Need Those Sweet Donations? Then You Need To Understand Content Marketing for Nonprofits
We’re all busy humans.
Hey, it’s true! I’m up to my ears in sticky notes, and I’m willing to bet – as a nonprofit leader – you are, too.
In the nonprofit sector, we’re desperate for people to hear us. Our voices, our messages, our pleas for donations and support. Our communities rely on us to provide programs and services, and we never want to let them down.
And we know all marketing isn’t sleazy. Mission-based marketing is a thing. We get it! We might even have a dedicated marketing team. But we’re often still hesitant to use the same tactics or the same language as our for-profit friends.
Here’s the thing: by ignoring the tried-and-true rules of marketing, nonprofits are letting resources slip through our fingers. Every day.
The same basic rules apply to both for-profit and nonprofit marketing:
Define our audience and know who we’re talking to
Use brand personas
Understand which digital channel is for whom
Write at a 6th-grade level so that everyone can understand us
And so on.
These are rules for a reason – they work! And they work because we’re all busy humans. No one has the time or energy to read through your super-dense word-salad of an appeal letter, Facebook post, eblast or grant proposal.
I know you know. And I know it’s hard to change.
So let’s talk the why and the how of updating your nonprofit’s marketing strategy and reaping all the benefits of content marketing for nonprofits.
The Benefits of Marketing for Nonprofits
So what are the benefits to a nonprofit organization adopting more of the for-profit sector’s marketing practices?
You’re building awareness of your organization.
And your cause. And your community.
We host friendraisers and fundraisers. (And let’s be real – sometimes, we host what we hoped would be fundraisers but turn out to be friendraisers.)
We talk a big game about drumming up public will and building awareness not only of the work that our organization does but of the needs of the communities we serve.
If we can continue to do that by investing in the newest and best nonprofit marketing practices, then why on earth wouldn’t we??
You’ll impress your funders and donors.
People like flashy things. Hey, it’s okay! We all do. We’re human – and that’s why marketing practices are based on real-life psychology. When you’re at least reasonably up-to-date on your nonprofit marketing, you’re going to organically grow your reach and keep people interested.
And that includes funders and donors.
You can better reach and impact policymakers.
The basic rule of copywriting is this: the purpose of your headline is to get someone to read your first sentence. Your first sentence should make them want to read your second sentence. Your second sentence should make your third sentence irresistible.
And the point of that third sentence? You guessed it!
Now think about your local electeds. Think about how many times every day they have pieces of paper shoved in their faces. Emails forwarded, cluttered inboxes to weed through. What if you had a headline that grabbed their attention? And then they read your first sentence, and your second, and then your third?
What if they got all the way to your call to action, or had their interest piqued so they visited your website or your social media profiles? What if they saw the community engagement and public will you’ve been drumming up with your marketing and your awesome, impactful programming?
Well, that’s a whole new ballgame, isn’t it?
All of these principles are helping you reach people.
Yes, donors and funders, but also volunteers, community supporters and even people who might need your services and not know you’re out there.
If I can be made aware of every new Starbucks, Target or Amazon distribution center popping up in my area, why shouldn’t nonprofits be able to reach me, too?
Start With Your Language
The CEO has a law background, so she formats every paragraph of every grant proposal like a new contract clause. Your development director was an English teacher in a past life, so he’ll never let you start a sentence with a preposition.
We’ve still got folks arguing over Oxford commas (it depends on your style guide!) and double-spacing after periods.
Double-spacing! I know we’re in nonprofits, folks, but it’s been a long time since I’ve seen a typewriter, even in our offices.
Messaging is the cornerstone on which all other marketing rests. The most beautiful graphic in the world won’t save that word-salad copy – and in the nonprofit sector, we do love our word salad.
Fans of the television show Gilmore Girls will remember main character Lorelai’s reaction to the long, rambling answering machine greeting of her best friend, Sookie:
“Shorten it. De-cute it. Call me back.”
The same thing can be said for nonprofit marketing: keep your messaging simple, clear, concise and compelling.
You don’t need to wow people with your grammar skills or jargon. You don’t need to look like the smartest person in the room.
You just need to tell your readers about your work and not put them to sleep while you’re doing it.
Apps like the free Hemingway Editor can be helpful here. Copy/paste your latest grant proposal or fundraising appeal into the editor, and check out the grade level score it gives you. To make sure the information you’re communicating is accessible to most everyone, you’ll want to aim for a Grade 6 rating. Grade 9 is okay for more complex subject matter.
But remember! Unless you’re a health-based organization or dealing with complex scientific issues, your subject matter is likely not so complex that you can’t explain it clearly to a middle schooler!
Another tip: Use formatting to your advantage. Include bold headlines for the skimmers and plenty of detail for the deep readers. One is not better than the other when it comes to support and donations.
Once you’ve got a handle on your language, you’ll need to spend some time thinking about what you’ll do with it.
