Welcome to my personal blog on Robin Hood Marketing—the concept of stealing corporate savvy to sell just causes—and my life as a marketer, from Washington DC to Madagascar to points in between.
Watch reality fundraising TV at 1 ET today
Posted by katya on Wed, July 09, 2008
It had to happen sooner or later - reality TV for fundraisers.
This is a really fun idea that my frolleague Alia called to my attention:
Seattle, WA (PRWEB) July 9, 2008—On Wednesday July 9, 2008, interns from across the nation will assemble in The Borgen Project’s office and in 60-minutes try to raise as much money as possible through a live broadcast. Unlike a traditional closed-door fundraising session, this one will be viewed live via the Internet.
By mixing reality TV, Dialing-for-Dollars and Web 2.0, The Borgen Project is trying to make fundraising more interactive and informative.
“This is fairly groundbreaking,” said Clint Borgen, President of The Borgen Project. “As a donor, you can watch live via the Internet as you talk to a volunteer inside the boardroom.”
In addition to speaking with volunteers, donors can also chat with other supporters who are watching the live broadcast.
Through this live broadcast, The Borgen Project is aiming to break down the walls between donor and fundraiser by creating a relationship that is less intimidating and more interactive.
“Wednesday will be rough around the edges,” Borgen said. “But I think it will be a good starting point for a new fundraising method that nonprofits and political campaigns will begin to adopt.”
The live broadcast can be viewed at here on Wednesday, July 9, 2008 at 10 a.m. PST.
The Borgen Project is a campaign to bring U.S. political attention to severe poverty. The Seattle-based organization operates on a national level meeting with congressional leaders and mobilizing public support for poverty-reduction legislation. Learn more at http://www.borgenproject.org.
This is my July column for Fundraising Success. Special thanks to frolleague Kivi for her great advice. Check out more of it here. Take her course, even. You won’t be sorry - you’ll be a storyteller!
Most nonprofit newsletters are very boring. I subscribe to about 20 of them, and only one or two are interesting enough to regularly skim. Most are full of cookie cutter human interest stories that elicit little more than a yawn.
This got me thinking, is this sample representative? If so, yikes. Newsletters are an important way that we cultivate relationships with donors. If we’re generally dull and needy in those communications, our audience will lose interest. And that ultimately spells financial heartbreak for us.
So what’s a nonprofit to do? How do we take our newsletters from snoring to soaring?
Looking for an easy answer to this question, I decided to turn to punt. I picked up the phone and called an expert who focuses on this very problem. Why not let her do the work? And here’s what trainer, writer and newsletter guru Kivi Leroux Miller of Nonprofit Marketing Guide.com had to say. If you want more of her wisdom - look here.
Katya: Why are there no stories, or only milquetoast stories, in so many newsletters? What gives?
Kivi: Two reasons, I think. First, people are afraid that they can’t pull it off. When you say “storytelling,” most people envision either someone like Mark Twain or Toni Morrison or a wild-haired grandpa on a stage at some mountain storytelling festival spinning some yarn – someone with way more creative juices flowing. Or they simply don’t think they are good writers, and the thought of writing something that qualifies as a “story” is just too daunting. It doesn’t have to be that way. Nonprofits have tons of great stories. Finding material in the nonprofit sector is never a problem.
Katya: So fix this problem for us!
Kivi: You just need to learn some basic storytelling patterns. In the book “Made to Stick,” which I highly recommend, Chip Heath and Dan Heath identify three different types of inspirational stories: The Challenge Plot, the Creativity Plot, and the Connection Plot. All three have very basic elements and once you know what to listen for, you’ll start hearing bits and pieces of these stories all around you, every day. At that point, you simply have to ask a few questions to fill in the gaps and you’ve got great stories for your newsletters and other donor communications.
Katya: Errr… what’s a challenge plot?
Kivi: The Challenge Plot is your basic three–act structure that practically every Hollywood movie is based on. These are your classic underdog stories, against all odds stories. You start out by introducing the character and his situation and goals. Then in Act II, he faces obstacles and the tension mounts. Things might start to work out, but then it usually gets worse. Then in Act III, the action peaks, and the character finally triumphs over the obstacles.
