nonprofit – Page 66 – The Healthy Non-Profit

The Importance of Archiving Social Media Data and How to Do So

March 26, 2012 DonorDreams Mondays with Marissa, technology

CTRL+S. File -> Save. We all do it when working in Microsoft Word, writing an email, or creating a spreadsheet. When we do, the work we create is saved on our hard drives for later reference.

When writing a tweet or updating a Facebook status most of us just write, press “post” and send it out into cyberspace; leaving no local copy. At the moment, it might not seem like an important thing do, but archiving your non-profit organization’s social media data should be part of your social media plan.

Why, you ask?

Historical Record – Most social media messaging is based around marketing of some sort. In the nonprofit world, our marketing is based upon sharing news, cultivating donors, and attracting event attendees. Wouldn’t it be helpful to be able to search a record of these messages to see if you can pick up on any successful trends that are worth repeating?

For example, imagine last year you tweeted about your annual pancake breakfast on every Tuesday preceding the event. As a result, your event registration went up on the first Tuesday, but you didn’t see the same numbers on the following days. Couldn’t this data help you decide how you’d like to tweet this year? Will you tweet once a week? Only on Tuesdays?

Lawsuits – Social media updates can be used in a court of law. For instance, if one of your employees posts something that slanders another organization or if one of your employees is named in a suit outside of the organization, you might want a copy of your social media records for your protection.

Regulations and Compliance – You may apply for and be awarded a grant that involves a requirement that you use social media. Having a copy of your data demonstrates compliance and can be shared with the funder. Furthermore, if your agency needs to comply with laws such as HIPAA, having your own copy of social media data can prove compliance.

Perhaps, the simplest answer to this question can be found during a discussion about your agency’s document retention policy. In this policy, your board of directors most likely spells out which paper documents (e.g. personnel files, financial statements, meeting notes, etc) need to be kept and for how long. Why should it be any different for data your organization publishes on the internet?

Now, you may be thinking, “Marissa, how the heck do I do this?” Don’t worry, I have some tools to make the job a little easier.

Backupify – This is a paid service, but the back-up of social media is automatic. Backupify covers Gmail, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Flickr, and other Google apps such as Google Calendar and Google Docs.

ifttt.com – ifttt.com allows users to set up “if this – then that” tasks to create a custom data backup plan. For example, all tweets could be saved to Google Calendar for that the day they were originally posted. At the time of writing, iftt.com is free.

ThinkUp – ThinkUp is the most technical of the tools I’m suggesting, but it is the most robust out of the bunch. ThinkUp is an application that needs to be installed on it’s own server before it can work. You can either talk to your IT department about installing it on your organization’s public server or you can install it for free using phpfog.com. ThinkUp not only archives your data, but it also analyzes it and tells you things that you might necessarily pick up otherwise. ThinkUp is even used by The White House to manage their social media data.

The current state of the web is in flux as the issue of an open or closed internet is debated more often. I suspect that the idea of archiving your agency’s social media data growing in importance. I have included a few more articles below for further reading on the subject to help you and your organization discuss how to do so.

Does your organization already have a plan to archive social media data? What tools do you use? Let’s talk more in comments!

Further Reading:
New York Times: Tools to Help Companies Manage Their Social Media
Mashable: 7 Ways to Rescue Your Curcial Social Media Data from Oblivion

Would you please solve the REAL problem? Structure Drives Behavior!

March 23, 2012 DonorDreams Fundraising, leadership, organizational development

Welcome to O.D. Fridays at DonorDreams blog. Every Friday for the foreseeable future we will be looking more closely at a recent post from John Greco’s blog called “johnponders ~ about life at work, mostly” and applying his organizational development messages to the non-profit community.

Today we’re focusing on a post that John titled “Close Cover Before Striking“. In this post, he uses the example of how matchbooks were re-designed to discuss an important organizational development concept — “structure drives behavior”. This is an important concept for all non-profit professionals to master if organizational excellence and mission-focused productivity is your goal.

At the Boys & Girls Club, I cannot tell you how many kids forget their barcoded membership cards every day. So, as I tried to apply John’s blog theme to this example, all I could think of is TATTOO that damn barcode on kids’ foreheads!

