Episode 115: Meet Your Donors Where They Are: Nonprofit Marketing & Fundraising Strategies
Are you posting on IG like crazy, but not seeing any return on your efforts? It could be that your donors aren't on IG. Learn how to research and identify which platforms your potential donors are on and how to reach them for more effective fundraising outcomes. Meet your donors where they are. Nonprofit marketing and fundraising requires strategy and intention. Learn what that looks like so you can increase your donations.
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🔦 NONPROFIT SPOTLIGHT 🙌🏿
Umpqua Bank Pt. 3
👉🏿https://www.umpquabank.com/
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🚀 RESOURCES TO HELP YOU RUN A SUCCESSFUL NONPROFIT
Donation Request Letters https://drive.google.com/file/d/1RjAzngjFTTH44BJ2iGp5QLoPHIO4O3P0/view?usp=drive_link
90 Days to a Profitable Nonprofit https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ofgeHJ2CTVS0t8STMiNqfveaVpWfaK7o/view?usp=sharing
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Learn more about my success with helping nonprofits
Visit My Website👇🏿👇🏿👇🏿
http://www.amberwynn.net
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Follow me on Facebook 👇🏿👇🏿👇🏿
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Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4G9QNaVAYz8eXTmz48gagl
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Got Questions? "Ask Amber" on any of my social media platforms or email me at amber@amberwynn.net
Podcast Transcript
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to On Air with Amber Wynn, where nonprofit leaders learn to fuse passion and commitment with proven business strategies to create long-term funding impact and sustainability. And now here's your host and resident, Philanthrepreneur Amber Wynn.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
Good morning fam. It's your girl back in the hot seat. Today we are going to talk about nonprofits marketing and fundraising strategy. Our topic today is meet your donors where they are. Oftentimes, I'm in these nonprofit spaces and I see nonprofits posting on Instagram. They're doing stories, and I'm just like, why are they on Instagram? Their audience clearly is on Facebook. Or I'll be like, why are they posting this here? They need to be on LinkedIn, and it just lets me know that as a community, we are not doing enough due diligence in our research. Understanding that there is a method, there is a strategy for reaching donors. Donors have specific behaviors. They have places that they hang out, and so you could be doing, oh yeah, I've been posting on Instagram, and your target audience isn't even on Instagram. So it's important to understand that just because you are a nonprofit doesn't mean that you can do what everybody else is doing, right?
(01:41):
You have got to look at where your donors are and you've got to meet them there. Otherwise, it is just wasted energy you're posting on Instagram. You're not going to see the results that you want to see in terms of fundraising because that's not where your target audience is. So when we come back, we're going to dive deeper into nonprofit marketing and fundraising strategies. In particular, meeting your donors where they are. Are you looking to leverage your 501(c)(3) tax exempt status to get products and services donated for an event, silent auction, or to support your program but aren't quite sure what to say? Get the donation request letters, toolkit. It provides you with the templates you can customize to fit any request, eliminate the guesswork of what to say, how to say it, and what to offer potential donors as benefits for their donation.
(02:32):
You had no idea you should offer donors something in exchange for their donation. Did you offering benefits triples your response rate. Plus the toolkit comes with the donor acknowledgement form template. It's the form you give them after they donate. This toolkit has everything you need for a successful donation request. What are your copy today? Welcome back. You're on air with Amber Wynn, and today we're talking about meeting your donors where they are at the top of the show. I mentioned about how nonprofits are out there, nearly Willie just posting Instagram. It doesn't lead to a conversion in this day and day and age in marketing and fundraising, you have got to create a strategy. If you are just posting just for the sake of posting, it is a waste of your precious time. So for example, there are statistics out there, there's data out there, analytics out there that will let you know where your target audience is.
