Easy As Pie

I was very impressed last night by the talk I heard at the Directors of Volunteer Administration meeting by Community Servings' CEO, David Waters. The subject of the meeting was corporate partnerships. Community Servings is a not-for-profit food and nutrition program providing services throughout Massachusetts to individuals and families living with critical and chronic illnesses. Around Thanksgiving every year they sell a whole lot of pies to raise funds for their programs. The program is so successful that it even has it’s own web page pieinthesky.org. Part of what makes it so successful is the partnership with Coldwell Banker.

The evolution of the program is pretty interesting and I’m going to do my best to paraphrase David. Back in the beginning of the program, Community Servings was looking to for a partner to help sell pies. The best source of skilled salespeople they could think of were Realtors. So, they approached three Boston-area realty businesses and convinced them to compete over who could sell the most pies. We all know that salespeople are competitive by nature. But the real draw of this program for the Realtors was the opportunity for a great conversation starter with new prospects and the ability to bring people into their offices to pick up the pies and further build relationships. Over time, the three businesses merged into one as part of Coldwell Banker and not only do they continue the pie sales, they throw in additional cash donations from the company as part of the project.

Sweet deal, huh? This is a great story and a great partnership because everybody gets a piece of the pie. Community Servings sells a lot more pies and raises a lot more funds than they could on their own. Coldwell Banker gets to build relationships and goodwill with potential clients. Corporate-Nonprofit partnerships have benefits and costs to both parties. The key is to make sure the benefits far out way the costs for everyone involved.

Thank You

Doesn’t that feel good? “Thank you” are two words most of us don’t hear often enough. I read a lot about the importance of thanking donors in a fundraising context. And, there’s been a lot written about rewarding and motivating volunteers. What about advocacy? This note from a friend of mine got me thinking …

“(I was) reading yet another newsletter from some random 'green' organization urging me to walk more, take the bus, change my light bulbs, insulate my house, etc., when I've already done or are doing much of that. Nowhere did it say 'thank you.'”

When it comes to changing behavior, we are often so passionate about our mission and so anxious to give advice that we don’t take the time to say thanks. In order to spur action, we often lean heavily on creating a sense of urgency. But, it’s easy to go too far and create a sense of guilt or overwhelm that results in inaction.

Chances are anyone who is interested in your mission is already taking some sort of action. Even the act of reading what you write is worthy of thanks. Thanking donors is generally accepted as a good way to motivate them to give more money. Likewise, wouldn’t thanking advocates motivate them to do even more? Get creative about ways that your supporters can take credit for what they’re already doing and be motivated to do more. If the same creativity that goes into thanking and recognizing monetary donors went toward letter writers or recyclers we might see change happen more rapidly.

Thanks for listening.

“If you can’t tweet what you do, the problem is not Twitter.”

That quote was delivered by Allison Fine last night at a presentation by Fine and Beth Kanter about their new book The Networked Nonprofit.

Her point was that nonprofits should keep it simple. Don’t try to be everything to everyone. Concentrate on what you do best and partner for the rest.

I had occasion to quote her at today’s Marketers Making a Difference meeting. Our featured nonprofit had been telling us about themselves for about 15 minutes and we still didn’t know what they did. So we spent the rest of our time helping them craft a new mission statement.

By the end of the meeting they had a vastly improved one-sentence mission statement and a short list of key concepts to flush it out. They were thrilled with the progress but also frustrated that they were still struggling with how to describe themselves after a year of working on it.

Sometimes a group of strangers can be better at describing what you do than you are (especially if they’re all marketers). Still, speaking with your target market is even better. I suggested they continue to refine the mission statement until they were comfortable with it and then run it by a few teachers (their target market).

The truth is, short and simple is not always easy and it takes time and effort. Can you tweet what you do?

I Love to Count

It’s not surprising that in tough economic times performance measurement has become a hot topic.

