What if you could provide Google users looking for your nonprofit with all the relevant details they need to get in touch with you right from the search engine results page? With Google My Business, now called Google Business Profiles, this has fortunately been a reality for some time.
Despite the name of this feature saying “business,” your nonprofit can also create a Google Business Profile! To help you get started, this guide will dive into Google Business Profiles, answering the following questions:
Ultimately, Google Business Profiles are incredibly simple and easy to set up. Once complete, your nonprofit can attract new supporters, increase its visibility, and present itself as a trustworthy, reputable organization to Google users.
What is Google My Business?
If you’ve ever Googled a business, you’ve likely noticed something appear above or to the side of search results that provides a lot of information about the organization you just searched for. This is a Google Business Profile.
A Google Business Profile is a summary of your business that Google will show users searching for your organization. These profiles are primarily managed by the organization they’re about, and they can contain as much or as little information as you want about your nonprofit. Although, it’s better to lean on the side of more information.
For example, let’s take a look at all of the elements of nonprofit Erika’s Lighthouse’s Google Business Profile:
Photographs
Link to the organization’s website
Google Reviews
A description of the organization
Address, hours, and phone number
Product listings
Social media profiles
Plus, there’s even more you can add to your profile, such as:
Questions & Answers.Do you get the same questions about your nonprofit over and over again? Answer them right on your Google Business Profile with the Questions & Answers section. Users can ask questions, and your nonprofit can answer them. Plus, you can also post questions yourself if you’d prefer not to wait for a visitor to ask.
Highlights. Highlights are essentially an opportunity to let supporters know a variety of other helpful details about your nonprofit that you may not be able to squeeze into your organization’s description. For example, you might share that your nonprofit is wheelchair accessible or has in-store pickup and delivery for product offerings. To help you determine what to add, you can navigate to the “More” tab under “Business Information” and add your information for a variety of categories provided by Google.
Updates. Is there anything you want to announce to visitors? This might be new product offerings, event promotions, or anything else new you want to share.
Plus, in addition to appearing in Google search results, Google Business Profiles also appear in Google Maps. For instance, here’s Erika’s Lighthouse again, but on Google Maps:
Is Google My Business Free?
Yes! Any organization can create a Google Business Profile for free. Google wants as many organizations as possible to create and maintain Google Business Profiles because of how they improve the user experience.
Can Nonprofits Use Google My Business?
Yes again! While Google Business Profiles were created with businesses in mind, nonprofits can use them as well.
Through this no-cost program, your nonprofit receives the following benefits:
Boosted visibility.
If you’re serious about search engine advertising, creating a Google Business Profile should be one of your first priorities.
When creating your profile, you will need to choose the “Business Category” that best fits your nonprofit. “Non-profit organization” is included as a category, but thanks to the extensive list, you may be able to select a category that aligns more closely with your mission and services, like “Environmental protection organization,” “Mental health service, and “Food bank” to name just a few options relevant to nonprofits.
This categorization is primarily for search engine optimization purposes. Picking the right category improves the chances that your pages and business profile will be shown to individuals searching for organizations like yours.
This means users looking specifically for your nonprofit will receive additional information about your organization immediately after Googling you, and Google will also have additional indicators of what keywords to push your content for, increasing your page rankings.
Plus, if your nonprofit has services, products, or programs for sale, you are at least slightly operating like a business! As such the opportunity to showcase product photos, respond to customer reviews, and get your organization literally on the map is just as important for your nonprofit as it would be for a for-profit organization.
Location-based traffic.
You’ve likely had the experience of searching for a specific service, product, or type of organization without referencing your location. However, Google still pulls up results for local businesses.
Google has extensive location data for both individual searchers and the various organizations using Google Business Profiles. As such, it uses geolocation to connect searchers with businesses and nonprofits near them to improve the user experience.
Additionally, as mentioned earlier, Google Business Profiles also apply to Google Maps. If you’ve ever opened up your map app to see what’s nearby, Google pulls from Google Business Profiles to direct you toward local organizations.
By sharing your address with Google, you can increase your chances of connecting with local volunteers, customers, beneficiaries, and donors.
