June, 2011

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KFC’s Shows They Don’t Give a Cluck. This Time with Juvenile Diabetes

Selfish Giving

I just can’t understand what Kentucky Fried Chicken is thinking with its latest cause marketing program. This picture says it all. Buy a HALF-GALLON of soda – with 800 calories from 56 spoonfuls of sugar – for $2.99 and a buck goes to Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation. I’m actually more astonished that JDRF would sign on for such a pact.

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7 Ways to Show Your Nonprofit’s Personality

Nonprofit Marketing Guide

A few weeks ago, I asked you to describe your nonprofit’s personality in three words and I got some interesting responses. Several of you emailed me privately to say that you really didn’t think your nonprofit had much of a personality at all. If you are in that boat, here are 7 ways to show more personality. 1. Write in the first and second person as much as possible.

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10 Common Mistakes Made by Nonprofits on Social Media

Nonprofit Tech for Good

Written for the June 2011 issue of Fundraising Success Magazine , where I am writing a quarterly column throughout 2011. For the past six years I have spent 50 to 60 hours a week utilizing Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Flickr, MySpace, LinkedIn, and Foursquare to promote nonprofits. I’ve watched the early adopters of MySpace in 2005 propel themselves into the national and international spotlight using social media, and I’ve seen latecomers begin to dabble with Facebook and Twitter just

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5 Tips to Maximize Twitter chats

Fundraising Coach

I last posted on Twitter chats back in April in the post 5 Twitter Tips for Fundraisers. Since then, I’ve really stepped up my participation in Twitter chats, particularly. #blogchat : primarily about blogging; occurs most Sunday nights at 9 p.m. Eastern. #speakchat : Monday nights at 9 p.m. Eastern, a moderated chat about some aspect of speaking & conferneces.

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Less Stress, More Success: Accounting Best Practices & Processes for 2025

Speaker: Amanda Adams, Fractional CFO, CPA

Are you ready to elevate your accounting processes for 2025? 🚀 Join us for an exclusive webinar led by Amanda Adams, a seasoned fractional CFO and CPA passionate about transforming back-office operations for finance teams. This session will cover critical best practices and process improvements tailored specifically for accounting professionals.

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The Top 10 Free Fundraising Ideas

Fundraiser Ideas

Especially during difficult economic times, charities and nonprofit organizations should consider fundraising strategies that require little or no cash outlay. The revenues generated by free fundraising ideas can be directly used for the work of the organization and require no upfront expenditure of already limited funds. Here are 10 free fundraising ideas that can produce great results.

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How NOT To Treat A Donor!

The Agitator

If a donor says — “Do not telemarket to me! — put them on a suppression list. If a donor says — “Do not rent my name!&# — don’t rent their name. If a donor says — “Remove me from your email list — remove them. Above all, don’t ignore them! Don’t treat them the way Newsmax.com treats me.

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Tips for Better Nonprofit Thank You Letters

Nonprofit Marketing Guide

It happened again this week. I received a very business-like form letter, really just slightly better than a receipt, in response to a recent charitable donation. What I should have received instead is a warm, welcoming thank you letter. This is an old soapbox of mine, but it’s time to get back up on it. Sending out really good thank you letters is an incredibly savvy marketing strategy, simply because so many other nonprofits are doing it so badly.

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Five Ways to Grow Your Nonprofit’s Facebook Fan Base

Nonprofit Tech for Good

A Few Words of Caution: Small to medium-sized nonprofits should take Facebook case studies and best practices based on the success of large nationally and internationally well-known nonprofits (with huge email lists and multiple communications and development staff) with a heavy dose of skepticism. 99.9% of nonprofits just can not duplicate their success, and such case studies and best practices set up many nonprofits for failure and disappointment.

