Latest / We Are For Good Podcast - The Podcast for Nonprofits / 517. How to Future-Proof Your Fundraising with Social Media + Make Giving Seamless - Nick Black

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517. How to Future-Proof Your Fundraising with Social Media + Make Giving Seamless - Nick Black · We Are For Good Podcast - The Podcast for Nonprofits

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Hey, I'm John.
• 0:02
  Speaker 2: And I'm Becky.
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: And this is the we Are For Good podcast.
• 0:06
  Speaker 2: Nonprofits are faced with more challenges to accomplish their missions and the growing pressure to do more, raise more and be more for the causes that improve our world.
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: We're here to learn with you from some of the best in the industry, bringing the most innovative ideas, inspirational stories, all to create an impact uprising.
• 0:23
  Speaker 2: So welcome to the Good Community.
• 0:24
  Speaker 2: We're nonprofit professionals, philanthropists, world changers and rabbit fans who are striving to bring a little more goodness into the world.
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: So let's get started.
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: Becky, the enthusiasm's real right.
• 0:38
  Speaker 2: I love that you almost had to have a conversation with me before we got on to record to say don't talk about how much you've loved this organization for 30 minutes, because I would so pop the enthusiasm yeah, oh, my gosh.
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: I mean what an honor.
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: We are sitting here with just kind of a legend in the space, honestly, of somebody that's pouring into not just the nonprofit side but to the social impact side and that is unleashing and making that tech available to all.
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: So it is a huge honor to have Nick Black on the podcast.
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: If you don't know him, he's the founder and CEO of Good United, one of our really wonderful partners of the podcast, and also founder and vice chairman at Stop Soldier Suicide, and that's not a stranger to this podcast.
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: We just talked to Crystal Kark a few weeks ago, who is, like you know, kick an A and take in names.
• 1:19
  Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, what they're doing is amazing.
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: Can I just just 30 seconds.
• 1:24
  Speaker 3: Can I just give a?
• 1:25
  Speaker 2: little shout out to our Stop Soldier Suicide friends because they are so active in the community Crystal Morgan, ashley, claire Cameron.
• 1:33
  Speaker 2: There are more of you, but we are just so grateful for how you lean in.
• 1:36
  Speaker 2: It's so nice to meet you, nick.
• 1:38
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it's an actual pleasure.
• 1:38
  Speaker 3: It's nice to meet you as well.
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: Well, I mean, your bias is so good I got to give a little bit more.
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: Then we're going to hear your story, nick.
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: But I mean, let's talk about Good United If you haven't heard of it.
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: It's this tech company that created the first fundraising solution for social media.
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: Hello, they have already helped raise more than a billion dollars.
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: That's with a B for the nonprofits some of the most respected nonprofits across the country.
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: But Nick is this incredible innovator.
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: He's a leader at the intersection of business and social impact for over 10 years and the concept of Good United came through Nick's work, co-founding and leading Stop Soldier Suicide.
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: So here's the deal that grew from a startup to really a national leader in the veteran space.
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: You know that's a huge heartbeat of our podcast.
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: They now have over 100 full-time employees and they count on Good United for over 10 million in donations a year.
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: So this is just really a fascinating case study of how both sides are really pouring into their work together.
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: So Nick co-founded Stop Soldier Suicide, stemming from his experience leading paratroopers as a ranger qualified army officer with the 173rd Airborne during 27 months deployed to combat zones in Afghanistan.
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: Thank you, my friend, and so much respect for your service to our country and Nick lives in one of our favorite places.
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: It's on my road map to come see you in Charleston.
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: South.
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: Carolina.
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: Yeah, we're on our way with his wife, Amanda, and they have a 10-year-old daughter and 8-year-old son and two amazing dogs.
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: You got to share the dog's names because about the most epic names ever.
• 2:59
  Speaker 2: Yeah, we need to know that.
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: But Nick also has this incredible book coming out.
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: You know it ties into the trends that we're lifting this year, making generosity frictionless.
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: Of course, Nick is writing a book on the subject, called One Click to Give how to Future Proof your Fundraising with Social Media.
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: Nick, my goodness, my friends, so much going on.
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the podcast.
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: Thanks for joining us today.
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: Such an honor to have you.
• 3:19
  Speaker 3: Thanks for having me.
• 3:20
  Speaker 3: I need you to do my promo right.
• 3:22
  Speaker 3: I need you to do the prep for everything on board.
• 3:25
  Speaker 2: You got it.
• 3:25
  Speaker 2: Yeah, just tell us where to show up.
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: Happy to do it.
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: I hope that Julie was recording this so you can have it on hype.
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: I love that.
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: I want your playback.
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: So I mean, Nick, I shared truly just the top-level highlights of your path.
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: I wonder we love getting to know our guests just on a personal level.
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: Tell us a little bit about growing up, maybe some of the formative experiences that led you into this really impactful work you're pouring into today.
• 3:45
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I appreciate it.
• 3:47
  Speaker 3: I grew up in Africa and Europe.