(03:34):
For me. I'll give you an example. My target audience isn't everywhere. I have different age groups that I am looking to convert, and if you look at the data, it shows that the biggest giver is generation X, right? 65% of givers are generation X. Those are the people that you want to tap into, right? Who's going to give the most? So the first thing you want to look at is who is giving the most. If it is generation X, then you need to look at where is generation X hanging out? They're not on Snapchat. That's for the young folks, right?
(04:20):
There's a tie between Instagram and Facebook. You're going to find most of my community on Facebook. That's where they say, oh, that's where the old folks go, right? If the answer was baby boomers, you're not going to find them on social media as much. There's an increase because that's just where we are as a society. But for baby boomers, you will see more success with email campaigns. So this is the type of knowledge you need to know as a nonprofit, where is your target audience? If you're trying to get people to support you and you're in the arts, where are you going to find them? Is it going to be on Facebook? Is it going to be on Instagram? Is it Snapchat? How are you going to engage them? Now, I'm not going to sit here and pretend like I'm a marketing person. I am not.
(05:13):
I pay people with knowledge to identify where my target audience is and where I need to invest my money to find them. Right? Now, the challenge is I have different levels. I have individuals who are thinking about starting nonprofits, people who just got their 501(c)(3) tax exempt status. I have individuals who've been around between two to five years, and then I have six to 10 and on. So I have different segments. So depending on what it is I'm trying to do, if I'm trying to recruit for a webinar or sell a particular book, I'm not going to sell a book for how to scale your organization to the target audience who just got their 501(c)(3). You have got to be that specific, right? If your campaign is to recruit people to one of your programs, if you are focusing specifically on youth development, then you're not going to reach an audience that is focused on something else. So what I'm saying is as a nonprofit leader, you want to be more intentional. You want to meet your donors where they are. Another thing that sometimes nonprofits don't consider is your campaign mobile responsive. I just read research that says 80% of most donations are made online.
(06:42):
Is your campaign mobile responsive? Because if it's not, you're missing 80% of where the money's coming from. It's not enough to say, oh, well, I'm a nonprofit. If you are a nonprofit and you're trying to generate revenue, you've got to do the research to find out how are you going to connect with your supporters If 80% of them are on their phone making donations, but your campaign is not mobile responsive, guess who just met out, missed out on the opportunity to generate revenue? You did. And so this comes down to what I've always been saying is that a nonprofit is a business and a business has business expenses. So if you're not willing to invest in those things, that's going to help you generate revenue, then you're going to continue to self-fund your nonprofit. So what does that look like? Well, maybe you don't have a lot of money, but if you're talking to your board, you can say, well, a priority in 2025, 2026, whatever year it is, is that we increase our revenue.
(07:45):
In order for us to do that, we need to know where our supporters are. So I want to do this fundraiser specifically to hire a marketing individual. This marketing individual is going to do the research to find out where our supporters are, what type of marketing campaigns, because now with Instagram, you get more responses with videos, so you're going to have to invest in creating videos. Maybe it's stories. You're going to have to invest in creating stories. You can't continue to just sit there and say, well, we post on Instagram, but nothing happens. What is your call to action? If you don't know what a call to action is, this may be the reason why you're not converting. This may be the reason why you're not getting the donations. It's not enough to say, please donate every dollar you give. No, that's not going to engage your audience.
(08:37):
Your audience is too sophisticated. Even in the nonprofit sector, people are responding to your requests based off of how it's competing with all of the other requests, right? If someone has a cute video or someone has a touching video, and then at the end it says, help us to continue to get clean water too, and then they click on it, but you're saying any amount will help. You're not going to convert. So it goes back to if you are going to take your organization to the next level, if you're going to stop funding your organization, you need to have a strategy in place, and that strategy comes with a cost, and so when I say a nonprofit is a business, this is what I'm talking about. So you need to get your house in order so that you can generate 10 streams of revenue so that you can allocate one of those streams to marketing and fundraising so that you can generate more revenue.
