A free resource for nonprofit organizations, NGOs, civil society organizations,
charities, schools, public sector agencies & other mission-based agencies
by Jayne Cravens
via coyotecommunications.com & coyoteboard.com (same web site)

Getting More Viewers for Your Organization's Online Videos

Videos are a great way to represent your organization's work, to show you make a difference, to promote a message or action that relates to your mission, etc. But just uploading a video to YouTube (or Vimeo, for that matter) isn't enough to attract an audience. Here are ways to get more views for a nonprofit, NGO, school, charity or government agency's videos on YouTube.

Note that many of these tasks would be great for an online volunteer to undertake, with guidance from an appropriate staff member:

• Ensure that you have just ONE YouTube channel for your nonprofit, non-governmental organization (NGO), charity, school, government agency, etc. If you have somehow ended up with several channels, choose one to keep, download the videos from the channels you will abandon and delete those accounts, OR, if you have frequently-viewed videos on a channel that isn't your main channel anymore, put the address of your main channel in the description of the video.
   
  
• Give each video on your channel a descriptive, appropriate title.
   
  
• Give each video a well-crafted description that uses keywords that you would want someone to associate with your organization and what is in the video. 
   
  
• Put appropriate hashtags in the video description. If the video relations to people using technology for good, like a hackathon, you would want to use #tech4good. If it relates to helping other people, add #humanitarian. If it relates to public health, tag it with #publichealth.
   
  
• Ask all staff and volunteers, including all of the members of the board, to subscribe to your channel and to "like" every video on your channel (within reason - if you have 100, ask them to "like" 10 or 20. Do not require them to do this, however.
   
  
• Ask your clients to subscribe to your channel and to "like" videos on your channel.
   
  
• Have links to the videos on your web site.
   
  
• Feature the videos on your organization's Facebook page and GooglePlus account. You may want to link to the videos a few times a year.
   
  
• When you feature a video on your organization's Facebook page and GooglePlus account, ask your volunteers and staff to consider sharing those posts to their network as well.
   
  
• Tweet a link to a video. For instance, on World Environment Day, tweet out a link to a video on your YouTube channel, saying how it represents the environment and tag it with the official tag for the day, #WorldEnvironmentDay. There is a UN Day for most every occasion a nonprofit or NGO could ever have.
   
  
• Encourage clients and volunteers to comment on a video on your YouTube account, and respond to each comment (that isn't a troll) with at least a "thank you", and "like" the comment as well. 
   
  
• Caption your videos. YouTube has a free tool that you can use to do this. By captioning your photos, you make them accessible for people with hearing impairments and also allow people who can't use their speakers in a particular moment to experience the video.
   
  
• If you have 12 or more videos, you could feature a video on your blog, your web site home page, or a particular section of your web site each month.
   
  
• You can blog about the making of a particular video, why it was special or especially challenging, the results of the video, etc.
   
  
• Delete completely off-topic or trolling comments promptly.
  

My own YouTube channel:

Here is my YouTube channel. I hope you will subscribe to it and "like" some of the videos! Note that I have my trainings for nonprofits, NGOs, etc. first.

Other Resources (on my web site or blog):

• Making a short video for your nonprofit with just the tech you have.
  Most nonprofits, no matter their size, no matter their focus, need at least one short video that succinctly explains their programs and their impact, or a video that shows how the organization engages volunteers. They may also need a video that helps onboard program participants or explains safety measures. Your small nonprofit with just a handful of staff - maybe just a few employees, maybe just one employee, maybe all volunteers (unpaid staff) - may think it cannot make such a video, because it can't afford a professional videographer. In fact, you can, and with just the tech assets you have. This resource takes you step-by-step in how to identify the hardware and software you have right now, via your smart phones and laptops and operating systems, and how you can leverage that very basic technology, as well as the photos you may already have on hand, to create videos you need, from videos of clients explaining the impact of your programs to short videos for Facebook and Instagram reels, Tik Tok, and whatever else shows up as the fun new social media. Note: this is the first tech-focused resources I've created on my web site in YEARS. It's nice to get back to the subject that inspired this web site back in 1996.
  
  
• Daily, Mandatory, Minimal Tasks for Nonprofits on Facebook & Other Social Media
  There are a lot of nonprofits using Facebook and other social media sites like BlueSky or Mastodon just to post to press releases. And if that's how your nonprofit, NGO or government agency is using social media, then your organization is missing out on most of the benefits you could gain from such. Social media is all about engagement. Social media is NOT one-way communication; you want people and organizations to read your information, but you also want them to respond to it. And they want YOU to respond to what THEY are saying. I broke these must-do tasks down into the most simple, basic list as possible - these tasks take minutes, not hours, a day

• Why I won’t follow you on Social Media
  If you are a nonprofit with a cause I support, or a consultant that does similar work, but you wonder why I won't follow you on social media, this is why.

