# Charities still struggling to make use of social media data, says survey

- Link: https://fundraising.co.uk/2014/10/02/charities-still-struggling-make-use-social-media-data/
- Published: 2014-10-02T17:05:41+01:00
- Author: Howard Lake

Although many charities and not-for-profit organisations have used social media 
for several years to support different areas of their work, most are still finding
it hard to gather and make use of the data generated through this activity. As a
result, they are being held back in making the most of these channels to maximise
fundraising and membership results.

This is one of the conclusions of a survey by Advanced NFP, who earlier this year
produced [a report on the problems faced by charities in handling data](https://www.fundraising.co.uk/2014/06/16/data-centric-approach-key-charities-survival/).
In that they reported that 96% of not-for-profits were struggling effectively to
manage to collect and analyse all donor, member or supporter data.

The Advanced NFP Social Media Data report shows that nearly all NFP organisations
are struggling to know what data they ought to be collecting from social media campaigns,
as well as how to collect and use it to best effect.

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## What is holding organisations back?

Although **95%** of the not-for-profit organisations surveyed said that social media
has had a positive impact on creating greater awareness of what they do, **80%**
report that they do not have the capacity to get involved as much as they would 
like to. After lack of resources, the next most common hindrance (68%) was lack 
of in-house expertise.

While 70% of organisations recognise that they should be spending more time and 
money on social media, **62% say they are not able to measure the impact of their
social media activity.**

**61%** of respondents claim that they do not have enough support throughout the
organisation, with **52%** revealing that a lack of full understanding or appreciation
of the benefits of social media from senior decision-makers was holding them back.

Over two thirds (**69%**) of respondents claim they were not able to link social
media data into existing systems, with 62% saying they could not link online and
offline campaigns. In addition, **68%** of respondents revealed they weren’t able
to connect together data from the different forms of social media activity.

## Most popular social media channels

Not surprisingly Twitter and Facebook were cited as the most popular social media
channels for not-for-profits to use. Yet **63%** of organisations could not collect
useful data from that activity, and **61%** could not effectively track what was
happening in their social media activity.

> Simon Fowler, Managing Director, [Advanced Business Solutions (Advanced NFP)](https://fundraising.co.uk/2014/10/02/charities-still-struggling-make-use-social-media-data/www.advancedcomputersoftware.com/nfp),
> said:
> “It’s encouraging to see NFPs embracing opportunities to engage with a wider audience
> via social media activities. However, data-driven insights continue to be an issue.
> Once again, the single biggest threat facing NFPs right now is an inability to
> gain a competitive advantage from data.
> “However, on a more positive note, we are encouraging our customers to get to 
> grips with these new channels and steal a march. To support them, we are investing
> in technologies that will integrate data from social media channels into our solutions.”

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