Peggy Hoffman responds to an older but stilll relevant post by Chris Brogan: “We have long acknowledged that the internet is an association’s toughest competitor… Perhaps the reason more associations aren’t joining in is because it’s not easy….

My experience of the last week suggests that social media can be a powerful tool to benefit an association and its brand.

Sorry for what is a long comment but think the case helps demonstrate the power of social media for organizations … more details are posted at http://bit.ly/3dIHqO.

One of our clients — the Christmas SPIRIT Foundation — implements a Trees for Troops program … involves 750 members; FedEx and others in touching lives of 50,000+ military families by providing them a free, fresh, farm-grown Christmas Tree. This is a hugely meaningful program to families with someone deployed during the holidays. See this NBC Nightly News piece (http://bit.ly/3l9wP)

For 2009, the Founded implemented a TweetUp4Troop campaign around Veterans Day to honor veterans, support Trees for Troops and honor veterans.

Last week, we discovered that an artifical tree company had created a similar Web address (TweetUpforTroops) and linked it to their fake tree sales page. I couldn’t believe a company would really attempt to divert donations to our military families. Still stunned with the ethics of that … but a different issue.

Alarmed, we created a blog asking a number of key contacts (from our Twitter files) for advice. @maddiegrant labeled it “brandjacking,” a term we quickly adopted.

With the feedback, we launched a defensive campaign designed to raise awareness about the brandjacking and work to get the fakers to drop their attempts to divert donors.

This included a blog post (with details), a news release and a social media information effort.

Because we had invested more than a year in building social media contacts, we were able to quickly reach hundreds of thousands of people. We reached out to our Twitter network, asking them to Tweet the story. Some key social media friends shared our shock and quickly Tweeting to their contacats. People such as @mddiegrant, @deidrereid, @johnhaydon, @kanter, @davecause, @askdebra, @joewaters, @Michael_Hoffman and others.

As the week closed, I reflected on the situation. And couldn’t help but wonder how could we have reached this many people this fast in a pre-Social Media age. The answer is easily … not possible.

So, to those who question the ROI of social media … think about someone attacking your association or industry. Will you have a developed (over a long period) a trusted community that will help you defend yourself?

Thanks to the fake tree folks, the power is clear to me.