Enter: Content Marketing for Nonprofits
Imagine: someone comes across your organization or program. They take in a bit of information and decide that you do good work. Great!
But – that doesn’t mean they’ll come back. It doesn’t mean they’ll donate. It doesn’t even mean they’ll remember you ten minutes later.
Not unless you’re intentional about what and when that person sees and hears from you.
This is where content marketing for nonprofits comes in.
According to the Content Marketing Institute,
“Content marketing is a strategic marketing approach focused on creating and distributing valuable, relevant, and consistent content to attract and retain a clearly defined audience — and, ultimately, to drive profitable customer action.”
Put plainly, content marketing for nonprofits includes all of the online stuff you produce, post, send and say to spur your donors and supporters to action.
Ideally, you’ll have a strategy behind it all. Your messages will complement and build on each other across a variety of platforms and channels.
Email Marketing for Nonprofits
Email marketing for nonprofits is one of the most effective ways to maintain consistent communication with supporters.
If you’re collecting email addresses on your website or social platforms, then you’re essentially getting the green light to build a relationship with someone who’s expressed interest in your organization. This is a great position to be in.
Employ automation like a welcome sequence to reach out and begin communicating right away. Never have a new subscriber simply added to a regular newsletter list and leave them hanging until you send it out next. That’s a surefire way to rack up unsubscribes.
Email welcome sequences can consist of a variety of content:
Evergreen information about your organization, programs and issue area
Links to important blog posts or your social media channels
Short questionnaires to fill in the blanks about your subscribers’ geographic location or specific interests
Along with information like donation history, event attendance or volunteer participation, answers to a brief questionnaire can help you segment your email list for more targeted messaging.
Your Website Is Your Most Valuable Real Estate
Because your website is a digital property that you control entirely – no being at the mercy of social media algorithms! No getting caught in spam filters! – it’s where you have the best chance of getting your message across faithfully.
Take the time to get your nonprofit branding right to fully communicate the work you do. A few simple tweaks is sometimes all you need to see a big improvement. Choose your images carefully, and use them to create an engaging visual story. This branding should carry through from your website to your emails, social media profiles, donation pages and your print collateral, too.
Form and function both count – so make sure your website is mobile-responsive, too. With more than half of all website traffic coming from smartphones and tablets, there’s no room for anything but a top-notch mobile experience. “Just okay” just won’t cut it!
Fix the overlapping images and awkward navigation menus, and nix the sidebars that make your body text teeeeeeeny tiny.
Social Media Marketing for Nonprofits
There’s no doubt that social media can be a valuable tool for engaging our communities and supporters. But there’s a lot more to social media strategy for nonprofits than just throwing up a photo on Facebook and calling it a day.
When it comes to social, the most important factor is a set of clearly defined goals that support your overall marketing strategy. If you’re currently looking to build your email list, you’ll want to include calls to action (CTAs) on your social media posts that drive viewers to an email signup form on your website.
If, on the other hand, you’re in the middle of a fundraising campaign, make sure your social posts are sharing stories of your impact, your community and the contributions your networks of donors have made.
You’ll need to spend time learning about the different social media platforms and what they work best for. Don’t bite off more than you can chew. Choose 1-3 that meet your needs, and post to them consistently.
Blogging for Nonprofits
Blogs for nonprofit organizations are often-overlooked strategy goldmines.
Seriously! Stick with me.
Content marketing and blogging align well with what we as nonprofits tend to view as part of our everyday work: meeting people where they are.
We can capture the questions people have about our organization. We can highlight the reasons our work is critical to our communities. We can take the space to lay out that point-by-point argument for why our communities need the supports we provide. (Yep, that argument you repeat daily in the shower after a funder hems and haws over your grant proposal!)
We can polish ‘em up, sprinkle in some high-quality images, tighten up our keyword usage and keep people coming back for more.
A blog gives us content to use when we email our list. Or we can pull out quotes and reuse them as social media content. We can send blogs to elected officials, funders and major donors. We can amplify the voices of our community and craft compelling calls to action that get people to sign up, volunteer or donate.
Every blog we write can do some significantly heavy lifting for our nonprofit. We just need to write them.
Inbound Marketing for Nonprofit Organizations
Inbound marketing means drawing people to you with valuable content instead of constantly shelling out cash to pay for ads or media spots. And when you do it right, that content gets even more valuable as time passes.
As nonprofits, we can be allergic to simple. (You know it’s true!) We turn up our noses at the idea of marketing like the for-profit sector, and we struggle to define our audiences, lest we leave anyone out.
But while we adhere to archaic language rules and wed ourselves to organizational histories that read more like dissertations, our communities are struggling. We’re all working for the good of our entire society – so why aren’t we chomping at the bit to find out what will best move people to action??
Nonprofit marketing certainly can’t cure every ill. But a cohesive strategy can help keep those donations rolling in so we can do our best to support the people who rely on us.
There are great resources across the web for applying marketing best practices to nonprofit organizations.
But you don’t have to go it alone, either! Let’s talk.👇
