Some Moms Hunger for More than Attention -- Another High-Impact Mother's Day Fundraising Campaign

I was struck by this high-impact Mother's day fundraising campaign from City Meals featured in a full-page ad in Sunday's New York Times. The woman at left could have been my grandmother.

City Meals educates readers that "70% of our meal recipients are women. Many no longer have spouses, siblings, friends or children in their lives. That can make for a lonely Mother's Day. Send meals in your mother's honor or memory to elderly New Yorkers who would otherwise be hungry and alone.

Mom taught you to care for others. Show her how much you learned."

Beautifully done, Citymeals-on-wheels. They get the empathy and the guilt pumped, and they motivate the desire to please with the encouragement to be your best, as mom taught you. Hokey but it works.

What makes this campaign truly effective are the supplementary components that make giving a real participatory experience including these e-cards for your mom (you "purchase" the card, that's your donation) and the campaign mini site.

C'mon and give. Show mom your true colors.

PS I love that Mother's Day has become a focal point for campaigns to help others, which is exactly what mothers do 24/7. Seems much more authentic than the Hallmark version of the day.

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Honor your mother. Send a net. Save a life. -- Mother's Day Campaigns Better than Ever

My husband received this highly-effective email from Nothing but Nets this week, just in time for Mother's Day.

There's probably no better holiday to leverage folks' humanity, love and guilt (yes, mothers are known for that, whether its articulated or not) than Mother's Day. And nonprofits are doing a great job of it this year, especially those who can capitalize on a natural link to motherhood (focused on children, seniors, etc.).

Here are just a couple of the powerful campaigns I've seen:

1) The Nothing but Nets email campaign, which opens with this hard-to-resist pitch:

In the first few years of our lives, our mothers held our hand, picked us up when we fell, and rocked us to sleep. They provided a healthy, happy environment and kept us safe from harm.

Nothing But Nets works to give mothers in Africa the chance to do those same things, by providing them with insecticide-treated bed nets so that they and their children have the opportunity to realize their full potential too. Pregnant mothers and children under five are the most susceptible to contracting malaria. Protective bed nets allow mothers to enjoy the simple pleasure of caring for their children, as our mothers cared for us

2) The Families of Children from China(FCC) Mother's Day appeal for assistance to Chinese orphanages is another winner. Most members are, like us, families who have adopted children from China, so the interest in the welfare of the orphans still in China is already very strong.

It's hard to resist when asked to "keep our promise to the children who call the orphanage home."  Tie that to a focused email campaign on how donations can help provide "grandmas" in the orphanages, or more foster care, and bingo. I forwarded this email twice to my husband, with a strong request that this be my Mother's Day gift.

Any other great Mother's Day campaigns out there? Let me know by clicking the Comments link below.

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Help Cyclone Survivors in Myanmar -- Donate Right Now

It's shocking to hear the current count (estimated at 50,000100,000) of those dead from last weekend's fierce cyclone (most from the low-lying delta region), and dismaying to learn that over 40,000 are still missing and almost 2-3 million more (that's the population of the region hardest hit) wounded and/or without food, water, shelter or fuel. Here's the latest from The Times (UK).

Worse yet, as you've heard, the military junta has been slow to allow aid agencies in to help, only yesterday giving the heads up to these agencies whose staff are still waiting for visas. This delay will only increase the severity of injuries, dehydration and starvation, and the need for help. Even when aid arrives in Myanmar, it will take time to get it distributed in this destroyed rural area.

The Federation of International Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies is already on the ground in Myanmar, and UNICEF and World Vision are en route to provide emergency relief. Help them do as much as possible as quickly as possible to help cyclone survivors in this devastated country.

Donate today to:
UNICEF
World Vision 

Photo credit: Luisrene

Who ARE You Trying to Reach? -- Create Personas to Bridge the Gap with Target Audiences

I'm a big fan of developing fully-fleshed-out fictitious characters (aka personas) to understand your base and other groups your org wants to engage. As Wikipedia so aptly puts it, "a user persona is a representation of the goals and behavior of your [target audiences]. Each persona is captured in one to two page descriptions featuring behavior patterns, goals, skills, attitudes, and environment, with a few fictional personal details to bring the persona to life."

Shaping personas is a practice that enables you to "know" your target audiences far better than simple audience segmentation, which is limited to demographic definition in most cases. Most importantly, personas are a great lead-in to audience research, and a useful ingredient in product/program/service development and testing. Use them to hone your approach as precisely as possible before you dive in with pricey and hard-to-find focus group participants or testers.

Learn how in my just-updated guide to developing personas that will increase the impact of your nonprofit marketing.