From a donor’s perspective, there are few tools available to evaluate the best use of their charitable dollars. The most widely used rating agencies – Charity Navigator and the BBB Wise Giving Alliance – rely heavily on measures like “overhead” to rate a nonprofits effectiveness.

Don’t get me started on “overhead.” Plenty of other people have made the case against this short-sighted perspective, so I don’t need to rant about it here. For example, see this article by Katya Andresen, about the commotion at this year’s DMA Nonprofit Federation meeting.

From a nonprofit manager’s perspective, we often feel so stretched for time and money that performance measures seem like a great idea that we’ll get to some day. Many of us also have an inherent distrust of statistics (damn lies and statistics). We sometimes prefer “touchy feely” measures or rely on “experience” to guide decision making.

From Andrew Wolk’s perspective, performance measurement is critical. Wolk is the founder of Root Cause, a nonprofit research and consulting firm. Yesterday at an event titled “Learning from Performance Measurement, Investing in What Works” he made the case that in an environment of limited resources and urgent social issues, we must concentrate investments on solutions that have the greatest impact. In order to do that, we need reliable performance measures. But, these measures are not just to guide decision-making for outside investors; they are also a management tool for continuous improvement and sharing best practices.

Paul Carttar, Director, Social Innovation Fund, Corporation for National and Community Service was also there. He shared that while government cannot take the lead in innovation, it can take a leadership role in identifying innovation, and performance measurement is key to that process. Simply by changing the way government funders like the SIF measure performance, they can have a ripple effect on the nonprofit sector. Carttar strongly urged private funders to demand performance measures to guide their philanthropic investments as well.

From a marketer’s standpoint, I advise caution. There is plenty of research that shows you can raise more money with one compelling story than with statistics. As much as we like to think we are rational beings, people make decisions for emotional reasons.

So, if you believe in performance measurement, do you share your results with donors? You absolutely should use data to make decisions. And you absolutely should make performance data available to all your stakeholders. Your annual report, website, and even your grant proposals are excellent places for this data. You might not want to build a fundraising campaign around it. But, don’t take my word for it. Test it yourself. Part of that data you are collecting should include message testing for your appeals.

Root Cause provides plenty of resources for building a performance measurement system on its website.
To hear Wolk & Carttar’s comments for yourself, here is also a podcast of yesterday’s discussion.

Happy counting.

What's on Your Backside?

This may be a little off topic, but it's on my mind because I just ordered business cards. Business cards used to be simple things that conveyed contact information. Now, like a lot of things, they have gotten fancier and fancier as individuals try to stand out from the crowd. As a result, many people choose to put content on the back of the card. I always find this annoying because I like to make notes on the back of cards I receive. Today, among other things, I was offered the opportunity to add a calendar to the back of the card. The print is so small I'm not sure how it helps me or the recipient.

The one thing I did add to the back of my cards was the recycle symbol. Recycled content seems far too hard to find, but that's a rant for another day. The point is, it's important for me to reflect my values in everything I do. That's how you build a brand - consistency and congruity.

Years ago I interviewed with an environmentally-focused organization and I asked why their glossy annual report wasn't printed on recycled paper. It was, they just weren't taking credit for it! Whether you have an environmental mission or not, your constituents will be turning you over and looking at all your decisions - from purchasing to your HR policies and more. Make sure your backside is covered.

Piling On

I’m a little strange. I collect fundraising solicitations. What’s even stranger is I open every envelop I receive. That makes me really rare. Here is a photo of the pile of direct mail I received in 2009.



On the left are “friends” and the right are “strangers” with a number ten envelop in front for scale. I use the term “friend” broadly. The friend pile includes the five hospitals where I have received care in Massachusetts, the two universities where I earned degrees, three organizations where I have applied for jobs, a few organizations where I have volunteered, and even a few to whom I have previously given a donation.

What’s the point? If you are going to send a direct mail solicitation, you need to keep in mind that you’re letter will be added to this pile. What will you do to make sure it gets opened? Read? Responded to?