Marketing & Communication

The communications strategy advice above sounds logical and well thought out. For the small non-profit that is in the transition from "entrepreneurial" to "organizational" and faces resource constraints as well, however, it can come across as somewhat overwhelming. Such an organization very likely is going through development processes in a number of different areas at once-board, organization, controls, structure, fundraising, etc. It would be helpful to get some additional perspective on "first steps" on a communication strategy for a younger organization that is resource constrained and is not necessarily in a position to embark on a holistic change all at once.

We now do an online newsletter - very simple one done exclusively by one person. We're just beginning to discuss a quarterly newsletter in paper as a group project, which will demand more commitment from the community.  How do we decide what's realistic for us to attempt?  Writers of our group are interested in this, but at many stages of expertise, and all with busy lives.

Gladys Tiffany, OMNI Center for Peace, Justice & Ecology, Fayetteville, Arkansas USA

I was interested in your 15 top tips.  I think another one could be "differentiate yourself from the others".  Like most of us, I am deluged with newsletters by post and electronically - I tend to actually open the ones that have a clear message (they do what they say on the tin) and that don't take too much time!

I'm producing a 2 page quarterly newsletter for social enterprises and support organisations in Essex (UK), and we've deliberately made it fairly low tech, and we're also posting it as well as emailing it.  It's just a perception, but I think people are more likely to read something they have in their hand, than something on a screen, or which they have to print.  What do others find?

Gladys - I think you're best starting small.  It's better to be telling people "sorry, we'll put it in next time" than be frantically begging for stories with 12 pages to fill by tomorrow.  You can always expand later.

More generally, I'd be interested in looking at other's bulletins or newsletters, if only to steal ideas - is there any way of hosting some on "social edge" as a kind of exhibition? I've attached ours here.

I am pleased to see this topic being discussed on Social Edge! In our small, jack-of-all-trades office, all of us wear many hats, so one of my duties is creating our monthly newsletter. I imagine ours might seem a bit long--it averages 5 to 6 pages. That's because we currently have 5 field programs--called "Campus Kitchens"--each of which submits at least one feature story each month. Add to that our national news and partnerships and it gets a bit lengthy. But we've gotten great response from our readers, and I've found it serves as a great tool to reconnect with people and rekindle interest in what we do. I often hear from people who've fallen out of the loop a day or two after we send out our latest newsletter.

I've got one question to start off with, although I am sure I will have more:

I'm interested in this "message from your leader" idea. Our newsletter comes out each and every month, so I worry a bit about things becoming too personality-focused with the same person speaking each month. Is there a way to put a twist on it--perhaps a "message from our leaders" section with a different leader (our field staff, volunteers, etc) within our organization? I'd be interested to hear thoughts on this idea.

Andy, thanks for posting your newsletter. I'm going to do the same, as well as provide a link to the page on our website where our past newsletters (pdfs) are archived. Al--thanks for the tip--we're going to ask one of our interns to index the contents of each newsletter. I also like the "In this issue" idea and will give that a shot for next month.

http://www.campuskitchens.org/newsletters.html

Best,

Jessica

One of the most traditional methods of fundraising, special events have always been part of organizations' repertoire to raise money, build a constituency and increase their visibility. We have all been to terrific fundraisers that accomplish all of the above. But there are also terrible failures. Here are some of the factors to consider in trying to design a special event that will reflect well on your organization.

1. What is the primary purpose of the event?

If it is to raise money, decide on the amount you intend to raise in advance. This may sound obvious, but many organizations throw an event just hoping for the best. And many times, the costs exceed the intake.

Approach everyone who might be willing to underwrite the event. This is a good opportunity for corporate sponsor visibility as well as for high net worth donors who have been waiting to "autograph" an event.

2. Think carefully about the best way to meet that fundraising goal.

If you are a small organization without a lot of resources, would you be better off "piggybacking" on a previously planned event, like a concert wherein the performers agree to donate a portion of the profits to your cause or organization, or an art exhibit where artists likewise donate proceeds from their sales? This involves minimal financial outlay on your part for maximum reward.

