#DEVELOPMENT: How Much Cash Is Required To Land A Donation?
What does it cost?
How often do nonprofits reach out to donors potential and actual online, yet have no real sense of how successful the outreach was? Did the time and money spent developing a program or launching a campaign prove to be worth the support? Dan Norris, founder of the online-analytics service Informly offers a tool to help you make that call. He also recently posted his somewhat-scientific results on using his ‘Cost Per Acquisition‘ (CPA) calculator to see what kinds of costs he was incurring to get people engaged with his for-profit business. Let’s see how the costs to acquire customers or donors can prove strikingly steep.
| Category Blogs, Campaigns, Case Study, Cause Marketing, Cross-Post, Development, Donor Acquisition, Education: General, Fundraising, How-to, Marketing, Marketing Budget, Marketing Skills, Measurement, Nonprofit, Social Networks, Strategic Marketing, Technology for Nonprofits | | 1 Comments
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#VIDEO: Ken Sterns’s Book Offers Tough Love To Nonprofit Economy
Ken Sterns, former CEO of NPR, challenges the nonprofit sector
Ken Sterns has served as CEO of National Public Radio, arguably one of the best-known nonprofits in the country. He supports The American Red Cross, and has served on the boards of a number of charities. So when his book, And Charity for All argues that the nonprofit sector is a huge part of the American economy, yet the least productive sector as well, people listen. And they should.
Mr. Sterns was recently interviewed at The Huffington Post, as he joined a roundtable (‘multiscreen’) discussion that included Alexander Berger at GiveWell; Dr. John Brothers, founder of Quidoo Consulting; and Rigo Sabarino, President and CEO of St. Barnabas Senior Services. The interview begins with him throwing down the gauntlet, wondering if the nonprofit community is even worth preserving.
| Category Advice, Advocacy, Book, Book Review, Civics, Community, Cross-Post, Development, Fundraising, Interview, Marketing, National/International, News and Current Affairs, Nonprofit, Opinion, Politics, Public Media, Public Relations, Publications, Reviews, Storytelling, Strategic Marketing, Video Interview | | 0 Comments
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#HOWTO: Use Crowdbooster To Marshall Your Social Media Conversations
Let this platform tame your Tweetstream and Timeline
Numerous social-networking monitoring sites are out there by now: Hootsuite, Sprout Social, Klout, Tinker… As programmers develop new tools, and social platforms like Facebook or (even!) MySpace evolve, the staff at a nonprofit can feel overwhelmed with the changes. What is important to remember in this fast-changing communications environment is that you are looking for tools that are beneficial to you and your organization − not (necessarily) the latest platform that is getting some buzz. One of the newer sites meant to aggregate metrics from your social networks is Crowdbooster, and we do believe it is worth a look because it helps your busy staff consider the near future of its social-media outreach as well as lay out the past trends.
| Category Advice, Communications, Dashboards, Education: General, How-to, Marketing Skills, Measurement, Project Management Tools, Resource, Reviews, Site Administration, Social Marketing, Social Media, Social Networks, Software Review, Strategic Marketing, Technology, Technology for Nonprofits | | 2 Comments
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#DEVELOPMENT: Do You Have Big Plans For Your Big Data? Not So Fast…
The latest buzz concept is ‘Big Data.’ Like most buzz concepts/ words, its definition leaves much up to the mouth of the speaker. Big Data, whatever the specifics, refers to the large amount of information that can be collected from online activity and exchange of information (on social networks, for example). The ability to aggregate such information from posts, streams, and online purchases creates some truly ‘big’ numbers. And they are only further extended with the collection of information from rewards programs and loyalty cards.
But Big Data can also trick us with impressive numbers like our Twitter followers or Facebook friends − but who within that number are encouraging each other to support our causes? Though ‘numbers don’t lie,’ statistics do, so an organization must know how it’s going to parse the data is collecting and what it hopes to achieve with the effort.
| Category Advice, Communications, Community, Crowdfunding, Development, Fundraising, Marketing Skills, Measurement, Media Review, Nonprofit, Public Media, Public Relations, Resource, Site Administration, Social Marketing, Social Media, Social Networks, Strategic Marketing, Thought for the Day, Tools | | 0 Comments
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#SOCIALNETWORKS: Can Niche Online Networks Outperform Your Nonprofit’s Facebook Page?
