Selfish Giving

APRIL 10, 2013

'This post has a companion post at Razoo’s Inspiring Generosity blog: Dollars for Doers: The Money Nonprofits Don’t Want? To learn more about Dollars for Doers - company grants that reward employee volunteering with cash for nonprofits – I knew I had to speak to a nonprofit that worked with a lot of volunteers. If it’s really true that only 7 out of 100 employees apply for this money, I needed an organization that had so many volunteers that they’d be sure to have exper

Volunteerism 258

Volunteerism Volunteerism Children Nonprofits 258

Nonprofit Tech for Good

APRIL 22, 2013

'Until recently the nonprofit pioneers of the Social Web had to mostly rely on their intuition that their social media campaigns were resulting in more dollars raised online, an increase in brand and cause awareness, and higher rates of volunteer recruitment and retention. However, as LinkedIn, Blogger and Myspace all celebrate their 10-year anniversary this year, nonprofits have now had a decade to study and experiment with social media and create systems for successfully launching and tracking

Advertising 110

Advertising Fundraising Fundraising Recruitment 110

Fundraising Coach

APRIL 20, 2013

'Last night my flight home to Maine was cancelled, presumably due to the manhunt in Boston. So I got to spend more time in NJ. While there, I turned on WDHA, a rock station in New Jersey. In the midst of a commercial break, I heard an add about an organization that helped people get employment. It was a compelling story and when they said, “Your generousity makes this possible”, I realized the organization was a nonprofit.

Fundraising 110

Fundraising Fundraising Nonprofits 110

The Agitator

APRIL 8, 2013

'“What differentiates great fundraising from the average, good or poor?” “What are the factors that allow an organisation to double, treble or even quadruple its income ?” These are the questions Professors Adrian Sargeant and Jen Shang set out to answer in a year-long study aptly titled: Great Fundraising. Released yesterday, the study was briefed and commissioned by the UK consultancy Clayton Burnett and is available free of charge on the firm’s website.

Fundraising 109

Fundraising Fundraising Culture Retention 109

Speaker: Tim Sarrantonio, Director of Corporate Brand

This session will dive into how to create rich generosity experiences that foster long-lasting relationships. You’ll walk away with actionable insights to redefine how you engage with your supporters—emphasizing trust, engagement, and community over transactional giving models. 🤝 Industry expert Tim Sarrantonio will explore data-backed strategies to engage supporters as active participants in a community that values their contributions and shared ideals.

Values

Getting Attention

APRIL 16, 2013

'Like you, my heart and head are heavy in the wake of yesterday’s bombings in Boston. Especially since I feel so helpless. I had a completely different post planned today, but wanted to respond a.s.a.p. to the questions, worries and just totally-wrong communications I’ve seen going out since the bombings yesterday afternoon. Most of this outreach was harmless, but simply a mismatch with what’s on our minds right now.

Communication 108

Communication Children Health Marketing 108

Nonprofit Marketing Blog

APRIL 4, 2013

Today I’m answering a question from reader Deirdre, who asks: “As an organization with a mission that is a bit more abstract than, say, feeding hungry children or saving whales, we often struggle to make our work concrete. Are there any resources out there that are especially useful for organizations dedicated to civic engagement and/or research?

Education 93

Education Education Children 93

Nonprofit Tech for Good

APRIL 24, 2013

'Social media has forever changed how nonprofits and journalists distribute and consume news stories, yet the format of nonprofit press releases has not evolved at all. Almost every communication medium out there has been impacted by the rise of social and mobile media, but not press releases. I think that enterprising nonprofits would be eager to try something new to help your nonprofit stand out from the hundreds of traditional press releases that journalists and media outlets are bombarded wi

Nonprofits 110

Nonprofits Activism Communication 110

Fundraising Coach

APRIL 9, 2013

'I run into so many nonprofit leaders who don’t “have time” for professional development. “I have so much to do I don’t have any time for myself.” One of the interesting things about self-talk: what we say over and over, especially with emotion, can hypnotize us. It may not change the world around us, but what we believe can definitely impact how we perceive reality.

