(ISF) Fwd: Question to N-TEN about blogging readiness for nonprofits

(Dear ISF Colleagues: I'm reposting Katrin's query here, because I
think it's an extremely interesting topic, and because Katrin raises
some crucial points. Meanwhile, I was recently approached by a
newspaper that wants to run blogs by local nonprofits on its web site,
and ended up pointing out that they would probably have to recruit and
train nonprofit bloggers from scratch, and provide follow-up coaching,
if they wanted this to happen. The good news is that they may be
interested in doing just that! Best regards from Deborah)

-----original message-----
From: Katrin Verclas < katrin%40nten.org">katrinnten.org>
Date: 16 Sep 2007 23:41:09 -0000
Subject: [NTEN Discuss] question about blogging readiness from a msnp
To: nten-discuss%40groups.nten.org">nten-discussgroups.nten.org

Dear all -- on occasion I get a question like the one below that
pertains to the readiness of a nonprofit to move (even if gingerly)
into the Web 2.0 world. This one is from a medium-sized nonprofit
(and grantmaker) that has a fairly traditional website and
organizational structure.

The organization wants to move into the brave new world of blogging
but has, rightly, some concerns that she would like your help with:

"I thought you might know the answer to this. Are there any resources
or best practices or something like that for organizations (caused
based NGOs) that want to use a blog? My colleague and I were talking
with some other NGO types about some of the difficulties of adding on
a blog when it's not your (or anyone else's) full time job. There are
issues with getting buy in from the heads of orgs about the informal
tone of blogs and also really getting readers when you don't have the
time to really add analysis or depth to your blog posts.

I know there are some people who use the blog as a way of
communicating new information about their campaigns or organizations,
but that's more of a web based newsletter using a blog function than
what a traditional blog would be.

I thought I would ask to see if you knew other people who encountered
the same set of issues and (hopefully!) came up with some good
solutions.&quot;

Thanks for posting your experiences, ideas, and resources about how to
assess the readiness of an org to blog, as well as how to overcome
institutional barriers to the list, and I will summarize them for us
and the org in question.

All the best,

Katrin

Katrin Verclas
Executive Director
NTEN: The Nonprofit Technology Network
katrin%40nten.org">katrinnten.org
413 687 9877
415 397 9000 ext 302
skype katrinskaya

Because People Who Change The World Need the Tools To Do It
NTEN: The Nonprofit Technology Network

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