Today’s Tips for NGOs 020515

In case you forgot, LinkedIn launched in 2003, Facebook launched in 2004 and Twitter launched in 2006 – that’s 12, 11 and nine years ago, respectively.

According to nptechforgood.com, despite the proliferation of social media – and the Internet as a whole – experts have documented that they are still growing in usage and are expected to grow for years to come.

Simultaneously, the writers at NpTechforGood noted that’s it’s no coincidence that online donating is also rapidly growing.

“A decade ago most individuals still consumed print news and donated by writing and mailing checks. Today, as donors, activists, and volunteers worldwide have embraced the Internet for news and entertainment, so have they transitioned their giving and their trust to digital. The investment the early adopter nonprofits made into online fundraising technology and strategy in the late 1990s and 2000s is now finally starting pay off – especially if they have also invested into a smart, multichannel, integrated social media strategy,” they wrote.

In line with this, they cited as evidence a charitable tradition that evolved into what is called Giving Tuesday, which last year fell on December 14.

A total of $45.68 million was raised, an increase of 63% over 2014. Social media enhanced outreach of the campaign as well: 32.7 million Twitter impressions and 698,600 hashtag mentions. NGO participation reached more than 15,000 and partner organization participation topped 20,000 from more than 68 countries.

It’s worthwhile to check this out for your NGO. Visit http://www.givingtuesday.org/

I have been encouraging NGOs to devote time to developing a marketing plan for their organization just like any small business would do. However, this idea is not based on the notion of merely stimulating creative juices of your team members – though creativity is a requirement of a solid marketing plan.

Your NGO’s marketing plan must result in the achievement of the goals that you outlined within a well-defined period of time. A marketing plan is not waxing poetic for an indefinite amount of time.

According to Laura Lowell, author of “42 Rules of Marketing,” while marketing is creative, exciting and fun, serious managers expect – and demand – concrete results.

“There was a time when brilliant creative was appreciated for being brilliant creative. Now, most CEOs actually want their marketing teams to help sell products. They are holding CMOs accountable for specific performance metrics - like all the other C-level folks at the table,” Lowell wrote.

That means frequency of press release, social media posts and tweets, research and reports, face-to-face events and raising money.

“At the end of the day, after all the creative is reviewed and approved, the copy is tweaked and refined, and the lists are scrubbed and de-duped, what really matters is that the campaign helped the company (or NGO) sell more products (disseminate its influence). Yep – it’s that simple. In the simplest terms, marketing is the way messages about your company (your NGO), product or service (your mission) are created and communicated to your customers (your stakeholders) in order to elicit a positive response. In other words, marketing is the way you create and distribute messages to get people's attention so you can convince them to buy more of your stuff (support your mission),” Lowell wrote.

In other words, the exercise to create a marketing plan and its implementation should not be belittled.

Contact me for more ideas and guidance.

For a global view of what NGOs do, please visit my Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/BoostingNGOOutreach