Needless to say, I abandon that blog post idea for something a little more rationale — donor contact reports.

Every time someone from your organization visits a prospect or donor, they should (in theory) fill-out a “contact report”. This report needs to find its way back to your agency, into the hands of the person entering data into your donor database, and typed into a contact record. Why? So, that the left hand knows what the right hand is doing. More importantly, the information a donor shares with you can influence many other things (e.g. how much they will be asked for during the next campaign, designing a custom stewardship program, building an effective Moves Management program and approach, etc).

Of course, few non-profit organizations are ever effective in convincing their volunteer solicitors to complete this extra form.

Hmmmmmm? John’s blog post got me thinking. This is likely a “structure” issue. So, how could this process be re-structured to get the desired result?

This topic is one that has bothered me for a very long time. I’ve tried everything including: talking slower, pleading, printing more forms, lecturing, simplifying the form, etc. I’ve even thought about investing in mind reading. As you can see, a new line of thought is probably warranted.

Here are a few thoughts I’ve had since reading John’s blog post (some might still be off-the-mark but I think I’m getting closer):

What about putting the “contact report” on the back of the pledge form? This could also re-enforce the idea that volunteer solicitors shouldn’t leave the pledge form behind with the prospect/donor. This could be a “twofer” solution.
What about taking the responsibility out of the hands of volunteer solicitors? Your agency could email each prospect/donor a short questionnaire a few days after they complete the pledge form. You could ask a few questions (both open-ended and closed) designed to yield important insights into why someone contributed, what they want to see your agency do with their contribution, etc.
If you don’t like the idea of a questionnaire, what about recruiting a team of volunteers to follow-up via telephone a few days after a donor makes a contribution to your annual campaign? The call could include a personal “thank you” and end with the volunteer asking if the donor minds answer a few questions designed to help the agency do a better job managing their generous gift and the priceless relationship.

OK . . . I’ve started the ball rolling with a few ideas. Please go back and read John’s blog post titled “Close Cover Before Striking” and use the comment box below on my blog to share additional ideas on how “re-structuring the process” surrounding your donor contact report might get better performance and better donor data.

Come on! This is an issue with which I’ve seen even the biggest and best non-profit agencies struggle. A few minutes of brainstorming can have a huge impact on so many other non-profit and fundraising professionals. It is Friday . . . how about “paying it forward” today?

Or perhaps you want to join me in advocating a TATTOO solution for kids and donors? 😉

Here’s to your health!

Erik Anderson
Founder & President, The Healthy Non-Profit LLC
www.thehealthynonprofit.com
erik@thehealthynonprofit.com
http://twitter.com/#!/eanderson847
http://www.facebook.com/eanderson847
http://www.linkedin.com/in/erikanderson847

Non-profit mergers aren’t the “easy way out”

March 22, 2012 DonorDreams organizational development

At the end of 2011, I wrote a series of blog posts focused on predictions for the upcoming year. It seems as if my post on December 28, 2011 titled “2012 Non-Profit Trends and Predictions: Contraction Continues” hit a nerve with some of you. There isn’t a week that goes by without someone engaging me in a discussion around collaboration, strategic alliance, merger, acquisition, and outright sale.

None of this surprises me for all of the reasons I wrote about back on December 28th. However, the thing that is a little interesting has been the manner in which people are talking about the subject. At least in my conversations, this subject has been framed as the “perfect solution to get out from underneath our financial problems“.

While it is true that most non-profit mergers and acquisitions are inspired and motivated by financial crisis, it is important to remember that there isn’t a large group of non-profits sitting on the sidelines with a large wallet of cash just waiting to bail you out. Let’s please get real for a moment.

There needs to be “benefit” on both sides of the merger equation. Figuring out what motivates each party is important, and it is one of the first steps.
Mergers don’t happen overnight. A due diligence process must be established with representation from all sides. This process will include discussions ranging from developing a case for change to addressing how to integrate systems (e.g. payroll, tech, etc) if the project gets green-lighted.
While discretion and confidentiality are important elements in such delicate discussions, there needs to be clear lines of communication with staff and both boards.

