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Social Movement Technologies
Twitter Power Boot Camp

For activists and campaigners waging justice against big adversaries, and journalists 

Photo credit: Tobi James Candid/CC

A 5-session series:
October – November 2021 (Starting October 12)
Weekly sessions on Tuesdays, 4pm Nairobi, Palestine / 2pm UK / 9am NY /10am São Paulo

Language access

The series will be held in English, with simultaneous interpretation in Arabic, French, Spanish and Portuguese (based on demand) and live captioning in English. All sessions will be recorded, with captioning in these languages as well for those who may not be able to access live sessions. 

Participants will be eligible to earn a “Certificate in Twitter Power for Campaigners” based on completing all assignments (all will be reviewed by an instructor) and attending at least 3 of the sessions live. Assignments for non-English speakers can be submitted in their own language. Slides and supporting materials can be translated in all 4 languages. 

Participants will:

  • Learn how activists, particularly across Africa, MENA and Europe, are using Twitter strategically to build pressure in campaigns targeting big corporate and government decision-makers and to build visibility in the media
  • Learn how journalists can develop their Twitter account to protect themselves and ensure they have allies if they need them
  • Build your account quickly and strategically, by up to 250 followers per week using free and low-cost tools and techniques (participants will implement during the series and share results)
  • Use Twitter lists and DM groups to activate followers
  • Orchestrate a Twitterstorm including the hijacking of a hashtag
  • Develop a guide using free tools to make it easy for allies to participate
  • Develop your Twitter Strategic Plan based on the needs of your campaign
  • Share options for when a government running scared tries to shut you down, and how to be prepared for it. (Participants will also have the option to form a global Twitter solidarity community.)

Movement examples from the Global South will be incorporated as much as possible, and participants with experience will be invited to share. 

Enrollment will include access to this online course, parts of which will be assigned as homework. This session is recommended as background. These recordings are or will be available with captioning in 5 languages.

Time required: 3.5- 4.5 hours/week

  • 90 minutes/week live session
  • 1 hour/week prep for live session (watch assigned video)
  • 1-2 hours/week complete assignment

Pricing

Global South – based organizations (Africa, MENA, Latin America, Asia) – FREE

  • The entire training is free
  • If participant wants to work towards a certificate, the charge is $50 per person at the start (assignments will get feedback for those pursuing a certificate). (This fee goes up to $60 after October 1.)

Global North – based organizations (North America, Europe, parts of Oceania)

  • Early bird cost (Global North) US$400 – $600 (higher end of scale if you can, to subsidize Global South registrations)
    • After October 1: Regular cost (Global North) US$500 – $600
  • Early bird Group rates up to 10 people (Global North) US$3000 ($300 per person*)
    • After October 1: Regular Group rates up to 10 people (Global North) US$3500 ($350 per person*)

*Group rates: per person rates indicated are if all seats are filled. The group rate involves one lump sum payment. Questions about group rate? Contact us. 

Registration

Please fill out this registration form to sign up for free or to continue to the payment process. This is also the form to use if you need to pay for a group or for someone else to participate.

With appreciation to those networks helping to get the word out

(Contact us if your network is helping with outreach and would like to be recognized.)

  • African Human Rights Network
  • Africans Rising
  • Girls First Network, Africa
  • Global Platform Zambia
  • Laudato Si’ Movement
  • The Youth Café

 