Katya: Who’s the underdog? The nonprofit?
Kivi: No! Many nonprofits throw themselves into the middle of the story, but that’s not where they really belong. The nonprofit doesn’t come in until Act III and then just as a supporting actor in helping the main character overcome the obstacles. Many nonprofits want to make the story all about them or their staff, but with a few exceptions, the main character really needs to be a client, volunteer, donor, or someone else involved in or affected by your work. You want the reader to relate to the story, and that’s easier to do if it is about t someone who is not on your staff.
Katya: OK got it. And the creativity plot? That sounds juicy.
Kivi: Creativity stories are those with the “aha!” moments and those “what if we . . .” stories that work out in the end. For a good creativity plot, you need a well-understood problem and a standard response that just doesn’t work. Again, use the people around you – clients, volunteers, donors – to explain the problem and inadequate solution. Then you talk about the new approach that your nonprofit or someone affiliated with your nonprofit is trying, and test runs and theories are OK here. It doesn’t need to be a completely well-thought out and fully tested solution. Then you close with a vision of a new reality and how the original problem would be solved.
Katya: Who in the nonprofit world has aced a creativity plot?
Kivi: I love the Heifer International founder’s story. The founder, Dan West, was ladling out milk rations to hungry children when he thought, “These children don’t need a cup, they need a cow.” From there, the whole idea of providing livestock to poor families was born. The families not only get livestock to provide food and income for themselves, but when their cows or goats have babies, they pass them on to other families in need, continuing the cycle of lifting families out of hunger and poverty.
Katya: And last, the Connection Plot?
Kivi: This one is a little harder to pull off without sounding sappy or forced, but once again, with the right elements, it’s easy. These are the bridging the gap stories and big meaning in small events stories. Start with a small, specific situation or event and then look for the larger connection to the greater human experience. These stories usually have a little surprise or epiphany in them that really drives the point home. You’ll see connections between the people in the stories and also between the storyteller and the reader. Interplast’s blog has some great connection stories about the doctors who are correcting birth defects in developing nations.
Katya: Cool beans.
Like this? Check out more of Kivi’s stuff and her storytelling course - available ON DEMAND, no less - here.
There is a great piece in Advertising Age online today from Peter Francese, founder of American Demographics magazine (registration required to view the article). He writes about the changing face of consumers. Like me, they’re getting more wrinkly and set in their ways by the day.
Here are a couple of the highlights (warning: sweeping generalizations ahead), along with thoughts on the implications for us. You can read the full article here (with registration).
OLDER: A full 80% of the growth in US households in the next five years will be from those headed by people over age 55. Yep, that’s right—EIGHTY PERCENT. The average age of the US household is already only six months shy of 50. The first boomers hit 65 in less than three years. So what does that mean? The older set (65+), says Francese, tend to be risk adverse and inflexible in their attitudes. That means clever marketers will play to this world view with messaging about guarantees, safety and experience. Warranties, corporate history and testimonials work. So, nonprofit marketers, emphasize your organization’s storied history and great performance with these folks. Don’t be too cute or flashy. Meanwhile, the second fastest growing segment is folks 25-34 - a group that is increasingly diverse ethnically. The bigggest spending, best paid group—those 35 to 54 - is shrinking. Groan.
ALL OVER THE PLACE, IN EVERY SENSE OF THE EXPRESSION: As you read this, I suspect you’re having the reaction that I did - sheesh, how are you supposed to reach such different groups? It gets even more challenging when you consider geographic segments. The West is getting younger and more multicultural while the Northeast is getting older and whiter. (I told you there would be generalizations - this is demographics, after all.) The answer? Segmentation of course. You’re going to need different positioning for different audiences—AND different message delivery vehicles. The latter is actually good news - it’s easier to target your message when not everyone is getting your messages the same way and when people are clustered into certain locations. There are people who live online and on their phones, and there are folks who stick to the newspaper. You need to look not only at the age of your audiences, but also where and how they live so you know the best way to reach them. Fancy marketers call this ethnographic research. Throw that into your next convo to look extra smart.
