At the iQ Bootcamp last week, in the Future Now Panel session that I took part in we shared the resource of Twitter.

One of the questions always come up when people hear about Twitter (one of the currently popular micro blogging platforms)  is ‘what’s the purpose?’ closely followed by ‘isn’t it a waste of time’.

Well here is an example of where following Twitter has resulted in a potentially huge opportunity for one of the not for profit organisations I work with and I hope will be of assistance for you too.

Today I noticed a tweet (a message on Twitter) from Laura Fitton of Pistachio Consulting (you can find Laura at @Pistachio on Twitter). She sent a message that she was doing a live video stream using Qik and her mobile phone from PodCamp NYC.

So I moused on over and heard the end of a presentation about ‘Affordable PR For Non Profits Using Social Media‘ hosted by Christopher Penn. 

Christoper shared a great tip which I don’t think many people are aware of. You see Google is supporting non profits by making grants available for Google Adwords for non profits.

The Google Grants web page states:

Google Grants provides free Google Adwords advertising to various charitable organizations. The program is designed to help organizations extend their public service messages to a global audience, in an effort to make a greater impact on the world.

Here is some further information about Google Grants:

• What are Google Grants?
• Details of the Google Grants Programme
• The countries supported by Google Grants in addition to the US  - yes the UK and Ireland are included.

Sometimes social media can help you attract more leads and more profits - today however, social media has led me to a resource to attract more leads, potentially more donations and saving us money in our marketing, public relations and communications budget.

So if you are a not for profit or know people in a not for profit, make sure that you tell them about Google Grants and prepare your grant application.

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES

Twitter as a research tool article

Talking About Twitter podcast

And if you are on Twitter or decide to sign up for an account which is free, you can follow me on Twitter here.

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