The Medium and The Message

(originally posted on BlogBaud)

The play on Marshall McLuhen’s famous phrase may be obvious, but the meaning it has for nonprofits may not be. We’ve just closed out a year where TIME’s Person of the Year was you, me, and everybody because of our participation in the Web 2.0 revolution. Congratulations!

I’m not so sure about the revolution part, but clearly the growth of personal content and collaboration has transformed the Web. We’re now in a new year where many nonprofits are trying to make meaning of all this stuff.

The Internet has always been more like radio than TV. You tune into things that interest you and the experience is so much more personal. The number of “stations” and strength of signal have only helped to drive greater online personalization. That perception of the Web is now taking on a new twist.

Up until recent years the Web has been dominated by text-driven experiences. Gerry McGovern just brought up this point in his latest weekly enewsletter issue that’s entitled “The Web at 15.” Gerry argues that “the Web is evolving, sure, but its foundation stone is the written word.” Clearly, we’re all now building on top of that foundation with some different materials.

Now you have online communities, weblogs, podcasts, videoblogs, social networks, and other examples of the collaborative Web becoming mainstream. They’ve been slowing evolving for a few years now and have finally “crossed the chasm” enough to capture the eyes and minds of meaningful numbers of people.

Jeff Jarvis has been blogging a lot about small TV and I agree with his comment that “the winners will be those who create and enable it.” I think that same sentiment applies to nonprofits that embrace these new capabilities and use them to create something remarkable. We have already witnessed a lot of nonprofit organizations that are leveraging YouTube, MySpace, and Second Life to reach their constituents in new ways.

The online medium has allowed nonprofits to communicate and engage people to help fulfill their missions. These new capabilities only push things to the next level. Smaller organizations need to leverage these high traffic places to establish more visible contact points. Larger organizations need to make them a part of their multi-channel communication efforts.

Many nonprofits have resolved in the new year to embrace aspects of Web 2.0. But the technology itself is no silver bullet. While the medium can shape the message there still needs to be a clear message to begin with. So don’t overlook this important point in all the buzz.

Make sure that your online communication, wherever it takes place, clearly conveys who you are, what is your mission, why it matters, how people can get involved, and what is the impact of their involvement. Choice abounds on the Web and someone else’s site is just a click away. Your message needs to be compelling and coherent enough to rise above the clutter. Don’t let your message get lost in the medium.