Date of Conferral
2021
Degree
Doctor of Psychology (Psy.D.)
School
Psychology
Advisor
Eugene Meyer
Abstract
Capacity building is key to organizational sustainability in the competitive environment of nonprofit behavioral health organizations. Strategic use of social media plays a prominent role in fundraising and stakeholder engagement to support capacity building. The aim of this study was to examine the use of social media by maternal mental health nonprofit organizations to increase income for the purpose of capacity development. The Baldrige Excellence Framework was used to ground this descriptive, multiple case study of four organizations in the United States. The primary data sources were public social media posts and statistics, organizational websites and documents, and data from a review of academic literature. Findings indicated variability in the organizations’ use of social media for fundraising purposes and limited application of social media fundraising best practices as identified in the academic literature. Recommendations based on findings include performing a social media needs assessment, developing and expanding social media capacity, hiring and training staff proficient with social media, creating a sense of urgency for donors, and exploring opportunities specific to each social media platform for fundraising. This study contributes to positive social change through the identification of opportunities to improve use of social media platforms for organizational capacity development, thereby ensuring sustainability and growth of maternal mental health support services for communities in need.
Recommended Citation
Abbott, Brandy Lynn, "Social Media Use to Build Capacity in Nonprofit Maternal Mental Health Organizations" (2021). Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies. 10472.
https://scholarworks.waldenu.edu/dissertations/10472