Groups Banner

Staff and activists of 4,900+ groups
have engaged with SMT trainings

Testimonials

The program was an incredible journey of meaningful learning and connections with amazing advocates nationwide.
I was able to immediately use the tools I learned and apply them to our organization. The program was intense, but I loved every minute of it and learned more than expected.
I found a lot of value in this Certificate Program that I use in my everyday work: from using social media effectively; significantly growing accounts and activating people online, pressuring targets in campaigns, and running Twitterstorms. Even when using other tools, I still apply the principles I learned!
This training provided invaluable clarity and direction for my digital organizing work, empowering my team to work more effectively.
SMT's coaching was incredibly supportive, encouraging and accessible. SMT had a huge impact on evolving La Semilla's storytelling program. Through SMT coaching, we diversified our digital communications. Having SMT as a source of resources and as a thought partner has been incredibly impactful to our work.
We’ve heard really good things from our grantee partners. SMT has a strong, grantee-focused way of working.
I had an amazing time. I am already applying the valuable content in my organization.
SMT is the only training I know of that speaks our language of activism and uses the tools we use everyday in the field. They are a go-to resource to help raise the bar for communications in the labor movement.
Working with SMT was easy and collaborative. The training helped our Greenpeace Southeast Asia team get new insights into campaign best practices across the globe.
The program offered interesting case studies, expanded my digital campaigning knowledge, introduced new organizing tools and strategies, and enabled connections with professionals in the progressive space.
SMT helped us think through what type of CRM we need and choose a texting platform to reach our base. SMT’s coaching has been instrumental in helping us develop a social media strategy that communicates our message through the voice of the young people involved in our organization. 
This program helped us harness effective tools and tactics that are aligned with our movement's needs and organizational values.
SMT's training helped me use my journalistic skills effectively to highlight people's struggles and create change. Using Twitter more effectively, we supported Syria's refugee camp hospital to get more media attention and raise funds to respond to the hospital's needs as well as build visibility on the issues affecting refugees.
We have had a fantastic experience with SMT…they have been highly responsive to the needs of our grantees.
SMT coaching enabled us to expand our presence within human rights spaces in Kenya beyond an LGBTIQ audience. It helped us use Twitter to connect with allies in the environmental justice and land rights movements. It was amazing to have someone to work with who knows our work and give us templates just when we needed them.
This program was pivotal in my early organizing career, providing a strong foundation for recognizing technology's power in social movements. It equipped me with tools to create effective systems for our organization and broader membership base.
This program is very comprehensive and provides tons of tools and resources that have strengthened my skillset in digital organizing. This is a great program that I highly recommend.
The trainings are terrific–geared for every level of experience. And being rooted in social change movement, especially helpful to organizers.
SMT has been a great partner to co-design and launch a set of offerings that meet the growing digital and remote needs of the organizations we support, including bilingual access for our Spanish-speaking partners. The team is relatable, attentive and knowledgeable and their use of case studies helps to make complex information accessible!
The assignments provided a better understanding of how the nuts and bolts of digital organizing fit together.
I strongly recommend SMT. Their strong organizing background, preparation and thoughtfulness made our strategy assessment with them enjoyable and really helpful.
I felt supported by a community of hundreds throughout my learning journey.
Learned invaluable skills, gained practical knowledge, and connected with inspiring professionals.
I really liked the A.I. custom training session, especially the parts tailored to our workstream and with examples pulled from our staff. It really helped to situate the tools in our work and open our team's minds to the possibilities.
The program was an eye-opener and better positioned me as a Communications Officer. I learned about digital mobilizing, online community building, and more.
The Design Apprenticeship course helped me become bolder in my design choices. I became confident enough to push for a more systemic approach to design in the team, developing templates and guiding other creative colleagues. This program was pivotal in my development as a designer!
Highly recommend it for individuals in civic organizations looking to enhance their technological campaigning skills!
The SMT trainings I’ve taken have helped us mobilize and deepen engagement in our communities. Through Twitterstorms, phone banking, and other tactics that I learned through SMT’s trainings, we succeeded in our call to #ExtendtheReg for a million young people who would otherwise be disenfranchised by anti-poor COVID policies.

SMT helped us create a social media presence to expand our cannabis worker organizing campaign. Our organizers have enhanced their social media capabilities. We have succeeded beyond our expectations. Working with SMT has been a great experience. They really understand organizing and communications.
SMT has worked with us to develop and implement a broad and integrated social media strategy. They helped our leadership understand the importance of such a strategy and taught our activists the basic skills to execute it. From website maintenance to targeted twitter campaigns, they are there when you need them and they understand that it is all about movement building.
I implemented lessons on personal narrative, public narrative and emails directly into my campaign, so this was an instant gratification. I loved learning from the other Digital Campaigning Certificate Program participants who came from around the world, working on different topics.
Each session was well-facilitated, skillfully blended presentation, discussion, and practical exercises, allowing me to immediately apply techniques to my work.
The program offered interesting case studies, expanded my digital campaigning knowledge, introduced new organizing tools and strategies, and enabled connections with professionals in the progressive space.
I'm grateful for the opportunity to expand my organizing knowledge with SMT. It's sparked creativity, and I'm excited to put new ideas into action.
SMT's expertise in social media, ads training, and particularly their personalized coaching, has been invaluable for navigating the unique challenges of the non-profit sector. SMT's guidance has empowered us to adopt new technologies and strategies, leading to our most successful social media ads campaign to date. Their support is a game-changer for organizations stepping into unfamiliar digital territories.
Without SMT we would not have been able to move our organizing from the field to the digital arena during COVID. They helped us set up systems, coached and trained our folks, helped us troubleshoot and launch digital outreach efforts all in crucial campaign moments. Can’t speak highly enough about what their help meant!
Our coach was an everyday reminder of what we needed to do. He checked in and followed up on us. It really helped us activate Twitter in our campaigns and tighten up digital security. We moved from just having a Twitter handle to building on a hashtag that saw a jailed human rights activist released from prison.
The DCCP program enhanced my skills and provided valuable support. I've applied these skills in my job and community work. Well-designed and presented program!
Our staff took a lot of SMT courses – including the intensive Digital Campaigning Certificate Program. It helped us take our digital campaigning and collectivizing actions to the next level! We used various tools to increase our follower base and successfully target authorities to take action at the village and municipal levels in India.

