Social Media is definitely an effective tool for nonprofits to use. However, before you jump into the pool, what are the things you need to do first?What are you trying to say? Do you have more than one message? Develop a short paragraph that encapsulates what you want to say and continually reference it as you work on social media tools.Who is your audience? Are they tech savvy? Creating a plan to enter the social media arena is irrelevant if none of your audience will follow you there. Consider surveying your donors to determine how they want to hear from you.What do you want to achieve from social media? Donations? Awareness? Determine your goals and remember to keep them handy as you progress.This goes hand in hand with #3. Get specific about the return on investment you are expecting. If you want donations, what's the amount? If you are looking for new supporters, how many?There are multiple social media tools out there. It's important to determine which ones work for you. Signing up for everything isn't going to be the best use of your time.Developing a strategy for your social media activity is extremely important. You need to determine what content you want to create and where you want to put it.What's your method for analysis? It's important to track what you do on social media tools so you can examine whether you are achieving the ROI that you want.Who's writing the content for your social media sites? Is it the same person who's posting them? Are there more than one person contributing? Hashing this out ahead of time will make the process flow much smoother.Create some of the content you need ahead of time so you aren't scrambling to find something to post/write about everyday.What's your procedure if you recieve a negative comment from someone? Or even a positive one? Determine how you handle questions and comments from your audience.