Leadership 103

Leadership Nonprofit Leadership Associations Nonprofits 103

The Agitator

APRIL 11, 2013

'Courtesy of fundraising consultant Pamela Barden, writing in Fundraising Success , here are 12 principles that all fundraisers would do well to heed … You are NOT the target audience. So figure out who is. You have to spend money to raise money. You have to ask to receive. Use multiple fundraising tools for balance. Good programs need good fundraising.

Nonprofit Management 103

Nonprofit Management Management Fundraising Fundraising 103

Kivi's Nonprofit Communications Blog

APRIL 16, 2013

'We''ve Moved! Update your Reader Now. This feed has moved to: [link] Update your reader now with this changed subscription address to get your latest updates from us. We''ve Moved! Update your Reader Now. This feed has moved to: [link] Update your reader now with this changed subscription address to get your latest updates from us.

Nonprofits 88

Nonprofits Communication 88

Speaker: Tim Sarrantonio

The average nonprofit uses five or more different software platforms to create their donor’s journey, making the experience clunky and disjointed. If you want to design a magical online giving experience for donors, making their journey as seamless as possible is key. In this webinar with expert Tim Sarrantonio, you’ll learn the fundamental steps to create an immersive and personalized online giving experience for your donors.

Nonprofits

Nonprofit Marketing Blog

APRIL 11, 2013

'Photo via Green America. The Chronicle of Philanthropy has a fascinating interview with fundraising guru Penelope Burk , author of the upcoming Donor-Centered Leadership. Turns out it’s not just donors who grow weary of too many direct mail appeals and telemarketing calls. It’s apparently a frequent reason fundraisers quit their jobs—the relentless pressure to bombard donors.

Fundraising 91

Fundraising Fundraising Philanthropy Leadership 91

Selfish Giving

APRIL 1, 2013

Curt Weeden (shown above) is a corporate giving expert, speaker, author and founder of the New Strategies Forum. I first shared this post with my email newsletter subscribers last week. But I got such great feedback on it I want to share it with all my readers! Subscribers to my email newsletter receive unique content from me twice a month. Sign up for my Wicked Good Newsletter today!

Nonprofits 236

Nonprofits Marketing Marketing 236

Nonprofit Tech for Good

APRIL 3, 2013

Hopefully your nonprofit has grown accustomed to the fact that Facebook is a constant work in progress. That said, some recent upgrades to Facebook Pages have a big impact upon your nonprofit’s presence on Facebook and with the site-wide launch of the new News Feed and Social Graph Search coming soon, many more changes are likely to come. Before you fall behind, make sure that your nonprofit is current with these four recent Facebook upgrades: 1) Turn on “Similar Page Suggestions.&#

Nonprofits 110

Nonprofits Activism Management 110

Fundraising Coach

APRIL 23, 2013

'Last week, in my weekly email to Fundraising Kick subscribers , I told them to stop talking about what percent of their budget goes to “overhead.” I won’t go into the entire message I sent, but here’s a summary. You need to know the percentage. People are talking about the percentage of a nonprofit’s budget that goes to “overhead.” Here in the USA, they can easily look at a charities 990 which publicly announces how much came in in donations and how muc

Fundraising 101

Fundraising Fundraising Advertising Marketing 101

The Agitator

APRIL 21, 2013

'The latest extension of Dove’s ‘Real Beauty’ campaign has generated buckets of attention. As Dove puts it, the mission of the campaign is “to create a world where beauty is a source of confidence and not anxiety” We first wrote about this campaign in 2006, applauding its focus on self-esteem. What’s creating the latest buzz is this video showing how an artist’s sketch based on a woman’s own self-description varies — i.e., is less flattering

Communication 99

Communication Fundraising Fundraising Nonprofits 99

Mission Minded

APRIL 24, 2013

'On May 19, Denver Art Museum will unveil its new exhibition, “Spun: Adventures in Textiles.” When helping to brand the exhibition, Mission Minded took a strategic approach, analyzing the Museum’s audiences, goals, and brand position. With the input and collaboration of Museum staff, Mission Minded helped create the name and designed the campaign that will [.].

