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The number of people using Facebook continues to rise and businesses and nonprofits are learning to use it to reach their current friends and build a broader social network.

An active Facebook user will often share links to an interesting web page with their social network.  You can make it easy for them to do this by having your webmaster add a “Share this page on facebook“

<a href=”http://www.facebook.com/sharer.php”>Share</a><script src=”http://static.ak.fbcdn.net/connect.php/js/FB.Share”></script>

See http://www.facebook.com/facebook-widgets/share.php for explanation.  Add the code to each page of your website to make it easy for people to share with their friends.

Integrating your website with Facebook using this “share” widget is one way to bring additional visibility and traffic to your website.

Contact me or sign up for our newsletter for additional help on maximizing your effective use of the Intetnet.

Facebook Groups have a new look.  The layout is easier to use – both for the group administrator and for the members of the group.  It has more the look of your personal Facebook or FB Pages.

Now when you visit a FaceBook Group – the Wall shows postings by the administrators and the members of the group.  On the left side as the Admin you can display information about the group.  Adross the top are tabs to different areas setup for the group.

You can create an EVENT for your group and send out invitations to people in your Facebook friends, or invite by email.

Check that you are linking to your website – and on your website that you include a “Share on Facebook” link to get more interaction between your facebook group and your website.

Maximizing Content

One of the things that I find helpful in creating new content is to listen and look at the comments and questions that people ask you about their website.  A big question is about content and time.  It takes time to write a new blog, or add new content to your website.  There are some ways that will help you to maximize your time and effort and get the most visibility for your thoughts and ideas.

 A few content areas that you may be using include:

• Your website
• Email Newlsetter
• Blog
• Facebook
• LinkedIN
• Twitter
• Articles

Here are a few suggestions on maximizing your efforts:

• Use your blog to write about topics of interest to your clients and prospects
• On your blog add a “SHARE” button that makes it easy for readers to post something of interest on their own social networks
• Add a “FEED” from your blog to your website. 
• In Facebook – setup a “Networked Blogs” in the Facebook Applications – register your blog and in the setup area set it to pull new postings from your blog onto your Facebook page.  You can invite your Facebook friends to sign up to receive notices and you can send out messages to those signed up.
• Setup your Twitter account to pull new postings from your blog.
• Add the “BLOG” app to your LinkedIN profile.  Then register your blog – this will pull your posting and display it in your LinkedIN profile
• When you are writing your email newsletter – look at your blog and identify topics you might want to include in the newsletter – then give exerpts and links back to your blog to read the full posting.
• Review your blog postings when you write your articles for ezine Articles or other article posting sites. 

These are just a few suggestions for maximizing the reach and value of your content.  Feel free to send any other suggestions.

If you have been using Facebook for a while you likely have a variety of types of friends.  You may have family and professional contacts, school friends, work contacts and people who share your interests in a hobby.

There are excellent methods in Facebook for managing the different types of friends and it is worth spending a bit of time to organize these. The benefits are:

• You will be able to select the people you want to view on your wall
• You will be able to send messages or invitations to a specific group of people

Steps to get started:

• Click on the “FRIENDS” tab – and then click on “Create a new list”
• Give the list a name – e.g. “family”
• Then you can click on the people on your facebook friends that you would like to add to this list. You will be able to have people on more than one list.  You will also be able to add more people later.
• When you have selected the people for your list – click on the “Create List” that is at the bottom right of the box.

Using Facebook Lists

• Once you have created your list, click on HOME. Look on the left side of your facebook page and you will see this list.  If you dont see it – click on the “MORE” button.
• Then click on the list you made – and you will see ONLY the postings from that list.
• If you want to send a MESSAGE that just goes to people on that list – click on the INBOX – COMPOSE NEW MESSAGE.  In the “TO” box, type in the name of your list.  When you put in the subject and text this message will be sent via Facebook only to the people on your list.
• You can send invitations to your list to view a particular posting.

Here are a few suggestions that I have found to be useful in organizing and writing the content for your website.

These are useful when you are first building your website or if you are doing a redesign.

1. First – decide on the structure and hierarchy of the website.  What are your top level pages?  Your website navigation will depend on how well you organize the information. Make your top level headings general enough that you will be able to continue using this structure – and add additional pages as you need them as sub pages.
2. I will be using MS WORD as an example of the word processing program to use as this is most common.  If you are using something else look for similar tools that you can use.
3. Start a new document in MS Word
4. Click on VIEW – and put a check mark next to “Document Map”  – this will then show you on the left a view of your document as a map.
5. Click on FORMAT – STYLES – and this will show a pane on the right side of your document with a list of styles.
6. Next – type in all the top level pages and sub pages.  Just use normal text and dont bother adding any formatting.
7. Then click on a top level page – and highlight HEADING 1 on the styles menu and click on it.  This assigns the level 1 style to this and you will see that heading appear on your Document Map.
8. Continue doing this for all the Level 1 headings (the top level of your structure)
9. Then do the same thing for all the SUB PAGES – assign them as a Level 2 style.
10. Now you have a view on the document map on the left pane, and you can easily click and access the specific pages.
11. You now can easily move through the document and add content on the pages.

