Chamber Opportunities: Social Media/Communications and Web intern

Date : August 3, 2011
Close Date: August 15, 2011
Job Title : Social Media/Communications and Web Intern
Salary : Paid ($10/hr); 20+ hrs/wk
Start Date : August 22, 2011

Greater Seattle Chamber of Commerce, the largest and most diverse network of influential business leaders in the Puget Sound region, is currently seeking candidates for a 3-to-6-month paid social media/communications and web internship. This is a part-time position (approximately 20 hours per week).

The social media/ communications and web intern reports to the Communications team.

Position Responsibilities:

• Importing/entering/formatting entries for the Chamber’s business promotion site, www.itstimeforbusiness.com. Working closely with communications, membership and small business teams to enhance site features and drive traffic.
• Helping to promote www.itstimeforbusiness.com entries on the Chamber’s Facebook and Twitter and other social media pages.
• Copy editing and writing
• HTML Coding/email support and creation for eBlasts and other marketing collateral
• Monitoring/compiling data for social media sites and assisting with tracking reports.
• Assisting with Chamber website redesign and other website updates.
• Performing other administrative and communication duties as assigned.

Qualifications:

• Pursuing or have recently secured a degree in marketing, communications, public relations or other related field
• Familiarity with Microsoft Outlook and Office software
• Dependable schedule
• A sincere interest in the internet, blogs and social networking
• Experience with Word Press sites and administration
• Basic knowledge of SEO and keyword search
• Basic Photoshop skills
• HTML coding knowledge and interest
• Attention to detail and established formatting standards
• Writing skills and a discerning eye for punctuation and grammar
• Video production and copy editing skills desirable, but not required

Submit a letter of interest, resume and three URLs/samples of related work to:

Mail:      Social Media/Communications and Web Intern
Greater Seattle Chamber of Commerce
1301 5^th Ave, Suite 2500
Seattle, WA 98101

Fax:       (206) 389-7288

Email:   Word document or PDF attachments only
Please include Social Media/Communications and Web Intern in the heading
Send to: jobs@seattlechamber.com

The Chamber is an equal opportunity employer

Can you see your team connecting with their clients?  Are they using body language and vocal variety to impact the message they want to leave behind? Toastmasters International is a non profit organization dedicated to improve the communication and leadership skills to help their members  improve their listening skills, critical thinking and responding in a logical and coherent manner.

For more information, please contact Michael Sun, Chamber Diplomat at mcsun22@msn.com

Here’s one thing we know about marketing: if you have a plan, you are way more effective. And yet, very few nonprofits have a marketing plan in place. We must put an end to this, people!

A plan is especially if you take a DIY (do it yourself) approach to marketing, which most nonprofits do. You’ve got to have your plan or you end up working really hard and doing a bunch of stuff, but not necessarily getting results. Not good.

As a way to help our fellow do gooders create mission-driven marketing plans in record time, we created the ‘1, 2, 3 Marketing Tree’. It guides you through the process of figuring out your plan in 3 simple steps.

In order of importance, here are the three steps:

1 : Define WHAT success means for your marketing.

2 : Figure out WHO you need to reach for your marketing to be successful.

3 : Figure out HOW to most effectively reach your ideal supporters.

Download your very own ‘1,2,3 Marketing Tree’ template and get planning!

If you’ve been paying attention to the tragic BP oil spill news, you may have read this Chronicle of Philanthropy article about the controversy behind the Nature Conservancy (TNC) accepting funding from BP before the oil spill. Whatever your opinion on the matter, it raises a really good question for nonprofits: Would you be prepared to handle it if your organization was at the center of a controversy?

Engaging stakeholders is a must-do during a crisis. In order to effectively engage, you’ve got to actively monitor what is being said about your organization online and in print. According to the Chronicle article, “[Nature Conservancy] employees have been monitoring the discussion closely and responding to criticism.” Indeed they have and we can learn a thing or two from them.

Here are two examples of how the Nature Conservancy engaged really effectively with stakeholders:

1.  On their blog, they held an interview about the BP oil spill with TNC’s leadership team. Leadership answered a lot of questions. A lot. Some were submitted in advance and some were taken real-time. It’s worth listening to and/or reading the transcript.

2. On Twitter, the Nature Conservancy has been reaching out to people tweeting about the issue: “@rotkapchen @lurainpenny @centregcs: For more info on #oilspill  & BP see the transcript of the live chat w/our CEO http://nature.ly/dre53k”

Last week at the Seattle NDOA conference, Debbie Marchione of the Alford Group led a conversation about the various real-life ethical dilemmas that organizations can face in the online world.  During the session, participants talked about ways their organizations manage the risks.  At the end of the day, things can go wrong and unexpected things can happen.  You could accept a donation that becomes controversial and have an explosion of negative comments and criticisms about your organization.  But more likely it’ll be something slightly less dramatic. Perhaps a disgruntled volunteer could post some negative comments on your Facebook fan page or a donor could Tweet nasty things about how much you spend on “overhead”. Yes, that would be somewhat scary and demoralizing.  Mind you, those people could say something negative to friends at the local country club and you’d be none the wiser.  You can’t control what people say; you can control how your organization responds, particularly when it comes to social media.

To get started, plan to talk about this as a team. Here’s a great tool to help you get started that offers an ethical framework for your social media efforts, and you can use it as a starting place for a broader crisis communications policy.

And, by the way, this is another great reason to setup a listening station and start dipping a toe in the social media world to find out who is talking about you.

Has anybody got a policy they’d like to share?  Share them here.

By Mills Communications Group

We spend a lot of time helping people get comfortable marketing their essence, rather than their everything.  (Check out our 1,2,3 Marketing Tree and you’ll see what we mean!) As this can be tricky and very hard to do, we wanted to showcase a local business or organization that really had this concept down. Office Nomads, this week’s success story, definitely does.

Office Nomads rents space to independents, freelancers, and professional refugees in a shared Capitol Hill office building. They are singularly fantastic in their unwavering focus on their essence, which can be summed up in one of their mantras: “Community cannot be built by the hour.”  To learn more about this super-focused, community-building business, we went and talked to the co-founders, Susan Evans and Jacob Sayles.

Office Nomads targets community-building, independent workers like a laserbeam. Susan and Jacob started the project when co-working was still in its infancy, particularly in Seattle. Their clear understanding of the essence of their business explains why they’ve attracted their ideal customers and built a thriving nomad community.

You can read more and listen on our blog as Jacob and Susan share their insights on staying laser-focused, especially when it means going counter to how business has historically been done.

Excerpt from our blog: DO GOOD. GET NOTICED.