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January Tips from the Toolshed
Jan5
Posted by nina
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Hello!
Happy New Year and Welcome to GMT's monthly e-newsletter for January 2009.  We send this e-newsletter on the first Monday of every month to share feature announcements, membership tips, links to recent articles from environmental reporters, new members, and other helpful resources. 

You are receiving this as your organization is a member of Green Media Toolshed and you are currently a registered GMT user.  Should you wish to opt out of this monthly communication, please see the instructions in section 8 below.
Word Count: 1,121
Read Time: 5 minutes
 
In this issue you will find:
1. Member Connections
2. Be in the Know – How GMT Tools Can Help Your Group
3. Buzz from the Beat
4. Link(s) of the Month
5. Community Coverage
6. GMT Welcomes 1 New Member
7. Support: Database Do’s and Don’ts
8. Opt out instructions
 
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1. Member Connections: Earn a discount on your GMT renewal by ….
           
~Referring a new member~
 
Earn a 5% discount on your next renewal for each referred group that joins GMT. With these referrals, you can earn up to 50% off at your next membership renewal.
 
This is an easy way to reduce your membership fee and still get access to the same great media contact resources and online web tools.
 
All potential GMT members must
•           be either a 501c(3) or 501c(4) organization
•           be an environmental organization or work on environmental issues
 
Questions or need materials for referrals? Call or write Nina, nina@greenmediatoolshed.org ; (202) 408- 8850 x10
 
 
Get Ready for the Advanced Media Database Training Series in 2009. These 30- 60 minute sessions will offer current media database users with the opportunity to get extra training on particular features within the system. 
 
RSVP to nina@greenmediatoolshed.org for the first training on DISTRIUBTIONS – or sending email and faxes from the media database. This session will take place on Friday January 23 at 2:00 p.m. Eastern. See more details in our training center, at http://members.greenmediatoolshed.org/taxonomy/term/989
 
Future topics will include Activity Management, Adding & Editing Media Contacts, and more. Please send topic recommendations to nina@greenmediatoolshed.org
 

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2. Be in the Know - How GMT Tools Can Help Your Group: Need a place to reach out for advice and engage in discussion with other environmental campaigns?

Get your word out on the GMT Discussion Forum

The Discussion Forum, located in the Community section of the member center, is a place where you and all your networks on GMT can engage in discussion. In the forum, you can….
 
  • Ask a Question
  • Offer a Piece of Advice
  • Post for feedback on an idea
  • Provide feedback to other members
  • Build your professional network on GMT
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3. Buzz from the Beat: Between Obama and the Press
 
Mark Leibovich wrote an article for The New York Times Magazine (December 21st issue), that takes a closer look at the tactics that Barack Obama, David Axelrod, Robert Gibbs, and David Plouffe used to communicate with the press during the campaign.
 
Leibovich analyzes the relationships between this team during the campaign, and how they mastered the political media and successfully used online tools such as blogs, video, and text messaging to engage voters. He then projects what that may imply for the new administration’s communication with the media and public when they move into the Oval Office.
 
Read the full online article at:
 
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4. Link of the month: Track the Success of your site…for free… with Google Analytics
 
Need a way to track who is visiting your website for what and when? Check out this article by Care2 on how nonprofits can utilize Google Analytics for the best results. It includes a short tutorial on how to install the program and some good advice for using results.
In brief, some benefits of Analytics: 
  1. Monitor each arrival and the cause- search engine, link, etc
  2. Know when each visitor came and how long they visited
  3. Know what they downloaded
  4. Helps determine if the visitors achieved their goals
 
And the Downsides:
  1. Google Analytics delays processing data for at least 12 hours, so you don’t see live data.
  2. Google itself does not offer any sort of consulting aside from the FAQ, which may call for some internal knowledge in your organization on the web tool. As a result, Care2 recommends that your organization does a cost benefit analysis of the benefit of Analytics considering the staff time that would need to be invested.
  3. If your website receives a large amount of traffic, you may want to consider using a combination of Analytics and another program, such as Webtrends.
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5. Community Coverage: Success Stories Needed!
 
Want to share one of YOUR successes?
 
Send submissions to nina@greenmediatoolshed.org.
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6. Let’s Welcome 1 New Member to our GMT Community:
 
The California Native Plant Society seeks to increase understanding and appreciation of California's native plants and to conserve them and their natural habitats through education, science, advocacy, horticulture and land stewardship.
 
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7. Media Database Q & A:  Filter Activities by Individuals and User Number
 
Activities are logged interactions (i.e. email and fax distributions, pitch calls, ect.) with media contacts and their outlets. Should you choose to record activities, they are logged in the contact and outlet profiles, and serve as good internal tracking features for your individual work or that of your communications team.
 
As all GMT user activities are listed in the contact and outlet profiles, you can follow these easy steps to sort all of the activities by one or more individuals by outlet, contact, and other criteria:
 
  1. Go to Media Contacts Advanced Search
  2. Open the "show all search options" box
  3. Go to the Activities page
  4. From this Activities search page, you can search for particular activities, including activities created by a certain user or users.
  5. You can select your individual ID number, or the numbers of your organization’s media database users, and view the activities created by them.
 
Other media database questions? Contact Nina Schwartz at 202-408-8850 x. 10 or nina@greenmediatoolshed.org, Monday - Friday 9am- 5pm EST.
 
Need a refresher media database training? View our updated 2009 schedule at http://members.greenmediatoolshed.org/taxonomy/term/989 and email nina@greenmediatoolshed.org to RSVP.
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8. Opt out instructions: 
             We’ll be sad - but not bitter - if you do.

To opt out of GMT’s monthly e-newsletter, reply to this email with the word "Unsubscribe" in the subject line.

 
To share feedback about the content and format, please reply to this email and include your thoughts in the body of your message. You can also submit a question to be answered in the next FAQ section by replying to this message.
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View past e-newsletters in our monthly e-newsletter archive section of the GMT Training Center: http://www.greenmediatoolshed.org/taxonomy/term/38
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