Plus, your nonprofit doesn’t need a physical storefront to participate either. If you have a physical location you want donors, beneficiaries, volunteers, and anyone else to know about, you can add your address to your account. If not, you choose your city or area code instead. For instance, if you’re a small organization working out of someone’s house, you likely don’t want to share your address.
Improved credibility.
Almost every organization around has a Google Business Profile due to either setting it up themselves or having an unverified listing created (more on that later). As such, organizations that come up blank on Google can seem suspicious. After all, would you buy from a business with hundreds of reviews or one with none? Chances are the former since 75% of consumers “regularly” or “always” read online reviews before doing business with an organization.
Maintaining a Google Business Profile shows supporters that your organization is active, trustworthy, and has real humans behind it. Plus, with the reviews, the Question & Answer, and Highlights sections, you have plenty of opportunities to talk to customers, supporters, and beneficiaries directly, address their questions, and promote your nonprofit.
How Can My Nonprofit Get Started With Google My Business?
Generally, your nonprofit can create a Google Business Profile using one of two methods:
Set up a business profile.
If your nonprofit doesn’t already have a Google Business Profile, you can create one by navigating to Google Maps, opening the menu, and clicking “Add your business.”
From there, either sign into your business account if you already have one. If not, you can create one by following these steps:
Create a Google Account and select that your purpose is “To manage my business.”
Fill out the standard Google Account information to create a new Gmail account or link a pre-existing email address to your new Google Account.
Agree to Google’s terms of service.
Set up your Google Business Profile by entering your nonprofit’s name into the “Business name” entry field (note: if your nonprofit’s name appears, skip to the next section to learn how to claim an unverified listing).
Enter your nonprofit’s category.
Complete your profile by adding your address, contact information, hours, and other pertinent information.
Verify your account via phone, email, mail, or video.
During this process, you can also choose whether to opt in to receive updates and recommendations from Google about how to improve your profile. These can be useful if you are new to Google Business Profiles or want to stay in the loop when it comes to Google’s recommended best practices.
Claim an unverified listing.
To be as compressive as possible, Google will auto-generate listings for some organizations that have yet to create Google Business Profiles themselves. If you’ve ever seen the buttons that say “Own this business?” you might be looking at an unverified listing.
To claim an unverified listing, follow these steps:
Identify your business. If your nonprofit comes in a Google Business Profile card, and you haven’t created a profile, then you know you have an unverified listing.
Click the “Own this business?” button. The name of the button may change depending on what device or app you are using. However, on web browsers, the button usually says, “Own this business?” If the button does not appear or a prompt comes up explaining that someone else is already managing the account, you may need to request access.
Confirm it’s your business and hit “Manage now.” Double-check that the nonprofit is yours and not another organization with the same name. Often, the best way to confirm it’s your organization is to open Google Maps and enter your address. If your nonprofit appears, it’s unverified. If nothing appears, then you will need to create a Google Business Profile.
Verify your nonprofit with Google. Imagine the chaos if Google let anyone claim they owned a business and manage its profile. Before being able to access the Google Business Profile, you’ll need to verify your ownership via phone, text, email, or video. The verification options Google provides are dependent on your organization type, area, Google support hours, and other factors. You must choose one of the verification options Google provides.
Google can take up to five business days to confirm your verification, and updates to your profile may start appearing a few weeks after your verification. Fortunately, you can start updating your profile before verification is confirmed.The changes will only go live after Google confirms your ownership.
How Can Nonprofits Make the Most of a Google My Business?
Ultimately, your Google Business Profile is as useful as you choose to make it. To get the most out of this free service, we recommend:
Adding as much information as possible. While you can stick with the bare minimum of just your nonprofit’s name and address, the more information you add to your profile, the better. These details turn the Google search results page for your organization into an advertisement for your nonprofit. Explain what your nonprofit does by adding a business description, what services you offer your community, and where supporters can connect with you on social media.
Featuring photos of your organization. Photographs show off what your nonprofit does, helping you market your cause and increase your trustworthiness. Even if you have limited photos you want to share, you can still post pictures of your logo, Google map location, and fliers. Be aware that Google will pull photos from users’ reviews and add them to your profile. To ensure photographs that best represent your nonprofit appear first, it’s good to post at least a few photos yourself.