• 3:48
  Speaker 3: Both my parents are an intelligence community.
• 3:50
  Speaker 3: I didn't know that until I was 15.
• 3:52
  Speaker 3: We moved back to the States for high school and you know, sitting around the kitchen table, we never talked about business or money or anything.
• 3:59
  Speaker 3: You know economics is about service.
• 4:01
  Speaker 3: My parents never had a bonus.
• 4:02
  Speaker 3: They never had anything other than service to their country.
• 4:05
  Speaker 3: So for me, my life is a series of things that essentially just pissed me off and I try to attack it.
• 4:12
  Speaker 3: So the first one for me was 9-11.
• 4:14
  Speaker 3: I was a senior in high school, about a mile away from the CIA, at Langley High School, and that was a moment where I decided that I want to do something about it.
• 4:22
  Speaker 3: So I went to undergrad at Johns Hopkins University in Maryland, did Army ROTC, played football and commissioned from there as a second lieutenant in the Army.
• 4:30
  Speaker 3: Nothing's ever come easy for me.
• 4:32
  Speaker 3: I usually start off last and everything that I do.
• 4:35
  Speaker 3: So it took me a while, but then I became a Ranger Qualified Officer.
• 4:39
  Speaker 3: I had the honor to lead paratroopers in combat for 27 months.
• 4:42
  Speaker 3: My first deployment was a 50-month deployment to Bob Tillman on the border of Pakistan.
• 4:46
  Speaker 3: Oh my gosh, you know, it was just so humbling and hindsight to see the men and women that you get to serve with.
• 4:52
  Speaker 3: And for me, you know, I got an email from the other founders other two founders to stop suicide.
• 4:59
  Speaker 3: All three of us went into military.
• 5:01
  Speaker 3: But that email is we lost more service than men and women and suicide than the enemy.
• 5:05
  Speaker 3: So you know, that was the second thing that really set me on a different direction and you know I decided to get out of the military.
• 5:12
  Speaker 3: I somehow got in the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill for grad school but along the way, knowing nothing about nonprofits I never think I'd ever be involved with a nonprofit came up with a brilliant decision to co-found a nonprofit.
• 5:25
  Speaker 3: And we were so creative that we were sitting around and saying, well, what the hell are we going to call this thing?
• 5:31
  Speaker 3: And they're saying, well, stop sort of suicide, let's make the logo an American flag.
• 5:36
  Speaker 3: That's the dumbest smart thing I've ever done.
• 5:38
  Speaker 3: And I thought people would be giving me free money because I thought, you know, millionaires would just hand out checks.
• 5:45
  Speaker 3: And I met with a billionaire and the gentleman wrote me a check for $100.
• 5:48
  Speaker 3: And I could not believe how difficult it was starting a nonprofit and growing it, and I can tell you that I started for profit.
• 5:56
  Speaker 3: There is nothing like starting a nonprofit.
• 5:58
  Speaker 3: That is the hardest thing that you can do and you know, in going through that experience I thought fundraising was way too hard and for me it made me.
• 6:07
  Speaker 3: We had a fundraising event and it was one of the you know, like the wine tastings, where you get to ask every single one of your friends to donate an item for the auction, like one of those deals, yeah yeah, we're in there.
• 6:17
  Speaker 3: One of my soldiers showed up and he was really struggling and he wrote check for $50.
• 6:20
  Speaker 3: And after the event I spent all my time reaching out to all the rich people.
• 6:25
  Speaker 3: He sent me an email and said hey, sir, did you get my gift?
• 6:29
  Speaker 3: I said I have no idea.
• 6:30
  Speaker 3: And it was that moment for me.
• 6:33
  Speaker 3: I was saying what would it be like if we could give the average person a meaningful experience?
• 6:36
  Speaker 3: And where he gave that gift was on social.
• 6:39
  Speaker 3: And I thought, well, why are we spending all this time, money and effort posting in a social community and engage with people that then have to pay to get them to leave to go to our website?
• 6:47
  Speaker 3: What would it be like if we can empower people to give where we're engaging with them?
• 6:52
  Speaker 3: And that's not to say you don't need a website, you do.
• 6:54
  Speaker 3: It's powerful, it's big.
• 6:55
  Speaker 3: But, man, I don't know about you all.
• 6:57
  Speaker 3: Where do you spend time?
• 6:58
  Speaker 3: And what we're seeing and we're really with the thesis behind Good United and the book and the conference is that I believe we're entering an age of hope and optimism.
• 7:05
  Speaker 3: So many people have this downward pessimism on what's happening for nonprofits and what I'm seeing in the social space.
• 7:13
  Speaker 3: I mean, who's got better content than nonprofits?
• 7:16
  Speaker 3: Who's telling better stories?
• 7:18
  Speaker 3: And what if we can engage with these people?
• 7:21
  Speaker 3: And they're new people, right?
• 7:22
  Speaker 3: That's one of the big pieces.
• 7:23
  Speaker 3: I can talk about this forever, but yeah, we had a cocktail party and someone came up to my wife and said what's the deal with Nick, which I guess people ask a lot?