Collaborations 80

Collaborations Communication Nonprofits 80

Nonprofit Marketing Blog

APRIL 5, 2013

'I’m a big believer in the positive effects of peer pressure (here’s one article on it ). Global Giving has proved this again - in an intriguing experiment focused on recurring giving. Last year, the organization experimented with a number of different calls to action to get donors to upgrade to recurring donations. They tested the messages on all donors who added a project to their giving cart.

87

87

Selfish Giving

APRIL 30, 2013

'Register programs are similar to pinups in one important way and different in two distinctive ways. First, they are similar in that they fall under the umbrella of point-of-sale (POS). For me, POS cause marketing is anything that happens at a business’ register that raises money for a nonprofit. In addition to register and pinup programs, I would put round-up programs and donations boxes under the point-of-sale umbrella.

Food 209

Food Marketing Marketing Nonprofits 209

Nonprofit Tech for Good

APRIL 14, 2013

'My e-newsletter is by far the driving force behind Nonprofit Tech 2.0. Those 27,000+ subscribers produce more return on investment (ROI) in terms of bringing in new clients and webinar attendees than my 600,000+ Twitter followers and 40,000+ Facebook fans combined. And even though a recent report pointed out that email open and donor response are dropping in the nonprofit sector, I can’t help but wonder if current (yet old) e-newsletter design trends have a lot to do with the results.

Ethics 93

Ethics Technology Nonprofits Production 93

Fundraising Coach

APRIL 2, 2013

I’ve been fascinated by the rise of successfully crowdfunded projects through sites like Kickstarter and Indiegogo. I think nonprofits can take lessons from them to apply to their own fundraising. So I when I read a thorough analysis of Brett Scott’s successful Indiegogo project , I invited him to share some of his lessons learned here. Brett is the author of the forthcoming book ‘The Heretic’s Guide to Global Finance’.

Finance 96

Finance Education Education Management 96

The Agitator

APRIL 23, 2013

'Early this year the 100 year-old American Cancer Society (ACS) rocked the direct response ecosystem with its decision to stop all direct mail acquisition … stop the use of direct mail to non-dm acquired donors … and remove the ACS list of donors from all exchange universes. Judging from comments I overheard at the February DMA conference, you’d have thought rather than finding a cure for cancer the ACS had discovered an extremely virile form of stupidity.

Public and Nonprofit Management 98

Public and Nonprofit Management Retention Universities Management 98

Getting Attention

APRIL 25, 2013

'Nonprofit Storytelling # 1-7. Stories are at the top of the format heap right now, because they work. Although they’ve been around forever (the Lascaux cave paintings in SW France are 17,000 years old), most of us still thrill to good stories on pages and screens. Why We Respond to Stories. Stories help us make sense of a world that can be hard to understand.

Psychology 78

Psychology Homelessness Nonprofits Communication 78

Nonprofit Marketing Blog

APRIL 19, 2013

'At the recent Nonprofit Technology Conference, I was asked about donor premiums - those return address labels, mugs, etc. given to people in exchange for making a donation. From the research I’ve seen, premiums can work to boost giving in the short term but also create some problems long term, especially if the premiums are positioned as a quid pro quo for a gift and have limited resonance with the cause.

Children 83

Children Retention Technology Marketing 83

Selfish Giving

APRIL 16, 2013

'Let review, shall we? Bad behavior: Good behavior: Got it? More: How to Help the Victims of the Boston Explosion … Keep reading.

Marketing 238

Marketing Marketing 238

Nonprofit Tech for Good

APRIL 29, 2013

'And yet another reason why your nonprofit can not ignore Google+… the Google Knowledge Graph which now prominently features information about nonprofit organizations on the right-hand side of Google Search results. Data is pulled from multiple sources including Wikipedia , GuideStar and of course Google+ Pages. As a result, nonprofits must ensure that their Wikipedia Page and GuideStar Profile are current and understand that simply being active on Google+ makes it more likely that your

Nonprofits 91

Nonprofits Activism Nonprofit Organizations Nonprofit Organizations 91

Fundraising Coach

APRIL 8, 2013

'Thanks to our digital age, people can now spread the message of their favorite cause further than ever before. But is your nonprofit helping them? The End It Movement Does It Right! Today, I saw a post about the End It Movement. I was thoroughly impressed. They’ve created a site that makes it easy for people trying to end slavery to help get the word out!