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3 fundraising ideas for a strong finish to your fiscal year

Fundraising Coach

For many of us, June is the end of the fiscal year. There is still time to make sure you finish this year strong. Here are my three suggestions: Revisit your no’s. Last year a friend told me about a campaign she was working on. Since I was familiar with her community, I mentioned some names of people that I thought she should’ve contacted.

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10 Excellent Club Fundraising Ideas

Fundraiser Ideas

Organizing fundraisers for clubs and activities can be a fun and educational experience for high school students. By selecting club fundraising ideas that relate thematically to the activity or club being supported, club members can often achieve improved results, both in donations and in increased awareness of the club in the greater community. Here are ten club fundraising ideas that go beyond the same old bake sale or car wash routine.

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Recognition Powers High-Performance — If You Do it Right

Speaker: Radhika Samant and Todd Wuestenberg

Employee recognition has often been deemed a "feel-good" initiative, tied closely to rewards. While we understand its importance, we tend to associate recognition with intangible outcomes like engagement and sentiment, rather than direct impacts on retention and high performance. In today’s workplace, the true ROI of recognition lies in its ability to regenerate tangible, business-driven results.

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Fundraising’s Past Isn’t What It Used To Be

The Agitator

The recent flap over the revision in Giving USA figures for 2008 and 2009 seems a more than a little silly and arcane to us. As reported last week in The Chronicle of Philanthropy , the annual yearbook of charitable giving (revised) is now saying donations fell by higher percentages in 2009 than at any other time in the past five decades—down by 8% from $304 billion to $270 billion—even though last year the report said that donations in those two years had declined only slightly or held steady.

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Why You Should Use Social Media to Sell Cause Marketing

Selfish Giving

Everyone wants to be more successful selling their cause marketing programs. But how? Try social media. It’s been a key part of my success, and I bet social media can help you too. I’ll talk about how to use social media to sell cause marketing in another post. But let’s first confirm why you should use social media for cause marketing in the first place.

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Nonprofit Annual Report on a Postcard

Nonprofit Marketing Guide

On Monday, I asked if you could boil down your annual report to just six words. We are getting some great examples: check them out in the post comments! But of course, I realize six words is probably not enough for most of you. What about a postcard? That’s more room, but still very short and readable, and one of the formats I advocate as the New and Improved Nonprofit Annual Report.

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Three Must-Haves On Your Nonprofit’s Blog

Nonprofit Tech for Good

As I have said many times, I was a reluctant blogger. I did not think the Internet needed another blogger. But I was wrong. So wrong. Blogging has transcended my ROI (return on investment) , primarily from simply featuring my e-newsletter “Subscribe&# option and social networking icons in the upper right column. Sadly, the vast majority of nonprofit blogs do not feature on their blog the three must-haves listed below: 1. e-Newsletter sign-up. 2. “Donate Now&# button. 3.

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Why Every Small Business Needs an HCM Solution: A Comprehensive Guide

Managing HR tasks like payroll, compliance, and employee data can overwhelm small businesses. That’s where a Human Capital Management (HCM) solution comes in. Our eBook, Why Every Small Business Needs an HCM Solution: A Comprehensive Guide , shows how an HCM system automates tedious processes, ensuring your business stays compliant and efficient. You’ll learn how to simplify payroll, eliminate costly errors, and empower your employees with self-service tools.

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A thank you to nonprofit fundraisers

Fundraising Coach

June 30 is the end of the fiscal year for many nonprofits. Tomorrow, the bar gets set higher. But that’s tomorrow. Today, I just wanted to say ‘thank you&# to all of you who raise money for nonprofit, community benefit organizations. Your work is making a difference. Feel free to share this with any fundraisers you know. (c) Marc A. Pitman, FundraisingCoach.com.

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Got stuff to get done?

Get Fully Funded

We all procrastinate from time to time, don’t we? There are lots of reasons why we do it – fear, perfectionism, doubt – the list goes on. We really need to just dig in and get the thing done. Here’s a great little video to help you get your stuff done.