Three things to do if you’re not feeling inspired:
1. Explain to a child what your organization does. This is a great creative jump-start if you have a hard time explaining the essence of your organization in your communications. Use what you said to the kid, it will be better than 90% of your messaging.
2. Find a person your organization helped and tell that person what an honor it was to do so. They conversation you have will remind you of the difference you’re making.
3. Imagine this is your last day of work and you only have a few hours to make a difference in some way. What would you do? Do it, even if you intend on working at your job forever.
Hands down, the best book on writing is Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird. If you have to do any writing in your job - or if you secretly believe you have the Great American Novel buried somewhere inside you - get this guide. I’ve read it three times, and I still come back to it when I hit a block. Buy it if you’re stuck or seeking inspiration.
This week, I’m sharing a few things that I find inspiring, and Anne Lamott’s advice on starting a writing project is very inspiring. Especially the part about ridding yourself of your inner critics, who get in the way of getting the words down.
Here’s what she says:
Almost all good writing begins with terrible first efforts. You need to start somewhere. Start by getting something—anything—down on paper. A friend of mine says that the first draft is the down draft—you just get it down. The second draft is the up draft—you fix it up. You try to say what you have to say more accurately. And the third draft is the dental draft, where you check every tooth, to see if it’s loose or cramped or decayed, or even, God help us, healthy.
What I’ve learned to do when I sit down to work on a shitty first draft is to quiet the voices in my head. First there’s the vinegar-lipped Reader Lady, who says primly, “Well, that’s not very interesting, is it?” And there’s the emaciated German male who writes these Orwellian memos detailing your thought crimes. And there are your parents, agonizing over your lack of loyalty and discretion; and there’s William Burroughs, dozing off or shooting up because he finds you as bold and articulate as a houseplant; and so on. And there are also the dogs: let’s not forget the dogs, the dogs in their pen who will surely hurtle and snarl their way out if you ever stop writing, because writing is, for some of us, the latch that keeps the door of the pen closed, keeps those crazy ravenous dogs contained.
Quieting these voices is at least half the battle I fight daily. But this is better than it used to be. It used to be 87 percent. Left to its own devices, my mind spends much of its time having conversations with people who aren’t there. I walk along defending myself to people, or exchanging repartee with them, or rationalizing my behavior, or seducing them with gossip, or pretending I’m on their TV talk show or whatever. I speed or run an aging yellow light or don’t come to a full stop, and one nanosecond later am explaining to imaginary cops exactly why I had to do what I did, or insisting that I did not in fact do it.
I happened to mention this to a hypnotist I saw many years ago, and he looked at me very nicely. At first I thought he was feeling around on the floor for the silent alarm button, but then he gave me the following exercise, which I still use to this day.
Close your eyes and get quiet for a minute, until the chatter starts up. Then isolate one of the voices and imagine the person speaking as a mouse. Pick it up by the tail and drop it into a mason jar. Then isolate another voice, pick it up by the tail, drop it in the jar. And so on. Drop in any high-maintenance parental units, drop in any contractors, lawyers, colleagues, children, anyone who is whining in your head. Then put the lid on, and watch all these mouse people clawing at the glass, jabbering away, trying to make you feel like shit because you won’t do what they want—won’t give them more money, won’t be more successful, won’t see them more often. Then imagine that there is a volume-control button on the bottle. Turn it all the way up for a minute, and listen to the stream of angry, neglected, guiltmongering voices. Then turn it all the way down and watch the frantic mice lunge at the glass, trying to get to you. Leave it down, and get back to your shitty first draft.
I was driving home tonight slightly grumpy because of the minor brush fires I felt I’d been extinguishing all day at the office. I had on All Things on Considered but was hardly listening. There was far too much noise in my mind as I reflected on the day. It’s summer, donors are on vacation, we’re maybe in a recession, gas prices are all anyone talks about, and business just seems tougher than usual. It’s all getting on my nerves.
And then I heard this woman speaking on the radio. And I listened to every word until I was in tears.
It was Kim Phuc, the woman from that horrible picture from the Vietnam War. She is in that iconic photograph running naked from a napalm-bombing attack near Saigon. She was telling her story for the series, This I Believe.
