Is Quora the next Twitter? And should charities have it in their sights?

Twitter has been alight this past week with
talk of the online craze Quora.

While the website isn’t new (it was
actually founded in 2009), momentum has been growing over the last few months,
with opinion seemingly split on the network’s merits.

QuoraFor those who aren’t already familiar with
it, Quora claims to be ‘a
continually improving collection of questions and answers created, edited, and
organised by everyone who uses it.’

So it provides in-depth
commentary to questions and allows others to add to the answers and provide
further context.

For journalists, students
and tech lovers the website will probably prove a helpful resource, but will it
have the same appeal as Twitter and Facebook for charities?

To answer this question Third Sector
took to Twitter to gauge how our followers were reacting to this new craze. The response
wasn’t great.

Whether it’s yet on their
radar or not remains to be seen, but the reaction we did get was somewhat
mixed.

Digital expert Fernando
Rizo pointed out that, at the moment, branded accounts are not allowed on the site – which means that charities are not allowed to set up accounts to ask or answer questions. But he didn’t rule out charities getting involved as charities can have a person using his or her own identity on
the site.

Another comms expert suggested
the social media tool could be used for filling knowledge and expertise gaps,
and for widening networks.

One charity professional
professed to be ‘looking into it’.

The jury seems to be out on
whether Quora will be as big as Twitter, but it’s worth getting it in your sights.