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10 Absolutely Essential Truths about Social Media

Nonprofit Marketing Blog

Today, the Case Foundation is holding a virtual summit on millennial donors, which I’m blogging about today. Julien Smith , who along with Chris Brogan wrote Trust Agents , shared these essential truths about social media. 1. If no one is paying attention to you, it’s your fault. You must have amazing content, over and over. What may look like apathy is filtering out your message because it’s not compelling.

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Lessons from the KFC, Juvenile Diabetes Cause Marketing Fizzle

Selfish Giving

It’s been an interesting week since I wrote my post on the cause marketing promotion between Kentucky Fried Chicken and Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation. I learned a lot, particularly about Type 1 and Type 2 diabetes. I plan to put my new found education to good use in the coming months. But there are lessons for everyone from this cause marketing promotion.

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Best Practices to Streamline Compensation Management: A Foundation for Growth

Speaker: Joe Sharpe and James Carlson

Payroll optimization can be one of the most time-consuming and complex factors of small business management. Yet, organizations that crack the code on streamlining employee compensation often discover innovative avenues for growth. With the right strategies in place, outsourcing and streamlining payroll processes can result in substantial time and resource savings.

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A Visual Heartfelt Appeal Makes a Difference – A Reader’s Experiment

Nonprofit Marketing Guide

Guest Post by Lisa Maher, student in Nonprofit Management at NYU. Lisa Maher. Last December I asked you, dear readers, to participate with me in some experiments regarding the types of communications we receive from nonprofits after donating. Lisa Maher decided to participate by putting together a list of organizations she has always donated to and then tracked the direct mail she received from those organizations.

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Three Ways Nonprofits Can Pioneer m-Advocacy

Nonprofit Tech for Good

The time is ripe for the early adopters in the nonprofit sector to embrace m-Advocacy, otherwise known as mobile advocacy. Odds are a year from now pitches to subscribe or join “Mobile Action Networks&# will be commonly seen in Facebook Status Updates, Tweets, blogs posts, homepages, and e-newsletter subject lines. As social media taught us, those nonprofits who act quickly and embrace emerging trends tend to experience the highest success rate, and similar to the rise of e-advocacy and &

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LinkedIn for Nonprofit Professionals

Fundraising Coach

This week, I’m honored to introduce you to Debra Askanase. Debra Askanase is the founder and engagement strategist at Community Organizer 2.0 , which works with nonprofits and businesses to create engagement strategies that move people to action. She has impressed me with her ability to help nonprofits do competitive analyses of their social media usage.

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We’re Not The Only Ones Focused On Retention

The Agitator

Back in April, we asked Agitator readers a simple question: What percentage of your nonprofit’s 1st time donors make a second gift? The final results of our survey … 32% — less than 30 percent converted. 29% — 30-39 percent converted. 22% — 40-49 percent converted. 17% — 50 percent or more converted. Not impressive.

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How to Scale Recurring Giving for Sustainable Growth

Speaker: Tim Sarrantonio, Director of Corporate Brand

Is your organization ready to build a recurring giving program that not only sustains but also propels your mission forward? 🚀 In this new webinar with industry visionary Tim Sarrantonio, we’ll guide you through the critical steps to establishing and scaling a successful recurring giving program. Whether you’re starting fresh or enhancing an existing program, this session will provide the strategies you need to deepen donor relationships and secure long-term support!

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Weinergate’s 5 Communications Lessons for Nonprofits

Getting Attention

Thanks to guest blogger Joan Stewart for sharing her timely advice. What a week for learning about crisis communications! Here are five important lessons that Rep. Anthony Weiner taught nonprofit communicators. You’ve heard them all before but Weiner’s massive misstep s clarify how important they really are: Never lie. Weiner thought he could fib his way through the crisis.