Engineering a merger is tough and takes a lot of time. It is NOT a quick fix nor is it the perfect solution from getting out from underneath your agency’s problems. The math supports this position. The Bridgespan Group published a paper presenting data and findings from a study that focused on non-profit mergers, and this is what they reported on the rate of success:

“We evaluated 11 years of merger filings in four states: Massachusetts, Florida, Arizona and North Carolina, and found that more than 3,300 organizations reported engaging in at least one merger or acquisition between 1996 and 2006, for a cumulative merger rate of 1.5 percent (number of deals divided by average number of organizations for 11 years).”

Does this mean non-profits aren’t as good at mergers and acquisitions as our for-profit cousins? Nope!

“This rate may seem low compared to the perceived ubiquity of M&A in the for-profit world, but it is not. The comparative cumulative total in the for-profit sector is a close 1.7 percent.”

If your non-profit organization is starting to chatter about collaborations, strategic alliances, mergers or acquisitions, I strongly suggest you: 1) do your homework, 2) develop a process, 3) hire a consultant to help and facilitate, and 4) prepare for a long due diligence process.

I really like this online white paper by CCF National Resource Center that I found on the United Way of the Midlands’ website. Click here to read more about non-profit merger best practices.

Have you ever been part of a non-profit merger process? If so, what was your experience? Is your agency currently looking for a merger partner? If so, why and how are you going about it? Have you seen other merger attempts in your community succeed or fail? If so, what happened and why? How do you think donors should be included in a non-profit merger due diligence process without causing a crisis of confidence with lasting impact?

Please use the comment box below to weigh-in with your thoughts and opinions. Why? Because we can all learn from each other.

Here’s to your health!

New Donor Formula: Hustle – Follow-Up – Tenacity

March 21, 2012 DonorDreams Fundraising

The following is true story about a salesperson who is trying to hook a new customer. I’ve changed the names to protect the innocent.

Once upon a time . . .

There was this salesperson who had a GREAT product, but needed more customers. He decided that millions of business people just like him traveled this path before, so he cracked the Sales 101 textbook and did the following:

Identified his prospects
Made a list of his prospects
Rated and prioritized his prospect list
Picked up the phone, started calling and tried to secure appointments with prospects to demonstrate his product

One of the prospects on this salesperson’s list (we’ll call him “Jorge”) would take his phone calls, listen intently, say all the right things, and then end the conversation by putting the salesperson off for a few more months.

“Gosh, your products and services do certainly sound interesting and affordable, but we already have a vendor who we really like who does the same thing you do. We really like our vendor, but once things slow down around here, we’ll let you come over and show us what you got,” said Jorge.

This went on for TWO YEARS!

So, one day the salesperson decided to flip to the next chapter in his Sales 101 textbook and read about how to respectfully get more aggressive with his prospects. Last week, the salesperson showed up at Jorge’s business. He was armed with a huge sample of his product along with sales materials and a business card. Unfortunately, Jorge wasn’t there when the salesperson showed up. Of course, the salesperson left everything behind and asked that Jorge please call him back when he gets a chance.

Well, Jorge’s employees looked over the huge sample and the sales materials. They fell in love with it just like the salesperson had promised on the phone. When Jorge returned to the office, he also totally became enamored with the product and services.

Two weeks later nothing has happened!

Jorge hasn’t followed up or called the salesperson because he is busy. While the salesperson’s product and services are really enticing, the reality is that the existing relationship with another vendor takes the sense of urgency out of doing anything. As for the salesperson, they obviously haven’t finished reading their Sales 101 textbook and have neglected to read the chapter titled “ABC: Always Be Closing”.

===================================================

“ABC: Always Be Closing” isn’t a bad paradigm for fundraising professionals. If you’ve never heard of this approach, it entails the following:

Always be hustling
Constantly be following up
Never take NO for an answer
Keep adding more and more enticements until you get to YES

While I think the final bullet point is probably where I draw the line, fundraising professional can apply “ABC” and walk away from this story with a few lessons learned.

