How I Prepared My Social Media for an Extended Medical Leave

Preparing for an extended medical leave was necessary as a solo business owner. It also gave me a sense of control when so many other things felt beyond it.

Countless nonprofits are doing meaningful work every day, and at Buffer, we want to play a small part in helping them share their stories and amplify their impact online.

To do that, we offer nonprofits a 50% discount, something we've done since the early days of Buffer. While our pricing is already designed to be accessible for everyone, the additional nonprofit discount helps make content creation even more attainable for these organizations focused on the public good.

I'm one of the Buffer teammates who review requests from organizations applying for our nonprofit discount. And, I gotta tell ya, these organizations are incredible! Every time I connect with them, I leave in awe of the incredible impact these organizations are having on their communities.

Buffer Now Offers a 50% Discount for Public Libraries

If you’re curious to learn if your nonprofit is eligible for this discount, head on over to buffer.com/nonprofits. We share what documents you’ll need to send our way. And once you submit the form, you’ll hear back from me, my teammate Nate, or one of our incredible Customer Advocates!

Expanding our nonprofit discount to include libraries

Recently, we received a few nonprofit requests from libraries. Unfortunately, they didn't have the documentation we required in order to receive the nonprofit discount. While I always feel for the organizations that don't meet our criteria, something about libraries being ineligible felt distinctly non-Buffery.

Libraries are deeply aligned with Buffer’s values. After becoming profitable and growing again, we reviewed our non-profit discount. After a quick gut check with our VP of Finance and Operations, Jenny, we agreed that expanding our nonprofit discount to include libraries felt like a natural next step.

We want our customers to feel welcomed and special. This discount can hopefully enable more libraries to use Buffer, which might mean they can reach more folks in their communities about events, books, or other updates, so they can continue to operate.

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Before I get into more, if you are a library looking to be added to our nonprofit discount, you can apply here.

There are a few reasons this decision was such an easy yes. Let's get into them.

Libraries and books play an integral part in the lives of all Buffer teammates

We're a fully remote company at Buffer, and several teammates choose to work from their local libraries as part of their remote routines.

Additionally, our Founder and CEO, Joel Gascoigne, read the book How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie early in Buffer’s journey. The book had a huge impact on Joel’s life and what Buffer would become. We have based several of Buffer’s values directly on the principles outlined in this book.

And as a remote team, one of the ways our remote team connects is by swapping recent reads in our #culture-books Slack channel.

Libraries embody a core Buffer value: Improve Consistently

One of our six company values is to Improve Consistently. Learning is part of how we operate as a team, and it’s also at the heart of what libraries make possible for their communities. They offer access to information, inspiration, and opportunities to grow — all core to why we see them as natural partners.

Books are woven into our culture

One of Buffer’s long-standing benefits is our unlimited free books program. Books enrich our team, our work, and our curiosity — and libraries make that enrichment possible for everyone.

While teammates can be reimbursed for e-books or physical copies, we also encourage borrowing from local libraries. You can browse what the Buffer team is reading any time at buffer.com/books.