• 14 (was 13) things you do to annoy me on social media
  A tongue-in-cheek effort to encourage mission-based organizations to do a better job with Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and other social networking sites.
   
  
• Facebook use to organize Women’s Marches: lessons learned
  Facebook was an essential tool in organizing women’s marches all over the USA in January 2017. They may have been the largest single day of marches in US history. This blog is a list of things I learned observing the online organizing first hand.
   
  
• For Schools: You Should Be Using Social Media. Here's How
  There are a lot of web sites saying what the benefits are for schools to use social media. But there's few that give specifics on what a public school should be sharing via Facebook, Twitter, etc. This advice talks not only about exactly what your school should be posting to social media, but the consequences of not doing so, as well how to handle tough questions and criticism. It also links to legal advice.
   
  
• For Local City & County Governments: You Should Be Using Social Media. Here's How
  To not be using social media to deliver information and to engage means you are denying critical information to much of your community and promoting an image of secrecy and lack of transparency. In fact, the lack of use of social media can be seen as your city council or county government trying to hide something, and even lead to rumors that are much harder to dispel than they would have been to prevent. This advice talks not only about exactly what your school should be posting to social media, but also how to handle tough questions and criticism. 
   
  
• Evaluating Online Activities: Online Action Should Create & Support Offline Action
  Hundreds of "friends" on an online social networking site. Thousands of subscribers to an email newsletter. Dozens of attendees to a virtual event. Those are impressive numbers on the surface, but if they don't translate into more volunteers, repeat volunteers, new donors, repeat donors, more clients, repeat clients, legislation, or public pressure, they are just that: numbers. For online activities to translate into something tangible, online action must create and support action. What could this look like? This resource can help organizations plan strategically about online activities so that they lead to something tangible - not just numbers.
   
  
• How to handle online criticism of your organization.
   
  
• The dark side of the Internet for mission-based organizations
   
  
• Measuring social media success? You’re probably doing it wrong.
   
  
• Volunteers can help you reach more people on Facebook

• How to handle online criticism of your organization.

• Snapchat’s Potential Power for Social Good – with REAL examples.

• Stages of Maturity in Nonprofit Orgs Using Online Services.

• How Not-for-Profit and Public Sector Agencies REALLY Use Online Technologies

• Could a Twitter exchange lead to change in a Kentucky nonprofit law?

• Police: use social media to invite community participation, show compassion

• How do international NGOs use Twitter?

• What nonprofit & government agencies “get” FaceBook?

• Addressing criticism, misinformation & hate speech online

• Nonprofit Organizations and Online Social Networking (OSN): Advice and Commentary.

• Basic Press Outreach for Mission-Based Organizations
  Like fund-raising, press relations is an ongoing cultivation process. Your agency strategy for press coverage needs to go beyond trying to land one big story -- you want the press to know that you are THE agency to contact whenever they are doing a story on a subject that relates to your mission. These are basic, low-cost/no cost things you can do to generate positive attention from the media.

• What are good blog topics for mission-based organizations?
  The word "blog" is short for "web log", and means keeping a journal or diary online. Blogging is NOT a new concept -- people have been doing it long before it had a snazzy media label. The appeal of blogging for an online audience is that it's more personal and less formal than other information on a web site. Readers who want to connect with an organization on a more personal level, or who are more intensely interested in an organization than the perhaps general public as a whole, love blogs. Blogs can come from your Executive Director, other staff members, volunteers, and even those you serve. Content options are many, and this list reviews some of your options

• For Nonprofits Considering Their Own Podcasts: Why It's Worth Exploring, and Content Considerations
  (includes my own podcast)

• How folklore, rumors and urban myths interfere with development and aid/relief efforts and how to prevent or address such.

• THE CLUETRAIN MANIFESTO
  "We appreciate your efforts in spreading this important sedition." A project from 1999 that is still completely relevant today (and shows why the Internet has ALWAYS been "online social networking" and there's nothing at all really all that new about sites like FaceBook). It's a challenge to companies to quit thinking that they can control the Internet and online culture and shape it to fit their outdated PR and marketing dreams, and to quit fearing its "open" nature and, instead, realize that this open system can actually be a good thing in the quest to meet customer needs and move products and messages.

 
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