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Revitalizing Nonprofits Through Broad-Based Community Support | Nonprofit411 · Nonprofit411 Podcast

• 0:00
  Hello and welcome to nonprofit 4 1 1, where we dive into resources and strategies that help nonprofits not just survive, but truly thrive.
• 0:08
  I'm Sarah Barton, your host and fundraising advocate.
• 0:11
  Each episode we bring you inspiring conversations with experts in fundraising, sustainability, and best practices to equip you with the tools and confidence you need to make a real impact.
• 0:23
  Hello and welcome to Nonprofit411.
• 0:25
  It's been a while since I met with you.
• 0:28
  I'm so excited to be back, and this year I'm going to be trying something different and I hope that you really enjoy it.
• 0:34
  I'm gonna be talking just a little bit about the things that I see in my work, and I wanna include you in on the conversations and.
• 0:42
  See how we can continue to impact the nonprofit sector.
• 0:46
  So when I started in fundraising, broad-based community support was kind of the default.
• 0:52
  It's the way that I was trained in fundraising and it was really the way that nonprofits interacted with the community.
• 0:59
  But today, we're watching support narrow for nonprofits, and I think a lot of it has to do with.
• 1:07
  Just a, a shift from that broad based community support concept.
• 1:12
  And so today I wanna talk a little bit about like, how do we move back that direction? I'm going to give some practical ways to rebuild that type of support, and I promise that you don't have to wait for the perfect plan to get started.
• 1:26
  If you know me, you know that I say practice is the key to everything.
• 1:30
  And so it's really about being intentional about practicing one or two of these activities and then keep practicing them till you get really good at them, and then you can add in a couple of more.
• 1:40
  But we start to see the shift as soon as we start to shift our focus and think about broad-based community support regularly.
• 1:49
  So first, let's define what we're talking about when I say broad-based community support.
• 1:54
  I don't mean just a lot of donors, I actually mean a lot of people connected in many ways with our organization and our mission and what we are doing in the community, it's about bringing new people in and helping them understand what we're doing as well as nurturing the relationships that we already have and strengthening those and helping those to become, those individuals to become part of who we are and what we are doing.
• 2:24
  It's really the difference between fundraising and just being in your community.
• 2:29
  So, you know, just because your organization is in your community doesn't mean that your community supports it.
• 2:35
  But when we think about broad-based community support, everybody in the.
• 2:40
  The community's excited about what you do.
• 2:42
  They know that your mission is so impactful, so important, and makes such a difference in your community that they want to support it, and they're talking about you and they're referring people to you.
• 2:54
  And so that's what broadbased community support means.
• 2:58
  So I wanna think about.
• 3:00
  The data and be realistic here and just, I don't wanna be basing this in, you know, something that's not reality.
• 3:07
  The reality is that people are less engaged.
• 3:11
  All of the data indicates it.
• 3:13
  The Fundraising Effectiveness Project, which is a phenomenal project that looks at giving for quarter by quarter in the United States, shows that donor counts were down last year, 4.5%.
• 3:27
  But what really is concerning is that the number of small donors, so those donors who give $1 to a hundred dollars has declined by 8.8%.
• 3:40
  Those small donors.
• 3:41
  Are kind of engaged to find out how well are we reaching out into the community and asking them to be involved.
• 3:48
  We are asking them at really low en engagement levels.
• 3:53
  Like we don't, we're not asking them to come on board and do everything with us.
• 3:58
  We're just asking them to get involved, and that's kind of how we measure it with that.
• 4:01
  Giving level between a dollar and a hundred dollars.
• 4:04
  So we are seeing some decline, and we're also seeing that retention is declining.
• 4:09
  So that means when people engage with us, they're not sticking around with us.
• 4:14
  And a lot of times we think that this has to do with the economy, but generosity over the century, if we look at over the century, shows that typically those donors do stay engaged.
• 4:28
  They do want you to continue.
• 4:30
  And we saw kind of that uptick during the pandemic of people wanting to support their local nonprofits.
• 4:37
  So we.
• 4:39
  We know that it's still there within the community, but we aren't tapping into it and we aren't bringing people into our work in the same ways that we have in the past.
• 4:50
  So the first thing that we have to do is we have to have a mind shift a mind shift.
• 4:55
  We have to stop saying that people aren't interested in giving and they're not interested in nonprofit work, and start thinking about how can we engage people in the work that we are doing.
• 5:07
  And then how can we practice things that are going to keep them engaged and want them, keep them wanting to come back to engage with us, right? So, the first thing that I think is really important for every nonprofit to do is to shift the mind thought about, you know.
• 5:25
  The gift size of a donor is what is important about their participation in our organization.
• 5:32
  We have to stop valuing people solely on the question, how much did they give? And start asking the question, how connected are they? You know, I want you to think about the different roles that people can play at your organization.