Responding to reviews. Anyone can rate and write a review for your nonprofit. Whether these reviews are 1 or 5 stars, it’s generally recommended to reply to as many of them as possible. Doing so allows you to address individuals’ concerns, encourage positive comments, and show users scrolling through reviews your nonprofit’s attentiveness to supporters and beneficiaries alike.
If your nonprofit is ready to expand its presence on Google by creating a Google Business Profile, we recommend taking just one more step and applying for the Google Ad Grant.
The Google Ad Grant provides participating nonprofits with $10,000 in ad credits every month, allowing you to promote your nonprofit on search engine results pages for free. By targeting keywords related to your nonprofit, you can connect with high-value leads who are likely to be interested in your cause, make a donation, or purchase your offerings.
To get started with the Google Ad Grant, partner with a Google-certified Ad Grant agency, like Getting Attention! As an officially recognized Ad Grant agency, we’re in the loop with any changes to Google’s Ad Grant program. This means we bring the latest knowledge on what’s trending on Google to help your nonprofit apply for the ad grant, create ads, and reinstate your account if it ever gets deactivated.
More Google Resources for Nonprofits
A Google Business Profile literally puts your nonprofit on the map. Supporters can learn more about your nonprofit as soon as they search for you, while your local community will start noticing you popping up nearby. In other words, Google Business Profiles lets you expand your audience and source high-quality leads just by filling out basic information about your nonprofit.
To take advantage of even more Google resources for nonprofits, explore these resources:
https://gettingattention.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/google-my-business-for-nonprofits_feature.png8102330Jessica Kinghttps://gettingattention.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/getting-attention-logo.svgJessica King2024-07-02 16:28:082024-11-15 14:29:06What To Know About Google My Business for Nonprofits
Nonprofits operate in a unique intersection of passion and practicality, striving not only to champion their causes but also to engage a community of supporters who are just as dedicated. At the core of this engagement lies an integral yet underappreciated tool: nonprofit content marketing.
While many nonprofits recognize the necessity of marketing for donor acquisition and retention, the content of these materials often gets brushed over. This oversight can mean missed opportunities in an environment where every interaction counts.
To help, we’ll explore everything you need to know about creating a successful nonprofit content marketing strategy that incites passion for your mission, including:
Whether your goal is to inspire a first-time visitor to become a lifelong donor or to re-engage lapsed supporters, the right content can make all the difference. Let’s dive in!
Content Marketing FAQ
Before you craft your strategy, let’s explore the fundamentals and importance of this type of marketing.
What Is Nonprofit Content Marketing?
Nonprofit content marketing is a type of marketing that involves creating and distributing written and multimedia collateral that’s valuable and relevant to an organization’s cause. This type of marketing focuses on telling the organization’s story, showcasing impact, and building trust among potential and current donors, volunteers, and advocates.
Content can take many formats, including long and short-form ones. Common types of nonprofit content marketing include blog posts, emails, social media posts, videos, case studies, and eBooks. The best content aims to help the reader and educate them on the cause, rather than pushing them to take action.
What Are The Benefits of A Nonprofit Content Marketing Strategy?
Generally, nonprofit content marketing helps deepen connections by fostering trust and engagement through storytelling and information sharing. By understanding best practices for content creation, your organization can enhance its narrative, connect meaningfully with its audience, and drive its mission forward.
Although most nonprofits engage in some form of content marketing, having a specific strategy can greatly boost its effectiveness. Here are some key benefits of implementing a well-defined nonprofit content marketing strategy:
Consistent Messaging: A structured content marketing strategy ensures consistent messaging across various channels. This consistency helps build a recognizable brand voice and identity.
Goal-Focused: A strategy ensures that every piece of content has a purpose aligned with your organization’s broader goals. Whether it’s raising awareness, driving donations, or recruiting volunteers, a strategic approach ensures all marketing efforts contribute to achieving specific objectives.
Easy Results Tracking: With a clear strategy, it’s easier to set benchmarks and measure the effectiveness of your nonprofit’s content marketing efforts. Marketing data like engagement rates, conversion rates, and overall reach can be invaluable for assessing what works.