Have you defined your organization’s niche?
Our participation in online social networks seems well beyond the status of a ‘fad.’ In some parts of the world, people risk censure − if not their lives − to post important information on such platforms as Facebook and Twitter. These social networks are the current heavy hitters, of course. But what about developing people’s interests in your nonprofit’s causes? Or engaging a peer group already predisposed to support your charity’s fund drive? The hard fact is, the best-known social platforms might just be too big for that kind of conversation. And we might just be witnessing the start of a tidal shift away from the bigger-is-better mantra of social outreach toward niche conversations among like minds. Could these more concentrated communities really be worth the effort of building a presence on yet another social network?
| Category Advice, Blogs, Cause Marketing, Communications, Community, Facebook, Facebook, Fundraising, LinkedIn, Marketing, Marketing Skills, Measurement, Media Review, Nonprofit, Public Media, Public Relations, Site Administration, Social Marketing, Social Media, Social Networks, Strategic Marketing, Technology for Nonprofits, Twitter, Twitter, Web and Print | | 0 Comments
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#TECH: Title Tags Can Make Or Break Your Site’s SEO
SEO success starts here
Oh, the last official weekend of summer, and it’s three-day long one to boot! You might be itching to get out of the office a bit early today and make it a three and a half day weekend. Before you do, please read some salient advice we took from online marketing specialist John Haydon as soon as it hit our Inboxes. The issue is the placement of Title Tags, the snippets of text − usually the title of the blog post or of a website − that is the first thing search engines scour for the keywords that make your site visible on those engines. With an afternoon of work, you could dramatically improve the ranking of your nonprofit’s site. Here’s what he suggests:
| Category Advice, Blogs, Cause Marketing, Communications, Education: General, How-to, Marketing, Marketing Skills, Measurement, Publications, SEO, Site Administration, Social Marketing, Strategic Marketing, Technology, Technology for Nonprofits, Web and Print, Web Design, Writing | | 0 Comments
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#MARKETING: Build Your Search Engine Marketing Strategy With Solid Search Engine Optimization
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) includes numerous tools and plug-ins that help (first) web crawlers and algorythems find your organization’s website, so that human web searchers can then find your site via Google, Yahoo!, Bing, etc. Optimization means (in part) key words are placed in specific parts of the website’s code and banners to ensure that not only do search engines find your site, but they easily calculate the importance of certain terms and ideas so as to put your site ever higher on their list of relevant sites.
SEO is something we’ve often talked about on this blog, but marketing experts have been taking SEO to the next level over the last year or so to develop an overarching strategy of online marketing: Search Engine Marketing. But what is it and why should your business incorporate it into your outreach?
| Category Advertising, Advice, Cause Marketing, Communications, How-to, Marketing, Marketing Skills, Measurement, Nonprofit, SEO, Site Administration, Social Marketing, Social Networks, Strategic Marketing, Video | | 0 Comments
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#SOCIALNETWORKS: Unifying Your Strategy By Diversifying These 5 Key Points
Click to Enlarge
As we move into the second half of 2012, especially into planning for the fund-raising campaigns of the holiday season, nonprofits also should do a checkup on the face they are presenting on their social networks. Get yourself in the mood to question, re-align, edit… and then get into your Facebook account. The folks at Awareness, makers of social-marketing software for small businesses, have just released a white paper called “Five Killer Strategies to Dominate Social Media’s Big 3: Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube”, which can be had by signing up and downloading the report. They also have released the infographic we post on the right here (which, to my eye, reads more like a strategic flowchart).
If you aren’t ready for a white paper on the topic, Jim Belosic has a five-step proposal to reconsider what you have on your organization’s page and what you might want to think about when monitoring it. Such as…
| Category Advice, Cause Marketing, Communications, Facebook, Facebook, Facebook, Fundraising, Geo-Location, Marketing, Nonprofit, Public Media, Resource, Social Marketing, Social Media, Social Networks, Strategic Marketing, Study, Technology, Tools, Twitter, YouTube | | 0 Comments
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#FUNDRAISING: The Holiday Season For Donations Begins Now. Ready?
