All this week, we are taking a look at what it means to be a CALM Communications Director (Collaborative, Agile, Logical, and Methodical). Today, let’s talk about being Methodical. You will always be short on time. You will always be surrounded by distractions. That’s why it is so important to be grounded in proven methods…
All this week, we are taking a look at what it means to be a CALM Communications Director (Collaborative, Agile, Logical, and Methodical). Today, let’s talk about being Logical. Many people mistakenly believe that good marketing is all about the creative. The right words, the perfect images. And those are important, without a doubt. But…
All this week, we are taking a look at what it means to be a CALM Communications Director (Collaborative, Agile, Logical, and Methodical). Today, let’s talk about being Agile. If you work in nonprofits, things are always in a state of flux. Same for marketing. To be successful, it pays to be good on your…
All this week, we are taking a look at what it means to be a CALM Communications Director (Collaborative, Agile, Logical, and Methodical). Today, let’s talk about being Collaborative. Communications directors are the translators and bridges between the people doing the work (inside the nonprofit) and the people supporting and benefitting from that work (outside…
Someone asked me the other day what the outcome of our Communications Director Mentoring Program and other coaching programs really was . . . what was the ultimate result of communications coaching? The word that instantly popped into my mind and off of my tongue was CALM. Communications directors are usually very busy, often frazzled, people. They…
In August, we here at Nonprofit Marketing Guide will be hosting the latest edition of the Nonprofit Blog Carnival. The Carnival is a round-up of recent posts — like a “best of” — on a particular topic. For example, this month Joanne Fritz at About.com compiled 18 posts all about year-end fundraising. Reserve some time…
Even if you like to write like I do, it can still feel like it takes forever to produce something good. And let’s face it, time is not something you have a whole lot of. Below are five online writing tools we like and that were also recommended by friends. They’ll help you…
At Nonprofit Marketing Guide, we use Google Apps for Work to manage our email, calendars, etc. As a two-person company, we don’t have lots of time to waste. And neither do you. So if you are a Google Apps or Gmail user, you might like my three favorite Gmail hacks. (I know these work on…
It’s time for community voting on sessions for the next Nonprofit Tech Conference by NTEN, happening in San Jose on March 23-25, 2016. This is the conference I always recommend first to communications directors who want to know which national conference to attend, and I will definitely be there. Let’s get some great sessions especially…
John Haydon gave me a great challenge: Share 9 content marketing tips. When you’ve written a 100,000-word book about nonprofit content marketing, boiling it down to your favorite 9 tips is a challenge. But I did it, and John captured it wonderfully: 3 tips for email newsletters: Be all about the reader Quick read, skimmable…
When something is overwhelming, like, let’s say, your job as a nonprofit communicator, it’s very hard to feel like you are getting anything done or making any progress at all, no matter how dedicated you are. We get overwhelmed, and motivation dissolves, in many aspects of our lives. For example, this summer, my husband has…
We’ll be kicking off the fourth edition of the #NPCommPix photo-a-day challenge for nonprofit communications pros on July 1, and I hope you’ll join in the fun. Dawn Crawford at BC/DC Ideas and I host the challenge, but we are very excited to welcome our first guest co-host, the Young Nonprofit Professionals Network this time!…
