Kivi's Nonprofit Communications Blog

Looking for the Nonprofit Marketing Guide.com Home Page? Go now.

I love helping small and medium-sized nonprofits communicate more effectively with their members, donors, volunteers and other supporters, so that together, they can make the world a better place. I do that as a blogger, trainer, coach and consultant.

I believe that even the smallest nonprofit staffs with the most modest budgets can achieve tremendous results through savvy marketing and communications. I hope this blog and my online marketing training and other resources encourage you do just that, while helping you grow as a do-it-yourself nonprofit marketer and communications professional.

Please comment on posts and feel free to contact me with your questions and comments. You can also learn more about hiring me as a coach or consultant. P.S. Curious about the photos?

Learn How to Light a Fire That Spreads and Gets Your Good Work Noticed with Kivi’s and Claire’s Creative and Effective Publicity Tips.  Get the Detail on This Thursday’s Webinar.

OK, it’s not totally free advice - you do have to register for this week’s webinar –  Nonprofit Publicity 101: Great PR Ideas that Get Attention – but in addition to some PR Basic Training by yours truly, several registrants will also get free advice from Nonprofit Marketing Guide’s media maven and all-around Big Idea Gal, Claire Meyerhoff, during the webinar. 

What will we be covering this week? All kinds of cool ideas to get your organization noticed, whether you are working online or offline, nationwide or in a community setting. You can get a little taste of some of the tips by listening to last Friday’s “Magic Keys Radio” show now available as a podcast.

After going over our tips, we’ll take your questions and we’ll also ask several participants to share their publicity conundrums, so you can see how Claire and I apply the advice to real-world situations.

Get the details and register now.

Filed Under: Media Relations, Nonprofit Communications, Online Courses

Photo by celebdu on Flickr

Calling all of you wonderfully creative, zany, clever, and even snarky nonprofit communicators!

Now is your chance to put to work what you’ve learned from Nancy Schwartz’s Nonprofit Tagline Report on a real fundraising campaign. And you can go wild because it’s not something your boss has to approve. And there are prizes too — good ones — like free webinar passes and an All-Access Pass to Nonprofit Marketing Guide.com for the Grand Prize Winner.

On September 18, I told you how I’m raising money to buy condoms for the Positive Wellness Alliance (PWA) to give away for free to anyone who needs them, including teens who are too afraid to be seen buying them and folks who just don’t have the money to spare.

I’m a new board member for PWA, which helps people infected with and affected by HIV/AIDS in rural North Carolina. (Did you know the rate of infection is dramatically increasing in the South while falling everywhere else in the U.S.?)

With your help, I’ve raised $220 of my $500 goal. You can help by donating $10 now.

Here’s the challenge: Come up with a good tagline for this fundraiser!

Now, because this fundraiser deals with topics that make some people uncomfortable (sex, and who’s having it with whom), I’m actually putting the tagline challenge entries on the ChipIn page. You’ve been warned — some of them are rather bold, to put it mildly! This is not for the faint of heart. If this is simply not your cup of tea, don’t click over.

If you are up for a little creative, good-natured fun for a great cause, however, enter the contest by emailing me your taglines at kivi@ecoscribe.com with TAGLINE in the subject line. If you don’t want me to post your real name on the ChipIn list of entries, tell me in the email that you want to be anonymous or give me a pen name to use instead.

This is a fundraiser after all, so you can greatly increase the odds that your tagline will win a prize by donating! $10 qualifies as an adequate incentive for me to give your tagline some special consideration! Prizes will be awarded in several categories yet to be named by me.

Let the tagline challenge begin!

Filed Under: Fundraising, Good Karma Quickly, Messages and Tag Lines, Nonprofit Communications

What does it take to be a great leader in the nonprofit sector? You’ll find some thoughtful answers in the current edition of the Carnival of Nonprofit Consultants, posted Wednesday at Ready, Aim, Inspire.

The roundup includes posts from Jane Arsenault, Jason Dick, Katya Andresen, Heather Carpenter, and Sam Davidson.

The Carnival of Nonprofit Consultants is a twice-monthly blog carnival that rounds up some of the best advice, forward thinking, and resources for nonprofits in the blogosphere. Its home base is here at Nonprofit Communications.

Where is it headed next, you ask?

October 15 - Katya’s Nonprofit Marketing Blog

Theme: “Chart Magic” - Share an insightful or absurd visual that sums up something important or amusing about the nonprofit sector. Check here for inspiration, nonprofit consultants!

November 3 - Zen and the Art of Nonprofit Tech

Theme: ”Is your work changing because of the economy? How? What adjustments are you making?”

