Community that’s built through common support of a philanthropic mission is a beautiful thing, and we know that a community can expand and evolve through the power of social media. 

While classic social media tactics can help an audience grow naturally over time, it is more meaningful to leverage your social media platforms so that they become a space where your donors feel seen, understood, and united. 

Here are some insights to incorporate into your social media content creation and strategy. 

Quality over quantity. Creating more content is often seen as an antidote to a lack of brand visibility or “figuring out the algorithm.” But the continuous pressure to create more content can put a heavy strain on production and creativity, resulting in lackluster content that your community won’t feel proud or excited to engage with. Instead, focus on approaching your social content with the mindset of “fewer, bigger, better.” Purpose-driven, quality content will end up getting you further visibility in the long run. 

Your brand is king. Bringing your brand expression to life doesn’t have to mean big budgets or countless hours of production. Slowly start to focus on small, easy ways to bring your brand look and feel to your social platforms so that people will know what to expect from you. For example, use photos that fit the same colour scheme as your brand colours, and try to get new photography that fits the same style. Or, if you are producing video content, use your spokesperson so your audience builds a connection to that individual. This helps your community know what to expect when they see you come up on their timeline, and the goal is that it will conjure familiar feelings of trust and appreciation. 

People want to have meaningful connections. Provide your social media community with the opportunity to share un-identifying parts of their story or experience so that will make them feel connected to others like them. It can feel like it’s not worth the effort of including a question in your caption, when no one leaves a comment. The key is to make it as easy as possible to share. Here are a variety of examples to draw inspiration from:

- Leave a “heart” emoji in the comments if you’ve benefited from our charity program
- Have you visited our facility? Share your favourite photo in the comments!
- Tag someone in the comments who helped you through this experience 

Bring back the “social” in social media. The importance of one-to-one interactions on social can often be overlooked. Prioritize responding to comments and answering direct messages. If you have the capacity, take it a step further and proactively find content that relates to your cause area to interact with. For example, if you are at a health charity, search the related hashtags and comment on public posts of people sharing their health journey. A small interaction has the potential to make a big difference.

Chloe Lynch is a marketing and communications leader and storyteller with over seven years of experience in digital communications raising revenue and brand awareness in the non-profit sector. Chloe is currently the Social Media Manager - North America at Movember. Her passion is telling stories that engage, inform and motivate people to make a positive impact.