Editor’s note: Periodically, we do a survey of Beaconfire staff to get impressions on a variety of non-profit technology issues. All opinions expressed here are solely those of their authors.

The internets have been besieged by 3 wolves – what started as a prank product review on Amazon.com became an online phenomenon when users marked it “helpful” and added their own ironic ratings to the mix (ex: Unfortunately I already had this exact picture tattooed on my chest, but this shirt is very useful in colder weather). Suddenly it was one of the most talked about items on the information superhighway, and the wolf skin site, which allows you to “wolfify” any website you choose, was born (similar to rickrolling, but with less surprise – users who look at the URL will know to expect something).

We asked the staff: What’s your favorite example of user-generated content that has been bum rushed by people who resist coloring inside the lines?

Rebecca, Functional Analyst: I read that Amazon’s Tuscan Whole Milk is the product that started the whole review trend about 3 years ago.

Featuring a very impressive Edgar Allen Poe spoof:

Once upon a mid-day sunny, while I savored Nuts ‘N Honey,
With my Tuscan Whole Milk, 1 gal, 128 fl. oz., I swore
As I went on with my lapping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at the icebox door.
‘Bad condensor, that,’ I muttered, ‘vibrating the icebox door -
Only this, and nothing more.’

Amadie, Client Manager: One of my favorite examples is the Playmobil Security Check Point toy

Review highlight:

My son said he wants the Playmobil Neighborhood Surveillence System set for Christmas. I’ve heard that the CC TV cameras on that thing are pretty worthless in terms of quality and motion detection, so I think I’ll get him the Playmobil Abu-Gharib Interogation Set instead (it comes with a cute little memo from George Bush).

Erika, Operations Manager: Amazon’s Fresh whole rabbit reviews

A review of the rabbit:

How many weekends have I spent, in the loincloth, knife clenched in my teeth, running through the fields trying to find a rabbit? (A bunch, trust me on this, a bunch.) All so I can have something to sacrifice on the altar once I get to the cave.

Now, with this, home, fix a cocktail, go through the day’s mail, finish my drink and drive over to the cave, yank this carcass out of the box and offer this at the feet of my dark lord and master, boom, done. I’m happy, my dark lord and master is happy, everybody wins.

Other items viewed by the rabbit viewers: Uranium Ore

Miro, Software Engineer: I would have to say that Google-spamming to connect the word George Bush with “miserable failure”. That one is my favorite.

And of course, Colbert trying to get NASA to name the space station module after himself. Or the turtle. Oh well, I’ll admit it, I don’t think Colbert will ever get old for me.

Do you have a favorite? Add it to the comments!

I was having a conversation the other day with a friend of mine about “robots that tweet for you” when I mentioned that our company Beaconfire Consulting had successfully mastered the art of Tweeting without actually Tweeting. Please note that I didn’t say “robots that sweep for you”, but then again, someone is probably working on that in Japan or the MIT Media Lab.

For better or for worse, since the global tipping point of Twitter was reached, everyone wants to be part of the action. If Twitter hasn’t come across your online radar, it’s probably because you are living under the proverbial rock and are a Luddite battling online reality. On second thought, if you are on the internet reading this blog post, then you probably aren’t a Luddite, just a Twitter Luddite. That’s ok. The Twitter sphere of knowledge is small and can be transferred from one person to another in usually a few sentences similar to the 140 character tweets.

Below, I’ve elaborated substantially to show you that there is a way that individuals and organizations can use this tool to keep their relationships better informed. I recognize that the audience for our blog here at Beaconfire  mostly consists of individuals in the non-profit industry. This knowledge however can be used by most anyone in any industry which uses the internet to interact with their customers, clients, constituents, or partners. Businesses and Governments, please utilize this knowledge wisely and don’t be evil. (That means you Google!)