Essentially, implementing a dedicated content marketing strategy will allow your nonprofit to maximize its outreach and drive passion for its mission.
What Can Nonprofit Content Marketing Strategy Accomplish?
A well-crafted approach to nonprofit content marketing can achieve several objectives that are vital for the growth and sustainability of your organization, such as:
Supporter Acquisition: Attract new supporters by creating content that vividly showcases your nonprofit’s mission and its tangible impact through beneficiary stories and impact metrics.
Supporter Engagement and Retention: Keep current supporters actively informed through regular updates and compelling stories that highlight ongoing efforts and the impact of support.
Sales Lead Generation: Strengthen revenue streams through content that promotes your nonprofit’s revenue-generating services, programs, or products, reinforcing your financial base.
By strategically employing content marketing, your nonprofit can ensure a broader reach and deeper connections, turning passive observers into active supporters. This approach not only drives your mission forward but also builds a sustainable foundation for future impact.
Types of Nonprofit Content Marketing
There are several types of content your nonprofit can create. While this gives your nonprofit plenty of options, it can be overwhelming trying to find the perfect mix that inspires your audience.
The best combination depends on your nonprofit’s mission, audience, and goals. With that in mind, here are the core types to consider:
Written Content
Written content is a cornerstone of an effective nonprofit content marketing strategy. It offers a variety of formats to engage different segments of your audience. Each type of written content serves a unique purpose and can be tailored to meet specific organizational goals:
Blog Articles: These provide a platform for deeper storytelling, allowing your nonprofit to elaborate on its mission, tell stories, and discuss relevant issues. When optimized for search engines, blogs can drive traffic to your website and establish your organization as a thought leader in its field.
Email Marketing: Personalized email campaigns can nurture relationships with supporters by delivering targeted messages directly to their inboxes. Emails are excellent for updates, donor appeals, and sharing the direct impact of contributions.
Search Engine Ads: Paid search engine ads can boost visibility and direct traffic to key content or your donation page. Since Google owns over 90% of the search engine market, Google Ads are particularly impactful for capturing the attention of potential supporters who are searching for related topics or services. You’ll need to write compelling ads that emphasize your mission, target relevant keywords, and inspire action, like this example from Erika’s Lighthouse:
Social Media Posts: Quick, engaging posts on social media platforms can increase awareness, encourage shares, and foster community among followers. These posts are ideal for real-time updates, event promotions, and viral fundraising campaigns. Consider which platforms your supporters are active on, whether that’s Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, LinkedIn, or X (formerly Twitter).
Flyers: Traditional but still effective, fundraising flyers can be used to promote events, recruit volunteers, and raise awareness locally. They are especially useful when posted on community bulletin boards and handed out by local businesses.
eCards:Charity eCards can be sent to thank donors, share success stories, and celebrate special occasions. It’s a fairly cost-effective method, so design birthday or holiday eCards to let supporters know you’re thinking of them or thank-you cards to show appreciation. You can even create cause awareness eCards for supporters to send, like this example from Project Sleep:
Each type of written content offers unique benefits and can be strategically integrated into your overall marketing plan to achieve your nonprofit’s goals. Do you want to enhance donor appreciation? Try thank-you eCards. Do you want to drive traffic to your latest fundraising campaign? Create Google Ads that highlight your campaign’s purpose and feature your fundraising page.
By diversifying your channels and tailoring messages to different audience segments, you can enhance outreach, deepen connections, and drive more meaningful actions.
Video
The rise of video content in digital marketing is undeniable, with marketing research showing that viewers retain 95% of a message when they watch it in a video compared to 10% when reading it in text. This visual and dynamic medium can significantly enhance engagement and message recall, making it a powerful tool for nonprofits.
Plus, video is only growing more popular. Wistia’s video platform reported a 15% increase in video plays and a 44% jump in watch time in 2023.
To create impactful video content, consider the following strategies:
Equipment: High-quality video doesn’t always require professional-grade equipment. Today’s smartphones offer excellent video capabilities, and when paired with a good microphone and stabilizer, they can produce surprisingly professional results. However, for certain projects, investing in or renting higher-quality equipment can improve the look and sound of your videos.