For example, if you aren’t HUSTLING for new donor prospects every day that you are employed, then you aren’t really focused on building your donor base. Prospects are all around you. They shop at your grocery store. They belong to your church. They attend your Rotary Club meetings. There is a way to always be talking about your charity in acceptable, non-obnoxious ways. When someone says “Huh, that sounds interesting,” then it is perfectly normal to invite that person to tour your facilities or sit down over a cup of coffee to learn more.

The thing I see most of us neglecting to do is FOLLOW-UP. We send letters, emails, and newsletters. We make phone calls, have introductory coffee meetings, and give tours. We drop the ball and let things hang out there just like the salesperson in the aforementioned story. We introduce our mission and cultivate prospects, and then one of the following things usually happens:

We don’t follow-up enough because we’re afraid of being obnoxious
We just let it drop because we think the ball is in the prospect’s court and they’ll take action if they’re really interested
We get our prospect really interested, but forget the “call to action”
We hear NO and cease & desist, rather than understanding that the NO was simply to the opportunity we were presenting or the timing of the ask.

I suspect that most of us would get 100 percent better at securing new donors if we mastered the concept of follow-up and didn’t fall into the same trap that the salesperson in the story fell into.

What are your thoughts? Do you have any similar stories to share? How do you apply the principle of “follow-up” without over-staying your welcome or upsetting the prospect? Please scroll down and use the comment box to share your thoughts along with your tricks of the trade. We can learn from each other.

Here’s to your health!

Non-profit lessons from the Illinois primary election

March 20, 2012 DonorDreams Fundraising

It is Tuesday, March 20th, and for those of you living in Illinois it means that Election Day has finally arrived. For me, it couldn’t have some sooner. While I am one of those strange birds who loves the act of voting, I am also really ready for all the political yard signs to come down. I guess I am just visually tired of them. Or, perhaps, I’m just getting old and cranky.

While walking the dog yesterday, I was reminded that politicians don’t really have a corner on the yard sign market. As a matter of fact, some non-profit agency’s have found creative ways to integrate yard signs into their marketing efforts. Here are just a few examples:

Many moons ago when I ran a rubber duck race fundraiser, I used yard signs to help promote online adoptions.
The Boy Scouts of America sometimes use yard signs during “Back to School” time to support recruitment and encourage kids to register for the Cub Scouts in their community.
While walking the dog yesterday, I came across a non-political yard sign in someone’s yard advertising Easter Sunday services for one local church.

While I don’t think yard signs are the most effective marketing tool in your non-profit toolbox, I do believe they can be effective in some circumstances. Here are just a few suggestions for those of you contemplating their application:

Use yard signs in a cross-channel marketing approach. For example, how many politicians do you see ONLY using yard signs? Slim to none! Those candidates lose. Successful candidates use yard signs in conjunction with television, radio, door-to-door brochures, etc. When it comes to messaging, don’t use this marketing tactic to “generally” promote your agency. You use yard signs to promote something specific and actionable like a special event, prospect cultivation open house, recruitment drive, etc.

Focus . . . don’t scatter your yard signs. You can’t buy enough yard signs to sprinkle them throughout your community on small streets in little subdivisions. Identify the busiest streets and ask residents on those main arterial routes to proudly display your sign in their front yard. You do this by knocking on their door and asking permission (even if you don’t know them or have a previous relationship). This will maximize how many people see your signs and keep your costs down.

K.I.S.S. — Keep it simple. Remember, less is more when it comes to small yard sign design. People are likely traveling by in their cars anywhere from 30 to 45 mph. They won’t be able to read small text. A few key words and a web address or phone number is about all you can do. This isn’t a mini billboard (and even if it were, most effective billboards also follow this same principle).

Sure, many of us find yard signs obnoxious, but this shouldn’t deter you. Why? Because everyone reads them. How do I know this? Because politicians wouldn’t be using them if they weren’t effective. The only catch is that you need to use them effectively.

Has your agency every used a yard sign approach to promote something? If so, how did it work? What lessons did you learn. Please scroll down and share your thoughts and experiences in the comment box below.

