RSS, a technology that makes it easy to gather and share information from the web, found its foothold in 2006—with heavy use in news sites, blogs and social bookmarking sites. In 2007, the average internet user will have more opportunities to take advantage of this very useful technology. For the nonprofit and progressive organizations we service at Pyramid, that means new opportunities to reach beyond the boundaries of your own website and marketing materials. (more…)

For anyone involved in online communications at a nonprofit, I’m recommending that you take a look at the book The Mercifully Brief, Real World Guide to Raising Thousands (if Not Tens of Thousands) of Dollars with Email by Madeline Stanionis. Unlike its verbose title, the book is a direct and no-nonsense compendium of tips culled from the author’s experience in online fundraising for a number of large nonprofits. At 108 pages, it’s a quick read with information that is easily applied to areas other than fundraising; such as advocacy, list and traffic building.

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I attended NTen’s Nonprofit Technology Conference (NTC) last week in Seattle, conveniently located four blocks from our office. For those of you who don’t know, NTen stands for the Nonprofit Technology Enterprise Network. The yearly conference brings together folks from nonprofits, software vendors, and firms providing services to nonprofits to discuss how nonprofit organizations can better utilize and plan for current and emerging technologies.

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The advent of blogs has fundamentally altered the way information is presented and consumed on the Web. What started as an online platform for personal diaries and citizen journalism has quickly become a new marketing and communications opportunity for nonprofits, advocacy campaigns and for-profit companies alike. The use of blogs is changing the way customers interact with businesses, clients with vendors, and constituents with advocacy groups and nonprofits. In this post, we’ll help to demystify blogging as a communications strategy, and explore why your organization may want to consider using a blog. (more…)