The pools are open and busy. The grill has cooled down since the July-4th Picnic. The MLB All-Star Game is tonight. It’s July. One of the traditional/old-fashioned ways to disrupt the heat is to hold a “Christmas in July” party, and your nonprofit or charity should be having one. Why? To celebrate the good work you have been doing for the last six months, and to energize yourselves for the critical holiday season of solicitation and fundraising that should hit its peak in mid-November and continue right through the new year. Yep, the groundwork for a successful holiday season needs to start soon, like tomorrow.
| Category Advice, Campaigns, Cause Marketing, Communications, Crowdfunding, Development, Donor Acquisition, Fundraising, Grants and Funding, Major Gifts, Marketing, Newsletter, Nonprofit, Permission Marketing, Planned Giving, Planned Giving, Public Relations, Publications, Report, Resource, Social Marketing, Strategic Marketing, Volunteerism | | 2 Comments
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#COMMUNICATIONS: Break The Sound Barrier To Encourage A Conversation
We welcome back Paul Jolly, Director of Jump Start Growth, Inc., a nonprofit fundraising and consulting firm in Washington DC. Today, Paul tells about the importance of breaking the sound barrier.
Back in 1947, US Air Force pilot Chuck Yeager broke the sound barrier in the Bell X-1 rocket/plane. Fighter jets break the barrier with ease nowadays, but it’s not the only sound barrier that must be broken. The sound barrier that a fund raiser hopes to break through is the sound of his or her own voice. More times than I care to remember, I have sat in the living room or office of a donor, hauling newsletters and annual reports out of my briefcase, talking about programs, accomplishments, plans. Blah, blah, blah. I am waiting for a signal from the person across the coffee table or desk, and he or she is waiting for me to stop talking.
| Category Advocacy, Campaigns, Cause Marketing, Communications, Crowdfunding, Development, Fundraising, How-to, Marketing, Marketing Skills, Nonprofit, Permission Marketing, Storytelling, Strategic Marketing | | 0 Comments
Written by: Paul Jolly
#SOCIALMEDIA: Facebook & WordPress Join Forces To Connect Blogging With Timeline
Click to enlarge
For some time one could link one’s Facebook and Twitter accounts, so that if your nonprofit updated its Facebook page, a tweet would automatically be generated − and vice versa. If your organization had a blog running the WordPress platform (as does MKCREATIVEmedia), you could install a plugin that auto-tweets your posts. And if your auto-tweets are connected to your Facebook account, the blog post would be tweeted, the tweet would be linked to your Facebook account, a visitor in Facebook could see the tweet, click the tweet and get to the blog post.
Confusing? Yes. Thankfully, developers at Facebook and at WordPress have developed a plugin to shorten that convoluted trip.
| Category Advice, Blogs, Cause Marketing, Communications, Cross-Post, Desktop Apps, Facebook, Facebook, How-to, Marketing, Marketing Skills, Nonprofit, Public Media, Publications, SEO, Site Administration, Social Marketing, Social Media, Social Networks, Strategic Marketing, Technology for Nonprofits, Twitter, Twitter, Web Design | | 2 Comments
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#INTERVIEW: Derrick Feldmann, CEO of Achieve, Discusses The Millennial Impact Report Coming June 11
Derrick Feldmann is CEO of Achieve, a creative fundraising agency that produces The Millennial Impact Report, an annual research study of Millennial Generation donors. (The 2012 report will be released on Monday.) The agency also hosts the only national virtual summit, MCON, on Millennials annually. The interview was conducted by Don Akchin, a principal of Nonprofit Marketing 360 and a frequent contributor to the MKCREATIVE blog.
MKC: You have made Millennial donors a specialty. Isn’t it a little early to be worrying about the Millennial donors?
DERRICK: Absolutely not! If we have an expectation that this generation of 20- to-30-year-olds will be future significant supporters of our causes, we have an expectation now to involve them. If you are an educational institution, if you are a nonprofit, if you are planning a capital campaign in the next ten years, and you want more donor support, you had better start working with them now. There is an imperative to work with this generation.
Organizations might not have them as a focus because they may not have the largest capacity to give right now. It’s been a bit tricky for some organizations to figure out parallel tracks of involvement for constituents who don’t necessarily have large capacity but in volumes could give a lot.
