Have you had a chance yet to check out the winners of the 4th Annual DoGooder Nonprofit Video Awards? This year’s contest, a collaboration between See3 Communications and YouTube, awarded a total of $10,000 in grants (funded by the Case Foundation) to the best videos of 2009 found in the YouTube Nonprofit Program. Winners also received prizes from Flip Video and the Nonprofit Technology Network.

“Darius Goes West—A DVD in Every School” (above) was the winner in the Best Small Org category. Below are the winners in the best medium and large org categories, as well as Best Innovation in Video. Be sure to check them all out.

As much as I enjoyed these excellent examples of how nonprofits are using video to forward the mission, I have to admit that this PSA for seatbelt safety is still the most compelling thing I’ve seen on video this year. It continues to push my buttons every time I watch it.

Here’s how charity:water tells its amazing story through video (thanks to Allison Fine for the lead on this one).

While it’s a brilliant example of nonprofit storytelling, there’s another lesson here I’d like you to consider. If you were to tell your organization’s story through video, would it be anywhere nearly as compelling as this? I’m not referring to the scale or impact, just the simple power of what you’re doing as illustrated through video.

If not, you might want to give some serious thought as to what you’re doing. There are countless nonprofits out there who, given their limited impact, don’t really have a reason to exist. Don’t be one of them. If you can’t tell a compelling story about your organization and its mission, then perhaps you should reconsider what you’re doing or how you’re doing it.

photo by robert couse-baker

Going postal over the letters to Santa program. The secret behind a truly great brand. Chicken soup in the cold remedies aisle. A look at why Twitter followers without engagement is worthless.

These are just some of my most popular tweets during the month of November. No surprise in today’s jobs-challenged “recovery” that the top tweet was a post concerning my search for a communications manager (still under way, tell all your friends).

If you missed any of these when first we tweeted, be sure to check them out now. Lots of good stuff here for what ails you.

Now Hiring: a Communications Manager

The Secret to Making Your Brand Truly Great

The Case of the 4,000 Twitter Followers Who Don’t Care

Confused Stock Boy … or Brilliant Product Placement?

Let’s Play 20 Questions to a Solid Strategic Plan

Is Social Media a Marketing Thing?

Content-ment: Curation Vs. Aggregation

Postal Service Limits Letter to Santa Program

Top 20 Tweets in October

Why Facebook Continues to Suck

25 of the Most Powerful and Influential Women in Social Media 2009

Why Nonprofits Should Be on YouTube

Five Things Brand Marketing Can’t Do

Writing Errors That Make You Look Stupid

Location is the Missing Link Between Social Media and the Real World

Email Campaigns That Work for Nonprofits

Beth Asked a Question

American Red Cross – Nonprofit Social Media Marketing Example

Top 50 Journalism Blogs

Ten Things Social Media Can’t Do

See3 Communications CEO Michael Hoffman produced this great preso on how nonprofits can make effective use of YouTube. If storytelling is one of our most effective communication strategies, then video has to be one of the best tools for executing on that strategy. Watch this or this if you doubt it.

There are so many reasons to be using video, but I’ll just cherry-pick a few from Hoffman’s deck:

• YouTube has become a top destination for searches.
• The YouTube Nonprofit Program enables you to put links anywhere in your video that take viewers to your website.
• Although video quality has improved, you still don’t have to be the consummate pro to shoot perfectly respectable video.
• Production costs have dropped to the point where anyone can produce pretty decent video.

There’s a lot more good info in the preso. Check it out.

Last month I told you about Tammi Ramsey, an old high school friend who auditioned for Season II of The Winemakers on PBS. Here’s the premise according to the reality show’s web site:

Twelve men and women compete for a chance to create and launch their own wine label nationwide. In each episode they will face challenges on every aspect of wine making from viticulture and enology to sales and marketing, but in the end only one contestant will win the title of Wine Maker.

Sound familiar? Anyway, Tammi is a recruiting manager for a financial services firm in the Bay Area who developed a passion for wine after a friend gave her a wine-making kit. She’s invested much of her hard-earned cash in the purchase of land in the Sonoma region where she hopes to build her winery someday.