PS While you're strategizing how to get to know your constituencies better, read Getting Great Audience and Stakeholder Feedback, at Little Cost (Case Study)

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Make it Easy for Bloggers to Cover Your Org -- Update

Update: May 2, 2008

I registered at the WE site and received an email confirmation, but not untill the next day. I would have loved to hear from them within an hour (easy to do with an auto-responder) while they were still on my mind. Lost opportunity for WE.

One more suggestion for WE -- the email I received was 100% generic, not reflecting any of the infromation (beat, interests, other sources) I submitted to them. I wish the org had taken the same kind of time I did to customize its response.

______________________________________________________________________________________

Just do what the WE Campaign does in its online press room, a model for nonprofit press outreach and one you can follow for your nonprofit, even if you didn't just launch.

1) Reach out to bloggers along with the traditional press. I'd include social media folks (who talk about you on Facebook, YouTube, etc.) as well but this is a good place to start.

2) Make it easy. Get a sense of press/bloggers interests plus contact info. Then let them know when there's relevant news.  The WE Campaign asks bloggers for basic contact info (email, name, blog name and URL), frequency of posts, topics covered, news sources, political orientation, take on the Campaign's mission and an open-ended response on how WE can help. This a great way to build relationships with the folks that matter most, but WE should do the same for other press as well.

3) Offer other means of staying in touch. WE invites press to subscribe to email distribution of its press releases and to a "releases plus" feed via their blog readers.

4) Follow up. Nothing's more annoying than a great system never implemented. The jury is still out on the WE Campaign. I submitted my info last week and am waiting to hear. I'll let you know when I do.

Any other ideas for nurturing relationships with the right bloggers? Please share your strategies in Comments below.

Learn more about crafting a satisfying online press room here.

Photo by Steve Rhodes.

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New NetSquared.org Home Page Strong Model of Easy to Use Design for Diverse Audiences

Take a look at the new NetSquared home page for a useful model of user-friendly site design.

As I stress repeatedly in my writing and training about writing for the Web, effective communications is all about making it easy for the user. This holds for offline communications too, but most important online with trillions of choices available to online readers at the click of a button.

One vital way to make it easy for your users is ensuring they quickly find what they need online. For  organizations reaching multiple audiences on multiple programs and goals, this is a real challenge. One approach I've seen is providing pathways for various user groups by job title/position. That might seem like a natural but research has found that people don't self-identify primarily as a "fundraiser" or "policymaker."

Instead, online readers come to a site to focus on what they want to do there -- register for a conference, absorb some information, or share a comment. NetSquared does a beautiful job of inviting site visitors to step into clear action paths (join, build, share) that make sense for one-time visitors and return audiences who want to pursue various modes of involvement over the course of multiple visits.

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New Research Unmasks the Wired Wealthy -- Connect Better with Middle and Major Donors

What makes people give online, and how can you motivate them to give to your organization?  Convio, Sea Change Strategies and Edge Research recently answered these questions via an in-depth study of some 3,400 wired donors who make four-figure or higher gifts to one or more causes. And get this -- "or the nonprofits who shared data, this segment of donors represents just 1% of their active donor file, but 32% of their annual revenue," says Convio founder and Chief Strategy Officer Vinay Bhagat.

The results, available here in full, offer some useful guidance on closing the gap between your org and your donors and here are just a few of the findings you can use to refine your strategies. The wired wealthy are:

• Very generous givers
  • Give an average of $10,896 eachyear to various causes, with a median gift of $4,500
• Notably wealthy
  • More than twenty-five percent (25%) have household incomes above $200,000 per year. More than half have annual household incomes above $100,000.
• Mostly boomers (born between 1946 and 1964)
  • With the center of gravity falling right in the middle of the baby boom cohort.
• Extremely wired
  • Have been using the Internet for an average of 12 years
  • Online an average of 18 hours per week
• Give online and via other channels
  
  • Like the speed, efficiency and instant gratification of online giving
  • Will be shifting more giving to online over next few years.

Clearly, you have to be online in a sophisticated way that engages boomers to succeed in this competitive arena.

Here's another vital finding: There are three main ways in which these donors want to relate to orgs they give to -- all business; relationship seekers; casual connectors.

"The three clusters offer some important clues about what kinds of communications your wired wealthy constituents...value, and might also help temper organizational expectations. Moreover, [the clustering indicates] that most organizations have a long way to go to fully satisfy even the most modest donor demands and expectations. And, it argues strongly for implementing some sort of psychographic segmentation so that you can cultivate relationships with the very different, yet equally valuable...clusters."

