Kivi Leroux Miller - The Nonprofit Marketing Guide

Joining, subscribing, or following.This objective helps you measure list growth. It can be customized in many ways, such as increasing newsletter subscriptions by 20 percent this year, or optimizing email sign-up forms on your website to convert more visitors to subscribers, for example.

Nonprofit communicators may also consider additional objectives that attempt to measure the impact of their communications on how people think and feel.

Increased levels of influence.This objective would assess the extent to which your communications are increasing your influence with specific groups of people or increasing your share on the public conversation. For example, you might seek to get invited to speak at five industry events. Or you might try to improve your search engine rankings on 10 keywords. Or you may try to get your policy positions covered in five prominent media outlets.

Increased satisfaction.Perhaps you want your program participants, supporters, or influencers to feel more satisfied about their work with or relationship with your nonprofit. In this case, you might customize your objective to raise the Net Promoter Score for a specific program to +60. Or, if you use a lead scoring system to measure engagement of your email list, you might want to keep at least 35 percent of your list at a five-star engagement level.

Expressions of trust.You might wish to track whether your communications are leading certain groups of people to say or do things that demonstrate their trust in your organization. For example, you might want three new organizations to agree to partner with you on a new project. Or you may want 100 new participants to trust your nonprofit to help them address an especially difficult challenge.

Change in tone or attitude.You may be interested in tracking the extent to which communications help change the tone, sentiment, attitude, or preferences expressed by a group of people. In this case, you could work to move the majority of social media comments you receive from negative to positive. Or you could use feedback surveys or polls to gauge changes in attitudes or preferences over time.

Finally, nonprofits may also choose objectives that help measure the impact on how people behave.

Increased demand or desire.Are communications increasing requests, demands, or desire for something the nonprofit offers? For example, a health clinic may create a marketing plan to increase appointment requests by 30 percent next quarter.

Increased readiness or empowerment.This objective would help measure whether communications were helping certain groups of people be more ready or empowered to take a specific action. For example, you might develop a plan so that 70 percent of petition signers continue to open educational emails six months later. Or you might track the percentage of people who move from being aware of an issue to acting on it.

Change in behavior.If you want your communications to lead to measurable changes in how people behave, you might set an objective such as 50 percent fewer students engaging in behavior resulting in suspensions next semester.

It's worth noting that attributing some results, including behavior change and change in tone, specifically to a nonprofit's communications plan can be extremely challenging or expensive. It's unlikely that you'll be able to connect your communications directly and exclusively to those results.

Instead of drawing a direct link between your communications work and achieving an objective, we often speak instead in the language of Key Progress Indicators or Key Performance Indicator (KPIs). These are indicators of progress toward your goals and mission.

The tactics you use – the channels or type of content – can also influence how you phrase your objectives. I do caution you against only using objectives that are directly tied to a specific tool or communications channel. Ideally, you are using multiple tools or channels to achieve an objective.

Tactics are easier to understand: it's all about the content you make and the channels in which you distribute that content.

Content includes all forms of writing and visual content, such as photography, graphics, and video.

Nonprofits especially interested in content marketing will likely create content in the form of downloads, problem-solving tools, and quizzes. Some nonprofits rely on content created by others through content curation or synthesizing data and information from others.

The most popular communications channels for nonprofits are:

Websites and blogs

Email, as single topic notices and appeals and as multitopic newsletters

Social media

Media relations or public relations

Events, including hosted gatherings, presentations and public speaking, personal visits, and displays and booths

Direct mail, including invitations, appeals, and print newsletters

Nonprofits also use:

Paid advertising

Signage

Brochure, flyers, and other “leave behind” materials

Additional online tools such as mobile apps and instant messaging

Guest writing or syndication on other people's blogs or publications

To make working with the goals, strategies, objectives, and tactics described in this chapter easier, Nonprofit Marketing Guide created the Nonprofit Communications Strategic Planning Card Deck. The double deck of playing cards, which includes definitions and examples, allows nonprofit communicators to visually lay out their communications plans. The card deck can also be used for a variety of planning and training exercises.

“When I begin to feel overwhelmed,” says executive director Jeanette Stokes of the Resource Center for Women and Ministry in the South, “I can see all those cards spread out and realize that we can't do it all. I say to myself, ‘Pick a goal and strategy and a few tactics.’”

Communications strategist Tara Collins feels the same way. “When planning a campaign, I restrict myself to just the three best cards for goals, strategies, objectives, and tactics so I don't get overwhelmed or sidetracked. The card decks allow me to lay it all out, shuffle, discard, reshuffle, focus and then get it all down on paper quickly.”

The card deck is available at both Amazon.comand NonprofitMarketingGuide.com.

I use this quote from Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist and author Thomas L. Friedman in many of my trainings:

“In the world of ideas, to name something is to own it. If you can name an issue, you can own the issue.” 1

Ineffective communications teams struggle with conflicting opinions and ambiguous interpretations of basic terminology. Effective teams, on the other hand, have a shared vocabulary that is clear and meaningful.

In nonprofit organizations where marketing is a fairly new or poorly understood concept, it's vital for communications staff to name and therefore own many important facets of the work. That includes naming the goals, strategies, objectives, and tactics described in this chapter. Doing so will help you build your team, be more strategic, and increase your effectiveness.

1 1. Thomas L. Friedman, “The Power of Green,” The New York; Times Magazine, April 15, 2007. See https://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/15/magazine/15green.t.html

“We used to use what I call the ‘Oh My God’ method of planning our communications,” said Jeanette Stokes, executive director of the Resource Center for Women and Ministry in the South. “We'd look at one another and say, “Oh my God, if we don't tell people about this right now, it will be too late!” The chaotic creation of communications would ensure.