• 5:47
  Perhaps you had.
• 5:49
  You have the introducers who connect you to new people.
• 5:52
  You might have advocates who share your posts or share story shares who love to talk about something amazing that happened at your organization, or give their testimonial about how your organization impacted them.
• 6:08
  Sometimes you just have people who bring really vibrant energy to your organization.
• 6:14
  All of those people are really, really important.
• 6:17
  And so a lot of times when you start our fundraising, we start looking at like, who do we think can give money to our organization? But a better question is, who's connected with our organization and how can we engage them better? So here's your first assignment for the day.
• 6:33
  Think of 25 people who are connected to your organization right now.
• 6:38
  Regardless of whether or not they're your top donors, and try to identify what their skill is.
• 6:44
  Try to identify how they're connected to your organization, and I'm gonna give you a quick list of potential ways they might be connected.
• 6:52
  Perhaps they're an introducer, they're good at introducing or connecting you with people.
• 6:57
  I love to do that.
• 6:58
  I love to send introduction, email, introductions, so you know, that might be their skill.
• 7:02
  Maybe they're an advocate.
• 7:04
  Go onto your social media, see who's sharing your post, see who is tagging people in the comments.
• 7:11
  Those are some of your advocates.
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  They're trying to tell others about the work that you're doing.
• 7:16
  What about some volunteers who bring their friends, like they're excited about volunteering.
• 7:22
  Do you have any people like that who have been part of your organization? For just a little bit or for a really long time.
• 7:28
  Sometimes we overlook those people who have been doing it for a really long time and we become a little neglectful of valuing their gift to our organization.
• 7:38
  So make a list, 25 people identify, kind, what role they might play.
• 7:45
  And I will drop a list of potential roles people can play into the comments of the podcast so that it can give you some ideas.
• 7:55
  So, you know, we have to make that shift.
• 7:57
  Think about who's involved in our organization and then when we're looking at asking people to get involved in our organization.
• 8:05
  Look at these traits, like start to identify people when you meet them.
• 8:08
  Ooh, they're a really good connector, man.
• 8:11
  They're a great storyteller.
• 8:12
  I'd love to have them be part of our organization because they would bring something really amazing and then tell them, tell them what you see in them and how you see that they could be involved in your organization.
• 8:23
  That's a great way to invite new people into our organization.
• 8:26
  So.
• 8:28
  All right.
• 8:28
  So that's kind of like the first step.
• 8:30
  I think the second shift that we can make is moving from an idea of campaigns to an idea of relationship.
• 8:37
  Because campaigns end, but relationships with our organization shouldn't end.
• 8:43
  And so to sustain relationships, you really need to have two lanes of communication.
• 8:49
  You need to have like a public lane, that's your newsletters, your social media post.
• 8:55
  That might be.
• 8:56
  Printed materials, you know, those things invite people into the organization, but you also need to have kind of a personal lane, and this is where you're actually helping people be, feel seen and known and in the personal lane of communication.
• 9:12
  You know, think about calls or text or notes or emails that really create that sense of belonging with your organization.
• 9:21
  Something that you, you might wanna look at.
• 9:23
  Or implement at your organization might be the 48 hour rule.
• 9:28
  One of the organizations that I worked with had this rule.
• 9:31
  If you had, if you received a gift of any type, you would get a thank you sent within 48 hours of the gift, even if it's short.
• 9:39
  I've worked with lots of organizations.
• 9:40
  Some organizations, like as soon as they get the gift, they write out a thank you note and, then mail that immediately.
• 9:48
  One of my clients said that she keeps thank you notes in her car, so she always has the capacity to write thank you notes if she's waiting for her son.
• 9:56
  She writes thank you notes.
• 9:57
  If you know, she's been at an event as soon as she gets done with the event and she's remembering the people right, then she'll write.
• 10:04
  Thank you.
• 10:05
  That's a, that's a great idea.
• 10:07
  Another one is to think about how many no ask touches do you have in a month? Once a month, try to just send a short email to people with a photo, a quick win, or maybe a story that was really impactful.
• 10:24
  But don't ask for any money in that.
• 10:26
  You know, I like to put a PS maybe like if you, if you love this story and you wanna hear more about this, you know, email me back.
• 10:34
  But think about those No touch asks.
• 10:37
  And one of the challenges that I see a lot of nonprofits getting into is that they think it has to be really elaborate.
• 10:45
  The, in my experience, some of the most.
• 10:48
  Impactful and well, received emails are actually just a blank page with a little bit of context.
• 10:55
  Just like, maybe one paragraph.
• 10:57
  If I throw on a picture that's great or I throw on an attachment, that's great, but really it's like, Hey, I was thinking about you and I just wanted to send this to you.
