Pull Your Base into Your Org for Powerful Marketing (and More) -- Carnival of Nonprofit Consultants

This is it. The boiled-down, essential, greatest potential takeaway I have from the Nonprofit Technology Conference is the value of imperative for nonprofit marketers to fully involve our bases in our organizations.

It's not just about Web 2.0, social marketing gewgaws, getting attention, or capitalizing on our constituencies' (external audiences, partners, boards, colleagues or...) creativity or intellects to create high-impact content. The whole dynamic has shifted, and you have to embrace it.

Here's confirmation and some exciting models:

• ServingYouth's Amy Jussel is passionate about engaging communities in program design and content creation. She points to HopeLab's global idea competition to get kids exercising as a great example. Contests are definitely a great way to crowdsource (get ideas from the field) and get your audiences involved and excited.

• Paul Jones at Cause-Related Marketing highlights how effective an old idea in a new wrapper shoes can be -- profiling the Muscular Dystrophy Association's e-Shamrock campaign. Jones does a great job of explaining why this approach works, and how to make it even stronger.

• I just love this one! Joanne Fritz recommends Peter Shankman's matchmaking service to connect journalists expert sources like you. Jump onto Shankman's Help a Reporter today to register for this no-charge, grassroots version of ProfNet.

• Ashoka intern David Stoker points to the power of an engaged citizen base, as outlined in this great overview from Ahshoka's Citizen Base Initiative.
  
  • "...That a nonprofit can engage a community like a church or sports team does is very interesting. Team fans do all sorts of crazy things: sacrifice large amounts of their time and money, and more.  And what they get in return is much more complex than ‘entertainment’.  The idea that a nonprofit can engage its community in a way that satisfies similar needs is exciting, and seeing so many examples [in this paper] of creative ways orgs are already doing so intrigues me," says Stoker.
    

I couldn't have said it better myself, David. Don't wait till your base goes elsewhere; remember, loyalty is to issues, not to organizations. Open up your arms today.

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