3. Staffing.

If you are embarking on an ambitious event--a large fundraising dinner/dance, for instance, assess whether your staff can handle the planning and execution without becoming derailed from their other responsibilities. Many organization opt to outsource the event planning for this reason. When staff and Board are already overtaxed, or do not know how to execute a successful event, you may be better off hiring an event planner. A successful event is seamlessly and perfectly executed.

4. Secondary reasons for the event.

For many organizations, raising money is not the only reason for a special event. Highlighting the organization's cause or mission, attracting publicity and "rewarding" or attracting donors may be other motivations. It is worth carefully thinking through whether all of your motives can be satisfied in a single event. For instance, an exclusive donors circle may not take kindly to being exposed to publicity, or mixing with the general public. Conscientiously consider whether the design of your event matches the nature of those it is serving.

5. Tone.

This follows from point #4. Who is your constituency? Do you want to through a bash in the ballroom at the Waldorf-Astoria, or would your constituent donors be offended by such indulgence, and prefer a weekend retreat in the Redwoods? Depending on your cause, consider political etiquette in your choices and planning. An organization that rescues sled dogs will most likely prefer a very different event from an organization that promotes inner city art. Plan in keeping with your constituency and their psychology.

6. Creativity.

A Manhattan philanthropist once told me that he would pay good money to organizations NOT to have to attend any more charitable events.

Consider that most donors and philanthropists give to multiple causes.

It is a good idea to try not to bore them. An internet auction is inexpensive and profit making. A short cocktail hour at an exclusive address beats a long dinner in an expensive venue. Travel has become an increasingly popular way for some organizations who work overseas to show off their work, engage donors, and raise money. Be open to suggestions from your board, your staff, and your constituents. Be outrageous when you brainstorm. It's fun and you can always rein in your ideas later.

7. Track record.

When you stage an event, you are creating an energetic field for your guests to share. Be attentive to the spirit and energy you infuse that field with, for you want people leaving your event to come back for more. Repeat annual events are one of the best ways to engender your constituents' loyalty. It is easier to remember and look forward to an event that happens with annual regularity. To ensure a positive spirit, be authentically appreciative of everyone taking part in the event: staff, guests, celebrities, etc. People will remember how they felt during the event more than what happened.

8. Asking for money.

If your event does not lend itself to prepaid reservations, and you plan on asking for money during the event, design a time during the evening for your guests to take our their checkbooks all together to write their checks. This will encourage check writing, as no one wants to sit inactive as everyone around them is brandishing their pens. If possible, collect and count the checks before the end of the event and tell guests what you have been able to raise. They deserve a pat on the back and to feel proud and excited about what they have made possible.

9. Hearing it from the horse's mouth.

If your organization benefits youth, minorities, disadvantaged or other populations, let them speak! They are much more likely to move the audience than a staff member or principal of the organization. Try to mix up styles and media of presentations so as not to bore...slice a video clip in with a testimonial, in with a game, with a celebrity appearance.

10. The Unexpected.

The road of planning an event is rarely smooth. Take contingencies in stride and with good humor, if you can. Mess-ups can pave the way for greater bonding if handled right. Remember that the point is to come together with others to enjoy one another and focus on a great cause!

Questions for you to answer:

• What kind of special event might work for your organization?
• Do you have any special resources or restrictions you should consider?
• What was the most fun or rewarding special event you've ever attended?

What are other factors affecting an event's design or execution that have not been mentioned above?

I look forward to hearing from you!

Hi Dominique,

Thanks for hosting this!

There are philanthropists here in Silicon Valley, too, who have told me they would pay NOT to attend events!

In my experience, event-based fundraising takes enormous effort; the bar for holding a "creative" event seems to climb higher each year.  Other forms of fundraising are typically more cost-effective.  Why bother with events?

Hey Pamela,

FYI I've got a new site concept coming online later this year called Auctions4Africa.com. Life in Africa's "Art4Life" team will be launching it soon. The idea is to auction African products in a global online envionment where part of the proceeds go to a verified local community project chosen by the African producer.

