Early Days

Observing that high quality Jewish organizations struggled to strategically and technically adapt to the internet age, Darim Online was formed to help synagogues, JCCs, Jewish day schools, camps and others build and manage professional websites to achieve their goals. From 2000-2009 Darim build a content management system and syndicated content for hundreds of organizations. We trained leaders through Synagogue2000 conferences, and worked with cohorts of synagogues through grant funded initiatives and partnerships with foundations and federations. In High-Tech Age, STAR Grants Help Shuls Build Online Presence, JTA, 10.16.02

By 2008 the market had matured, and Jewish organizations recognized the need to invest in professional services. When our competition became other professional firms (rather than a 14-year-old volunteer) we knew it was time to move to other goals. Darim sold the website development portion of our business to JVillageNetwork, and reinvested the proceeds into our mission.

Emergence of social media

As social media was emerging, it was clear there were new horizons to focus on — not only how to technical use Facebook or Twitter, but how to do so strategically. We launched Social Media Boot Camps, funded by Federations, Foundations and Associations to help train their grantees and affiliates to leverage social media for engagement, education, fundraising and community building.

Berrie Fellows Make BIG Grants to Foster Jewish Future, The New Jersey Jewish Standard, 8.7.09
Darim Online is the recipient of a Berrie Innovation Grant for the North New Jersey Social Media Boot Camp.

Lead Us To Tweet, and Forgive the Trespassers, The New York Times, 7.4.09
How congregations are using Twitter and other social media to engage those on-site and off-site.  Lisa Colton quoted.

New Models of organizing

As Clay Shirky wrote in Here Comes Everybody, “Organizations no longer have a monopoly on organizing.” The power of the internet has major implications for the culture, structure, strategy and leadership of organizations. By 2010, Darim’s focus began to turn to the impact and opportunities of this disruptive innovation on Jewish life, community and organizations.

Lisa Colton gave one of the inaugural Eli Talks titled: Innovation, Revolution and Tradition.

In partnership with UJA Federation of New York, Darim designed and led Connected Congregations, a multi-year cohort-based program for 6 synagogues in the New York area each of which focused on a specific initiative to make their congregations more connected and communal.

In 2019, we designed and led the Engagement track of FedLab, Jewish Federations of North America’s think-tank style conference to help leaders understand disruptive innovation and the challenges and opportunities for their work. Resources and the workbook we wrote are available at the Engagement section here: https://jfnafedlab.org/resources

During the pandemic, we took the opportunity to design and produce multiple online campaigns and festivals. Learn more about the Great Big Jewish Food Fest, Big Bold Jewish Climate Fest and HighHolyDays.org projects here.