Digital marketing: Little and often

A hypocrite speaks

This afternoon I had the pleasure of chairing a seminar hosted by the Media Trust all about how small charities can take advantage of using the web in general and video in particular to further their communication.

There were some fascinating examples from both Greenpeace UK and Macmillan Cancer Support.

We discussed:

• Video’s ability to explain complex ideas and express emotive messages
• The underlying importance of social networks, particularly finding enthusiastic supporters who can at as ambassadors and help a charity develop
• Using existing tools, going where the audience already is and not re-inventing the wheel
• Not spreading your efforts too thinly
• Supporting material for the main message – video has more impact if it doesn’t stand alone

What is clear in modern marketing is that big campaigns still have some use, if you can afford them, but they suffer from a long preparation,  followed by a large but short-term impact.

However, you can get a very worthwhile result from regularly putting small and simple messages out there. You’re playing the long game.

My top tip is actually very simple:

Keep a weblog. Add info it regularly. (Sharp eyed readers will notice that I don’t actually manage to do this myself. Oops!)

Link to pictures, video, other writers who resonate with your cause. Use other tools like Twitter and Facebook to send people back to your blog.

Quite apart from the conversation you can now start to have with your supporters, a weblog is a great way to prove your diligence in your chosen field. It’s also a great way of reminding yourself what you’ve been doing for the past few months.

In short, it’s a planning tool as well as being a your archive of actions. Need to get that Annual Report out in half the time? Keep a weblog and you’re doing the work throughout the year rather than in one exhausting block.