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(Happy Monday! Today’s post is from Sande Smith our Communications expert.)

I admit it. I’ve got Flip fever.

And the fever’s growing now that I’ve won one of those slim Flip cameras! It happened at the recent Pink Magazine Empowerment Conference.

There was a session on social media and meaningful engagement, and because that’s my latest obsession, I went.

Jeannette Gibson, the speaker, was terrific. She’s Cisco’s Director of New Media, and showed some very simple examples of how Cisco has integrated mini-videos – made with the flip – into their communications plans and interactions with customers. (In March 2009, Cisco bought the maker of Flip video, Pure Digital.)

Some examples:

• John Chambers, Cisco’s CEO, answered questions on the future of the company, his vision & goals. The questions were sent through Twitter, and the result was a 4 minute video.
• A product manager sits next to a Cisco switch and talks about the product – an alternative to the printed fact sheet).
• And my personal favorite because it’s silly, surprising and gives you insight in the CEO’s character – John Chambers showing his team how to do duck calls. That video has 23,415 views!

At the Global Fund for Women, we recently made our own simple Flip video. After Christine Ahn, a Progressive Women’s Media Resource Center fellow and Global Fund colleague, came back fired up from a weekend training where she learned to make Flip videos, she and another Global Fundie, Preeti Shekar, held up the camera and asked staff one simple question.

Why do you care about violence against women?

The result is a simple, moving 4-minute video that helps viewers learn more about the people behind the Global Fund and the reasons we do the work we do. It accompanied our campaign for the 16 Days of Activism Against Violence Against Women, and has almost 200 views.

Of course, you don’t have to use a Flip to create simple videos. The Women’s Foundation of Minnesota created a series of simple videos using a Sony camera (with video capacity) on a tripod. With these fun Happy Birthday videos as the basis, the foundation raised almost $5,000 for their girlsBest (girls Building Economic Success Together) Fund – in less than a week! How did they do it? I called their Communications Director, Mary Beth Hanson, to find out.

“With our 26th anniversary as the basis for our online campaign, I really wanted to expand our social-media tool chest to include video,” said Mary Beth. After watching the carefully crafted and scripted videos of other nonprofits on YouTube, she realized that most were too long and not very interesting.

“So, I decided that our videos had to be short and celebratory with surprising content that would get folks interested enough to return daily – for the duration of the campaign. And hopefully donate at some point along the way.”

To distribute the videos and promote the campaign, the Foundation used a daily combination of its nonprofit YouTube channel, Facebook page, website and email blasts. Not only did the Foundation nearly reach its $5,000 goal, it attracted many new donors, recharged lapsed ones, and inspired current ones. The campaign was a resounding success.

The lessons? “Short is better, fun is great! While the issues we’re working on are serious, we don’t always have to be serious in our communications. It’s really important to provide ways for people to celebrate with you.”

Instead of thinking about how hard it is to make videos and engage in social media, ask yourself what can I share? What moves me? What’s fun?