Here’s to your health! (And happy election day, Illinois) 😉

Does your non-profit cell phone policy and apps violate clients’ privacy?

March 19, 2012 DonorDreams Mondays with Marissa, technology

Apps. There’s a ton of them. Need to track your most recent run? There’s an app for that. Want to keep track of your expenses? There’s an app for that. Need to go to the bathroom in the middle of the a movie and don’t want to miss out on any of the action? There’s an app for that.

We all know there are plenty of smart phone apps out there, but do we really understand what they do once they are downloaded onto your phone?

This past week, Facebook, Apple, Twitter, Yelp and fourteen other social media sites were listed in a lawsuit for distributing “privacy-invading” applications. According to a PC World article, these applications are accused of collecting user address book data and storing it on their servers without the user knowing.

This issue is at the top of many minds in the technology field as just last month, the popular social network Path issued a public apology after it was discovered the company used address book data to notify users when their friends had joined the network.

So what does this mean for your non-profit agency? Well, not much if your agency doesn’t allow staff members to use data based applications on their phones. I am guessing though, that nowadays that is a rarity.

When I read stories like this, I often think of non-profit organizations that deal with HIPAA on a daily basis. Many of the employees may have access to company smart phones that allow employees to check in on email while away from the office. Or what if the agency doesn’t supply cell phones and staff members use their personal cell phones to update the organization’s Facebook page?

Phones are so smart these days that . . .

information from the email the staff person replied to,
the new Facebook friend that was just confirmed, and
the phone call that was just made

might be added to the phone’s address book and sent to third-party servers without the user even being aware.

In the case of the HIPAA abiding non-profit (and even those who wish to protect board member and donor information), there could be a violation without anyone’s knowledge.

Even if your agency doesn’t need to protect the identity of their clients, do you really want address book information being shared without your knowledge? These days, with security breaches more rampant, you can’t take privacy seriously enough.

So what can we do?

Decide if your organization really needs to use cell phones. Yes, it is nice for staff members, but is it necessary? Can you get by without them? A radical idea, but it just might be the right one.

If you decide that cell phones are needed, consider providing them only for “necessary staff” instead of allowing staff to use their personal phones. I know this costs money, however; it ensures more control over the use of the phone on behalf of the agency.

Also, consider what type of phone is needed. Does the user really need all of the bells and whistles of an iPhone or can she be as productive with an older generation Android device?

In addition, regardless if phones are being provided by the agency or not; a clear and strict technology policy must be in place and understood by all employees.

If staff members are provided smart phones, what applications can they use? If it is decided that apps can be downloaded to agency phones, then make sure the person overseeing the policy reads up on the privacy policies of the allowed apps. Most of them can be found online in either the iTunes App Store or Google Play Store. Keep in mind that these policies can change.

Audit your agency’s technology. If your organization currently allows staff members to use their personal phones, there is not much you can do other than make them aware of the issue of apps and how they can compromise your clients’ privacy. However, on phones provided by your agency, see if any of these applications are already downloaded and check out their settings to see if any sharing options can be turned off. When in doubt, hard reset the phone and start all over.

I will be the first to admit that managing the technology of business is not easy. And these privacy concerns do not make it any easier. However, until applications stop sharing information, taking the time to address these issues now could mean avoiding a sticky legal situations later.

I’d love to hear how your organization manages cell phone usage for staff members. Do privacy issues concern you? Let’s continue this discussion in the comment section below!

Is your non-profit organization on the road to Abilene?

March 16, 2012 DonorDreams Fundraising, leadership, organizational development

Today we’re focusing on a post that John titled “Jerry’s Trip to Abilene“. In this post, he uses Jerry Harvey’s story about one family’s ill-advised trip to Abilene, Texas to talk about a concept many people might refer to as “Groupthink“.

In John’s blog and Jerry’s story, none of the four family members really wanted to take a trip Abilene on that hot summer day in Texas. So, how did it happen? The answer is amazingly simple . . . take a self-sacrificing suggestion from one person and add it to three other people’s desire to accommodate the group and THAT is how it happens.

