The consultants, designers, editors, and bloggers at MKCREATIVEmedia wish you a happy Martin Luther King Day. The holiday has been on the US calendar since 1986 when the left-leaning, union-supporting, out-of-the-mainstream Republican President Ronald Reagan signed it into federal law. And on this Martin Luther King Day 2012, numerous schools, nonprofits, and religious organizations are getting their students, volunteers, and parishioners out into the community to put service into action.
To inform your members of such service opportunities and to inspire others to join your organization, you need to reach out and market your organization’s focus, skills, and ambitions – as well as explain how your followers can help achieve those ambitions. So in that spirit, we wanted to relay a short list of handy, inexpensive, online tools to help you do just that.
Sign up for a free account
One that seems pretty well known but bears repeating is Posterous, which allows you to establish Spaces to share online materials with the target group(s) you want. Its system could be considered the original Google+ ‘Circles,’ yet its ongoing popularity for both individuals and organizations means it has a simplicity and elegance that remains a powerful attraction. A feature this blogger especially appreciates is the ability to create both an open public blog space and a blog that requires ‘subscriptions’ of family and friends.
Forms can be fun!
Another handy tool for organizations is the quietly growing Wufoo platform, which allows you to create online surveys, forms, and payment pages for free (with the ability to upgrade various features for various price points). Any page your charity wants that involves donations or purchases can be linked to your PayPal, GooglePayments, or Freshbook accounts as well – no need to figure out a new payment package!
Power tool for power users
A last one, perhaps for the larger nonprofits and small-businesses, offers the opportunity to create similar surveys, donation-pages, etc., as well as develop robust cloud-based databases. Caspio is used by PBS, the American Red Cross, and EcoSector, so clearly has the muscle to empower larger organizations. But a tw0-week trial is absolutely free, and thus any nonprofit can check it out to see of its tool box would be useful going forward.
We wish you a blessed MLK Day of inspirational service and good work. We hope these tools might prove of value to you and your organization as you move further into 2012 and prepare for your events marking next year’s holiday.
Human progress is neither automatic nor inevitable… Every step toward the goal of justice requires sacrifice, suffering, and struggle; the tireless exertions and passionate concern of dedicated individuals. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Another good Uk alternative to Wufoo is Smart Survey. I’ve been using them for a while and never had any problems.
They would be worth adding to the list.
http://www.smart-survey.co.uk
@tomsggraham Thanks, Tom. We’ll be sure to check out this UK service. Much appreciated! marcokathuria mkcreativeteam