(more…)
| Category Communications, Community, Cross-Post, Development, Donor Acquisition, E-Mail, eNewsletter, Facebook, Facebook, Fundraising, Grants, Interview, Major Gifts, Marketing, Marketing Skills, Nonprofit, Permission Marketing, Report, Resource, Social Marketing, Social Media, Social Networks, Special Series, Strategic Marketing, Study, Twitter, Twitter | | 0 Comments
Written by: Don Akchin
#SOCIALNETWORKS: Let Flickr Tell Your Nonprofit’s Story As It Happens
A picture, they say, is worth a thousand words. And with digital social media, images are becoming both more common and more powerful as platforms such as Facebook and Google+ emphasize the photo and graphic qualities of their social-media networks. A kind of ‘visual economy’ is developing, within which social networks are competing and users are finding ever more refined ways to share their most interesting/compelling/entertaining work. With the ubiquity of smartphones with at-least decent cameras, nonprofits should be encouraging their staffs and volunteers to use those cameras to help tell the story of your organizations good work. One of the best ways to share that story is through Flickr. Let us show you how.
| Category Advice, Branding, Campaigns, Communications, Community, Cross-Post, Design, Geo-Location, How-to, Marketing, Marketing Skills, Media Review, Mobile, News and Current Affairs, Nonprofit, Public Media, Reviews, Social Media, Social Networks, Software Review, Strategic Marketing, Technology for Nonprofits, Video | | 0 Comments
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#SOCIALNETWORKS: Facebook Stocks Being Sold Off & Facebook Accounts Not Expanding
Should nonprofits worry?
The saga that is the Facebook IPO continues. Wall Street took a break from claiming to be the US Economy yesterday, but as of lunchtime this Tuesday, stock in the uber-social network fell below $30 for the first time. The brouhaha surrounding the IPO has largely concerned possible fraud or withholding of information from public investors, but some are wondering if the real issue is simply the product itself. If it is, what should nonprofits and charities be doing with their Facebook accounts as the company deals with this shakeout?
| Category Advertising, Blogs, Branding, Cause Marketing, Civics, Communications, Facebook, Facebook, Facebook, Fundraising, Marketing, Media Review, Newspaper Article, Nonprofit, Public Media, Public Relations, Resource, Site Administration, Social Media, Social Networks, Software Review, Strategic Marketing, Technology for Nonprofits | | 0 Comments
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#COMMUNICATIONS: The Number One Way To Gain Site Or Blog Readership Is…
If your nonprofit or your charity has any online presence at all, you want readers to engage your content, click through the link(s), visit the site, and get involved with money and/or time. If you are a blog writer, you want pretty much the same, though gifts might also/instead mean advertising dollars because so many people come to your site. And, of course, no reason a nonprofit can’t have a blog that carries those ambitions for the blog and the site that hosts it.
The million-dollar question is: “How do I get people to move from scanning the headline to clicking on it and getting engaged?”
| Category Advice, Blogs, Campaigns, Cause Marketing, Communications, Development, E-Mail, eNewsletter, How-to, Marketing, Marketing Skills, Newspaper Article, Permission Marketing, Public Relations, Publications, Storytelling, Strategic Marketing, Writing | | 0 Comments
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#ADVOCACY: When A Clever Concept Just Misses, It Misses By A Lot
Sometimes being close really means missing by quite a bit
Sometimes a nonprofit’s campaign can include a fine idea that, alas, doesn’t quite get it right. Like a long fly ball to the 385-foot alley of a ball park that falls in to be caught at 382 feet, the charity can be excited at what seems to be about to happen, only to trudge back to the dugout (or in our cases today ‘back to the glitzy communications agencies’) lamenting about what could have been.
Let’s return this Monday to a theme we led off with last Monday on high-concept advocacy plans that did not quite live up to expectations. The good folks at the Showcase of Fundraising Innovation and Inspiration (SOFII) provide us all with food-for-thought when it comes to campaigns that might have looked good in the pristine world of the conference room, but came up just short in the real world. And ‘just short’ can mean real human tragedy where the fight against hunger is concerned.
| Category Advice, Blogs, Campaigns, Case Study, Cause Marketing, Civics, Communications, Community, Crowdfunding, Design, Development, Donor Acquisition, Fundraising, Graphic Design, Health, Marketing, Marketing Skills, Media Review, Nonprofit, Public Media, Public Relations, Publications, Reviews, Social Marketing, Storytelling, Strategic Marketing | | Comments Off
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#ADVOCACY: Make Sure Pitch Has Call To Action, Not Just High Concept
What happens when you get corporate assistance to launch a new campaign, or pro bono development from a commercial ad agency? You can get some fabulous ideas and some valuable insights on establishing your brand. You can get your materials into some of the best publication and on some of the most visited sites on the web.