Ohhhhh, come on now! This happens at your non-profit agency all the time. Let me refresh your memory with this fictitious example:

The executive director explains to board members that something must be done. There isn’t enough private sector fundraising revenue being generated. If more donations aren’t secured soon, then the agency will run a budget deficit at the end of the year.

Someone speaks up and suggests the agency run a unique, new special event fundraiser that they just saw another organization run in a different community. Another person jumps on the bandwagon with a suggestion pertaining to venue, and another person jumps in with a suggestion pertaining to who should be recruited to chair the event. The last person shrugs their shoulders and makes a neutral comment about how this is the most excited they’ve seen everyone get about a fundraising idea in the last decade.

(Side note: the resource development professional has their head buried in their hands trying to choke back their tears.)

So, the event is held, the bills are paid, and it is discovered that a little bit of money was generated but not nearly enough to avoid a year-end deficit. During the post-event critique meeting, everyone seems to pile on negative comments, shake their heads and tell the group that they knew it wouldn’t work.

(Side note: the resource development professional still has their head buried in their hands trying to choke back their tears.)

What went wrong? Well, it is the same thing John Greco said in his blog, and the same thing Jerry Harvey said in his original Abilene story. (By the way, please circle back and read those links.)

So, what should you do to make sure this doesn’t happen to your non-profit organization?

Invest in diversity!

When recruiting boards and committees, make sure that you have a diversity of different kinds of people around the table. Too many non-profit organizations chase critical thinkers (aka contrarians) away because they can be “pains in the butt”. They are the people who like playing devil’s advocate, and they can be difficult especially when you’re desperately needing to build consensus. However, they certainly come in handy in situations when you can’t afford to take a trip to Abilene.

So, non-profit professionals need to be skilled at asking the right volunteers to get involved in the right conversations. Or perhaps we need to get better at facilitating constructive conflict. Or better yet non-profit professionals need to get better at leadership and applying a strong teachable point of view.

Did the fictional story about adding one more special event in an attempt to desperately raise some cash resonate? Do you have a story to share about a personal “trip to Abilene” that you or your agency might have taken? Do you have additional suggestions on how to avoid that long and hot road to Abilene? Please use the comment box below to weigh-in with your thoughts. Remember to also check out other blog posts on organizational development by John Greco at his blog johnponders ~ about life at work, mostly.

Here’s to your health!

Where are all the new board members?

March 15, 2012 DonorDreams Board development, Fundraising, organizational development

Let’s face facts . . . your non-profit board has gaps in it. How do you know that? You know it because you and your board members sat down with one of any number of different board composition gap assessment tools (available in the public domain) and you did the math. You looked at demographics, experiences, skill sets, interests, fundraising, and social networks, and everyone at that board development committee meeting was able to see gaps.

Guess what? This happens every time and it happens in every organization. There is no such thing as the perfect board.

Hopefully, your board development committee is doing a gap assessment every year before it goes out to recruit board members. While your gaps may not regularly change, the reality is that your circumstances and the external world around you is in a constant state of change, which affects how you look at your gaps and approach your prospecting and recruitment efforts.

For example, you might have built a very strong “governance board” with gaps around fundraising acumen. In most years, this might not have been an issue because you had very strong grant funding from key foundations. Unfortunately, let’s hypothetically say that Wall Street decides that a major market correction was necessary and the stock market takes a historic tumble. Where do many foundations secure the money they give away every year? Yep, they distribute their investment income. With your foundation income streams in a state of flux, your fundraising gaps on the board have become a major liability. Perhaps, this year’s board recruitment efforts should focus on identifying prospects who possess private sector fundraising acumen and experience and come from a diversity of different social networks.

It is at this point where I have personally sat in board development committee meetings and the conversation always seems to bog down. The brainstorming and prospecting dialog oftentimes lead to someone saying, “There isn’t anyone in our community who I know that fits that description.” Even better, I’ve heard people say, “That person doesn’t exist in our community.”

I suspect that these reactions are a result of:

The committee giving up after mentally examining all of the “usual suspects”.
The composition of the committee being such that there isn’t very much diversity from a social network perspective sitting around the table.
Being unsure of how to determine what skills and experiences people bring to the table.