November 17 - Social Butterfly

Theme: “Give thanks! Tell us which tools, resources, mentors have aided you or what you are thankful for.”

Filed Under: Carnival of Nonprofit Consultants

The Nonprofit Marketing Guide weekly webinar series is continuing this fall, with some great new topics and a few encores of popular topics from earlier this year. As always, registration for each webinar is $35, which includes everyone in your office who can fit around one speakerphone and computer monitor. 

Even better — get the All-Access Pass for just $97 and you can attend all of these sessions at no additional charge. It’s the recession-proof way to get the training you need so you can build support and raise money for your good cause!

Ten Captivating Ways to Start Fundraising Letters, Newsletter Articles & More

You’ll learn 10 different ways to start your fundraising letters and other marketing communications — all of which will engage your supporters and keep them reading. Leave writer’s block and boring letters behind forever! This Thursday, October 2, 1:00 p.m. Eastern (10:00 a.m. Pacific). 

 

Nonprofit Publicity 101: Great PR Ideas that Get Attention

Light a fire and watch the good news about your nonprofit’s work spread with the creative publicity ideas you’ll get during this webinar. Thursday, October 9, 1:00 p.m. Eastern (10:00 a.m. Pacific). 

 

Nonprofit Writing Stinks! Bring Your Writing Back to Life

During this webinar, you’ll learn how to write like the smart, passionate human being you are — instead of the dead-inside, jargon-loving droid you just might sound like now. Tuesday, October 14, 1:00 p.m. Eastern (10:00 a.m. Pacific). 

 

Forget the General Public! How to Define and Reach Your Target Audience

Stop wasting time and money trying to reach the general public. They don’t care (and they don’t really exist!). Instead, learn how to identify your target audience and to speak directly to them. Thursday, October 23, 1:00 p.m. Eastern (10:00 a.m. Pacific).

 

Blogging for Nonprofits: Tips, Traps, and Tales

Everybody’s doing it - should you? Learn how other nonprofits are using blogs and how your organization could use a blog to build an online community. Wednesday, October 29, 1:00 p.m. Eastern (10:00 a.m. Pacific). 

 

How to Write a 4-Page Nonprofit Annual Report - A Crash Course Webinar

Learn how to write an annual report that highlights your accomplishments, explains your financials, and appeals to both hearts and minds — all in four pages. Thursday, November 6, 1:00 p.m. Eastern (10:00 a.m. Pacific) 

 

Online Writing: Dos and Don’ts of Writing for the Web and Email

Learn the key differences between writing for print and for pixels, including the top three characteristics of good online writing. Make your online writing more appealing and improve your website or email’s performance. Wednesday, November 12, 1:00 p.m. Eastern (10:00 a.m. Pacific). 

 

How to Write Moving Personal Profiles about Donors, Clients, and Other Supporters

Inspire others by telling great stories about the people you meet and work with everyday, including donors, volunteers, and clients. Escape the boring bio syndrome and write engaging, dramatic profiles. Thursday, November 20, 1:00 p.m. Eastern (10:00 a.m. Pacific).

 

Like what you see? Get all of this training (and much more) for only $97, with the All-Access Pass.

Filed Under: Nonprofit Communications, Online Courses, Professional Development

Tags: training, webinars

Here’s a quick update on what I’ve been working on the last week or so . . . 

Online Marketing Workshops

I’m being asked to speak a lot lately on various elements of online marketing for nonprofits. Last week, I presented two workshops to museums, historical sites, and other arts organizations in Charlotte, NC. The first workshop addressed nonprofit websites and email marketing in general. The second dealt more specifically with how to raise money through email, with an introduction to social media at the end.

Here is the first slideshow:

 

Here is the second slideshow:

 

If your association or foundation is interested in having me present some version of these workshops to your members or grantees, email me or give me a call at 336-499-5816 and we can talk about it.

 

How to Write a Nonprofit Annual Report - E-Course Now Online

I spent much of today putting the new on-demand annual reports e-course online. It’s ready for you! When you enroll, you’ll get a copy of my 50+ page e-book, “How to Write a Nonprofit Annual Report,” a workbook with exercises to help you write your report sections, and access to a recorded webinar and handouts that explain how to create a slimmed-down four-page annual report. This course is $60 a la carte, or free with your All-Access Pass.

If you missed my online chat at the Chronicle of Philanthropy on annual reports, check it out now for lots of free advice. I also recently completed an interview with one of the leading companies producing video annual reports and will share those tips with you soon.

