Online Community-Building and the Nonprofit Sector
We live in an increasingly digital world. Now, more than ever, people who never felt they fit in anywhere can find a sense of belonging by seeking out online community hubs that relate to their passions.
For nonprofit organizations, this search for connection is a golden opportunity to attract a loyal and devoted following of likeminded allies who share their vision. The online space offers a wealth of new opportunities to cultivate active participation from allies and supporters.
In addition to tried and true models, like email blasts and galas, organizations can build an interactive online community where potential donors can participate actively and consistently. When they do, donors can begin to feel that they truly belong to something greater than themselves.
Creating these portals, and encouraging user engagement with the organization and its community, builds a sense of emotional brand loyalty and personal connection to the mission of the nonprofit.
People will invest their dollars where they invest their time and energy. It’s a new frontier to explore. Fundraising can become a more personal, inspired, and emotionally invested experience. It can even be gamified. The possibilities are limitless.
People love to give back. The connection to others makes them feel like they are doing something good in the world. They love to feel that they are a part of a team.
This article will review the significance of online community for nonprofit organizations and recommend relevant strategies to promote online engagement:
Connect the dots
Amplifying voices
Member spotlights
Content creation station
Clever contests
Real-world crossover
Gamification
Calling in your community
Then, it’s up to each nonprofit organization to build the framework within which people can find that sense of belonging.
Connect the Dots
Society is woven together by the strands of connection forged between individual humans. We are social creatures, but as the world goes online, we must learn to build new community structures in a virtual space.
When people truly feel connected to a mission and an organization, they will open their wallets wider and donate more generously. They will bring their friends with resources into the fold. They will rally towards the greater vision with personal passion and commitment. They will want to do the hard work of building your network for you.
This is what we want. We want to tap the infinite potential of the worldwide web, for all its interconnected, expansive magic.
Strong brand identity and clarity around your mission statement are key to magnetizing likeminded people to your group. Once you have cultivated this nucleus, you can send out your bat signal, a homing beacon, to beckon your community of dedicated followers.
People need simple, focused reasons to feel commonality with others. Offering a clear mission statement will help to forge a connection between your heart and those of others. Instead of simply being potential donors, they will become engaged, interactive pieces of your puzzle. Members of your team.
Once you have developed this clear identity for your organization, you must next develop a strategy to engage members in meaningful ways. This will make them feel connected to you, and to each other, which will help your interactive community thrive with a life of its own.
Amplifying Voices
Belonging is a feeling that most humans ache for. Everyone wants to feel included, valued, and heard. Community nourishes the human soul so it feels that it belongs somewhere. Yet, many people often still feel like outsiders.
Harnessing that urge for understanding and connection is a beautiful way to both contribute to the strength of a community, and to give individual people a platform to be witnessed.
Consider running initiatives on your page that encourage people to raise their voices on issues that concern your organization’s values. Post questions. Invite and support healthy discussion. Give your members a place to speak and feel heard by an audience of their peers.
This will spark even greater passion and engagement between your members and your mission. When the time arrives for fundraising, they will be even more emotionally invested in supporting the vision than if you were just cold calling them and asking for money. Now, they are engaged. Now, it’s personal. Now, they WANT to give.
Simultaneously, you must moderate wisely, and be sure to curate a safe space where people feel comfortable sharing. It’s up to the leaders of the community to control potentially argumentative or abusive participants who are venting about their issues in an unhealthy way.
Much like a team coach or school principal, someone needs to be in charge of asserting boundaries and steering the group’s energy in a positive direction.
Member Spotlights
To make people feel seen and build a deeper sense of community, perhaps feature a member spotlight once a week, or once a month, on your page. Shine a light on an individual in the community who is doing great things to further a good cause in their own life. Perhaps highlight your most loyal volunteers, and commission feature articles about their life purpose and contributions to the world.
This will create a deeper bond of connection between all the members. It will establish shared value systems. It may even help uplift their life purpose and cross-pollinate your mutual missions and value systems.
