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The World's 100 Most Creative People In Business 2012

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Claire Diaz-Ortiz

Manager of Social Innovation, Twitter

How Not-For-Profits Can Help Everyone Not Stink At Twitter

Claire Diaz-Ortiz amplifies the best uses of the hashtag empire, such as charity: water's 2012 campaign where people used their birthdays to fundraise for World Water Day. Her ideas and advice are now being packaged for businesses:

Twitter is not like issuing a press release

"You can't have a lot of people around a table to think about what's going in a tweet. Nonprofits know that the only thing they can do is word of mouth."

You are not Kanye West

"The whole world hasn't been waiting for you to log on. You need to bring the world to you. The top two things: Ask a question and try to help someone."

Tweet more than retweet

"RT'ing is the lazy man's tweet. You're not creating content."

Search for yourself

"People forget to search for others talking about them. You want to be able to jump in on a conversation that's happening about you."

Timeline

  • 2004

    Graduates from Stanford University with M.A. in anthropology

  • 2006

    Visits Kenya and cofounds Hope Runs, a non-profit running organization operating in HIV/AIDS orphanages

  • 2008

    Wins Skoll Foundation Scholarship to pursue MBA at Oxford

  • 2009

    Joins Twitter as manager of social innovation; writes The Choice Effect

  • 2011

    Writes Twitter for Good: Change the World, One Tweet at a Time

Photo courtesy of Claire Diaz-Ortiz

A version of this article appears in the June 2012 issue of Fast Company.