A couple of other useful things

• Add a Table of Contents at the top of the document.  This will be a good view for people who see the print out.
• Do the editing and draft of your content in MS Word – and then add this to the draft view of your new website.  Read it again to see for any fine tuning needed on the editing.

Remember that it is a good idea to review and update your website on a regular basis.  This helps with your website traffic, and makes sure that your website stays current with your activities.

Please contact me with any suggestions and tips that you have.

Thank you to Douglas Firebaugh and his excellent article on the “10 Social Media Laws of Facebook”

I think each of the points is valuable but the one that I want to discuss today is his Law number 7 — “Law of Facebook Groups”

Facebook Groups are the best way to grow your network on facebook with people who share common interests.

• Click on GROUPS – this might be on the bottom of your browser screen on the left – or click on the “f” icon on the bottom left and see it on the full list – and you should see it on the list of applications.  Book mark it so the icon shows up for easy click in the future.
• You will see 2 columns on the GROUP page.  The left column are the groups that people in your network have joined.  The right column are groups that you have joined.  For each of the groups you will see a brief description and the number of members and any recent activity.
• Look at the LEFT column (groups recently joined by your network) – click on the “see all” at the top right of the column – and then browse through this list.  You can click on a group, review the overview section, look at the number of members, and see the types of things in their discussion forum and events etc.  If you are interested in the topic – click on the JOIN THIS GROUP on the top right column.
• Now that you are a member of the group – follow the discussions, post your own comments and questions — all of these activities will show up on your own profile and increase your visibility.
• The next step is to GROW your own list of friends – click on a person who is a member of the group – and click on the “Add as friend” – You can write a short email e.g. “We are both members of the xxxx group and I would like to invite you to be a facebook friend.”  You can copy and paste this – and personalize it with “Dear FIRSTNAME” -   If the person agrees – you will get  a notice that they have added you as a Facebook friend.   Send them a thank you.  These activities will help you to grow your network with people who share a common interest.
• Invite other people to join the group – this will also help your visibility and your network – and it will also help your friends to find an interesting group.

In addition to using the “groups recently joined by your network” — you can do a SEARCH in groups on any topic and review the list of groups.  Follow the same steps.

If you have any additional suggestions please feel free to send your comments or questions.

Online webinars are a very cost effective way of attending seminars, and learning something new.  Webinars let you build your knowledge and network without the expense of travel.

Here is an overview of an upcoming conference that looks valuable for anyone interested in fundraising. See the full details on The Resource Alliance website

The IFC Online is the world’s first global, virtual fundraising conference. Taking place completely over the internet, the event will deliver three days of live, interactive, workshops and plenaries to a world-wide audience of fundraisers.

Featuring an incredible line-up of expert speakers in the field of new media fundraising, the IFC Online is a must for anyone interested in raising funds online and building constituency through email, SMS and Web 2.0.

During IFC Online, our presenters will not only share online teaching and learning techniques, but facilitate a lively dialogue with a community of participants. The result: the sharing of practical ideas that each participant can immediately integrate into their fundraising strategy, and an instant network of peers that serves as an ongoing resource to all members of the IFC Online community.

A PDF is a useful format – it saves the formatting of a document so that you can be sure that the person receiving it is viewing it correctly and that they cannot make changes to it.

Try Primo PDF – this is a free PDF creator software.  You can download it here –> http://www.primopdf.com/

• Click on the free download
• Install the software on your computer
• After you have installed it – try it out.  For example – open up a WORD document Spreadsheet, or powerpoint file
• Then click on FILE – PRINT — and you will see PRIMO PDF as one of your listed printers.
• Select PRIMO PDF as your printer, click on BROWSE and decide on where you want to save your PDF file

Primo PDF Screenshot

• Click on the CREATE button – and in a few seconds (depending on the file size) – you will see your PDF file.

You can use PDF files on your website, to send by email, to provide to your printing company when you are creating flyers or other publications.

You can also create a PDF from a web page following the same process. This is useful for saving an exact view of a web page to review later.

Please send any suggestions on other PDF software that you have tried and your comments.

Bloggers and Social Networks can provide a powerful channel for getting the word out to raise support and awareness for specific causes. For example this campaign for “Bloggers Unite for Hunger and Hope” BlogCatalog members and Heifer International are partnering to call for the end of world hunger and start of hope on April 29. Their appeal is to join thousands of other bloggers and write a post about world hunger on April 29.You can make a difference. If you are a blogger you can participate in the campaign.