Scriptwriting: A well-crafted script is crucial. It should clearly outline the message, ensure a logical flow of ideas, and include a compelling call to action. The script should resonate with your audience, emphasizing the impact of their support and the real stories behind your cause.
Editing: Good editing can transform basic footage into a compelling story. It involves not just cutting and arranging clips, but also integrating elements such as music, text overlays, and effects to enhance the emotional and informational value of the video.
Accessibility: Include closed captions, create transcripts, and ensure that videos are compatible with assistive technologies. This not only broadens your audience but also complies with accessibility standards, enhancing the inclusivity of your content. On TikTok, adding captions boosts viewer affinity by 95%, recall by 58%, likability by 31%, and uniqueness by 25%, according to that same Wistia study cited earlier.
Tap into this form of nonprofit content marketing with YouTube for Nonprofits. This program offers special features like linkable donation buttons directly in videos, the ability to broadcast live events, and access to powerful analytics tools. These features help maximize the reach and impact of your videos, making it easier for your nonprofit to connect with a global audience, spread its message, and drive donations.
Images
Visual storytelling through images can significantly enhance the way your nonprofit communicates its mission. Decorative images not only capture attention but also convey emotions and narratives more effectively than text alone.
Here are a few types of images that can be particularly impactful:
Photographs: Real, compelling photographs of your nonprofit’s activities and the individuals whose lives you’ve impacted can evoke strong emotional responses. These images can make your mission feel more tangible to your audience.
Infographics: These combine graphics and data to explain complex information clearly and quickly. Infographics are particularly useful for illustrating your nonprofit’s achievements, explaining processes, or showing how donations are used.
Illustrations: Sometimes creative or abstract concepts are best conveyed through illustrations. These can be used to visualize stories and ideas that are difficult to capture with photographs, offering a unique and engaging way to communicate your mission.
Using these types of images strategically can enhance your nonprofit’s storytelling and deepen understanding and empathy toward your cause. If you don’t have a graphic designer in-house, consider outsourcing the work. Kwala’s nonprofit graphic design guide suggests choosing a company that offers a wide range of creatives, provides web and print designs, and has mission-driven expertise. That way, you can focus your energy on your work rather than attempting to master different design tools.
Events
Whether virtual or in-person, events serve as dynamic content that engages audiences, provides valuable experiences, and communicates key messages about your nonprofit’s mission. Events offer unique storytelling opportunities that can be captured and leveraged in future marketing efforts to showcase success stories backed by direct quotes and video content.
Here are a few types of events that serve as content marketing opportunities:
Live Events: These include galas, fundraisers, and, community gatherings that provide direct engagement with attendees. Live events not only raise awareness and funds but they also create vivid content through speeches and participant interactions that can be shared across media platforms.
Webinars: These virtual events offer educational content that can attract a broader audience. Webinars are excellent for sharing thought leadership, expanding reach, and providing valuable content that can be repurposed in blogs, podcasts, or e-learning materials.
Appreciation Events: These events are explicitly designed to thank donors, volunteers and community members. Although they don’t directly solicit donations, they play a crucial role in stewardship by deepening loyalty and affinity towards your nonprofit. This indirectly promotes your organization by fostering a strong, supportive community.
Incorporating these nonprofit events into your nonprofit’s content marketing strategy can provide a rich source of content for ongoing outreach efforts.
7 Content Marketing Strategies
With these types of content in mind, you can develop a strategy that promotes your mission and inspires support. Let’s walk through seven easy steps to create your plan.
1. Have Clear Goals.
It’s essential to align the objectives of your nonprofit’s content marketing with your broader strategic goals. This alignment ensures that every piece of content—whether a blog post, video, or social media update—contributes directly to overarching fundraising targets, volunteer recruitment, or awareness campaigns.
Assess your strategic plan to determine how these objectives translate into specific marketing goals. For example, if your goal is to reach a certain fundraising milestone, your nonprofit’s content marketing strategy might focus on:
Increasing donor value: Create content that educates current donors on the impact of increasing their contributions.
Acquiring new donors: Develop targeted campaigns that appeal to potential donors by highlighting the uniqueness and urgency of the cause.