• 7:30
  Speaker 3: And she just said you know, things happen and he attacks it.
• 7:34
  Speaker 3: And here I am, you know, working with incredible nonprofits and I'm really fortunate and glad, but it's been quite a journey.
• 7:41
  Speaker 2: I mean starting at the kitchen table with mom and dad just laying that foundation of it's bigger than us, it's bigger than anything else, but we have to be a part of the small change.
• 7:53
  Speaker 2: And to the tune of over a billion dollars raised on your platform, I cannot believe that Stop Soldier Suicide is yielding $10 million on social a year and it just makes me wanna say nonprofits, listen to this.
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: Please take some of this playbook and integrate it, because the way that we are engaging and I have to say that was such a powerful story, that of your time in nonprofit and it was a lot like mine in nonprofit and I was raised in this and just the mindset shift of hey, that $50 donor could be the lynchpin to everything, it could open up everything If we weren't just putting our attention on the people that everybody is hitting up.
• 8:38
  Speaker 2: And that's not to say I don't wanna diminish the major gift donor, because they are extremely powerful.
• 8:42
  Speaker 2: But, to your point, if we can really harness that story, that hope, that joy, that conviction that people have inside to want to do good, to want to be better, to want to get lit up, and that's to me is like the through line of your story is you didn't never get mad, you got active.
• 9:03
  Speaker 2: You know, and I think that that is like what a true founder has, and I just really respect your journey very much and what you see, and I wanna just talk to you about this next shift of giving that we're all feeling right now.
• 9:17
  Speaker 2: I want you to talk about from your periphery what are you and the team paying attention to?
• 9:22
  Speaker 2: What is that opportunity that is in front of nonprofits today that we are just not seizing?
• 9:29
  Speaker 3: Yeah, that's a great question.
• 9:29
  Speaker 3: The irony is, it's pretty obvious.
• 9:32
  Speaker 3: You know, why have we been posting to social pages for over a decade?
• 9:36
  Speaker 3: And I meet with organizations.
• 9:38
  Speaker 3: That's saying, man, if I give you a magic wand, what would you like?
• 9:43
  Speaker 3: They say, oh, we want new people Like really how many.
• 9:47
  Speaker 2: Anything you want how many?
• 9:47
  Speaker 3: people, 30,000.
• 9:48
  Speaker 3: We want 30,000 people for our house file to get engaged with the organization.
• 9:53
  Speaker 3: Saying what if I told you you had 150,000?
• 9:57
  Speaker 3: That's consuming your content and engaging with you.
• 10:00
  Speaker 3: Saying where it's like talk to your marketing team.
• 10:03
  Speaker 3: So for me, right, if we blow this whole thing down, I think it's really important to understand user behavior, and there's a rise in Delta happening, where we have huge technology giants that are pushing all of us to different areas of the internet, to different experiences, whether you're in Spotify or whether you're a TikTok or wherever that may be.
• 10:22
  Speaker 3: But our attention is being captured in these different networks and to me, it's just trying to follow e-commerce.
• 10:30
  Speaker 3: Where are people engaging?
• 10:31
  Speaker 3: Where are they buying?
• 10:32
  Speaker 3: That's where they should be giving.
• 10:33
  Speaker 3: So, like there's a great quote by Greski, right, go to where the puck's gonna be right.
• 10:38
  Speaker 3: It's just like talk to your kids, talk to your friends.
• 10:40
  Speaker 3: Where do you spend time?
• 10:41
  Speaker 3: Are you in Pinterest?
• 10:42
  Speaker 3: Well, how can we get creative?
• 10:43
  Speaker 3: And there's just so much opportunity to go to these different channels to understand your audience.
• 10:48
  Speaker 3: Who wants to support your organization?
• 10:50
  Speaker 3: Where are they?
• 10:50
  Speaker 3: And let's start to build that there.
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: I mean it's so good.
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: Nick, you're definitely in our head on what we see as trends in the space, because we talked about even that.
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: Joy is trending, media scales, impact.
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: It's like you've lifted that.
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: The stories that happen in our mission are like bomb to society right now when everything is so negative and so divisive and all of that.
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: And I think the traditional from Becky and I that spent all these years in non-profit social media was let's give the intern that project.
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: You know and you bring such a good way Like oh really.
• 11:25
  Speaker 3: I've never had to put on that.
• 11:26
  Speaker 3: I get board meetings.
• 11:27
  Speaker 3: It's just our railing.
• 11:28
  Speaker 3: The social media person come up with like impressions to stop, stop, stop, we're the money people, those are vanity metrics, right?
• 11:34
  Speaker 3: And he's like, hey, I get it.
• 11:35
  Speaker 3: And like we know it's a thing, we kept doing it Right and thank God, we kept doing it.
• 11:39
  Speaker 3: Well, I think, stop, I haven't done anything Right.
• 11:41
  Speaker 3: Let's be clear the team that stops for suicide has grown that community 750,000 people, wow.