Kim Phuc told the story of watching her clothes burn from her body at age nine, the same age as the daughter I drove to sleepaway camp for the first time yesterday. She speaks of knowing in that minute that her life was changed, that she would be horribly scarred and different forever. She lived through 17 surgeries in 14 months. She talks of wanting to be a doctor but the government took her from school to make her a political symbol. She lost everything.
She says:
The anger inside me was like a hatred as high as a mountain. I hated my life. I hated all people who were normal because I was not normal. I really wanted to die many times.
Then she speaks of how she overcame that mountain with forgiveness. That is what she believes—she believes in forgiveness.
She said,
Napalm is very powerful but faith, forgiveness and love are much more powerful. We would not have war at all if everyone could learn how to live with true love, hope and forgiveness.
If that little girl in the picture can do it, ask yourself: Can you?
I have never felt more forgiving in my life. Or as inane for my worries when I got in the car. Or as grateful for extraordinary people that remind us that life is about such vastly bigger, simpler things.
I declare this week inspiration week. I feel we all need it right about now. Each day, I’ll try to share someone or something I find inspiring. And a good place to start is someone who inspires us to forgive ourselves and others.
Please take five minutes and listen to it here (you can read it, but click to listen to the recording to hear her voice - it’s the best way to experience this story). It is worth every last second of your time, particularly if you are feeling unforgiving. Or just grumpy. It will all go away when you listen to Kim Phuc.
This week, a couple of colleagues of mine were out at nonprofit and technology networking events and miraculously, each met someone who reads this blog. This was nice ego boost to be honest. Some days, as all bloggers and writers must feel at times, I’m not sure who is actually reading the stuff, if anyone. Whatever the traffic stats say, it’s hard to feel the audience when you can’t see them.
But about five seconds after my ego started to puff up, it promptly deflated.
“Hmmm, there are people out there reading and I haven’t posted since Monday,” I thought.
Followed by, “Gee, I hope the last few posts were decent.”
Then I asked my colleagues about the people who said they read the blog. Interesting, smart people working for worthy causes, natch.
Then I felt inspired. Because I started getting the vivid sense of audience I have when I speak to groups in person.
My little thought process caused me to reflect on the importance of keeping our audience in our minds when we engage with them. I don’t mean audience in the abstract. I mean a few representative, REAL human beings. When we’re writing a blog post, fundraising appeal, annual report, whatever—it really helps to think of it as a direct communication to Bob or Nancy or Andre, rather than a missive to a sea of faceless folks. It inspires us, motivates us, improves our work and enriches our tone.
When Network for Good started marketing our services to nonprofits, I wrote little biographies of made-up people that represented key audience segments. I had Technophobic Tina, for example, with details on where she lived and worked, the many hats she wore at her small nonprofit and the solutions she was seeking. Whenever I wrote up product information for people who weren’t of the geek ilk, I’d think of Tina. It really helped.
It’s sort of like the Stanislavski method for audience-based communications. There are whole books on the topic, especially in terms of how it relates to customer experience. But you don’t need any special expertise to do this. Just sketch out the profiles of a few people out there, hang them over your desk, and talk to them when you address your audience.
Burst Media noted that US Internet users ages 18 to 24 had a greater tendency to fully integrate green behavior into their daily lifestyles than did their older counterparts. Nearly 10% of respondents in that age group said they “completely” incorporated environmentalism into their lives. The group ages 25 to 34 ranked second-highest, at 6.3%, while other groups hovered in the 3% to 5% range.
It should be noted that the Burst survey categorized its responses according to the degree to which people adopted eco-friendly habits, and the vast majority of respondents across all age groups put themselves in the “somewhat” category—leaving open the possibility that different perceptions among respondents of “somewhat” and “completely” could color the survey findings.
A JupiterResearch study of US teen Internet users found that green teens, who are especially concerned about or committed to environmental causes, were noticeably more likely than other teens to engage in e-commerce, visit movie or mobile content Web sites, participate in chat rooms and use digital photo services.