Engaging recurring donors: Produce updates and stories that keep loyal supporters informed and emotionally connected to the organization.
In a broader marketing context, these specific goals can translate into measurable marketing objectives, such as generating sales leads from new donor segments, increasing traffic to your donation page, or boosting social media engagement.
2. Establish Your Target Audience.
Creating content with a specific audience in mind is essential for effective nonprofit content marketing. Here’s how to determine the materials that will appeal to your target audience:
Assess your internal marketing data, particularly past engagement metrics, to identify what’s previously resonated with your audience.
Analyze marketing trends to understand broader behaviors within the nonprofit sector or your specific cause area.
Survey your donor base to gather direct feedback about your audience’s interests, needs, and preferences.
This multi-angle approach ensures your content strategy is data-informed and tailored to your audience’s evolving expectations.
3. Personalize Content.
In direct marketing, personalizing content ensures your material resonates on an individual level. Start by segmenting your audience into groups like donors, volunteers, and customers. Then, refine those segments even further, such as by dividing donors into recurring, lapsed, and prospective major donors.
To enhance your segments, consider using data appends, which improve your existing databases with additional details like preferences and behaviors, allowing for even more precise and impactful content customization.
Beyond only considering common characteristics, you’ll want to tailor the messaging to address the specific interests and needs of each segment. This is known as personalization, and it’s a powerful way to produce content that resonates with your audience. For instance, someone who would potentially purchase your nonprofit’s professional development courses might need to read testimonials and impact metrics to understand the value of investing in your product.
4. Use Storytelling Strategies.
Emotions can influence supporters’ behaviors. One donor behavior study found that positive emotions tend to elicit higher total donation amounts, while negative emotions can lead to higher individual donation amounts.
Here’s how to effectively use storytelling to tap into these emotional drivers:
Focus on an individual protagonist. Center your story around a single character to create a more relatable and emotionally engaging narrative.
Add specific details. Incorporate vivid details to paint a clear picture without overwhelming or distracting the audience.
End with a call to action. Conclude your story with a compelling call to action. This tells your audience how they can help, whether that’s by donating, volunteering, signing a petition, or taking another action.
Adhere to storytelling ethics. Always obtain permission from individuals whose stories you share and commit to truthfulness in your narratives.
These storytelling tactics will enhance emotional connections and align with the observed impacts of different emotional appeals on donation behaviors.
5. Demonstrate Your Thought Leadership.
The best content is original and insightful. When posted on your nonprofit’s website, this not only appeals to search engines but it also builds trust with supporters.
Here’s how to accomplish just that:
Share internal research. Whenever possible, share studies or data your team has compiled, ensuring privacy and confidentiality are not compromised.
Link to trusted research. Enhance credibility by linking to reputable sources.
Use original photos. Incorporate unique photos taken by your team to add authenticity to your content.
Once you produce valuable content, drive immediate visibility to those key pages by promoting it with Google Ads. If eligible for the Google Ad Grant, your nonprofit can promote these pages for free. You’ll receive up to $10,000 each month to promote valuable pages that advance your mission.
6. Follow SEO Best Practices.
Search engine optimization (SEO) is vital for increasing the visibility of your nonprofit’s website content. A comprehensive SEO strategy is particularly useful for nonprofits that sell programs, products, and services, because people searching for terms related to your nonprofit already know exactly what they’re looking for. SEO puts your nonprofit front and center.
When someone searches for a word, phrase, or question on Google, they’re directed to a search engine results page (SERP) that’s comprised of relevant ads and organic results. If your website’s content is optimized for SEO, it’ll ideally appear under the Google Ads on the SERP.
Keyword Research: Identify and naturally use keywords throughout your content, so potential supporters can find services like yours.
Original Content: Create unique, high-quality content that addresses your audience’s needs and interests related to your cause.
Backlinks From Reputable Sources: Boost your site’s authority by securing backlinks from reputable sites within your industry, such as by guest blogging.
Technical Best Practices: Optimize your website for speed, mobile usage, and accessibility to enhance the user experience and ensure search engines can crawl your content.
SEO is a long-term strategy, meaning it will take time to see results compared to paid ads. Google constantly recrawls content, so you have endless opportunities to study results and improve your approach.