You'll find lots more data to guide your marketing and fundraising efforts in the full report.

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Surprise Them -- It Works Every Time, When Not Overused

Our daughter Charlotte had her fifth birthday last weekend, and instead of our usual huge friends and family bash, she asked five friends to help her celebrate.

After carefully thinking through a few "theme" options, she pounced on the hiking expedition to take place in South Mountain reservation just two blocks away. We mailed invites and asked kids to wear their oldest clothes.

I was the one to be surprised to to get RSVPs accompanied by parental wonder that we were hosting this "out of the norm" (e.g. Chuck E. Cheese, a gymnastics party, etc.) party. Post-party, we got five calls telling us how much the kids loved the hike and commending us for making this adventure happen. To us, not a big deal. But to the other parents, who may not hike often or have a nature preserve two blocks away, a pleasing surprise that got their attention.

Your org should be putting surprise to work -- periodically, not steadily, since all the time is no surprise -- to get your audiences attention. Surpassing their expectations works every time, as long as you do so periodically, not daily (which means no surprise).

I was absolutely surprised, and 100% engaged, by Al Gore's Coalition for Climate Protection's (aka WE Campaign) $300 million campaign bringing the surprise duo of Al Sharpton and Pat Robertson together to discuss the importance of caring for the environment, and the need for everyone to work together for the cause. Now meet the latest couple in the "strange bedfellows" or "unlikely alliances" series: Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Republican former House Speaker Newt Gingrich.

Here's how the WE Campaign explained the series in their email to me and other bloggers: "Our hope is that showing this kind of Unlikely Alliance will demonstrate the unity of purpose needed and will serve as an invitation to people from all walks of life to join WE."

That's $300 million all about surprise and it's working big time. Not only is the ad campaign getting huge consumer attention, it's getting the Coalition major media coverage.

Think about surprising your audiences with a format, look and feel or message significantly different than your norm. If Al Sharpton and Pat Robertson can do it, your nonprofit can too.

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Timing is Everything -- Reach Your Audiences When They're Likely to Read and Act on It

Mea culpa! I made one of the most common (and most avoidable) nonprofit marketing mistakes yesterday -- sending out my bi-monthly e-news during vacation week for at least 50% of school districts nationwide.

It wasn't a crisis. After all, people are always out of the office, and I get about auto-responders to that effect every time I publish the e-news. Usually those represent about 1/2% of my mailing list. But yesterday, I got auto-responders (which I have my assistant read to ensure we capture key info from the recipient, such as a new email address, she's moved on, she's out that day or two) in the 1% range, most telling me that the recipient is out of the office this week.

1/2% is no crisis. I'm not gnashing my teeth. But if you can reach that extra 1/2%, why not?

Obviously, you can't avoid vacation weeks like that if you have a daily or weekly e-news, advocacy alert or other very frequent campaign. But whenever possible, make sure you reach your audiences when they are working and ready to read or act.

Here are some basic guidelines on what to avoid when scheduling an e-mail or mail alert:

• School breaks of a week or more; check your district's calendar and those of a few other districts
• Federal holidays
• Extended holiday periods (Xmas week, 4th of July week, etc.)
• Core conferences in the fields your audiences represent (for professional audiences, and only if you segment out audiences by trade); for example, don't try to reach foundation CEOs or program officers during the annual Council on Foundation conferences, or fundraisers during the AFP annual meeting.

Anything else to avoid? Please add in the Comments link below.

Timing is everything. Here's how to do it better time-of-day wise: Best Time to Send Out Your E-News--An Aha Moment.

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How to Get Your Annual Report Read Online

Let's see a raise of hands for you nonprofits that publish a PDF download as the Web version of  your annual report. Thought so...way too many.

Remember, PDF's are just a downloadable/printable version of something you've designed for print in most cases. Back to Nonprofit Marketing 101: Most design for print readers doesn't work online. It's just like putting on a blindfold.

If you really want audiences to see and digest the report, make it easier for them to do so. Take a cue from the University of Richmond(UR) with it's new online catalog.

Higher ed marketer Bob Johnson, who brought this great model to my attention, lauds UR for making it easy for catalog readers to find what they want, right from the first page. It's the equivalent of a table of contents, but in a narrative form that is a better fit with online reading habits while effectively highlighting the key points of entry for students.

Johnson points out UR's request for feedback right on the home page. To me, this emphasis on feedback show's how UR values its base (students) -- and that comes through to the end-user. In addition, this interactive discussion enables UR to fine-tune the online catalog to work as best as possible for the students,and that's who it's for, right?

Think about who your annual report (and other marketing content) is really for, and create an online version that makes them want to dive in.

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