Cuts are looming, so if you're thinking about the best way to reduce some of your charities costs, online information sharing is often a cheap and effective option.
Sharing information online can seem like a golden opportunity reducing the costs of printing, postage and personal visits. Producing publications online only; or video conferencing as opposed to arranging meetings can be cost effective but the needs of our supporters and colleagues should still be considered. There is still a widespread wariness of engaging with web technologies among some of our supporters and some may not even have access to the web. Depending on the area that we serve it could still be more cost effective to visit in person or give printed materials if it will yield a greater response.
Third Sector Magazine’s, Foresight update has some great links with things to think about when deciding if online information sharing is for you and the pro’s and con’s of moving everything online.
http://www.3s4.org.uk/drivers/ease-of-publishing-online
http://www.3s4.org.uk/drivers/digital-exclusion
http://www.3s4.org.uk/news/is-the-information-society-a-community-catalyst-or-a-community-liability
http://www.3s4.org.uk/news/is-social-networking-right-for-your-organisation
http://bookleteer.com/blog/about/