• 11:07
  People open that it's meaningful for them, and that can be a simple practice for our organization.
• 11:14
  Another great activity that when I think about shifting into broad-based community engagement, you know, is the email that says, I thought of you.
• 11:25
  And it's just a genuine message that as somebody comes to mind, you send them an email and say, Hey, I saw this and I thought of you and I just wanted to let you see it too.
• 11:36
  So that could be.
• 11:37
  You're scrolling on Facebook and you see something and it reminds you of one of your donors, and you could pull that link and say, Hey, I thought of you when I saw this.
• 11:45
  Or you might just forward it to them on Facebook.
• 11:48
  Or perhaps something came across your email or you saw a report, you know, that you think one of your board members might.
• 11:56
  Just send it to them.
• 11:57
  It doesn't have to be elaborate.
• 11:58
  It can be like a Hey, I, I just wanted to let you know I was thinking of you.
• 12:02
  I know for the people that I'm connected with, those are really meaningful.
• 12:06
  And those are the ones that they often come back and say, Hey, when I got that, that was like perfectly timed right? And so we never know how that's gonna work on the other side, but those are some activities that you can do.
• 12:19
  So I think another mind shift that we might need to make when we think about broad-based community support is actually depending on our community when we have something going on.
• 12:35
  There is a new organization in our community called the Escape Ministries, and one of the things I absolutely love about them is when they need something, they just put out an appeal, a quick appeal that's like, Hey, we need volunteers to help us come unload this truck.
• 12:50
  Or, Hey, we're going to be doing this.
• 12:52
  Could you pray over us? So they're faith-based and so, you know, they'll ask people to pray over their event.
• 12:58
  It doesn't have to be really.
• 13:01
  Ornate and organized.
• 13:03
  It can be really simple.
• 13:05
  Hey, we need water for this event.
• 13:07
  If you could drop water off, we'd really appreciate it and start to look for those ways to share the responsibility of the work that you do with the community.
• 13:16
  When the community feels like they're helping out and they're making a big difference in the lives of others, they keep coming back to see if there's another opportunity to serve alongside you.
• 13:27
  That really helps share that burden of the work that we do.
• 13:31
  And I promise you, when you do this and somebody responds positively, you feel good.
• 13:38
  As the nonprofit professional, it really helps just reignite your belief in humanity and that the community cares about the thing that you're doing, that the community wants to be involved and see that problem solved.
• 13:52
  So if you're like me, you may be thinking all of those are great ideas, but how do I manage that? And as a solopreneur, I also struggle with this and it's something that I have to work at regularly to try to address.
• 14:07
  But I wanna tell you about a, a cool system that I started using this year.
• 14:12
  It's based off of a book called The Side Sidetracked Homemaker, executive or Home Executive.
• 14:19
  And.
• 14:21
  And it was created in the 1970s.
• 14:24
  And so it's a little old school, but I'm gonna tell you that I really love it.
• 14:27
  I'm gonna see, yeah, you can see unfortunately, can't see very well.
• 14:31
  I have a little filing cabinet f.
• 14:34
  Filing box and it's for index cards.
• 14:38
  And what, what you do with this is you sit down one day and just kind of graph out like what do you need to do every day? Perhaps it's like you need to check your thank yous and you need to reach out to one donor.
• 14:51
  And maybe you need to write a note about something that happened that day so you can start having a story log and.
• 14:58
  You put it on your card, you'll put that it's a, this is a daily activity and you'll write what it is, one activity per card, and you stick it in your box.
• 15:07
  And then you'll also wanna think about like, what do I need to do weekly? Maybe do you need to send two personal outreaches and plan your next batch communication and monthly you need to do a.
• 15:22
  A supporter spotlight, or you need to check in with one of your business partners, and you need to do that monthly.
• 15:28
  So at the top of your card, you'll write daily or weekly or monthly.
• 15:33
  And then you'll write what it supports.
• 15:36
  So maybe this is like a donor thank you or a donor touch, maybe it is an outreach activity.
• 15:43
  And you'll kind of write what that is.
• 15:45
  And then on the card you'll write the one activity that you need to do.
• 15:48
  So maybe it's send a thank you email to yesterday's donors and you'll put it in your box and then.
• 15:57
  Actually, you then have your box divided up by day.
• 16:01
  So you have like one through 31 listed, and you'll put your activities in daily, weekly, or monthly.
• 16:09
  And so each day you'll start with a stack of cards.
• 16:12
  I'm not sure I'm doing a great job of explaining this, but hopefully it comes across.
• 16:16
  You get your stack of cards of daily, weekly, or monthly activities, and then you do them and then you refile them wherever they would go.
• 16:24
  So if it's monthly, you'll refile it to the back of the box to the, so that the next month you'll be able to do that.
