Donor Acquisition ― Lessons Learned

One of the sessions I attended at the 2011 Bridge Conference was, “Donor Acquisition in the New Normal.”  The speakers shared ideas, methods and strategies on how they’ve created and/or maintained successful acquisition programs during the recession. Here are the highlights from one of the session speakers who was from The National Parks Conservation Association (NPCA). […]

Read the full article →

Path to Donor-Centric Copy

Whether writing to donors of your charity, members of your association, or any other supporter of your nonprofit … your marketing copy must be centered on the reader.  For simplicity in this post I’ll always refer to it as “donor-centric” copy. Before getting into the “how” let’s briefly cover the “why”: It’s essential to be […]

Read the full article →

Definition of small, medium or large nonprofit is …

UPDATE (9-15-11): Voting closed. Classifications established. I recommend you first read this post for the background. You’ll find the results of the poll in my September 15, 2011 post, “Votes Tallied. Classifications of Small Medium & Large Nonprofits Set.” Thanks again to all who participated!  [End of update.] The definition of a small nonprofit … a medium […]

Read the full article →

When Dogs Fly

Today’s post is a “feel good” story.  It’s about a charity, Pilots N Paws, and the 747 pets they helped match with new families after the tornado struck Joplin, Missouri this past spring. You’ll find the complete article, “Joplyn flies out of Joplin, lands new home” on AOPA Online. The Weather Channel’s Mike Bettes was […]

Read the full article →

Friendly Nonprofit Websites

Want visitors to have a good experience when they come to your nonprofit website?  And do you have a Facebook page?  Do you Tweet?  Do you have a YouTube channel?  Do you have donors between the ages of 18 and 90? If you answered “YES” to any of those questions then you need to have […]

Read the full article →

How NOT to do nonprofit email marketing

People need to know WHY you’re sending them an email. Is it to simply share a story of the great work donors and members are doing through their support of your nonprofit?  Is it to ask them to sign an electronic petition?  Is it to ask them to support your charity?  Or is it to ask […]

Read the full article →

Monthly Giving Tune-Up

That was the title of a session I attended last week at the Bridge Conference for nonprofits (co-hosted by the Washington DC chapters of AFP and DMA). One of the speakers was from St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital … Rachel Thomas.  She passed on a ton of useful information based on her experience in growing […]

Read the full article →

Nonprofit web design: The risky dominance of images

Once again I find myself in partial disagreement with the good folks at “Nonprofit 2.0.”  On Monday they published a post titled, 11 Nonprofit Websites Designed for the Social Web. I’m not in complete agreement that the 11 examples they cited are great examples to emulate. My primary concern is that these websites have too […]

Read the full article →

Do strangers receive more courtesy than your donors?

When someone opens the door for you … do you say thank you? When someone offers to let you go ahead of them in the check-out line … do you say thank you? When someone picks up a glove, set of keys, or a pen that you accidentally dropped on the ground … do you […]

Read the full article →

Test every link or else you risk trouble

When you create a newsletter, email, web page, text message, etc. make it a priority to test every hyperlink BEFORE publishing. No exceptions.  Period. Why is this imperative? 1 – Bad links frustrate readers.  Instead of getting the promised content, they end up on an “error page” or a page with the wrong content. 2 […]

Read the full article →

← Previous Entries

Next Entries →