Regardless, you need find ways to push past this obstacle and stimulate a dynamic brainstorming exercise around prospect identification.

I’ve seen some non-profit professionals bring lists of people to that meeting such as: Chamber of Commerce membership lists and Rotary Club (or Kiwanis, Lions, Jaycees, etc) rosters. In my opinion, this can definitely help people start thinking; however, I’m always left with this one question:

What about your donor database?

Many of us have these amazing database programs with thousands of names. These are people who must have liked us at least at some point in time. In fact, they liked us well enough to write a check. For some of those people, they love our mission so much that they support us regularly.

If you are an “excelling organization,” then you have more than just names and dollars in that donor database. You’ve been collecting data pertaining to birthdays (aka age), occupation (aka skill sets and acumen), interests and experiences, and service club participation (aka social networks). If you aren’t this good and haven’t been collecting and recording this type of information, my suggestion is that you figure out a way to start doing so immediately.

Your donor database is an amazing tool on so many different front, and it isn’t just something you use for fundraising. It can and should be the best board development tool that your board development volunteers turn to every year when they start prospecting and brainstorming.

So, the next time someone on your board development committee suggests that your community has “run out of” board prospects, I encourage you to say poppycock and pivot quickly to your donor database for an endless supply of names to consider.

Does your organization use its donor database as part of its board development prospecting process? If so, what have been your experiences? Which board composition gap assessment tool do you use? Where did you find it, and can you point others in that direction? What is the biggest gap that you’re seeing on non-profit boards in your community (e.g. too many Baby Boomers and not enough young prospects or not enough people with fundraising skills, etc)?

Please scroll down and take 60 seconds out of your busy day to share an answer to one of these questions. Why? Because we can all learn from each other and something you share today might actually make a HUGE impact in someone else’s agency. It is time to “pay it forward”. Please?

Here’s to your health!

Tips from the unemployment line for struggling non-profits

March 14, 2012 DonorDreams Fundraising, Planning

My local United Way published a brochure titled “Help for Hard Times Guide” as a way to help people with their financial decisions during tough economic times. Yesterday, I came across a copy of that document and the following quote on the inside panel grabbed my attention:

“Reduced income is going to require expert money management. This checklist will help you get started.”

While this is as obvious as the nose on your face, it struck me that this is also the case for non-profit organizations who are dealing with falling revenue. So, just out of curiosity, I decided to scan the checklist and see if there was any good advice that might also apply to non-profits.

The bolded text is the United Way’s advice, and the italics text were the thought I had while reading:

Determine your financial resources. What a great idea. Make a list of all the agency’s “resources” and determine what can be maximized and leveraged. Even more important might be to review all revenue streams and circle back around to those donors and funders for personal conversations about their support and if they can do more to help.
Plan a realistic budget. While this is always a good idea, I’ve seen too many non-profit budgets with “plug numbers”. During tough times, an extra special dose of reality is probably sound advice. Real numbers with real strategies behind those revenue numbers.
Stop all use of credit. This might be difficult to do, but it is still sound advice. How many times have you seen a non-profit dig itself into a hole that it can’t crawl out of all in the name of “tough times”.
Alert your mortgage holder or landlord. Yes, engaging the bank or landlord might open up unforeseen opportunities. It might engage a stakeholder in a fruitful, solution-oriented discussion and you might see things that weren’t obvious to you.
Alert your utilities. Same thought as the previous bullet point. There might be some payment plan options that you weren’t aware of. They might even be able to help you better understand how to reduce your agency’s usage and save money.
Alert creditors. Ditto . . . same as the last two thoughts.
Set priorities. Sometimes there are more accounts payable than there are accounts receivable. Right? Well, if and when this happens, it is probably smart to know what gets paid first.
Cancel unnecessary purchases/services. We all have things that we can live without (e.g. cable service, newspaper subscriptions, etc). Surely, the same is true for your agency. However, when we get used to things, we tend to forget that they aren’t essential. Engaging volunteers and an outside set of eyes might be a very valuable exercise for a non-profit executive director.
Consider refinancing. Restructuring loans and stretching payments over a longer period of time might free up some working capital during lean years.
Sell unnecessary items. Determining which assets are essential to the mission today versus what you might be sitting on for tomorrow (e.g. vacant land, old office furniture, etc), might create some working capital and make your cash flow situation a little easier.