Along with the Auctions4Africa concept, I've been playing around with the concept of "webbed auction events." The idea here would be to play on the global time differences to have offline auction events scheduled simultaneously and connected through the online auction interface. For example, a brunch in California, a dinner in Holland, and a party in Uganda - all with guests invited for the purpose of bidding on art or artisan products to benefit small scale African producers and the community projects they bring with them.

"the positive and healing image of Africa will be superimposed to the negative."

Thanks so much for sharing this, Dominique. This is very much one of Life in Africa's intended outcomes too.  Any thoughts on the webbed auction event idea??

I've got a few more event ideas I'll toss out soon. Meanwhile...

Here's a concrete take-away for any African project checking in: we've got a yahoogroup set up for the potential member projects that artists and artisans will be able to direct funds to from sales at any of the Life in Africa Network websites. There is a verification system we need to put into place to be able to do this on an Africa-wide scale. If you would like to be a part of discussing that, with a view toward working with us to build a flexible online revenue stream for your African community project, then please join us in the MicroSuccess Team Discussion.

My best to all -

C

• At Digital Divide Data, our experience has been that our social mission can "open the door" and start a conversation with potential customers. But to close the deal, we still need to be competitive on quality and price.
• We also find that our social mission is very attractive to some customer segments, and a turn off to others who might think that our social mission means we aren't as professional or business-like as our for-profitcompetitors. Now that we’ve recognized this, we spend most of our time marketing to customers who do care about our social mission and we don’t start off discussing the social benefits of the business to customers who don’t. With the customers that don’t care, we jump right to quality and cost. The challenge for us is that the customers who don’t care about our social mission are often larger customers – dream clients for us – while those who do care are a generally a smaller, more niche market.

1. How have you integrated the “double benefit” of what your social enterprise sells?
2. Is it sustainable to “charge more” for the social benefit our customers support by buying from us?
3. Do you agree that you can “open” with the social benefit, but still need to match price and quality to “close” the sale? Or what other strategies do you use?
4. Do you find that certain consumer segments are more responsive to your social mission? Will these always be niche customers, or can it cross over to the mainstream market?

Marketing is a great tool to use in promoting your social cause and reaching out to potential customers, partners, or donors.  Most people are very familiar with marketing techniques, so are receptive to receive your message.  The most important part of marketing is defining your unique selling proposition, that aspect of your offer that is differentiable from others in the marketplace.  And, this is where promoting your social mission should be up front and evident as a unique differentiator to your prospective customers.

The article makes the points that smaller social entrepreneurs lacking the budget and resources of larger for-profit corporations have challenges in creating the same level of awareness for products or services.  Try asking how to bring your unique differentiator to partner with companies that might lack a strong social mission, but have more resources to take your product to the market.  Today, many companies are under increasing pressure from a customer base that is more aware of social issues.  Approaching these companies who can be potential partners instead of competitors can be a good way to get your own products and services into the marketplace by leveraging more resources.

There are many good examples of successful partnerships between social entrepreneurs and large companies who take their products to the market.  Consider the case of Cafe Direct, the maker of fairly traded coffees and teas.  Cafe Direct works in partnership with the large grocery chains and gets their products stocked alongside other non-fair trade drinks.  This gives the supermarkets the chance to position on social issues, by featuring these fair trade products and reaching out to a more loyal customer base who are motivated by social issues.  Plus, the coffee and tea taste great.

The bottom line is that social issues are very important today and much talked about in the media.  By marketing your social mission upfront, you leverage a unique differentiator in the marketplace.  This is a powerful asset that you can bring in partnership with other companies, turning competitors into partners.

Mark Emanuelson

mark@emanuelson.com

All good marketing starts with your customer.  Knowing them, what ticks their boxes and gets them going is key to making your sale.