But as some of our colleagues at Sofii.org have discovered, you can also get a good deal of expensive nothing. The commercial backer or ad agency might not be sensitive to the constituents who want to be involved with various types of nonprofits. They might encourage outreach through channels that are quite unlikely to reach the people your charity traditionally reaches. They might give you a fabulous product on the design board (Indeed, I think it’s safe to say that they certainly will give you a fabulous design.) that falls flat in the real world. Let’s look at a couple of examples from Sofii.
| Category Advertising, Advice, Advocacy, Blogs, Campaigns, Case Study, Cause Marketing, Communications, Copyrighting, Crowdfunding, Design, Development, Donor Acquisition, Fundraising, Graphic Design, How-to, Marketing, Marketing Skills, Measurement, Media Review, Newspaper Article, Nonprofit, Public Relations, Publications, Publications Design, Resource, Reviews, Sponsorship, Storytelling, Strategic Marketing, Study, Writing | | 2 Comments
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#INTERVIEW: Debra Askanase, Socialbrite.org Strategist, Offers Useful Advice To Nonprofits Using Social Media
Debra Askanase, founder of Community Organizer 2.0, is an “engagement strategist” who consults with nonprofit organizations on digital media. She is also a strategist for Socialbrite. Her background includes a decade of community organizing experience, followed by seven years in community economic development. The interview was conducted by Don Akchin, a principal of Nonprofit Marketing 360 and a frequent contributor to the MKCREATIVE blog.
MKC: How did you get into digital media? Did you reinvent yourself?
DEBRA: Yes, but it also seemed a pretty natural progression. I started off as a relatively traditional community organizer with multi-issue/low-income organizations. I moved into tenant organizing as well, then into economic development. I saw many of the same skills in leadership development that I saw in community and economic development. I worked with low-income immigrant entrepreneurs to start businesses. After doing that for seven years, I became very interested in business, from the perspective of how business can change society. So I went to business school and there seemed to be a confluence at that point. Social media was just gaining traction – this was 2007 and Facebook had just opened up beyond the college crowd – and I made that leap, intuitively, that social media is really community organizing. Here’s an opportunity where I can use my expertise in business strategy that I had been doing for seven years and my understanding of how people come together to change things. And I wanted to bring that interest to nonprofits. My entire experience had been working with nonprofits, so I understood that world from the ground up.
| Category Advice, Blogs, Communications, Community, Cross-Post, Development, Donor Acquisition, Facebook, Facebook, Facebook, Fundraising, Grants, Grants and Funding, Interview, Marketing, Marketing Skills, Measurement, Nonprofit, Social Media, Social Networks, Storytelling, Strategic Marketing, Twitter, Twitter, Writing | | Comments Off
Written by: Don Akchin
#SOCIALMEDIA: Online Communication Is A Team Sport
Prep your staff for social media success
Difficult not to start this post with a shout-out to the Baltimore Orioles, who beat the Red Sox at Fenway last night after 17 innings. One of the best of the many anomalies of the game is the fact that the O’s Designated Hitter, Chris Davis went 0-for-8, with 5 strikeouts − and was the winning pitcher, throwing two shut-out innings when the rest of the staff was used up. It takes a team, and everyone contributes something critical to the overall success.