This finding correlates greenness with overall engagement in new technologies and online social behavior. Any marketer seeking to connect with the teen audience should take note of the potentially powerful link between environmental sensitivity and a willingness to use online channels for e-commerce, social networking, and content consumption and sharing.
Despite this correlation between youth and environmental consciousness, other studies have noted that older Internet users are more likely to take specific measures to curtail their consumption of resources.
A Harris Interactive poll of US Internet users’ environmental activities found that mature respondents (ages 63 and older) were the most likely group to engage in energy reduction in their homes, purchase energy-efficient appliances, buy more locally grown food and break their bottled water habits. Further, in the first two of those categories, the second-most-active group was the baby boomer generation (ages 44 to 62).
A 2007 survey of the shopping behaviors of US baby boomers by AARP and Focalyst found that 70% of respondents—an estimated 40 million boomers—use their purchasing power to buy environmentally safe brands.
These “green boomers” are more demanding of quality in the products and services they buy, more attuned to advertising and more likely to exercise brand loyalty than other members of their generation, according to AARP and Focalyst.
“We anticipate that as time goes on, more and more boomer shoppers will simply expect brands to be eco-friendly,” said Heather Stern, director of marketing at Focalyst, in a statement. “Rather than this being a point of brand differentiation, it will be a price of entry.”
Here’s what I think:
1. Most people want to feel they are totally “green.”
2. Most people, as Seth Godin will tell you, are lazy and in a hurry.
3. Most people, therefore, are in practice “somewhat” green, whatever their self-perception. They do some things that are environmentally responsible as long as they aren’t too hard, inconvenient, time-consuming or expensive. (I am in this category.)
4. Young people are the most well-intentioned - but also lazy and in a hurry.
5. The marketers that succeed are those that make it very easy to be green, whatever your age.
Don’t be a Kermit the Frog, “it’s not easy being green” marketer. Make it easy to take action, to make the right choices, to support your organization. I know we need energy and time to be truly green, but most people are only somewhat green. We have to start somewhere with them. They’ll get greener one baby step at a time. After all, people want to feel green - there’s a demand - so meet it with easy, concrete actions that collectively may just make a difference.
Katya’s note: A few weeks ago, I got invited to a very cool party for cutting edge nonprofits in New York. (Can’t believe I made the guest list...) I couldn’t go, sadly, so I asked the organizers of the NY event to fill in me and my blog readers on their party via a guest post. Here is Jerri Chou of alldaybuffet with her report.
By Jerri Chou
If anyone needs to understand how to get things done, it’s those working on some of the most important social causes and issues of our day.
So recently, alldaybuffet, an organization that brings together the creative and social worlds, teamed up with Behance, a company that helps creative people be more productive, to throw an Internet Week event called Make Good Ideas Happen.
In an introduction to the world of creative productivity, three nonprofits—StartingBloc, City Year, and Sustainable South Bronx--presented themselves and their initiatives, inviting the creative community to provide ideas, action steps and contacts to help make their ideas happen.
And for one hot night, 250-300 creative and idealistic professionals showed up to the roof of the Delancey in New York where business cards flew, next steps filled white boards and engaging conversations flooded a tropical rooftop. In addition to generating contacts, strategies awareness, a rare level of communication between nonprofits and the creative community was a great productivity driver.
Mission statements came to life as City Year corps members explained what they do day-to-day and StartingBloc executives showed off the breadth of a network that reaches from London Business School to Goldman Sachs. Meanwhile, creatives filled the gaps in knowledge of these social leaders and put a face to everything from IA to brand planning.
At alldaybuffet we really feel (and it’s often proven by our initiatives) that one of the best ways to ensure next steps is to connect and learn about the people you’d like to be working with face-to-face.
You can pour over websites, brochures and PDFs, but when it comes down to it, you learn differently through dialogue. It’s the same reason a teacher is often more effective than a “How To” book. You can ask questions and dynamically fill in your gaps in information based on what you know, what you don’t, and where your interests lie.
That effort to understand is extremely important. One of the biggest confusions comes from lack of knowledge of how things work. Indesign what? XML who? Nonprofits, just like creatives need to make an effort to understand where each person is coming from, if you’re open, that understanding will come and will help you better understand what the next steps really are instead of dodging lingo.