(09:34):
It is a cycle. It's not enough to have a fundraiser and to just throw it into this slush fund because there's not enough revenue to cover all the expenses. I want you to think about really being strategic in saying, if I invest in some type of marketing that is crafted by a marketing individual with the knowledge and the expertise, and they know what they're doing, it's going to get you there faster than you continuing to make stuff up, right? I want you to think about, if I invest this one fundraiser to cover the cost of this marketing individual, how is that going to pay off you then may increase the amount of revenue that is coming in. That's how you make your priorities. That's how you make decisions. What am I going to invest in that's going to get my organization to the next level?
(10:25):
What am I going to invest in that's going to help me to generate more revenue? Instead of taking your Sundays and just posting and posting and posting, really be strategic. How am I going to reach my target audience? How am I going to get more exposure to the supporters that's going to help me generate revenue? That's how you meet your donors, where they are, you invest, you find out where they are, you find out how much they're giving you, find out what they like. Do they like videos? Do they like stories? And then that's what you create because then that's how you're going to get those conversions. I just think it's important. It's not enough to be like, well, I'm a nonprofit and I can't afford it. That's not enough. If you have started your nonprofit, if you are the nonprofit leader, you've got to do what it takes to keep your organization afloat and stop self-funding.
(11:14):
And today what you want to do is to meet your donors where they are, so you need to go find them. We're going to pause right now so that you can learn about how to position your organization to be found, how to even understand what your goals are, how to position your organization for marketing, right? I have all of the answers for you, ladies and gentlemen. I've been doing this for over 30 years, and in my course, 90 days to a profitable nonprofit. It's going to help you get there. It is the roadmap. I have modules specifically on nonprofit fundraising modules, specifically on nonprofit marketing. So if you're not sure I got the solution, let's take a look. Are you struggling to fund your programs? Can't get a grant to save your life. Most consultants will share the what of how to start a nonprofit or how to fundraise.
(12:11):
They may even share the why, but they don't share the how because that's where they make their money. Now, I'm not hating. I'm a businesswoman too, but I've been where you are trying to make the world a better place, struggling to keep the doors open up to the wee hours of the night writing grants and doing whatever needed to be done. And because I've walked in your shoes, I'm not here to make you spin your wheel, waste your time or your hard earned money. We ain't got time for that. The world needs you. I'm here to show you how to transform that pit. You keep dumping your hard earned money into and to a profitable nonprofit. I take my 30 years of nonprofit experience as a founder, executive director, program developer, grant writer, and funder, giving out over $7 million annually in grants, and I save you literally thousands dollars in hundreds of hours.
(13:06):
I walk you through setting up your nonprofit organization so that you can be generating enough revenue to cover your monthly expenses in just 90 days. How would that feel? Not paying bills from your personal bank account. I share my insider secret tips, tricks of a trade, and provide you with a step-by-step roadmap on how to turn your bootstrap organization into a profitable nonprofit. Within six months, you could be generating enough revenue to pay your salary or fully fund your program. The choice is yours, but you have to get the blueprint, and it took me three years to develop it, but it's here and it's going to change your life. Join my other successful clients who are just like you, full of passion and determination, but they had no idea all that it takes to run and fund a successful nonprofit. Now, they're winning grants and drawing a salary, and they know what it is that they're supposed to be doing to run a successful nonprofit.
(14:07):
They're no longer making it up as they go. They have the roadmap and they're clear about next steps, and I want that for you too. So what do you get in this course? You'll walk away with knowledge, products, processes, and systems, not just a bunch of promises, but exactly what you need to turn your organization into a profitable nonprofit. I promise you don't need grants. What you need is a solid infrastructure, and this course is going to give you all of that and more. And what's more, it comes with the money back guarantee. So go ahead, click the link below to register for this course. Welcome back to On Air with Amber Wynn, and now it is time for you to ask Amber. It's the time in the episode when you get to ask me your pressing questions. You can find me on all of the social media.
