I got a heads-up about a free event promotion and calendaring service that allows you to create widgets and pages for free.

It took me just a few minutes to sign up, create an event, and customize the widget by adjusting colors (see it below). I also got a web page for added information about the event, RSVPs, and collecting information from those interested. It even allows people to subscribe to event updates.

SpongeCell, the software provider, provides tracking data (widget and page views) and lets you collect your subscribers' contact information. Not bad for a free suite of tools! (The software service also provides email and SMS messaging to your contacts, but fees apply per number of messages sent.)

What's cool is the ease of integration and sharing of the widgets -- think Facebook. I'm not really a techie (I just play one on TV), but I found the back-end management and creative tools very straightforward.

Let's see how many social media metaphors I can cram into one post, shall we? :)

Jeremiah Owyang has a piece today about trust. I don't know if you've felt this lately, but I certainly have: we're head over heels for trust in the sector these days. I wrote a bit about it back in November. Katya Andresen and Mark Rovner think it's one of the seven things everyone wants. Search for "trust" on Beth's Blog and you'll come up with myriad posts. Search for trust on the NTEN website and you'll get dozens of job listings where "building trust" is in the job description.

But back to Jeremiah's post. Want to guess what the number one source of trusted information is for most Americans?

For some reason, I've been shadowing Beth Kanter on the conference circuit lately. I've had the great pleasure of listening to her speak several times in the last few months -- with more to come! At some point during every presentation, one of the attendees, whose mind has just been blown by her awesomeness, asks "Do you have that written down somewhere?"

Beth's answer is always the same. "Just 'Google' Beth. My blog will be in the top of the listings. See?! Another reason to blog. It increases your search engine rankings!"

While I've always agreed with her -- blogging has clearly increased our own search rankings -- I now confess that I never truly understood why... until today!

Many thanks to Paul Hyland for posting this Wired Magazine infographic about the secret life of your blog post on his Facebook news feed. It sums it all up nicely. Next time I see Beth, I'll be able to agree with her whole heartedly.

Nancy Schwartz, over at Getting Attention, is doing some research on nonprofit taglines. "Effective taglines complement an org's name, convey the unique value it delivers to its community and differentiates it from the competition," she says. "But more often, nonprofit taglines are vague, ambiguous, over-reaching, too abstract or simply non-existent."

When you've got a moment, take her short survey at:

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=zjXNjEU9fh1wCcHCZelFYQ_3d_3d

Nancy promises to provide a copy of her report to all respondents who request it.  We may all benefit from her findings.

Google and Salesforce.com have announced that Google AdWords will be integrated into existing Salesforce applications through a new product called Salesforce "Group Edition". The application, targeted at small to midsize organizations, will make it easier to create and manage AdWords campaigns. While some prognosticators and commentators downplay the significance of the alliance, "Group Edition" can benefit NPOs immediately: members of the Google Grants program and nonprofit Salesforce users will gain access to the application for free.

Marc Sirkin, The International Rescue Committee
Republished with Permission from npMarketing Blog

I’m finally recovered from a solid NTEN experience, my first ever. I will leave most of the commentary, notes, and reflections to the great round up on the NTEN blog and will instead talk about something that is happening to our industry (or may have already happened): marketing and technology are merging into one beast.

What was evident from the lack of marketing people in attendance (or so it seemed to me!) is that marketing folks either don’t see how important this is, or have their heads in the sand. Why?

One reason could certainly be how the conference positions itself (The Nonprofit Technology Conference or NTC) certainly could throw a marketer off. What marketer would possibly want to sit around with geeks all day talking about code and open-source software? A smart marketer would, that’s who. The reason a smart marketer should attend these types of conferences is simple – but understated. While technology should never drive strategy, it most certainly does enable strategy.