Category Archives: fundraising

7 Tips to Implement a Successful Fall ePhilanthropy Campaign

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Sadly, Labor Day is followed by fall with shorter days and cooler weather.  But it also provides an opportunity to reconnect with your constituents, climaxed by the important year-end fundraising campaign.  Here are some ways to hit the ground running when you return to the office tomorrow:

  1. Prepare an integrated communications / fundraising calendar describing how you will engage with your supporters across channels.  Balance appeals with messages showing how your organization has helped your target audience and be specific about you’ve utilized past donations.
  2. Start planning content for email campaigns well in advance, using these 7 tips for better fundraising emails and applying these best practices for enewsletters - they apply just as much for nonprofits as for small businesses (More ideas here)
  3. Take the time to analyze data on email subscribers, website traffic, Facebook ‘likers,’ Twitter followers etc. so you better understand what platforms your constituents are engaging with you
  4. Is your website consistently providing fresh content that is in synch with your other communication media?  If not, have you provided ongoing training to staff on how to utilize your content management software?  (What?  You don’t have a CMS.  Read Idealware’s Five Tips for A Successful Open Source CMS Project on a Budget)
  5. Find a few simple ways to start thinking multi-channel, even if it means changing the way your nonprofit usually works.  Get ideas from Frogloop’s  Multichannel Magic, then read about others’ successes in this month’s upcoming nonprofit blog carnival hosted by Big Duck featuring this topic
  6. Get out of your office.  If you’re in NYC, for example, you can learn how to innovate and thrive in the digital age at this month’s 501 Tech NYC event and discuss what makes successful websites at the Not-for-Profit Webmaster Round Table.  (You can also learn from your desk by taking a webinar during you lunch hour.)
  7. Optimize your online giving forms, paying particular attention to whether they work as well on mobile and tablet platforms, where more of your constituents are seeing them.
Congratulations once again to Charity:Water, which has kicked off its September campaign as another example of how to do ephilanthropy right with stirring video and constantly providing feedback on how it uses donations towards its mission of providing clean water worldwide .

Report from Event Fundraising Roundtable

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This week I joined many nonprofit colleagues at the Event Fundraising Table sponsored by the Run Walk Ride Fundraising Council, Blackbaud, Charity Dynamics and Event 360, focusing on ideas to stimulate peer to peer fundraising.  Below is a summary of my takeaways:

How can I get more event participants to fundraise?

  • encourage participants to form and join teams, then ask their employers to sponsor corporate teams
  • offer incentives for specified fundraising levels
  • provide step by step instructions and coaching
  • ask on the registration form – are you planning to fundraise?  Then prepare different messaging based on their response
  • encourage participant donations – makes it more likely they will ask others to contribute

How to Use Social Media for Event Fundraising

  • Sponsor live chats with top fundraisers (chats don’t only have to be about fundraising, but can help to build affiliation with nonprofit)
  • Create a mobile phone application, then push it out to social media (has worked well for March of Dimes and will be released soon by National MS Society)
  • Target Facebook messages based on location
  • Provide Facebook exclusive content
  • Give ‘white glove service’ to top fundraisers (at National MS Society – 50% of $ is raised by top 2% of fundraisers!)
  • In multi-site organization, national office can offer weekly highlights to provide content to local chapter / affiliate offices

How Can I Enhance My Marketing and Communication Efforts?

  • Event360 strongly suggested segmenting messages (my concern – do many of our orgs have staffing to provide strong content for different audiences)
  • Focus on customer service – offer a special hotline for top fundraisers
  • Use Seth Godin’s ‘Purple Cow‘ concept – find a way to differentiate your event from other organizations offering walks, endurance events etc.
  • Ask your nonprofit staff to come down on event day to cheer event participants (has been consistently used successfully by YAI)
  • Don’t rely on one person to handle social media (Autism Speaks has devoted considerable resources to build huge audiences on both Facebook & Twitter)
  • Visit your organization’s programs and tell great stories (suggested by YAI)

Thanks to roundtable participants who shared their expertise: Scott Archimbaud, March of Dimes;  Paul Irwin-Dudek, Autism Speaks;  Papa Kofi F. Baffour-Awuah, YAI; and, Nancy Palo, National MS Society (NYC-SNY Chapter) and to David Hessekiel of the Run Walk Ride Fundraising Council who moderated the panel.

