Modeling the Adoption and Use of Social Media by Nonprofit Organizations

Abstract

This study examines what drives organizational adoption and use of social media through a model built around four key factors – strategy, capacity, governance, and environment. Using Twitter, Facebook, and other data on 100 large US nonprofit organizations, the model is employed to examine the determinants of three key facets of social media utilization: 1) adoption, 2) frequency of use, and 3) dialogue. We find that organizational strategies, capacities, governance features, and external pressures all play a part in these social media adoption and utilization outcomes. Through its integrated, multi-disciplinary theoretical perspective, this study thus helps foster understanding of which types of organizations are able and willing to adopt and juggle multiple social media accounts, to use those accounts to communicate more frequently with their external publics, and to build relationships with those publics through the sending of dialogic messages.

Keywords: social media, new media, nonprofit organizations, Facebook, Twitter, technology adoption and use, diffusion of innovation, dialogue, organization-public relations, charities, NGOs, not-for-profit

JEL Classification: L31, O33, M15