• 11:47
  Speaker 3: And then, like there was this moment where we kept like, okay, well, let's do a race in, you know, in Eastern North Carolina, like how many people are going to show up?
• 11:54
  Speaker 3: 50?
• 11:54
  Speaker 3: And then the social media person is at the end of the table talking about half a million and they're like, well, why don't we go there?
• 12:00
  Speaker 3: You?
• 12:02
  Speaker 2: know like, and I'm sitting there like, wow, I'm an idiot.
• 12:04
  Speaker 3: You know, like why don't we just go?
• 12:05
  Speaker 3: Wow, you're doing a great job.
• 12:06
  Speaker 3: I never knew that.
• 12:07
  Speaker 3: Cool, let's actually tap into this incredible community that you're actively posting a building.
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: I mean it's just so cool.
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: Last year we called this, this trend, which is now just like a mantra around here.
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: So like marketing is mission, like you actually realize, like part of such a suicide is just starting a bigger conversation with hundreds of thousands of people on the daily basis.
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: So just really love that.
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: I mean we're talking a lot about activating the one as you grow your movements.
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: We talked to us about how nonprofits those of us that are in this work can establish personal connections really at scale to really activate and grow our movements.
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: How are you seeing this workout?
• 12:42
  Speaker 3: I think it's easy from a tech point of view to talk about scale, but I think the real scale starts with one to one conversations.
• 12:49
  Speaker 3: So if you can't have a one to one conversation to understand why people are engaging with you, then there's no hope of scale.
• 12:55
  Speaker 3: So what I talked to organizations saying like we can go one to many, but one to many is not going to go well if you can't do one to one.
• 13:02
  Speaker 3: And whether it's your, you know the local community group or just an individual that keeps showing up.
• 13:07
  Speaker 3: What do they want?
• 13:08
  Speaker 3: What do they do?
• 13:09
  Speaker 3: Do we understand them?
• 13:10
  Speaker 3: Are we taking the time to do the discovery, to really figure out why they're engaging with us?
• 13:14
  Speaker 3: Well, how many other people are like that and where are they?
• 13:17
  Speaker 3: And so, in trying to figure out, to understand that one to one communication, there's so much insight to be gained, how to start thinking about scale.
• 13:24
  Speaker 3: And there's a ton of technology out there and people talk about gender, they are chat you to be in these different things.
• 13:29
  Speaker 3: Well, it's to me, what's the point if you can't figure out as a human to really engage one person, then 10, then 100, can you do 100 really well, really well, honestly, 100 people, and it could be like if you just had a $50 donor and he built a relationship with 100 people, what would you learn?
• 13:45
  Speaker 3: How could you take that to a thousand?
• 13:47
  Speaker 3: So I think that scale actually starts right.
• 13:49
  Speaker 3: We want to skip the hard work you know and, like all the technology is just replicating your knowledge of who that person is right, that relationship, and I don't think that's something that you can skip.
• 13:59
  Speaker 3: So my advice would be there's all sorts of great technology out there but, man, it all starts with really doing the work to understand why people are engaged with you.
• 14:08
  Speaker 2: Thank you for saying that because, honestly, trend number two for this year is activate.
• 14:12
  Speaker 2: The one is gonna build the movement, and I get on my soapbox every time somebody gives me an opening to talk about this.
• 14:20
  Speaker 2: But the days of valuing donors based on what they're financially giving you are over.
• 14:27
  Speaker 2: We have to look at donor behavior, we have to look at those engagement signals and, I think, just flexing that tech and finding a way to just be an authentic, freaking human being when you talk to them and see them as a human being, asking about their family I saw this I mean, I just think there are ways to connect personally and so thank you for bringing that up and I just think that the good United I think the way stop-soldiers suicide has just done a brilliant job of like future-proofing fundraising with social media, and I love that we're like taking it to this 2.0 of this conversation, because I want you to talk to us about how nonprofits can really leverage social media, not just as like this additional channel, like because your board member told you we need to be on Twitter.
• 15:17
  Speaker 2: Yes, I still call it Twitter.
• 15:18
  Speaker 2: We need to be on X, we need to be on Facebook, you know, just because that is not a strategy, but how can they really flex it as a primary platform for fundraising and how can they future-proof that fundraising in the way that you just explained it, which is that personalization, that one-to-one, that one-plus-one equals 100?
• 15:39
  Speaker 2: Love your thoughts on this.
• 15:40
  Speaker 3: Yeah, sure.
• 15:41
  Speaker 3: So if you're starting net new and you haven't done social before, I'd really start to understand where is your audience?
• 15:45
  Speaker 3: Who do you most resonate with?
• 15:47
  Speaker 3: What's the path leads?
• 15:48
  Speaker 3: Assistance you can probably see demographic information of what social channels are out there, but I believe in the world of always doing less better.
• 15:56
  Speaker 2: So are you going to?
• 15:56
  Speaker 2: Are you?
• 15:57
  Speaker 3: going to hold everything going into Facebook.
• 16:00
  Speaker 3: Do you want to do TikTok?