(14:59):
Today's question I got from Annmarie, who is from Altamonte. She dmd me on my Instagram account. Thank you. Annemarie says, my board acts like I'm their assistant instead of the executive director. In your podcast, you say they're supposed to support the executive director, but I feel like all they do is tell me what I should be doing. Most of it is their job. Based on what you've been saying in your podcast, and now I'm heated because I knew it didn't feel right, me doing everything, but now that I know I want to scream, what should I do to stop the madness and get them in line? Well, first of all, I'm so sorry that you want to scream. Secondly, Annemarie, I'm excited that now you know better.
(15:49):
And thirdly, it's not about getting them in line. It's about getting both your board and yourself the knowledge that you should have about what the IRS says, a public charity, how it's supposed to operate, because it's not about what Amber Wynn says. It's about what the IRS says. Public charities have a structure, and that structure is predetermined by the IRS. So I think a good start could be to share the episodes, some of the articles that I have on my website and some of the resources about the board roles and responsibilities to educate them, right? What you don't want to do is be combative. You want to educate them, and you want to come at it like, listen, I know we've been functioning this way because I didn't know better, but now I know better. And here's some information on what the separation of duties are.
(16:52):
The board's responsibility is for visioning. The board's responsibility is for fundraising. The board's responsibility is making sure that the organization is run ethically and that you support me as the executive director doing the day-to-day. It's not you giving me your job to do. So, while their responsibility technically is to supervise, to supervise the executive director, not dump their responsibilities on them, are they doing what they're supposed to do? Are they fundraising? Because if not, that's where they should be focusing their energy. I think it's important for you to give them that information, share with them so that they come into an understanding and hopefully shift the way that they engage with you. But if that doesn't work, then my recommendation is for you to hire a qualified nonprofit management consultant that focuses on board development. Have them come in for one of the board trainings because should be undergoing board trainings to support them and to help them grow and to do their job better.
(17:57):
If they haven't been, then you can introduce that and say, listen, based off of the knowledge that I have acquired, you guys should be getting board training in that consultant. Let the consultant outline what it is the IRS says that they're supposed to be doing, and then you should see a shift. One thing. They're going to be like, oh, she's just lazy and she doesn't, no. You need to understand that is not your role. Your role is not to dump your responsibilities on me. Your role is to support me. So if sharing the podcasts and articles and resources doesn't shift their energy, bring in a qualified nonprofit consultant to do board training to lay out for them what their roles and responsibilities are, and if that consultant is worth their salt, then you will see a shift because they'll be like, oh, this is what we're supposed to be doing, and they'll start to focus on that. If you have questions for me, you can hit me up on any of my social media channels. You can email me at amber@amberwynn.net, LinkedIn, Instagram, Facebook, all of that. Share with me your questions. You can even reach me on Anchor and Spotify and leave me an audio. If you're not comfortable with typing, you can just leave me an audio. Alright, so now we're going to shift to the next part of our episode. We are in conversation with Umpqua Bank.
(19:26):
I have expanded my nonprofit spotlight to not just focus on nonprofits. I do. You guys are the most amazing individuals, and I'm sharing interviews with my nonprofit leaders, but I'm also sharing interviews with consultants, funders. I want you to get an insight onto what they think, their perspective, and that's what we're doing right now with our conversation with Umpqua Bank. So we are on part three. Let's continue the conversation.
Speaker 3 (20:06):
Another part of that is foundation giving, grant making. So grant making falls under service where we give grants to nonprofits. All banks do it. Each banks have different lines of businesses or different focuses that they are focused on. Some banks just give a lot to a lot of anybody from the homeless shelter to the animal welfare. Then there's some banks that are very hyperfocused and they want to be focused on the kind of work that they do, housing, small business investment. They are focused on nonprofits who are doing that work. So in foundation giving, we are giving grants to those organizations that fit whatever framework that bank is working within, and also sponsorship. We sponsor things. We get our names out. We'll sponsor a luncheon or a gala or an event or what have you in order to be a part of that process. Then there's investing.