Of course, while we can all learn a lot through dialogue, it also helps you understand what you don’t understand. Finding out what you don’t know, and either learning more about it or accepting that you can’t possibly make the time to will help you determine what resources you actually need and who you need to help you implement them.
How do you find those people? By building personal connections and, while we love the Internet, ala Internet Week, face-to-face meeting is still one of the best ways to make a direct, impactful and lasting connection. After all, we’re social creatures and as faces are one of the most familiar social tools, putting a name to a face is still one of the most powerful means of communicating. But more than any face book profile, engaging with someone allows you to read body language, see a person’s passion through expressions, ideas and gestures of another human being. It’s these human components that motivate people to act more than any email list.
Of course, if you’re going to be doing a large-scale project, you will need large scale help. Understanding exactly what someone can do, and a realistic idea of how much they can do is key to creating a long lasting relationship.
We look forward to seeing what the creative world can do to help and what more we can teach the social world about being more productive. If anything, we and the future depend on it.
I recently chatted with a roomful of nonprofit folks before giving a speech, and I heard the same things over and over:
1. Money is tight.
2. They feel a keen sense of competition for resources from other organizations. (No wonder, given more than 100 new nonprofits crop up every day)
3. They are anxious about the future.
So how do you stand out? How do you compete in that environment?
By focusing on your audience, NOT your competition. This is about reaching out to your audience better than anyone else. You must do a better job connecting with those people than your competition does.
We get into so much trouble imitating others organizations. Don’t waste energy worrying about another nonprofit’s website, event or corporate sponsor. Focus like a laser beam on pleasing your audience.
When you meet with corporate partners, stand out by impressing them with your ability to listen to them and by showing how you’re uniquely qualified to help them reach their business and philanthropic goals. It’s not about your needs, it’s about theirs.
When you reach out to supporters, stand out with your ability to connect to their interests and values - and with your gracious gratitude for their help.
That’s how you win - by focusing on the people you want to reach, not the organizations around you.
If you’d like to hear me field questions from Marc Pitman on his Ask Without Fear show tomorrow, check it out here. It’s at 11 am EST. I’ll be talking with Marc about how I stumbled (literally) into social marketing, trends in fundraising and my book.
The two essential, yet oft-forgotten, marketing questions
Posted by katya on Mon, June 16, 2008
There are two questions you should ask yourself before planning any kind of marketing or communication effort. I’m sure I’ve mentioned them here before, but they bear repeating. They are so often forgotten.
THE TWO QUESTIONS
1. Who is my audience?
2. What do I want them to do? (DO, not think - awareness is not a marketing goal)
The answers to these two questions are the first sentence to a marketing plan.
You must answer these two questions before you ask questions like: Should I blog? Brochure or flyer? Green or red? This message or that message?
When you know your audience and what you want them to do, the answers to all the tactical questions become clearer.
Jeremy Gregg at the Raiser’s Razor blog asked me to answer the following question: What drives your philanthropassion?
In other words, why have I, like you, chosen to be overworked and underpaid in the third sector?
Part of the answer for me is, I spent a number of years working as a journalist in very poor countries. And the poverty and pain I saw on a daily basis was hard to simply witness, over and over. So I stopped reporting and started working to remedy what I was seeing. (This is not to say journalism does not do much to contribute to the social good or to right wrongs - it does. I just wanted to be more involved in the story.)
So part of my motivation is based on need.
But the bigger part of it is based on change. I saw enough good when I was reporting that I also grew to believe there was hope in most situations. And that, ultimately, is the most motivating thing of all.
I started my book this way: We all have moments in life when we happen upon our calling, and mine was when I encountered a giant, smiling condom in Cambodia. I go on to tell the story of being inspired by the ground-breaking work of the nonprofit PSI to make AIDS prevention fun and hopeful (including via a giant condom balloon), to great success. I saw the good in the story and possibility in the future.
I think ultimately, what makes for the most powerful motivation (at least for me) is not how bad something is now but rather how much better it could be.
Posted by katya on Wed, July 09, 2008
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