• 16:01
  Speaker 3: Okay, whatever.
• 16:01
  Speaker 3: But like what is that channel for that?
• 16:03
  Speaker 3: Most organizations that I interact with have been posting and building community channels for a while.
• 16:08
  Speaker 3: You know, the first place to start, I think of your smaller organization is trying to monetize the existing work that you're already doing, and we think about monetizing the work, and you brought up something really profound.
• 16:19
  Speaker 3: One of the biggest drivers of revenue for Good United is someone that has no net worth, is a gentleman that got engaged with our cause and just shares every single post that we have.
• 16:28
  Speaker 3: He's just so passionate about the cause that he's probably moved hundreds of thousands of dollars for our benefit.
• 16:35
  Speaker 3: Because he engages, he tells his story.
• 16:38
  Speaker 3: It's not the stopster suicide story, it's his story.
• 16:40
  Speaker 3: So I think, starting with where you're already investing, where you're already posting, who are those champions?
• 16:46
  Speaker 3: I can speak a lot to Meta.
• 16:47
  Speaker 3: I can speak a lot to Facebook.
• 16:48
  Speaker 3: They'll tell you the people that are sharing your post.
• 16:50
  Speaker 3: How do you engage with them?
• 16:51
  Speaker 3: How do you leverage the technology available?
• 16:54
  Speaker 3: I would start with building a group.
• 16:56
  Speaker 3: So we know that Meta has deprioritized your post reach, but they've also prioritized group reach.
• 17:01
  Speaker 3: Have you been able to invite your top followers or fans into a specific group that you can cultivate that are going to see everything that you post to them.
• 17:08
  Speaker 3: So I would start there.
• 17:10
  Speaker 3: I'd also start with signing up for the Facebook giving tools.
• 17:14
  Speaker 3: That's free, it gives you ability to fundraise, it gives you ability to ask for donations, and if you're not doing it, then you're leaving money on the table.
• 17:21
  Speaker 3: But with that, using those tools for in-channel calls to action.
• 17:25
  Speaker 3: When I speak with organizations, I think generally most people agree that you want to keep people where they are, and I've yet to meet a nonprofit that has ever sent their web traffic to anywhere else other than the keeping on their website.
• 17:35
  Speaker 3: That's why we have wonderful software platforms that are out there to be able to harness that website traffic.
• 17:40
  Speaker 3: So why is it that we're okay with sending social traffic to the website?
• 17:44
  Speaker 3: If you want to keep people where they're at, then let's just make this simple.
• 17:48
  Speaker 3: I can tell you, if I put my stop-source suicide hat on, it makes me mental when we have to spend time, money and effort to post and build community in one place, then have to pay to send them to another, and so I think that to me is the future.
• 18:02
  Speaker 3: And the most powerful part and I think I'd love to get your thoughts on this is when we first started Goodie Night and we built the first fundraising software for social media.
• 18:12
  Speaker 3: The feedback that I got from nonprofit executives saying, nick, all you're doing is robbing Peter to pay Paul.
• 18:17
  Speaker 3: They say well, I've had seven concussions.
• 18:19
  Speaker 3: Explain to me what that means.
• 18:20
  Speaker 3: They're saying well, the people that would have given to us through our website were now given through social.
• 18:25
  Speaker 3: I said that's super interesting.
• 18:27
  Speaker 3: How would we prove that?
• 18:28
  Speaker 3: They're saying let's take the email addresses and the contacts, let's match them against ones we already have.
• 18:33
  Speaker 3: Over 95% of people that have given social are new, and my favorite question is what does that mean?
• 18:39
  Speaker 3: And to me that is the single, even for the largest organizations on the planet with tens of millions of email contacts.
• 18:47
  Speaker 3: For them it's over 90%.
• 18:49
  Speaker 3: They're new and to me that's hope, that's opportunity.
• 18:53
  Speaker 3: That, to me, underlines where we can go.
• 18:55
  Speaker 3: There isn't the client at Israel Giving.
• 18:58
  Speaker 3: There isn't the client of Americans being philanthropic.
• 19:00
  Speaker 3: They're just changing where they're at and the question to me is are we going to go to them or force them to where we want them to be?
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: I feel like you're calling out truth, that just when you say it it sounds so obvious.
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: But I think sometimes you need somebody to say the obvious, of like, of course you want to keep them in the channel.
• 19:16
  Speaker 3: It's taking me a decade, so don't worry.
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: But secondly, this is the power of growth mindset.
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: Those of us that grew up in the field, annual giving meant this thing.
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: Hello, you have this huge opportunity for acquisition that we're not even looking at it as a legitimate channel in most shops, and I think your point is so spot on that it's there.
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: It's just going to look different than it used to look, and actually the opportunity is greater probably than what it's ever been.
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: So those are two things that I'm just like.
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: Yes, keep preaching, nick.
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: Where are you going to go?
• 19:47
  Speaker 2: be Well and to your question about what does that 95% mean?
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: Right To me, nick, it means that if I'm not engaging with those people over there, I'm getting 5% of the pie.
