you’ve probably gotten wind of this post by marketing guru Seth Godin, in which he slams nonprofits for their failure to show up at the social media table. Needless to say, this prompted a good deal of vigorous conversation, like this post from the Chronicle of Philanthropy’s Give and Take column. What do you think? Do you agree that the nonprofit sector isn’t moving quickly enough to adopt and adapt to the social web?
• The Salvation Army is going digital this year with an online-only annual report. Instead of a printed book, they’ve created an attractive, interactive microsite. Are there any print communications your nonprofit produces that could be replaced with lower-cost online versions?
• There’s a new donor in town: the Web 2.0 donor. An interesting post from Nonprofit Tech 2.0 blog describes some characteristics of Donor 2.0. Is your nonprofit thinking about ways to reach and retain this new generation of nonprofit supporters?
• A New York Times Op-Ed from last weekend argues that Twitter and its ilk are poor tools for expressing big ideas. The topic for the post was health care, but it’s an interesting point for nonprofits as well: perhaps trying to express your mission in sound bytes is not only difficult, it’s unproductive. What have you found?
• This post from Katya Andresen on common mistakes nonprofits make in social media is just one of many excellent resources from the Case Foundation’s Gear Up for Giving series. The series started up this week, and if you’re new or newish to social media, it’s worth a few minutes to check out the tutorials, free webinars, and other tools for getting started in social media.
• And because it’s Friday, if you feel (as I do) that there aren’t enough seafaring scallawags in your day to day life, change your Facebook language to pirate English in celebration of Pirate Day tomorrow. Don’t just share that link to your new website, “blabber t’ yer mates”. Arrr.

A weekly roundup of interesting reads from the online world of nonprofit communications. Check out my Delicious bookmarks for more noteworthy links.