It was also great to see many friends from across the country such as Shana Masterson who attended with several of her co-workers from the American Diabetes Association, Jono Smith from Event 360, and a few attendees from the Crohn’s and Colitis Foundation, where I first focused on managing peer to peer fundraising events.

What’s New in ePhilanthropy

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For best results in ephilanthropy initiatives, I’ve always advocated for an active partnership between Communications and Development.   Here’s more reasons why from Kivi Leroux Miller,  If you’re not getting the type of response you want from your nonprofit e-newsletters, Kivi also offers a free 15 day e-newsletter course at her Nonprofit Marketing Guide website. which offers many simple tips you can easily implement.

The debate continues on the new Google Plus.  Beth Kanter offers her take, as does Frogloop and TNW Social Media.  I believe there may be a benefit to adding your contacts manually, as it forces us to give some thought of who should be in each ‘circle.’  According to the Huffington Post, nonprofits are wasting no time in kicking the tires of Google’s answer to Facebook.

If your organization is undergoing a major change (as most of us do sooner or later), Peter De Jager provides many great resources on change management at Technobility.  See also Chaos is the New Normal.

Learn about fundraising and emarketing in Blackbaud’s Summer School webinar series which starts this week and, if you’re in NYC, attend next week’s 501 Tech Club meeting featuring how to get started with WordPress (which this blog uses).

As a follow-up to last week’s post on How to Make Your Projects Successful, Ben Lichtenwalner offers his Inverted Pyramid of Project Success.

Why Everyone is in Communications

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If you’ve followed my blog for awhile, you’re probably familiar with my theme that if you work for a nonprofit, you should be involved with fundraising, even if you don’t work in Development.  In my work with nonprofits for over ten years, I’ve helped to raise money online by project managing online campaigns and have worked directly with many fundraisers.  Although I’ve usually focused on technology, in my latest gig I’ve been part of a Communications group.

This week’s post by Big Duck on Embedding Communicators in Your Nonprofit explains how the role of Communications has changed as many more staff members are now speaking publicly about their organizations in blogs and in social media platforms.  So while Communications may still be considered the ‘official’ voice for channels such as the organization’s main web site, press releases, enewsletters, annual reports etc., there are many more opportunities for staff to spread the word about their nonprofit’s work. Rather than something that needs to be ‘controlled,’ this should be viewed as an opportunity to increase an organization’s outreach.

This trend also points to the importance of developing a social media policy, which I mentioned in this post earlier this year, so nonprofit staff have guidelines on how to talk about their nonprofit both online and off.

I’ve noticed that the most successful nonprofits often have environments where staff routinely collaborate, regardless of what department they work in.  This is especially important when implementing online initiatives, which require the participation of technology, communications and development staff.  It’s no surprise that this is most easily done in smaller nonprofits, such as Charity:Water, which I recently profiled, and Harlem Academy, which this week won the main prize at the New York Times Company 2011 Nonprofit Excellence Awards.   (Congrats also to City Harvest and Sanctuary for Families who were also recognized, as well as semi-finalists City Parks Foundation, Heart of Brooklyn and NYC Outward Bound.)

Recommendation – don’t think that only Development raises funds and only Communications represents your organization to the public.  It may have been that way in the past, but not today.