SMT developed a custom training for our youth climate fellows from around the world. It was a holistic training on creating campaigns from strategy to implementation and building our activist base. We appreciated SMT’s attention to detail around language and inclusion and always thinking about power building.
Taking this course really transformed my organizing skills to be more effective.
This program was very useful for understanding the digital aspects of organizing workers and incorporating them into a comprehensive campaign toolkit.
The digital training was expertly executed and helped me develop new ideas and best practice to implement in our campaign.
This program has boosted my confidence in organizing and sustaining digital campaigns.
I found this course inspiring, especially the strategies part. Learning from diverse students with different backgrounds was enriching."=
The course provided invaluable tools and strategies, real-world case studies from different cultural contexts, and a supportive learning environment that encouraged interaction and peer learning.
SMT helped GAIA use LinkedIn to reach a key constituency we were having trouble reaching - thousands of people who play a specific role in the waste management industry. We got responses from key players.
For anyone who wants to dive into the world of digital communications, this is the training for you!
Having access to experts through the certificate program was amazing. The course is so practical. I set up google ads for the first time and created our digital security policy and implementation plan. Our whole team uses the campaign strategy template now. Now we know how to improve our email deliverability and started a texting program.
SMT helped us craft an effective public narrative for our campaign to get a mine closed. SMT helped us finalize a campaign strategy and come up with an effective plan to raise visibility and engage the public. Our campaign led to a pause in the mining. We will keep fighting!
This program greatly helped integrate our thinking on organizing and digital campaigning. I wish all our organizers and digital staff could undergo this training.
The Digital Campaigning Certificate Program was immensely helpful, and I continue to apply its learnings in my daily communications and strategizing.
We’re starting our third straight year providing grantee partners with Social Movement Technologies training and coaching…our grantees are in good hands.
I learnt a lot on grassroots movements, digital campaigns and communications in times of state intrusion or threats.
For change-makers looking to harness people power for good. Expert presenters and experience sharing with classmates enhanced my knowledge and provided valuable, immediately applicable skills.
This program has been a great experience for me personally and for my work. With the few campaigns going under way I’m excited to show my colleagues what I have learned from SMT!
The program allowed me to deep dive into specific campaign strategies, learning from diverse examples of what worked and what could be improved.
The program offers excellent support, knowledge, and peer collaboration for learning about organizing and campaigning.
I took the workers organizing in the digital age training. We really need this kind of training in Finland, which people in the US have had access to for some years. The training was effective to start organizing for instance on Twitter.
It helped me better understand, through the experience of like-minded organizers, how to use accessible digital organizing tools to support the efforts on the ground.
The program made me think holistically about offline and online impacts.
It was powerful hearing directly from groups across the country using these powerful tools to win campaigns and create real change.
I initially thought this program was centered around communications, but it offered so much more. It provided an inside perspective on organizing work and how communications integrates with it.
I received input on how to align field and digital work which is directly connected to the advocacy research that we are doing.
The program gave my team the tools and time to strategise how our grassroots migrant organising translates to a digital context. I picked up tools like source codes, which then enabled us to see that more people were registering from Instagram than through any other platform and caused us to adapt our strategy. We also became SMT an Outreach Partner to enable our network to benefit from trainings at lower prices
SMT’s training on using WhatsApp to activate our bases helped us activate more leaders by creating conversational WhatsApp groups for members and assigning different leadership roles to volunteers.
I appreciated connecting with passionate changemakers across the U.S. to discuss effective digital campaigning strategies.
I'm still digesting the valuable information from this training and applying it to my work. Meeting activists worldwide and learning about important campaigns was inspiring.
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