And it should be that way for your nonprofit or charity as well. Whatever the extent of your staff, you need to structure a social-media team who are dedicated to listening, contributing, and monitoring your outreach both quantitatively and qualitatively.
| Category Advertising, Advice, Blogs, Campaigns, Cause Marketing, Communications, Crowdfunding, Development, eBook, Marketing, Marketing Skills, Measurement, Nonprofit, Permission Marketing, Public Media, Public Relations, Publications, Resource, SEO, Site Administration, Social Media, Social Networks, Strategic Marketing, Writing | | Comments Off
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#INTERVIEW: Chris Forbes, Co-Author of Guerrilla Marketing for Nonprofits, Offers Great Advice to Groups
Chris Forbes is the co-author of Guerrilla Marketing for Nonprofits and a certified guerrilla-marketing coach. His varied background in marketing includes experience in the faith sector and work on five continents, and he has pioneered several media initiatives in public relations, television, radio and the Internet. The interview was conducted by Don Akchin, a principal of Nonprofit Marketing 360 and a frequent contributor to the MKCREATIVE blog.
MKC: What drew you to the marketing field?
CHRIS: I grew up in a marketing family. My mom had a product-administration service and worked with grocery stores and established networks with, say, free samples of food. When I was 14, she wanted me to dress up as Twinkie the Kid in a big foam-rubber costume to pass out Twinkies. When I was 15, she wanted me to dress up as Freddy the Fresh Guy from Wonder Bread. Then at 16, she asked me to be the Planter’s Peanut guy, but you have to wear leotards for that costume. I drew the line there.
| Category Advertising, Advice, Book, Branding, Campaigns, Case Study, Communications, Community, Cross-Post, Facebook, Facebook, Facebook, Interview, LinkedIn, Marketing, Marketing Budget, Marketing Skills, Measurement, Nonprofit, Permission Marketing, Pinterest, Public Relations, Research, Resource, Social Media, Social Networks, Special Series, Strategic Marketing, Tumblr, Twitter, Twitter, YouTube | | Comments Off
Written by: Don Akchin
#INTERVIEW: Michael Hoffman, CEO of See3 Communications, Discusses Why Nonprofits Need to Embrace Video
Michael Hoffman is co-founder and CEO of See3 Communications and a leading authority on online video for nonprofits and online fundraising and outreach strategies. After turns as a political consultant and developer of Internet startups, he founded See3 to bring together his vision of the web and his passion for nonprofit fundraising. The interview was conducted by Don Akchin, a principal of Nonprofit Marketing 360 and a frequent contributor to the MKCREATIVE blog.
MKC: What was the concept of See3 when you founded it?
MICHAEL: See3 was a coming together of my background, which was really on the web side in terms of Internet business and strategy, and that of my partner, Danny Albert, which is video. Danny has been a documentary filmmaker for 20 years. Around 2004-2005, we both saw some trends that we call our ‘your chocolate and my peanut butter moment.’ I was telling Danny about changes on the web and the development of broadband (It’s hard even to remember that only a few years ago, some 90% of people were still using dialup). Broadband was around the corner and Danny asked me, ‘What does that mean? What will broadband do?’ And I immediately answered ‘video.’ When you have broadband web, the web will become a platform for video, just as it is with us talking over Skype now on this interview.
| Category Campaigns, Communications, Community, Cross-Post, Facebook, Fundraising, Interview, LinkedIn, Marketing, Marketing Budget, Measurement, MySpace, Nonprofit, Pinterest, Posterous, Scoopit, Social Media, Social Networks, Special Series, Storytelling, Strategic Marketing, Technology, Tools, Tumblr, Twitter, Twitter, Video, YouTube | | Comments Off
Written by: Don Akchin
#Tech: The Net Is Not Quite Dead, But It’s Not Your Mom’s Web Anymore
First of all, an adjustment/correction to yesterday’s story: Facebook pushed back its rollout of Timeline across all accounts until tomorrow, the 31st. Facebook did this rather quietly and did not state why, but you now have about 20 hours to get your Timeline up-and-running, as we outlined yesterday. (Thanks to Cody Damon of Damon Strategic for the heads-up!)
Today’s tech topic is related in so far as it is about how we interact with Facebook and other online services in new ways. The traditional ‘internet via browser’ model is fading away, to be replaced by a more precise paradigm − one that moves us from our mobile devices directly to the service/platform/medium that we want. The opportunity it presents will streamline, and perhaps redefine, the internet as we knew it. How?
| Category Advice, Apple, Case Study, Communications, Desktop Apps, Fundraising, iDevice, iPad Apps, iPhone Apps, Marketing, Marketing Skills, Media Review, Publications, Report, Resource, SEO, Site Administration, Social Media, Software Review, Strategic Marketing, Technology, Web Design | | Comments Off
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#SM4NP: ROI From Social Media May Be Elusive, But It’s Not Impossible
If you search for information about how to measure returns on investment in social media, you will be quickly reminded about just how new social media is in the business and nonprofit economies. Mathematicians are still searching out formulae and quality-control gurus want to talk about the developments of relationships that will bring customers and donors a bit later down the road. One of the underlying themes, though, is that no one doubts the value of social media writ large, even as we try to quantify that value and/or make it predictive of our outreach.