Lessons From Charity:Water

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At Friday’s Fundraising Day in NYC, I had the pleasure of learning online strategy from the nonprofit that has probably done it best in recent years.  In only five years of existence, Charity:Water has used a combination of compelling content and innovative outreach strategies to build a dedicated constituent base.  Digital Director Paull Young described their approach:

  • ask supporters to ‘give up their birthdays,’ offering a great ‘experience’ in return
  • focus on ‘sharing great content,’ not on asking for money
  • ‘uncomfortable transparency’ about exactly how donations are used
  • we ‘make the campaigner the hero,’ not the organization
  • goal is to have a ten year relationship with constituents
  • 100% reliance on social media / online – no direct mail
  • exceptional video – take a look at Water Changes Everything

After his session, I congratulated Paull on his success and asked whether some of Charity:Water’s techniques could work in a larger, less nimble nonprofit.  He pointed out that he had worked primarily with larger organizations before joining Charity:Water, then added that any nonprofit could do well by paying close attention to its culture and by ‘getting people with the right skills on staff.’  In our country where the availability of clean drinking water is usually taken for granted, it’s also impressive how this organization has developed such a huge following in such a short time.

As I also heard from several speakers during the event, you get the best results by developing the relationship with constituents first before making any ask.  And as Charity:Water has demonstrated, it’s critical to stay in touch to show supporters specifically how their contributions have helped the cause.

If you weren’t able to attend the event, several session handouts are available here.

Need Job Description for Integrated Fundraising / Communications Position?

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If so, consider these suggestions from Internet Management for Nonprofits, which offers a detailed competency profile for a Manager / Director of Integrated Fundraising.  As the authors suggested, I feel that communications must be an integral part of this role, so I’ve added a few items:

  1. detailed knowledge of multiple fundraising channels: e.g. direct mail, telemarketing, ephilanthropy
  2. can apply and utilize database segmentation techniques
  3. ability to work well across departments when developing integrated fundraising / outreach initiatives
  4. collaborative work style – supports and celebrates team successes
  5. strong listener – able to ask and utilize others’ feedback
  6. conflict resolution skills to negotiate conflicting priorities of multiple groups
  7. curiosity and insight into overall organizational goals
  8. strong connection with / customer service skills when interacting with donors
  9. can encourage colleagues to update online communications content and to actively promote organization
  10. unafraid of taking risks to experiment with new programs and adjust approach when needed

Fundraising is enhanced by clear and consistent communications.  The nonprofit that is able to integrate these functions will be more successful in connecting with its audience, presenting a unified message to supporters and in blending traditional organization structure into a true multichannel strategy.

Why You Need to Connect Advocacy with Fundraising

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When planning your integrated communications / fundraising calendar, you may offer several opportunities for your constituents to take action on issues your organization is supporting, as well as scheduling fundraising appeals throughout the year.  You probably have a department that focuses heavily on advocacy, while another group is involved primarily in development.  But as will be clearly demonstrated during the upcoming Advocacy Live virtual event, you will get the best results if you connect online advocacy and fundraising, also detailed in this white paper available from Amnesty International, Blackbaud and M&R Strategic Services.

If you examine open rates and click-thru statistics from your email marketing (you are regularly looking at these, right?), you will find that advocacy focused communications consistently outperform other types of emails such as enewsletters and financial appeals.  Advocates for your causes often feel strongly about showing their support, and may often respond favorably to a fundraising ask at the same time that they are taking action to sign an online petition.

Per the white paper, these are your strongest targets for fundraising appeals:

  1. repeat activist who took action in the last 24 hours
  2. current donor who took action in the last month
  3. “super activitist” (took 6 or more actions in last year)

As I’ve discussed here, your constituents view you as one organization, not as multiple departments with differing goals.  If you’re still operating in silos (see Beth Kanter‘s inspiring book, The Networked Nonprofit), you’re missing an opportunity to allow your strongest supporters to help you in more than one way.  Online strategy works best when its a joint effort from many parts of your nonprofit.