Education 94

Education Education Marketing Marketing 94

The Agitator

APRIL 17, 2013

'Unlike Roger, who sings its praises, I confess to no personal experience with face-to-face fundraising … other than as a consumer. So I was pleased to get this article – 8 things you should know before starting Face-to-Face fundraising — from Terry van den Bemt and Willemien Melis of Pepperminds in The Netherlands. His bits of advice cover the super-importance of training, reinforcing with digital and other channels, measuring everything, planning for scale, and more.

Fundraising 93

Fundraising Fundraising Technology Communication 93

Getting Attention

APRIL 19, 2013

'As of Friday, April 19 1:42 pm ET—Will update as the news story evolves. Please share your take, questions and/or how your org is responding. PAUSE. That’s my #1 recommendation for your nonprofit right now, as responders chase down the second bombing suspect. We’re all too tense (at least now, at least the people I know) to absorb anything much right now.

Environmental 78

Environmental Communication Nonprofits 78

Nonprofit Marketing Blog

APRIL 16, 2013

'It’s the time of year when you’re packaging up your annual reports for 2012. Before you move forward with the same approach as last year, it’s worth asking: -Who is the audience? -What do you need to accomplish with this report? -Should we question the old approach? Here’s a great example of what happens when you ask these questions: The Children’s Bureau report - which takes the form of an interactive report online and a poster in its direct mail form - combines a

Children 82

Children 82

Selfish Giving

APRIL 26, 2013

'On today’s show, Megan and I talk to David Hessekiel , Founder and President of Cause Marketing Forum. David shares what’s on tap for the May CMF Conference in Chicago, including my session on Cause Marketing for Small to Medium Sized Businesses and Nonprofits. He also gives us a peak into keynotes by LIVESTRONG CEO Doug Ulman, Andy Goodman on storytelling and J.

Marketing 200

Marketing Marketing Nonprofits 200

Nonprofit Tech for Good

APRIL 1, 2013

The reports listed below are just a small sampling of the research available to nonprofits about online communications and fundraising, social media, and mobile technology. These reports are, however, some of the most valuable in terms of insight, useful and practical data, and how-to advice. If you would like to suggest a report be added to the list, please post the name and a link to the report in a comment below.

Communication 81

Communication Fundraising Fundraising Technology 81

Fundraising Coach

APRIL 3, 2013

I’m honored to be giving the first webinar in Blackbaud’s npEXPERTS series! Donors Don’t Live in One Place so Why Do Your Communications? I’ll be sharing four ways to make sure you are integrating communications for your online donors and your offline donors. We’ll look at donation pages, direct mail, cool apps, and even hashtags!

Communication 90

Communication Marketing Marketing Fundraising 90

The Agitator

APRIL 18, 2013

'We’ve been talking about visual impact this week on The Agitator, so I suppose it fitting that we close out with this item on the winners of the 2013 DoGooder Video Awards, sponsored by the Nonprofit Technology Network (NTEN), YouTube, see3, and Cisco. Best of Nonprofit Video Award — Follow the Frog (Rainforest Alliance). Funny for Good Award — No Joke.

Technology 91

Technology Communication Fundraising Fundraising 91

Kivi's Nonprofit Communications Blog

APRIL 1, 2013

We've Moved! Update your Reader Now. This feed has moved to: [link] Update your reader now with this changed subscription address to get your latest updates from us. We've Moved! Update your Reader Now. This feed has moved to: [link] Update your reader now with this changed subscription address to get your latest updates from us.

Marketing 77

Marketing Marketing Communication Nonprofits 77

Nonprofit Marketing Blog

APRIL 25, 2013

'This week, I published a personal post on my LinkedIn blog. I thought I’d share it here. I was asked by LinkedIn to post on the theme of “my best career mistake.” You can view the original post here. I welcome your reactions and thoughts. Eight years ago, I found myself scraping the tops off store-bought cupcakes in my kitchen at one in the morning.

Construction 79

Construction Leadership Activism 79