FYI: I’m in Southeast Asia Giving Social Media Trainings to Nonprofits!

Wow! I’ve only been away for 10 days and in that short amount of time Facebook has launched Timeline, Twitter has been redesigned, and YouTube Channels have a whole new look and functionality. That’s how fast social media can move and evolve! I’ve been out of touch a mere 10 days and already find myself behind the curve. 🙂

I was hoping to blog at least once or twice while I am away, but it’s turning out not to be possible. Microsoft Citizenship Asia Pacific is keeping me pretty busy. No complaints, of course. It’s been a fascinating experience thus far. Microsoft works with nonprofits all over the world and offers technical training and software grants through their partnership with TechSoup. Ultimately their goal is help nonprofits become better equipped at fulfilling their mission by building their technological capacity. I’ve been fortunate enough to be hired to provide three social media trainings to their nonprofit partners in Malaysia (photo above), Singapore, and the Philippines. Most nonprofits in Southeast Asia are in the early stages of using social media and I’ve been provided the honor and the privilege to help them skip years of making mistakes by providing them the knowledge that the nonprofit sector in the United States, Canada, and the U.K. has gained through using social media for almost seven years now. I’ve also learned quite a bit about Windows Live, Photo Gallery, Movie Maker, and Live Writer  – a suite of free tools that could definitely help nonprofits better tell their story through social media if only knew about them. I didn’t until just a few weeks ago.

So, though I won’t be able to blog while I am here, I decided instead to offer an excerpt from Social Media for Social Good on why nonprofits must get organized before they get started with social media. It’s definitely a timely topic for nonprofits here in Southeast Asia, and even if your nonprofit has been using social media for years, the excerpt may also help you get organized just in case you discover that you missed a few steps when launching your social media campaigns. That said, happy holidays to all! One of the biggest take-aways from this trip for me personally is the reminder that we live in very diverse world with multiple political, cultural and religious beliefs. Tolerance and appreciation for diversity in thought is so important as we go deeper and more global into the 21st Century. It will definitely make me a better social media practitioner and advocate for nonprofits worldwide.