Why Technology is Core to Your Mission

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Back when I was focused mostly on technology, my role was often viewed as a back end function, not really part of the core mission of the organization I worked for.   Currently, technology is no longer a niche specialty, but something that everyone is involved in through the huge influence of cell phones and portable computers.   And while I still help nonprofits to make the best use of technology, my role has expanded to include communications, marketing and fundraising.

Blackbaud’s new report, Top Trends in Technology offers a great overview of how technology now influences an organization far beyond the original emphasis of desktop and network computing.   Definitely worth reviewing in detail;  some of my takeaways are:

  • Continually evaluate how well your website is serving your constituents.  Many nonprofits still only focus on the website while it’s being redesigned, then allow it to stay dormant until the next makeover.  Remember that your web presence serves many audiences, those who already support your cause and others who are new to your organization and are seeking an overview of your services.  Give your website a health check.
  • Know who your strongest supporters are and help them to spread the word about your organization.  Most nonprofits already focus on those who have given major gifts or who are strong candidates to do so.  But many other constituents want to help you to engage others in your mission, not only by making donations.  Find out how to help with fundraising without asking for money.
  • The idea of a single supporter database is difficult to implement, but do your best to reduce islands of data that may develop when staff aren’t adequately trained to keep their data in a central, sharable location
  • Establish a culture where technology is implemented to achieve specific organization goals, not because a vendor or consultant tells you that it is a good strategy.

Fortunately, technology is no longer a back end service, but affects the overall success of how well your nonprofit achieves its mission.  Establish a partnership between IT and other departments, as suggested by how fundraisers can manage and work with IT departments.

P.S. Hope you’ll join me at Nten‘s Nonprofit Technology Conference, coming up in March in Washington DC.  It’s always a great event, and we talk a lot about these topics.

I Will Join Jewish Funds for Justice in 2011

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I am pleased to announce that I have accepted an offer to join Jewish Funds for Justice to direct their online initiatives and will begin Monday, January 3, 2011.   I will be managing the relationship with Convio (they are using both Convio Online Marketing and Common Ground) as well as enhancing their website, which was recently redesigned using Drupal.  Although my role will be within Communications, I will be working actively with Development as well as advising on all technology issues.  In addition to continuing my blogging here, I hope to also contribute to the organization’s blog and action center.   Social media will also be a part of my focus, although my strategy will be to integrate the newer and more traditional engagement tools, as I have always recommended.

In addition to the private thanks I’ve been sending out to my network this week, I’d like to publicly thank everyone in my network who has been supportive and encouraging during my search for a new gig.  I’d also like to thank my new colleagues at Jewish Funds for Justice, especially Mik Moore, who were especially helpful in structuring a role that will allow me to follow my passion for ephilanthropy and also meet the organization’s needs.  Thanks also to those who agreed to be references or who advocated on my behalf.

Wishing everyone a peaceful and joyful holiday – stay tuned for my special New Years message next week.

What’s New in ePhilanthropy

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I’ve long advocated using web based applications, but are we ready for a cloud operating system?  Here’s a first look at Google’s Chrome OS, planned for release next summer.  (Why not just focus on Android, which is already in wide usage on the mobile platform?)

Need help in planning a social media and online engagement strategy?  Here’s a great overview of what’s involved, thanks to Big Duck‘s Farra Trompeter.  For example, pick the channels where you have the time and resources to participate (you can’t be everywhere).

Will you join me at the Nonprofit Technology Conference in March in DC?  For a preview of some issues we’ll be discussing, Nten summarizes the best of nonprofit technology in 2010.

In social media, a key principle is to listen first.  Janet Fouts recently offered a terrific webinar on Streamlining Your Social Media Workflow , and offers this useful list of listening tools.

Only two weeks left to get out your year-end appeals.  Here’s why you need to act now, and some last minute advice, more tips on making the ask and best practices for year-end fundraising.

While this is a busy time for fundraisers, I hope you still find time to celebrate the upcoming holidays.