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Help KFC Earn Its Cause Marketing Wings

Selfish Giving

Megan Strand of InCouraged.com joined me in writing this post today! Last Friday, Joe appropriately ranted that Kentucky Fried Chicken’s latest “cause marketing” promotion (we cringe to even call it that) pushing mega-jugs of soda to “support” Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation was, well, chicken. In this post, we team up and invite all cause marketers to pitch in for a public brainstorm for KFC about what types of cause marketing partnerships might make more sense for the quick serve chain.

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A Replacement for the Dreaded Fundraising Thermometer?

Nonprofit Marketing Guide

I've never really understood what thermometers have to do with fundraising anyway, other than the idea of something rising, which is a pretty weak link. I’m not fan of those fundraising thermometers. Yes, they are an easy way to show progress, but they are so overused. And when you think about it, what does a thermometer and temperature rising have to do with 99% of the causes that use that graphic: nothing!

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Don’t Think Social Media Results in Online Donations? Think Again!

Nonprofit Tech for Good

Source: Social Good: Charity and Technology in the Online Universe. Written for the March 2011 issue of Fundraising Success Magazine , where I am writing a quarterly column throughout 2011. * * * * * * * * * * *. In the summer of 2000, I launched an e-advocacy portal called eActivist.org. It was a fiscal project of the Tides Center , and I was able to operate and fundraise like any other 501(c)(3).

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Engage, Empower, Excel: Transforming Performance in the New Era of Work

Speaker: Radhika Samant and Adri Glover

The world of work has fundamentally changed. The series of waves that the pandemic began have rippled through the Great Resignation, quiet quitting, the Great Regret, and other eloquent phrases that boil down to the same thing: people aren’t engaged at work or enabled to perform at their best. The truth is that engagement and enablement is more important than ever, but how we do it is the critical differentiator for many organizations.

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3 wicked easy tips to make your fundraising phone calls more effective

Fundraising Coach

The phone is an important tool in the fundraiser’s tool kit. Whether your fiscal year ends this month or not, June should involve a lot of phone calling. But we often forget to do these three things. Video not showing? Watch it on YouTube at [link]. Happy phone calling! Before you make your 5-10 calls, would you take this quick, 30-second poll about when your fiscal year ends?

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Writing Fundraising Letters: What Should You Consider?

Fundraiser Ideas

The average direct mail campaign achieves a two percent success rate. In simple terms, this means that of fifty fundraising letters sent only one produces a positive response from its recipient. Increasing your return on investment is essential in order to maintain adequate operating funds for your nonprofit or charitable organization. By incorporating the following proven strategies into your direct mail fundraising campaign, it is possible to improve your return on investment on these fundrais

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Turn Your Email Auto-Responder Into a Powerful Marketing Tool

Getting Attention

See below for a creative, engaging and mission-driven use of an email auto-responder (what you set up in your email program when you’re away or otherwise unable to reply in a timely manner) as a strategic marketing tactic. Kudos to Molly Thompson, Development and Communications Coordinator with Pillsbury United Communities, for turning what’s usually plain vanilla on its ear!

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Live Blogging from Cause Marketing Forum – Day 2

Selfish Giving

Wow. What a great Cause Marketing Forum Conference this year. Day two featured an excellent lineup with lots of good and interesting speakers. My favorite speaker of the day was Kami Watson Huyse , President of Zoetica , who presented on best practices in cause-related social media. You can find her slides here. Among other things, if you’re looking for solid information and direction on how to best compete in online contests, Kami is the woman to talk to.

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Pricing for Profit: How to Set, Negotiate, and Succeed

Speaker: Igli Laci, Strategic Finance Leader

In today’s competitive market, pricing is more than just a number — it’s the cornerstone of profitability. The right pricing strategy ensures that you capture the true value of your offering, paving the way for sustainable growth and long-term success. Join Igli Laci, Strategic Finance Leader, in this exclusive session where he will explore how a well-crafted pricing approach balances customer perception with business objectives, creating a powerful tool for securing both competitive advantage a