However, sometimes we have more than one customer for the same product - indeed some of our customers are the product as far as other customers are concerned.  If Government want to get 'hard to reach' learners onto their Skills for Life programme we have to have one sales pitch for them and a very different sales pitch for the learners!

When I sell community events to local people, they want to have a good time.  When I sell the same event to funders, I am selling community engagement, cohesion, development or whatever the buzz word is at the moment.

For my high level customers, the fact that I am a social enterprise is another 'box' they can tick in their reporting mechanism.  So for them I have to go in with the hard sell about that.  For the community, many of them are sophisticated purchasers and do understand that buying from us helps to support a whole range of activities that may or may not be of direct relevance.  At the end of the day, what they care about is - is my product good and is the price appropriate.  And ... if I don't get that right, then I don't have the community to 'sell' to my higher level stakeholder customers either.

When working with my private sector clients, its exactly the same.  Some of them have strong social responsibility programmes and their own reasons for needing to engage with the community and their own marketing strategies about how to achieve this - if they like what I can deliver on this front, they are very happy to buy my other product too (occasionally for slightly more than they would otherwise pay).  For others, its quality and price all the way down the line.

We have tended to make our products fit our social mission and therefore there is very little divide in our marketing other than the customer focus - who is the customer for which product and what will persuade them to 'buy'.

As to budgets - I am usually selling very locally, or in a very targeted way.  Investing in good PR and relationships with the press means that I very seldom 'pay' for marketing.  Within the community, I use mechanisms like word of mouth and I produce a community newsletter (which I fund through advertising revenues from others) as my main marketing vehicle.  I host the community website and make sure this is open to the whole community to use and promote themselves and develop projects that include specific parts of the community that I want to target.  Current examples include producing a shopping guide for the village (being funded by the County Council) which has given me an in to local shops.  We also use feedback, complaints procedures and tracking as part of our quality control systems.  We also try to use our management information intelligently to show us what our customers are buying.

With higher level stakeholders, I get others to write case studies about me and get permission to use these and I network.  However, a good quality 'souvenir' can be useful to remind people you are there.  A well thought through 'visit' is good to have up your sleeve - know what you have to sell and make it relevant to the customer and fun.

The main cost of almost all of this is time - and we all know there is never enough of this.  But at the end of the day, its the bottom line for our business, being there with our community and delivering what they want and need.  If we haven't done our market research we won't know what this is, and we don't do our marketing, they won't know that we do it - so we might as well not exist.

I've worked recently in marketing several sorts of mission-based products (social enterprises of both the for- and non-profit varieties).  Both products (green building, sustainably-raised food/wine) have immediate and obvious benefits passed directly to the consumer, as well as secondary benefits to society.  Marketing these direct-benefit types of SE products is different--and likely easier to succeed at--than marketing SE products like DDD's responsible outsourcing.  In quickly sketching types of SE products, it seems that they might largely be segregated into direct to consumer (direct-benefit SE products) and B2B (indirect-benefit SE products).

Marketing the quality and integrity of direct-benefit SE products seems to be the most successful approach. With products we use on a daily basis (our food, our homes, our offices) quality and safety are important. With regard to consumer segments, I worked with organic foods during the rapid period of mainstreaming in recent years, and I'm convinced that the same soccer mom consumer segment will be the tipping point of mainstreaming green building. Moms care about quality and safety.

With indirect-benefit SE products I think that marketing to the direct customer of the product (B2B marketing, say, Cadbury buying fair trade cocoa or publishing company buying responsibly outsourced digitization) can only be successful if sufficient demand exists in the consumer marketplace. Surely occasionally you'll get a highly ethical purchasing manager that can justify going to an SE supplier's increased cost, reduced quality and/or abandoning a dependable contractor--but I'd want more to ensure success in sales. A slick set of materials that tells your SE's story to the direct purchaser must be supported by equally impressive press releases to publications read by end consumers.

Your marketing will likely reach a much wider audience than your product.  The opportunity for education in mission-based marketing should not be neglected, and has the added benefit of increasing the credibility of your organization. Take the opportunity to teach while you sell.