Getting Started With SEO
To elevate your SEO strategy, we recommend partnering with Nexus Marketing. Their team of skilled SEO experts and content creators has over a decade of experience in the mission-driven sector.
Not to mention, Nexus boasts an incredible network of 500+ partners in the mission-driven space, meaning they can scale your authority-building strategy rapidly through valuable backlink and guest posting opportunities.
In fact, they helped the Christian publishers at David C Cook rank for 187 of their most important keywords on page one of Google, compared to just five at the start of the partnership. And those numbers account for only the keywords they’re tracking! Now, the organization can rely on its SEO strategy to drive sales for its curriculum.
Please note that Nexus is best suited for nonprofits selling products, programming, or services. While they excel at increasing online engagement, they’re not well-suited for local SEO or exclusively attracting donors.
7. Work With A Marketing Consultant.
Creating professional content and managing a comprehensive content marketing strategy can be a full-time endeavor. Hiring a marketing consultant or agency can offer several advantages:
Expertise and Efficiency: External experts can provide specialized knowledge, helping to maximize the impact of your marketing. For example, our Google Ad Grant experts can help you acquire the Grant, create compelling ads, target the right keywords, and drive qualified traffic to your website.
Professional Content Creation: A consultant can handle the intricacies of creating high-quality content that resonates with your audience and adheres to the latest trends and best practices in nonprofit marketing.
Leveraging professional assistance ensures that your nonprofit’s marketing efforts are both strategic and effective, allowing you to focus more on your mission and less on the complexities of content marketing.
Additional Marketing Resources
Nonprofit content marketing is an essential tool for engaging supporters and expanding your reach. From creating powerful Google Ads to developing SEO blog content, your opportunities are endless!
Continue your journey in mastering nonprofit content marketing with these resources:
In the fast-paced world of nonprofit, trade, and professional association membership programs, you need to create and sustain long-lasting relationships. That’s why membership marketing is essential—it paves the way to a thriving, sustainable membership base.
To help your organization attract members and build brand recognition, we’ll explore the purpose of membership marketing. Then, we’ll provide the tools and tips you need to acquire, retain, and actively engage your members. Here’s what we’ll cover:
At Getting Attention, we specialize in helping nonprofits reach their marketing potential with the Google Ad Grant Program (which we’ll cover in more detail later). With our professional guidance, you can amplify your message and connect with more prospects in no time.
Why Membership Marketing Matters
Membership marketing describes the strategic marketing efforts that focus on acquiring, engaging, and retaining members within a nonprofit organization. Effective membership marketing can help your organization make these benefits a reality:
Stable revenue: Leads from membership marketing can help you build a solid financial foundation through recurring membership fees or subscriptions.
Increased engagement: Marketing communications boost your members’ engagement and can facilitate community-driven experiences like event participation.
Long-term support: Consistent marketing efforts can translate into meaningful retention rates that decrease membership turnover.
Collaboration: Marketing platforms allow productive networking, knowledge sharing, and collaboration that can strengthen member connections.
Advocacy and ambassadorship: Successful member marketing can transform members into advocates and ambassadors for your cause, expanding your reach and amplifying your impact.
A long-term member marketing strategy can help your organization tap into these advantages and many more. However, to achieve these benefits, you’ll need to create a plan that caters to your individual members’ needs. That means you’ll need to take a step back and understand the full picture of the member experience.
Membership Marketing Funnel: Understanding The Member Experience
What does the current journey look like for prospective members to become active and engaged supporters? These questions will help guide you to create an actionable membership marketing plan that prioritizes member experience above all else.
If you provide a positive and memorable experience, you’ll give your members every reason to take the next defined step and engage. You can use a membership funnel to visualize your member’s journey:
Capture: Prospective members are “captured” when they are introduced and become aware of your mission through email, word of mouth, your website, or another source that prompts them to consider learning more about your organization.
Nurture: Follow-up emails, direct mail, or other methods prompt prospects to continue their research and build up experience with your organization.
Convert: Various membership benefits, in addition to your regular marketing communications, convince prospects to become full-time members of your organization.