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Recently, there’s been a proliferation of url shortening services, driven largely by Twitter’s 140 character limit and the need to keep links as short as possible to fit in your tweets.  They are run on websites with names like bit.ly and tr.im, as well as the classic tinyurl.com.  As a user of the internet, I have a serious dislike of these cryptic little URLs, and I went searching to find out if they came with other problems I hadn’t thought of, especially problems for SEO.  It turns out that they’re not as bad as I suspected, but they do have some serious downsides (some even say they’re evil).  If you’re trying to make a name for your nonprofit in social media, these are issues you’ll want to watch out for.

Shortening urls provides some important benefits to the person sharing the link, which is why they’ve become so popular.  Aside from taking up less space (thus making them more tweetable), many of the services provide tracking data, giving you details about how your content is being used.  That can be really fun for the casual user, and valuable for organizations.  Some people think they look tidier than long urls.

But there are two (or maybe three) other parties affected by the shortened url, and they aren’t so well served by it. (more…)

For everyone who attended the HRA-NCA annual conference today, this is where you download the handouts for the above presentation:

• Full presentation (PDF)
• Glossary of Web 2.0 terms (PDF)
• Examples of organizations using social media (PDF)
• Association Global Services – Social Networking & Associations Survey results (PDF)
• Principled Innovation – Association Social Technologies (PDF)
• The Economist – Serious Business: Web 2.0 Goes Corporate (PDF)
• Facetime – Greynets in the Enterptise (PDF)
• Interivew with Dr. Brent Coker, University of Melbourne (mp3)

Bonus link for visiting the BFWire:  Laurel Papworth’s terrific roundup of social media policies available online.

Edited Friday, May 15 to add:

Check out another great list of social media policy resources from Wild Apricot and an interview on this topic with business relationship expert David Nour in the crowdsourced May 2009 issue of Associations Now.

Looking for advice on how to elevate your Adwords campaign to the next level? With a little heavy lifting upfront and some ongoing maintenance, I’ll show you how to rise above your competitors’ listings and attract new prospects you didn’t even know existed.

Let’s start with keyword selection. When identifying keywords to target, a common mistake is to focus on words that your website already ranks well for in organic search results, like the name of your organization. Instead, think of new potential audiences that might be interested in your organization and write down a few key search terms for each. Then, enter each of these terms into a free keyword suggestion tool, like the one that comes with Google Adwords, to identify additional related terms. You will soon have hundreds of words added to your list.

Many are unaware that they can assign different ‘match types’ to keywords and end up using only the default broad matching. Broad matching shows your ad even when your keywords make up only a portion of someone’s search. This leads to more impressions. Exact matching only shows an ad when a search term matches it exactly. Because Google gives preference to exact matches over broad matches, you should use these for keywords that you value highly. Bidding more for these exact match phrases will also help. Make sure to also set your high-value terms to broad matching. That way your ad will also be displayed for longer terms you may not have thought of. Later, when you analyze your keyword search reporting results, you can determine which of these longer terms were valuable and place them in their own exact matching bucket to give them more weight.

Another common mistake is lumping keywords into a single ad group. Instead, create multiple ad groups where each one represents a unique audience. Place similar keywords in each and incorporate the ones you value the most into the ads because they will appear bolded and draw more attention. Also make sure to create multiple ads which are fairly different from one another. Google can rotate them and tell you which one is getting better results. Afterwards you can modify the winning ad to get even better returns.

Finally, many non-profits use Google Grants to run their campaigns. This generous program  provides non-profits with up to $300 per day in free ads which should be more than enough to meet your needs. It’s easy to apply and Google will usually give you the OK. Just make sure to leave yourself enough time because it can take up to 6 months to hear back.

Who couldn’t love NTC? Great times spent with colleagues, excellent sessions from which to learn, and great conversations on what’s possible for nonprofits and technology. The three days at the conference were invigorating for me. And guess what? No one was disappointed to not receive a Beaconfire chachka. Instead, we had more than 100 deserving organizations recommended by the NTC community for Beaconfire’s Chachka Grant.

This year, instead of spending our marketing budget on stuff no one really needs anyway, we decided to give the money we would have spent on chachka’s to 3 organizations nominated and voted on by the NTC community.

And the winners … (more…)