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: And so when you think about meta, when you think, like there's over a billion people on Instagram, there's a quarter of a million people on Facebook, and I just think the diversification of where our revenue comes from, and not just the diversification but the way that we engage with them there and I think the behavior piece comes back to that, because it's like how are they?
• 20:27
  Speaker 2: Is somebody one of your Rebit fans?
• 20:29
  Speaker 2: Are they showing up and liking everything?
• 20:30
  Speaker 2: Is somebody sharing something to your friend in North Carolina?
• 20:35
  Speaker 2: You know, what are you doing?
• 20:36
  Speaker 2: To reach out to them, to stoke those flames, to steward that and tell them how much that means to you.
• 20:43
  Speaker 2: And just being seen like that in the world right now has a compounding effect to not just our connectivity to the mission but to our worth as individuals, as we're all chasing purpose, all chasing some sort of high to mute out this loud rhetoric we're hearing and it's like you are really doing it.
• 21:03
  Speaker 3: Becky is spot on, and you know my message to the nonprofit world and what I'd really like to put out there is hope and optimism, optimism, optimism, optimism.
• 21:12
  Speaker 3: And I've yet to meet a nonprofit that's not going to continue to post in the social.
• 21:17
  Speaker 3: And then, when I ask them why, there's a very awkward pause Longer than that right, and they say, well, because that's what we do.
• 21:28
  Speaker 3: And I say no, seriously, like why they say well, that's where we get engagement.
• 21:32
  Speaker 3: So why are you fighting yourself?
• 21:35
  Speaker 3: Then, like, why do I have to like, litigate this?
• 21:38
  Speaker 3: You know that 70% of America is on Facebook.
• 21:40
  Speaker 3: You know that they spent 30 minutes a day there, so, like, and you know that because you're posting and you're engaging.
• 21:45
  Speaker 3: So, like, let's just open.
• 21:48
  Speaker 3: You've already done the hard work, you're already sharing great stories, People are already engaging with you, and it's not just Facebook, right, think about LinkedIn.
• 21:56
  Speaker 3: I think LinkedIn is something on the roadmap for Good United, but holy smokes, the amount of people that I get that reach out to me trying to sell me something.
• 22:03
  Speaker 3: I've yet to have a nonprofit ever reach out to me.
• 22:05
  Speaker 3: Ask someone on your board or someone that you have that's in sales to show you sales navigator.
• 22:10
  Speaker 3: Sales navigator has at least 35 different like inputs and filters where I can search for someone that used to work in the army, that is a chief executor at a software company in Philadelphia and their name will pop up and saying wow.
• 22:26
  Speaker 3: Well, if you know who your donors are and who supports you, linkedin is maybe the best way to find local like audiences and start to build relationships at whatever scale that you want, but these people are spent, the whole point being there's so much opportunity to be had for nonprofits.
• 22:41
  Speaker 3: It's just we just have to see where people are and be okay with trying.
• 22:45
  Speaker 3: Trying instead of reaching out to someone LinkedIn saying can I send the email?
• 22:49
  Speaker 3: Talk to them in LinkedIn.
• 22:50
  Speaker 3: That's where they are.
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: I mean, nick, the fact that you can be a torchbearer of hope, you know, considering the lanes that you have had to, you know walk or you have chosen to walk in your life, like I mean, you just think it says so much and I thank you for the way you're showing up and giving us tons of like ideas and energy in this today.
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: So I want you to shine light on some examples.
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: I mean good, united works with some of the coolest organization Stop Soldier, suicide's, epic who are some orgs that are doing this engagement well and like what sets them apart?
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: What have you seen in terms of impact?
• 23:55
  Speaker 3: Yeah, there's, there's so many and we're very fortunate, and I'm very humbled, to be able to do a small part in service on incredible missions, and for me the mission is everything.
• 24:02
  Speaker 3: And you know there's a ton of organizations, a couple that come to mind One is the Michael J Fox Foundation.
• 24:09
  Speaker 3: They tell incredible stories to write Love on our Arms.
• 24:13
  Speaker 3: They're a.
• 24:14
  Speaker 3: You know, there's just like this new generation of nonprofits that are digital first, social first, and it's amazing to see right where they might not have the heavy infrastructure that one would think of a nonprofit.
• 24:26
  Speaker 3: I know Stop Suicide doesn't.
• 24:28
  Speaker 3: We're actually really good at social, so we're building a direct mail program, we're building a email program.
• 24:34
  Speaker 3: So these organizations are really figuring out how to tap into their community to be able to leverage the content that they have, the storytelling that they're doing to the world and allowing people to engage on their terms, to share things, to be able to post One of my favorite kind of use cases of Good United to Stop Suicide piece.
• 24:51
  Speaker 3: But we had, unfortunately, there was a post from the Veterans Affairs Administration, I think in November that said we've lost more service men.
• 24:59
  Speaker 3: We had, unfortunately, more people take their life year over year and the Stop Suicide team use Good United to ask people to share the post in Messenger and what that resulted into is kind of like a movie, right In real time.