I’ll be speaking on annual reports at two conferences in October: the American Health Care Association Convention in Nashville and the NC Center for Nonprofits Annual Conference in Raleigh.

 

Got Writer’s Block? How Do You Start Fundraising Letters, Newsletter Articles, Etc.?

Now I’m working on my slides for Thursday’s webinar called Ten Captivating Ways to Start Fundraising Letters, Newsletter Articles and More. I don’t know about you, but when I write, getting that first paragraph just right is really important. Once that’s in place, the rest of flows naturally. 

Whether that’s your writing style or not, if you have trouble getting started or knowing what’s effective, check out the webinar description and join us on Thursday if it sounds interesting to you. I’ll not only talk about those pesky lead paragraphs, but what should follow them too. And yes, this webinar is also included in the All-Access Pass.

Filed Under: Annual Reports, Copywriting, E-Newsletters, Nonprofit Communications, Online Courses, Online Marketing

”Email Newsletter Basics for Nonprofits” Tuesday, Sept. 23 at 1:00 p.m. Eastern     At your desk and on your phone Registration and Details

I’m teaching a new webinar on Tuesday, September 23 called Email Newsletter Basics for Nonprofits: From Start to Finish.

This webinar is for you if:

– You are thinking about starting an email newsletter, or

– You have an email newsletter, but you’ve been winging it and have some knowledge gaps, or

– You are debating whether an email newsletter is right for your organization or not.

The webinar will be an expansion on the article I wrote a few months ago called 10 Surprisingly Easy and Startling Effective Ways to Improve Your Email Newsletter.

As usual, it’s $35 for one connection: as many people can attend as you can fit around one computer monitor and speaker phone. Or if you have the  All-Access Pass, this webinar is included free of charge.

P.S. If you didn’t listen to Magic Keys Radio today, you missed a great show with Nancy Schwartz talking all about nonprofit taglines. No worries, we recorded it! You can listen on your computer or download/subscribe to our weekly podcast.

Filed Under: E-Newsletters, Online Courses, Writing for the Web

How is your nonprofit evolving? That’s the topic of the latest edition of the Carnival of Nonprofit Consultants, posted earlier this week at the blog of FIO Partners. You’ll find some interesting posts on how nonprofits are changing and growing. 

The next edition of the Carnival will be hosted on October 1 by Ready, Aim, Inspire and the theme will be “what it takes to be a great leader.” 

The Carnival of Nonprofit Consultants is a twice-monthly blog carnival that rounds up and summarizes some of the best advice, forward thinking, and resources for nonprofits in the blogosphere. I launched the Carnival in June 2006 and it has become one of the longest continuously running blog carnivals around! Thanks to all of our contributors and readers for your support! Learn how to contribute your posts and subscribe to the Carnival feed.

Filed Under: Carnival of Nonprofit Consultants

“Karma Goes Both Ways” Photo by LexnGer on Flickr

If you like this blog and all of its mostly wholesome goodness, please do me a favor by taking five minutes to do these four things below. If you whip right through them, I really do think you can pull it all off in five minutes, earn some good karma, and make me very grateful and happy to be in such a fabulous community of nonprofit leaders! Well, I already am, but I’ll be super-duper grateful and happy, OK?

1) Vote for The Nature Conservancy in TripAdvisor’s “More Than Footprints” Campaign. Jonathan Coleman shares a ton of information about his experiences in using social media to promote TNC’s work so please thank him for his generosity with your vote. All five charities will get some $$, but the voting determines how much.

2) Give $10 to Stop HIV in the South. Did you know that HIV infections are rising dramatically in the South, while falling elsewhere in the U.S.?

I’m raising $500 so our local nonprofit working on HIV/AIDS prevention can keep the free condom basket by their front door full, so teenagers, poor people and anyone else who stops by can protect themselves, no questions asked. Please give $10 now.

3) Vote for My Sessions for NTEN’s Conference. I submitted two sessions for the Communications Track for NTEN’s 2009 Conference in San Francisco. Voting will help determine the agenda, so please vote for my sessions. Just follow the links, then click on all five stars at the bottom of the description. There are tons of great sessions, so after you finish this list, go back and vote for some more.

Rapid-Fire Website Reviews: What’s Working and What’s Not on Nonprofit Websites

Out of Print: Using Technology and Social Media to Move Your Print Publications Online

4) Take the Twitter Survey. Take John Haydon’s quick 8-question survey on how nonprofits are using Twitter and social media.

That’s it — THANK YOU — and enjoy the good karma!

Filed Under: Good Karma Quickly, Nonprofit Communications