(21:01):
So we do some investments, like some people may be familiar with EQ twos or equity equivalent products where we give lending to a nonprofit, but it's at much lower rates. You're able to be flexible with the funding. You can count it as equity and not debt as a nonprofit, even though it's a loan, but it's a different way to engage. So those are just the things that are on a high level, that CRA manifests itself with nonprofit partners. So part of that is as a nonprofit, you want to ensure that you're not just going to a random bank asking for random things. You need to understand that bank's focus, right? You need to understand how are they showing up in the community? What are their nonprofit partnerships look like? Most banks really want to work with the nonprofits who are in their space. They are being fully effective, right?
(21:53):
They're not, be quite frank, that's just who I am. We have in the nonprofit space a lot of nonprofits who might be doing the same thing. You have 25 nonprofits doing the same thing when it really makes sense for some collaboration to get the whole ecosystem working, and usually there's one nonprofit who's doing it better than everybody else. So some of those things are what we look at from a bank perspective. Okay, so in your ecosystem, where do you land as a nonprofit? And are you doing something innovative? Are you doing something new? Are you being effective? Because we want to make sure our investment, whatever it looks like, is being effective. And so, I mean, nonprofits need to make sure that they are an effective participant in whatever ecosystem they find themselves in. And a bank is looking at that along with the business continuity piece. How is your financials? What do they look like? What does your programming look like? How are you approaching that? Those are all questions that are asked. Even if you're getting investment from a EQ two or Patient Capital, or you're getting a grant, they're an application process, and there's questions that are going to be answered.
Speaker 2 (23:19):
And we're back. You're on air with Amber Wynn, and that was part three of our shine on nonprofit sharing resources with nonprofit leaders. From the perspective of funders, Umpqua Bank is, as I said at the beginning of the episode, moving into more of the far west region. And so it's an opportunity for you to learn about banks, bankers, and the resources that they also provide nonprofits. When I say to you that a nonprofit is a business, it is, you should have a specific business banking account. You should not be combining your personal banking account with your professional one. So banks are a part of your ability to look professional. You have a business account, and when you establish relationships with your banker, when it comes time for lines of credit, when it comes time for credit cards, when it comes time for those things, you've established a relationship with your banker, and it's a whole lot easier for you to get those business resources.
(24:28):
One of the reasons why it's important to have a relationship with your business is when you expand as an organization and you start getting things like government grants. Those grants are reimbursable, meaning you do the work, you submit your invoices, and then the government reimburses you. What happens when the government doesn't pay you in the 30 days that they promise they never do? It's more like 90 days. So there's a gap in between that you need to fill, right? You got that grant because you're like, oh, this is going to help me with my daily operations. But what happens when there's a funding gap? You talk to your banker, you get a line of credit. That line of credit is available to float you, right? To cover your payroll until that invoice is paid. When that invoice is paid, then you replenish that, right? And you keep that line of credit so that you're not tapping into your personal account to cover your expenses.
(25:22):
So having those types of resources is important as a business, making sure that you can keep your payroll paid, making sure you can cover your expenses. Those come from things like having lines of credit and having credit cards that you can utilize. So if you want to see the full episode, go to my YouTube channel and check it out. We've got one more episode and then we'll wrap it up. But yeah, I'm excited to bring you more interviews from consultants and other people who are supporting nonprofits. So that's it. You guys. Be sure that when you're thinking about your donors, that you meet them where they are, that your campaigns are mobile responsive, that you do the research that you need to find out where they are and how to get them to convert. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe, like, and share with your community, but most importantly, be sure to take care of yourself like you take care of your community. We'll see you next week. Thanks for
Speaker 1 (26:28):
Thanks for listening. If you enjoyed this episode, subscribe and leave a review on iTunes. Head over to www.amberwynn.net/podcast for the links and resources mentioned in today's podcast. See you next time.