• 25:13
  Speaker 3: We went from eight shares to 2,800.
• 25:15
  Speaker 3: In real time, the sharepiece just exploded, which gets to the point.
• 25:19
  Speaker 3: It's not all about money.
• 25:20
  Speaker 3: So if people are engaging with their content, then, holy, let's ask them to share a post, let's ask them their story and like these are the things that can happen.
• 25:30
  Speaker 3: So I think Michael J Fox to write Love in Our Arms are doing incredible things.
• 25:33
  Speaker 3: There's a small organization, one of my favorites, puppy Rescue Mission.
• 25:37
  Speaker 3: The NAO speaks for itself, but they get puppies from combat zones or bring them to America.
• 25:42
  Speaker 3: They're an entire volunteer organization.
• 25:45
  Speaker 3: They just posted a fundraising link on their About page through Good United on their Facebook page and they raised $1,000 the first month, just people clicking at the start of fundraiser.
• 25:54
  Speaker 3: So, like you know, they have, I think, over 300,000 people engaged with them.
• 25:58
  Speaker 3: But like, wow, look what you've done, look at the stories, you can raise money here, you can build community here you literally just got Puppy Rescue Mission a gift, because I'm obsessed with it.
• 26:08
  Speaker 3: I want to go make a gift.
• 26:11
  Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, Save dogs please.
• 26:12
  Speaker 3: I'm a terrible CEO.
• 26:13
  Speaker 3: Sometimes I see organizations like I'm hopping on the sales call and I warned them and the sales team hates it because I just I'm like I don't care what's happening, we're serving you Like, so like I'll pay you you have nothing, yes.
• 26:26
  Speaker 2: Yes, let us please raise money for you.
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: So I mean, nick, we are storytellers at heart too.
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: We love philanthropy.
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: I know we're in like-minded community with you.
• 26:33
  Speaker 1: You know we got to ask you for a story, a moment in philanthropy that stopped you in your tracks some point in your journey.
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: It could be big or small, but take us back Like what's a moment of philanthropy that has stuck with you.
• 26:45
  Speaker 3: We were very fortunate to stop soldier suicide.
• 26:47
  Speaker 3: We got an award from General Milley and the Department of Defense's nonprofit of the year and it was really neat where we got to go to the Pentagon and meet with General Milley who was the chairman of Joint Chiefs, and they gave us a tour and for me we got to go to the tomb of the unknown soldier and that in itself is unbelievably powerful.
• 27:06
  Speaker 3: But we got to go to the barracks for the honor guard.
• 27:09
  Speaker 3: It was an elite kind of calling where you do the funerals at Marlington.
• 27:14
  Speaker 3: You do, you walk the walk.
• 27:17
  Speaker 3: At the tomb of the unknown soldier.
• 27:18
  Speaker 3: We had people walking, no matter what rain, hurricane, whatever they're walking.
• 27:22
  Speaker 2: It's so powerful to witness it.
• 27:23
  Speaker 2: I encourage anybody to go if you haven't seen it before.
• 27:27
  Speaker 3: And one of the moments that really shaped my life was that we got to go down to the barracks and I was standing in the corner and, as only a 19-year-old private could do this, young man asked me hey, sir, congratulations.
• 27:41
  Speaker 3: It was really neat.
• 27:42
  Speaker 3: He's saying what's the name of your organization.
• 27:44
  Speaker 3: He said stop social suicide.
• 27:46
  Speaker 3: And a guy looked me dead in the eyes and he goes so when are you going to do that?
• 27:49
  Speaker 3: And it was this moment where I sat there and looked at him, I realized that stop social suicide, to that point, did not have a mission.
• 27:59
  Speaker 3: That was driving an outcome.
• 28:00
  Speaker 3: We were driving an output.
• 28:02
  Speaker 3: And I thought about it a lot and I said you know what, for this organization, it's no longer good enough to be a nonprofit and power cells on the back.
• 28:09
  Speaker 3: We have to be bold, we have to develop a mission set that's specific, measurable, attainable, realistic and time bound.
• 28:14
  Speaker 3: And it was that moment I called the other two co-founders and saying guys, we've got to change how we're thinking about this.
• 28:19
  Speaker 3: And we came up with the mission statement that we're going to reduce veteran suicide to the national average by 2030.
• 28:25
  Speaker 3: And with that, that night, in my hometown of Great Falls, virginia, there was a fundraising event and we usually brought in $15,000 to $18,000 from this fundraising event at the Old Brogage Pub, which is an awesome place you should go.
• 28:37
  Speaker 3: But that night I went off script, which I'm known to do, and talked about how we had failed to that point and that we haven't been prioritizing the thing.
• 28:45
  Speaker 3: And the thing was to accomplish the mission of reducing veteran suicide to the national average, and we did do everything we can to get there.
• 28:51
  Speaker 3: Instead of 15, we raised 55.
• 28:53
  Speaker 3: And I had a line of people standing up and saying you talking about your failures and having a big mission set.