Perhaps success can be measured in hard, but not precise, numbers. Moreover, we should also consider social media as a ‘value added’ component to the core vocation of our nonprofit or charity, rather than as a fundamental element. How might we do both?
| Category Advice, Blogs, Campaigns, Case Study, Communications, Facebook, Facebook, Fundraising, Marketing, Marketing Budget, Marketing Skills, Measurement, Social Media, Strategic Marketing, Twitter | | Comments Off
Written by: Christopher Gardner, PhD
#INTERVIEW: Jeff Brooks, Nonprofit Blogger, Author, and Creative Director
Jeff Brooks has been working on behalf of nonprofits for more than 20 years and passionately blogging about fundraising since 2005. He writes the Future Fundraising Now blog and is creative director at TrueSense Marketing. The interview was conducted by Don Akchin, a principal of Nonprofit Marketing 360 and a frequent contributor to the MKCREATIVE blog.
MKC: What do you consider to be the greatest challenge of being a good copywriter?
JEFF: What most people who are not professional copywriters get wrong is they don’t differentiate themselves from their audience. That’s why most fundraising is just bad. It doesn’t succeed the way it ought to because they say, I’m going to make this please me, and then it’ll please the others and then it’ll work. Well, that’s just wrong. That’s not how you create quality fundraising. You have to know your audience, and reach out to them, and 99 percent of the time, you’re going to hate it. You may say, I wouldn’t respond to this! And you’re absolutely correct, and it absolutely doesn’t matter.
| Category Blogs, Campaigns, Communications, Copyrighting, Cross-Post, Development, Donor Acquisition, E-Mail, eNewsletter, Fundraising, Grants and Funding, Interview, Marketing, Marketing Skills, Measurement, Newsletter, Nonprofit, Permission Marketing, Publications Design, Research, Special Series, Storytelling, Strategic Marketing, Writing | | Comments Off
Written by: Don Akchin
#INTERVIEW: Jocelyn Harmon, Vice President of Sales, Marketing & Customer Success at Network for Good
Jocelyn Harmon is Vice President of Sales, Marketing and Customer Success at Network for Good. She has been writing Marketing for Nonprofits blog since 2007. The interview was conducted by Don Akchin, a principal of Nonprofit Marketing 360 and a frequent contributor to the MKCREATIVE blog.
MKC: You have said a focus of your blog is helping nonprofits succeed online. When did you latch onto the online piece of marketing?
JOCELYN: I was working at the National Council of Nonprofit Associations, from about 2004 to 2006. Our goal at NCNA was to help nonprofits run better as businesses. My job was to do marketing and raise money for NCNA. I was also tasked with helping our member organizations be better marketers and fundraisers. I started doing a lot of work with a group called NTEN, the Nonprofit Technology Network, and through them I met some really interesting people: Holly Ross from NTEN, Billy Bicket at TechSoup, and of course I met Katya Andresen (Network for Good) at that time. They were talking about how technology was going to revolutionize the way that nonprofits work – from programming to marketing to raising money: everything was going to move online, and nonprofits were going to be left behind if they didn’t hurry up and get on board. I thought, well, this is really cool. The other piece for me is the promise of technology to level the playing field. I’m an African-American woman, I have a strong history in my family of social justice work, so I love the idea of people having access to tools where they can be publishers, where they can have a voice, where they can connect with people potentially all across the world. So I got really passionate about the power of technology to change nonprofits, and how people with access to tools like that could change the world.
| Category Blogs, Communications, Community, Cross-Post, Fundraising, iDevice, Interview, iPad Apps, iPad/Tablet, iPhone Apps, Mobile, Nonprofit, Special Series, Strategic Marketing, Technology, Technology for Nonprofits, Tools, Twitter | | Comments Off
Written by: Don Akchin