When you give others a way to share their ideas, opinions, and talents, as well as acknowledge their offerings, you earn a special place in their hearts.
Of course, then when it’s time to fundraise, these spotlighted VIP superstars will feel they are a meaningful part of your organization and be far more likely to give generously. Other members may wish to be featured in the future and therefore step up their giving game as well, in the hopes of acknowledgement.
Content Creation Station
People love to learn. Their minds hunger for it. When sharing content on your page, consider researching educational and inspiring offerings that will motivate your members to engage. To comment. To feel something. To be inspired.
Draw inspiration from any webinars or conferences you’ve attended. If you provide members with entertaining education around topics that relate to your mission, they will begin to care even more deeply about your organization. Use interesting images. Post fascinating videos. Create a portal where your members find value and willingly invest their time.
Build those bonds of heart connection and intellectual stimulation. Then, a collective sense of community loyalty will expand exponentially, simultaneously.
Clever Contests
A great way to spark connection and excitement in your online community is to run contests. Perhaps people are invited to submit short essays on a topic that is relevant to your organization, in order to win a prize.
Maybe the community members vote on the best essay. Then, it may even be published in the nonprofit’s newsletter. This not only creates free content for your site that is related to your mission, but also allows community members to engage in some friendly competition, form bonds, and get to know each other better.
Perhaps you invite members to design the invitation fliers for your grand gala fundraiser, (and the prize is a free ticket). A low barrier option is to give away event tickets where each comment or share on a particular post count as a raffle entry.
Be creative. This will increase the engagement of your audience by allowing them to actively participate in your organization and feel connected to your success.
Real-World Crossover
Bringing your online community members together in the real world is the next step to building strong allies. When people meet in real life and form a genuine, in-person connection, they are more likely to participate in and find a sense of belonging on your online platform.
Throw a barbecue beach cleanup. Go for a members-only hike in the woods. Volunteer at a soup kitchen together. Create experiences that engage members around in-person contributions to society. Then, you become their one-stop-shop philanthropic outlet.
Again, when the time comes to fundraise, you have built a multifaceted, loyal base of members, who are used to donating their time and energy, making financial support the natural next step.
Gamification Station
Ultimately, a huge part of any nonprofit’s core operation comes down to fundraising. You need donor support in order to fund your good work in the world.
In our modern era, many businesses are turning to gamification techniques to build brand loyalty, utilizing people’s natural hunger for competition, status, achievement, altruism, learning, and socializing.
By framing a fundraising push as a game, you can exponentially increase your donor engagement. Online is the best place to do this.
If you had the resources to build an app, you could create an app that teaches principles of your nonprofit within the format of a game. When purchasing or playing the app, your community members would be supporting your cause.
When considering your fundraising strategies, find creative ways of engaging the community with a sense of playfulness and friendly competition.
Perhaps mimic the Indiegogo model and put a progress bar at the top of your fundraising page, with digital rewards and social media badges for the top givers.
People love playing games, and if you can find a way to entertain people and make them excited about handing over their money to your organization, it will feel like a win for everyone. Ultimately, this will lead to greater funds raised for a good cause.
Calling in Your Community
Your online community should become the central structure that supports your different types of outreach in the world. Mindfully structuring and engaging your personal online community is the quickest way to build a (virtual) meeting place where all are welcome.
We are only as strong as our network! The more you fortify the magnet of your organization’s online hub, the greater your impact can be out there in the real world.
For more information on developing a movement of support around your mission, check out these Donorly resources:
Building a Community Within Your Volunteer Program in 2021 (& Beyond). Having an engaging volunteer program is one of the best ways to build a community and set up long-term support for your mission.
5 Best Practices to Improve Donor Retention in 2021. Learn these five best practices to improve your retention efforts and build relationships.
Community-Building 101: How to Use Storytelling to Build Community Awareness of Your Nonprofit. Learn about strengthening your nonprofit’s community through storytelling in this helpful guide.