• 29:01
  Speaker 3: I'm behind you.
• 29:02
  Speaker 3: So for me it was a moment right.
• 29:05
  Speaker 3: Well, the number one thing that I'll talk to nonprofits, the number one thing for me is your mission big enough?
• 29:09
  Speaker 3: Is it measurable?
• 29:10
  Speaker 3: There's a lot of people asking for money.
• 29:13
  Speaker 3: Are you asking for money or are you asking for an investment?
• 29:16
  Speaker 2: Nick, I like you so much, I like you.
• 29:19
  Speaker 3: How many people?
• 29:20
  Speaker 2: say that I, like you, I do, I do.
• 29:23
  Speaker 2: I felt like I was with you in that room and John we've talked about this so many times, you know and I channeled the Dan Pallotta all the time Is your vision and your mission so big and so ridiculous that it actually can be a beacon to people who want to come along and either eradicate that thing, reduce that thing or amplify that thing.
• 29:52
  Speaker 2: And if business is usual I mean we've talked about this this was our number one trend this year Business as usual is dead gone.
• 29:59
  Speaker 2: Right, we're facing the vulnerability, the authenticity People want to know.
• 30:06
  Speaker 2: They don't you know, they think they know the founder of Stop Soldier Suicide.
• 30:12
  Speaker 2: But right there, they saw Nick, they saw a human being, and it shifts when you get out of that mindset of here is our CEO on a pedestal and you actually shift to the humanity.
• 30:22
  Speaker 2: Guess what Community comes along with you because they see themselves as that.
• 30:28
  Speaker 2: They don't see themselves as a CEO, they see themselves as a part of the movement.
• 30:32
  Speaker 2: So I love the way you are living this life, I love the way you're running this business and I absolutely love that you're sharing all of the details and you're talking about.
• 30:41
  Speaker 2: You've written this freaking book, which is amazing.
• 30:44
  Speaker 2: We're going to make sure that it gets when it drops.
• 30:46
  Speaker 2: You all have access, but I anticipate you probably will give it a lot of way, because you want people to have this resource in their hand.
• 30:53
  Speaker 2: And I just feel the generosity of your spirit, Feel the hope for winding down this episode, and I have to ask you this final question, which is what is your one good thing?
• 31:04
  Speaker 2: We ask all of our guests this could you distill something, a piece of advice, maybe a life hack, something that you've learned, and give that to the community today?
• 31:15
  Speaker 3: For me.
• 31:15
  Speaker 3: I've never been very talented at anything, I don't have many physical or mental capacity, but the one thing I think I've been able to do as a person is and I think that for me, for whatever it's worth, the road less traveled means the world.
• 31:34
  Speaker 3: But I have Winston Churchill quotes all over my wall and I can read you a couple of them Success goes from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm.
• 31:42
  Speaker 3: 99.9% of what I do, I fail, and I think embracing failure is one of the keys to being successful, and that if you're not failing or not trying, and my guidance to you is that don't fail big, right, Fail small, and that's an art.
• 31:55
  Speaker 3: But you know and I have one that when I walk out my door and it's a military one, because I don't know how I'm going to win I just know I'm not going to lose.
• 32:02
  Speaker 3: So whether it's reducing veteran suicide and match hours by 2030 or democratizing a fundraising experience through Good United, there's going to be a million failures along the way, but you know I've embraced it and it's worth it.
• 32:14
  Speaker 3: So just keep going, Nick.
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: Black.
• 32:17
  Speaker 2: Good human status.
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah, really, this whole conversation just been such a beacon to the sector.
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: I mean, I'm just sitting here thinking I wish I would have had access to this type of conversation 15 years ago, as we kind of had starry eyes dreams in our nonprofits.
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: This is the kind of game changing perspective and mindsets to embrace.
• 32:36
  Speaker 1: So how can people connect with you?
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: I mean, you're a powerhouse on LinkedIn.
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: Tell us the ways to find you where you show up.
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: How can people engage with your content and Good United and everything else?
• 32:45
  Speaker 3: LinkedIn's probably the best and you know I'd love to chat with anyone that's interested and learned.
• 32:50
  Speaker 2: Nick, thank you so much for coming in.
• 32:52
  Speaker 3: Thank you all so much.
• 32:52
  Speaker 3: You're going to come back?
• 32:53
  Speaker 3: I can tell yes, ma'am.
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: Thanks so much for being here.
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: Friends, and you probably hear it in our voices, but we love connecting you with the most innovative people to help you achieve more for your mission than ever before.
• 33:06
  Speaker 2: We'd love for you to come join our good community.
• 33:08
  Speaker 2: It's free and you can think of it as the after party to each podcast episode.
• 33:12
  Speaker 2: Sign up today at weareforgoodcom.
• 33:14
  Speaker 2: Backslash hello.
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: And one more thing if you love what you heard today, would you mind leaving us a podcast rating and review?
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: It means the world to us and your support helps more people find this community.
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: Thanks so much, friends.
• 33:25
  Speaker 1: Can't wait to our next conversation.