• 16:31
  So, if it's a daily activity, you'll file it into the front of the, the next day, and if it's weekly, you'll move it like seven days out.
• 16:41
  So anyway, what this does for me is it helps me be able to have a little visual reminder of what I need to do today so that I don't keep forgetting the activities that I'm supposed to do.
• 16:53
  If you're like me at the beginning of the year, a lot of times I'll write out my plans and I'll try to make them simple and doable, but I do forget them over time.
• 17:02
  The benefit of kind of keeping it in this little index box.
• 17:06
  Is that it's right there and I, while I may neglect it for a day or two, when I come back, it's so easy to know what I need to get caught up on because it's all in a stack of cards.
• 17:16
  And so I'll just pull my stack of cards and be like, oh, I need to send a thank you.
• 17:20
  I need to do an outreach and I need to plan our next.
• 17:25
  Blog or our next newsletter.
• 17:27
  So anyway, it's a great little idea if you wanna look it up, it's called the She Cleaning Method, and it's based on a cleaning method, but you'll be able to find an outline of how you do it.
• 17:38
  And so I hope that that's really challenge.
• 17:40
  I hope that that's really helpful.
• 17:42
  Sorry, not a challenge.
• 17:43
  I hope that that's really helpful as you.
• 17:46
  Think about a way to keep on top of things, because it's definitely a challenge for me, and I'm sure it's a challenge for you as a busy nonprofit professional.
• 17:57
  I just wanna close that, you know.
• 18:00
  I want us all to be thinking about fundraising under this new light of broad-based community support.
• 18:07
  It, it's something that has worked for generations in the nonprofit community, and when you can think about your supporters and support in this way, it helps broaden.
• 18:21
  Who we're asking and how we're asking them.
• 18:23
  And it will start to broaden who engages with your organization.
• 18:29
  And the goal is to hopefully move this metric so that next year we don't see that we've had a decline in even our small donors.
• 18:37
  But actually we're starting to grow back our supporter base and we're finding great ways to do that.
• 18:44
  So.
• 18:46
  For a challenge this week.
• 18:47
  I know I've given you lots of great ideas, but I'd love for you to try the 10 Connections and 10 Days Challenge.
• 18:53
  In the next 10 days, try to send five.
• 18:55
  Thank you, thank yous to someone on your contact list or in your donor base.
• 19:02
  If you have a CRM, someone in the CRM send a meaningful thank you.
• 19:06
  It could be a voice memo, it could be an email, it could be a written card, however you choose to send it is fine, but try to send five thank yous in the next 10 days and then do three check-ins.
• 19:18
  Don't ask for any money, but just try to check in with someone who has supported you and supported you well, you know, maybe it's a phone call.
• 19:26
  If you need ideas on how to make a great phone call, look up Kel Haney on LinkedIn.
• 19:31
  I'll make sure to link her in the, the notes below.
• 19:34
  But she has lots of information about how you can make a simple phone call to one of your supporters and it be a meaningful conversation.
• 19:43
  You could also send an email or do one of the, Hey, I was thinking of you, and find something meaningful to send to someone by email.
• 19:51
  And then.
• 19:52
  Try to do two introductions.
• 19:54
  Ask someone to introduce you to someone they know.
• 19:56
  Maybe it's a board member to somebody that they know.
• 19:59
  Or introduce yourself to do two new people and tell 'em about your organization.
• 20:03
  If you do that, that'll be 10 great connections in the next 10 days, and you'll definitely feel the difference and your community will too.
• 20:11
  So thanks for listening to nonprofit 4 1 1.
• 20:13
  I hope this has been beneficial.
• 20:15
  I look forward to continuing to support you in the new year.
• 20:19
  Have a great week.
• 20:20
  Bye.
• 20:21
  Thank you so much for tuning into this episode of Nonprofit 4 1 1.
• 20:25
  I hope you found today's conversation as insightful and inspiring as I did.
• 20:29
  Remember, building a healthy nonprofit requires a holistic approach.
• 20:33
  There are many resources available to support your staff, and we're dedicated to helping your organization access what it needs to thrive.
• 20:40
  One key to creating a thriving organization is a diverse fundraising strategy.
• 20:45
  While grants are an important part of that strategy, they're just one piece of the overall puzzle.
• 20:50
  If you're looking to strengthen your grant writing skills as part of this bigger picture, I've got a resource to help you get started.
• 20:56
  Download my free grant writing guide, packed with practical tips and best practices to help you craft proposals that align with your overall fundraising goals.
• 21:05
  You'll find the link in the show notes, and as always, if you enjoyed today's episode, please subscribe, leave a review, and share it with your fellow change makers.
• 21:13
  Let's work together to build a vibrant nonprofit community.
• 21:16
  Until next time, keep pushing forward in making a difference.