Impressive . . . nice job United Way! Not only did you create a good resource for people in the unemployment line, but you also created a nice checklist for struggling non-profit agencies.

Of course, these are all temporary fixes because it is difficult to live forever with inadequate resources. Once these adjustments are made for survival, it is advisable to quickly pivot to engage your agency’s donors, board members, and volunteer supports in creating a resource development plan. This ensures that your focus isn’t just on managing what’s left and instead is on developing goals and strategies to secure the necessary funding and get back to a place where you’re thriving and mission-focused.

What additional tips would you add to the United Way’s punch list that I shared with you? Please scroll down and use the comment box below to share some best practices because we can all learn from each other.

Here’s to your health!

Kony 2012: How Viral Video Messaging Can Make an Impact

March 12, 2012 DonorDreams Mondays with Marissa, resource development, technology

Last Wednesday, I woke up to see the same video posted countless times on Facebook and Twitter. It was a 30 minute documentary about the leader of the Lords Resistance Army, Joseph Kony, and what he has done to the people of Uganda. This seemed strange to me because I can’t think of the last time I discussed the situation in Uganda with many of my friends. What was it that suddenly got a large number of people interested in what is happening on the other side of the world? So, I watched the video.

Video is a powerful medium that can be used to raise awareness about your mission. But how do you make a video that people want to share?

Make it personal

KONY 2012 starts off, talking about the world and how “humanity’s greatest desire is to belong and connect”.

Who cannot identify with that? We are all human. We all want to belong. In fact, the reason why I watched the video in the first place was because I wanted to belong to the community of people that knew what this video was about.

The movie continues with a home video from the birth of the director’s son. How much more personal can a person get? We all were born and some of you are parents. Because of that, this clip does wonders for connecting the audience to the cause and once the audience is connected. They are instantly more interested in what comes next.

How can you achieve this in your video? Go straight to the source. Talk to the people who are impacted by your organization. Show your audience how you make a difference in both your client’s life as well as for the community.

Make it special

There are a couple of key points in KONY 2012 where the narrator lets the audience know they are special. He states, “99% of the world doesn’t even know who Joseph Kony is”. He is letting you in on a secret; giving you information a lot of other people don’t have. People love to feel like they know something that someone else doesn’t. This works to the filmmaker’s advantage because a lot of people wanted to tell their secret after watching the video.

You might not have a mission that is as unique as stopping a Ugandan warlord, but you can define a unique problem that needs solving and tell people about it.

As a nonprofit staff person, it is easy to think that everyone knows about your mission and what you are trying to achieve because you personally live and breathe it every day. But what about those who don’t?

What specific part of your mission do you want them to focus on in order to become more interested in your organization? What don’t they already know?

Make it urgent (and give directions)

KONY 2012 is titled KONY 2012 for a reason. The organization behind the film, Invisible Children, wants Joseph Kony arrested by the end of this year. That’s not a lot of time. They want you to get involved now. Invisible Children has organized an action day in April of 2012, which creates even more urgency for your involvement. The film gives the audience four specific actions they can take to get involved now — one of which is very simply is to share the video.

People want to help. You just have to tell them how they can. In my exerperience, people are more willing to do something if they are given clear and easy instruction (e.g. “share this video”)

One more observation . . . KONY 2012 is 30 minutes long. At the time of writing this post, it has received over 71 million views on YouTube. This is incredible since most videos that go viral are under four minutes long. Take the time to tell your story to build your community. If you connect with your audience, they’ll be sure to stick around. More importantly, they will want to share it with others.

Hopefully, you find my observations about KONY 2012 helpful as your non-profit investigates online video as a way to extend your social media messaging. You might also want to check out YouTube’s Nonprofit Program.

Do you currently use videos in your social media messaging? If so, is it more for an awareness campaign or as a direct call for donations? What methods do you find to be the most successful? I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments!