Twitter for Good

Change the World One Tweet at a Time

Claire Diaz-Ortiz

• Publisher: Jossey-Bass
• Year: 2011
• Print ISBN: 9781118061930
• eBook ISBN: 9781118120859
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Business General
• Index: Business

Silver Medal Winner, Social Networking, 2012 Axiom Business Book Awards
Silver Medal Winner, Business and Leadership, 2012 Nautilus Book Awards

The official word from Twitter on how to harness the power of the platform for any cause.

As recent events in Japan, the Middle East, and Haiti have shown, Twitter offers a unique platform to connect individuals and influence change in ways that were unthinkable only a short time ago. In Twitter for Good, Claire Diaz Ortiz, Twitter's head of corporate social innovation and philanthropy, shares the same strategies she offers to organizations launching cause-based campaigns. Filled with dynamic examples from initiatives around the world, this groundbreaking book offers practical guidelines for harnessing individual activism via Twitter as a force for social change.

• Reveals why every organization needs a dedicated Twitter strategy and explains how to set one
• Introduces the five-step model taught at trainings around the world: T.W.E.E.T. (Target, Write, Engage, Explore, Track)
• Author @claired is the head of corporate social innovation and philanthropy at Twitter, collaborating with organizations like Nike, Pepsi, MTV, the American Red Cross, charity: water, Room to Read, the Gates Foundation, the Skoll Foundation, the Case Foundation, National Wildlife Federation, Kiva, the United Nations, Free the Children, Committee to Protect Journalists, Partners in Health, FEMA, Ushahidi, The Acumen Fund

With more than 200 million users worldwide, Twitter has established itself as a dynamic force, one that every business and nonprofit must understand how to use effectively.

Chapter 1
Be a Force for Good

One day at Twitter headquarters in San Francisco, I was doing a media training, learning to better convey my message and respond to common questions when speaking publicly. While employees around me had difficult and sensitive questions thrown their way about potential acquisitions and hiring statistics, I had it easy. “Tell me more ways that Twitter has helped people change the world,” people typically ask me eagerly. Or, with interest, “What's your favorite story of using Twitter to help in a crisis?”

The trainer asked me what I wanted to work on. No one ever asks me hard questions, I told the trainer. And so he did.

“You say one of Twitter's operating principles is Be a Force for Good. But what on earth does that mean?”

Because broad questions don't merit vague responses, I dove in. I told one story of an individual using Twitter to change the world around her. One example that proved that the Twitter platform seemed built for social change from the beginning and that the way individuals are using it every day only maximizes its power. But there are many such stories I left out that day.

Think of this book as the complete response to that initial question. In these pages, I will teach you to be a force for good on Twitter.

Corporate Social Innovation at Twitter

In my position leading social innovation, causes, and philanthropy at Twitter, and as the first employee to drive and shape such work at the company, I work on a daily basis to show non-profit and for-profit organizations how to use Twitter to make a difference. In my work, I help guide small non-profits, large non-profits, and big brands running cause campaigns in how to best use Twitter to reach their goals of social impact and world change. I believe it is not the obligation of an organization to engage in social change, but rather the opportunity an organization has to innovate in extraordinary ways, with this unique real-time information network. This book grew directly out of this work. As such, Twitter for Good is the definitive manual proving that individual activism via Twitter is a viable answer to world change.

Specifically, in Corporate Social Innovation and Philanthropy at Twitter, we work in three main areas to:

1. Support non-profit organizations and causes on Twitter
2. Promote cause marketing advertising initiatives
3. Carry out Twitter's internal philanthropic efforts

Our work breaks down as follows:

Support for Causes

Twitter's operating principle, “Be a Force for Good,” is the guiding principle of the service structure we provide to non-profit organizations and causes. The broad category of our non-profit support encompasses a variety of initiatives aimed at onboarding new non-profits and improving their experience on Twitter, including the following:

• Within our advertising platform, we offer pro bono programs for non-profits already engaged on Twitter. Promoted Tweets are a tool advertisers use to promote specific campaigns via Tweets on Twitter. The Promoted Tweets for Good program is an application-based pro bono program serving a number of non-profit organizations each year. We offer a second type of Promoted Tweets for Good ad hoc to organizations involved in crisis relief during times of natural disaster or civil unrest.
• We conduct regular talks and trainings to non-profits and causes who want to use Twitter better, based on the five-step T.W.E.E.T. framework explored in this book.
• On Twitter's Hope140.org, we compile an array of case studies, best practices, and past cause campaigns to help organizations better learn how to get started on Twitter.
• We work with organizations in the field of disaster response, taking advantage of Twitter's power on mobile devices to use our strategic partnerships to support humanitarian aid initiatives.
• Finally, we regularly bring speakers in to Twitter headquarters to better educate employees about innovative uses of Twitter in the world.

Cause Marketing

Within the area of cause marketing, we support brands promoting prosocial or social good initiatives, generally through paid campaigns on Twitter's platform.

Internal Giving

Within our internal philanthropic strategy we have spearheaded a variety of initiatives. Since 2009, we have worked with Room to Read, a non-profit organization supporting girls' education and library development in nine developing countries. We have mutually supported each other on a variety of initiatives related to literacy, including the creation of a wine label for charity called Fledgling. We have also worked with a number of other organizations on ad hoc fundraising and Twitter-based awareness campaigns, including (RED), Malaria No More, and the American Red Cross.

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What Is Promoted Tweets for Good?

Twitter launched our first advertising product, Promoted Tweets, in April of 2010. Much of the public didn't realize it, but Twitter launched Promoted Tweets not only with six big brands—including Starbucks and Virgin America—but also with two non-profit organizations: Partners in Health and Room to Read. Since that time, the Pro-Bono Promoted Tweets for Good program has served a number of key non-profit organizations with pro bono advertising on Twitter and has expanded to a secondary program featuring organizations serving Tweets in times of crisis. To find out more about Promoted Tweets for Good, visit www.Hope140.org.

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What Is Hope140?

Twitter launched Hope140 to help meet the needs of the growing number of non-profit organizations and causes on Twitter searching for best practices and training tools. At www.Hope140.org, you'll find case studies, examples of campaigns Twitter has engaged in to support causes, information on our pro bono advertising products, and a blog with the latest information and examples of causes on Twitter.

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Twitter for Good provides a comprehensive manual that teaches organizations to help change the world using Twitter. Through working with hundreds of organizations, I have developed a simple five-step model called T.W.E.E.T. (Target, Write, Engage, Explore, Track), which uses case studies and examples to teach cause-based initiatives how to excel on Twitter's platform. Twitter for Good lays out this exact framework and will dive deep into the specific strategic steps needed to build and effectively promote cause-based campaigns. Case studies from organizations like the American Red Cross, Water.org, and Free the Children; eye-opening information about Twitter's own internal work on philanthropic campaigns; and how-to frameworks and models all are key elements of the text.

Although the focus of this book is non-profit organizations, social enterprises, foundations, and corporate entities running cause-based campaigns, many of the strategies explored apply to any entity that wants to make a difference in the world. Twitter is a tool for enabling individuals to reach their personal and professional goals, and the ideas in Twitter for Good can and will help anyone.

In speaking to thousands of individuals each year, the one question I receive most often is, “Where can I go to get more information about how to promote my cause on Twitter?”

This book—and Twitter's Hope140.org—are the answers.

Twitter for Good is designed as an engaging, case study–rich manual for innovative leaders in non-p...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Contents
• Praise for Twitter for Good
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Foreword
• Preface
• Introduction
• Chapter 1: Be a Force for Good
• Chapter 2: T (Target): Why Tweet?
• Chapter 3: W (Write): Why You Should Tweet Like Kanye
• Chapter 4: E (Engage): Tools to Win
• Chapter 5: E (Explore): Finding Everybody, and Bringing Everybody to You
• Chapter 6: T (Track): Making Sure You've Hit Your Mark
• Chapter 7: Applying the T.W.E.E.T. Framework
• Conclusion
• Top Questions Reference List
• Resources
• Acknowledgments
• About the Author
• Index
• End User License Agreement