Personally I think the show’s producers would be idiots not to put her on the show, given her personality and story. But you never know.

She made it through the first round and now anxiously awaits the final selection announcement, which comes next week. Sixteen finalists will make the cut (I assume there are four “understudies” in case someone bails out at the last minute). All but one will be chosen by the show; the 16th will be selected based on the number of views a contestant’s two-minute audition video garners on the internet.

We learned this morning that Tammi is one of the five semi-finalists  vying for that last spot. The final decision will be announced Aug. 13 during a screening event in Sacramento. She’s currently in a tight race with one other competitor. Last time I checked they were less than 100 views apart, both exceeding 4,500 views.

If you haven’t watched her video yet, I encourage you to do so. I’ve got no skin in this game other than as an old friend. I’m not her social media “guru” or consultant or anything else, just someone who thinks she would make a great addition to the show.

Check out the video and let me know if you agree.

An old high school friend recently came back into my life (through Facebook, of course) and it’s been great catching up with her, learning where the various twists and turns have taken her.

Tammi is a recruiting manager for a financial services firm up in the Bay Area, but her real passion is wine. A few years ago she took her assets and invested them in some land in Sonoma. Her ultimate goal is to build her own winery there.

An opportunity to take a huge step forward in fulfilling her dream recently presented itself when Tammi made the first-round audition cuts for the second season of The Winemakers, a reality show on PBS that will begin airing in September. The next round of interviews is on Monday, and I’m confident she’ll make the Final 12.

However, if the judges disagree with me and cut her, she still has one more chance to make the cast. All of the semi-finalists have been told to put their audition videos on YouTube and other video-sharing sites to allow the people to cast their votes (and to give the show as much free publicity as possible, of course). Whoever receives the most views will be added to the cast.

So my purpose here is twofold. First, I’d like to see Tammi make the show. She’s got a great personality, she’s driven and competitive, and I think she’d liven things up quite a bit. Check out her video above and see what I mean.

Second, I’d love to hear your thoughts on her video. Beyond Facebook and LinkedIn, Tammi’s not really a social media practitioner. But I think she’s done a great job with her video (full disclosure: I had NOTHING to do with it). She comes across as genuine, personable, relaxed but not totally polished, a few stumbles here and there but overall a nice presentation. It’s actually a pretty good lesson in how you should communicate with your audience via video.

What do you think? Does she have what it takes to be on the show? Any thoughts on what you liked and where she might have improved her presentation? I’m going to put a link to the video here since this is, after all, a shameless plug to encourage viewings.

If you think Tammi deserves her shot, please forward it far and wide. Poke the Beehive’s readership is still modest, but with your help I think we can make a difference. Use your power to CHANGE THE COURSE OF PUBLIC TELEVISION! (Insert evil laugh here.)

OK, that was a little over the top … your consideration and help are sincerely appreciated.

Any graphic designer, writer or other creative professional on the vendor side of the relationship will appreciate this … well, maybe not appreciate but wince in recognition of the absurd truthiness of it. I really enjoyed it when it first hit YouTube a couple of months ago.

For those on the client side of things, watch this again the next time you consider asking creatives to essentially give away their services.

Go to ad agency BooneOakley’s web site and you’ll end up on YouTube. In fact their entire site is a series of YouTube videos, accessible through links embedded in every video.

I can’t begin to tell you how brilliant this is. It’s innovative and engaging in ways that most agency sites aren’t. It does a great job of reflecting the personality and culture of BooneOakley and its work. And it’s hilarious. After watching a few of these videos, you really want to work with these guys.

(Full disclosure: partner Dave Oakley was a neighbor of mine when I lived in Charlotte for several years. I have had beers in the man’s kitchen. I’ve played ping pong in his garage. And I’ve trick-or-treated with his lovely wife Claire and their two kids. It’s still brilliant work.)

Why aren’t more web sites this creative? I don’t mean ad agency or graphic design firm sites, I mean the rest of us. Why can’t a law firm or accountant or nonprofit or neighborhood liquor store tell its story in such a fun, engaging fashion?

The short answer: They can. If an organization has the guts to do it.