Retain and Re-engage: Regular marketing efforts continually engage existing members with personalized member experiences such as members-only events, discounts, and workshops. Surveys and feedback opportunities are implemented to ensure your organization is exceeding membership expectations and re-engaging lapsed members.
Every organization should have set marketing efforts based on each of the above stages of the member journey. That way, your team will have a well-rounded strategy that enriches your member’s experience from start to finish.
Membership Marketing Tools
It’s one thing to know marketing can transform your organization, but it’s another thing to know which tools will help you get there. That said, let’s explore the top tools you should keep handy in your member marketing toolkit:
Customer relationship management (CRM) software: A CRM system lets your nonprofit manage member data, track interactions, and personalize its messaging. The right CRM will help you segment your audience based on predetermined criteria such as demographics, interest, and engagement level.
Association management software (AMS): For trade and professional associations, an AMS allows you to tackle all back-end tasks related to managing your members, such as event planning and website building.
Community engagement platform: While AMSs might offer some community features, associations that are serious about developing an online community need a community engagement platform. This tool creates an online space where members can post content, engage with each other’s posts, and chat with one another. This keeps members engaged, increasing the chances of expanding your organization via word-of-mouth marketing.
Email: Email marketing tools let you create consistent, targeted email campaigns that engage your members. Several email marketing tools offer templates, automated email capabilities, and analytics to track your email open rates. Keep in mind that email captures almost 70% of new members.
Social media: While social media management tools like HootSuite can help you schedule posts and analyze engagement, design tools like Canva can help you create eye-catching social graphics.
Analytics: Marketing tools like Google Analytics can give your organization a bird’s eye view of member engagement by analyzing website traffic and campaign performance.
Website: Your website acts as the home base for your marketing efforts. Therefore, it should include clear information about how a new member can join, relevant schedule information, and member testimonials to highlight the impact of your organization’s programs.
This last point bears emphasizing as your website is essential for other onsite content strategies, including Google Ads. This means a clean, organized website should not only engage your current members but also attract new ones. With this in mind, let’s explore our top ten nonprofit membership marketing ideas.
Below are ten membership marketing ideas your organization can leverage. Let’s break down each according to member acquisition and member retention:
Membership Marketing Ideas for Member Acquisition
Member acquisition refers to the process of attracting and acquiring new members to your organization and is represented in the “capture”, “nurture”, and “convert” steps of the marketing funnel. Note that membership acquisition is notoriously tricky as 68% of organizations face challenges in growing their member base.
Try these ideas to help your organization get its feet off the ground and hit its acquisition goals:
1. Referral Programs
People trust people more than they trust organizations. For example, if a trusted friend told you that you need to check out a new restaurant, you’d be more likely to go than if the restaurant reached out to you personally.
That said, consider leveraging your existing member relationships by creating a referral program. You can do this by:
Identifying your target member: Are you wanting to recruit more students or more experienced professionals? Determine your current member base gaps and select an ideal persona that would bridge them. Then target existing members who have connections with these leads.
Determine member incentives to offer referees and referrers: You could offer a membership discount, free webinar, or free brand merchandise to incentivize existing members to refer and prospective members to join your organization.
Set guidelines: It’s best to set a timeline to prompt more referrers to act with urgency. Additionally, you’ll want to attain qualified leads, so it might be best to set a benchmark for the amount of time referred members are required to stay at your organization to obtain the referral incentive.
Advertise your program: Communicate your referral program guidelines on your website, social media, at events, and through emails to inspire more member applications.
Ideally, your referral program is a win-win-win situation for your referrer, referee, and organization as your referrer and referee enjoy the program’s incentives and your member acquisition rate keeps climbing!
2. Email Marketing Campaign
Send out a dedicated email marketing campaign to nurture your existing contacts and lead them one step closer to conversion. To nudge your prospective members using email marketing, follow these best practices:
Segment your email list: The average nonprofit email list size is 4,191 recipients. Narrow them down by engagement level and demographics to target prospective members.
Create compelling subject lines: 64% of recipients decide to open or delete emails based on subject lines. Stand out in your recipient’s inbox with lines that communicate your organization’s value in memorable and relevant ways.
Craft engaging content: Use a mix of visuals, storytelling, and distinct calls to action that lead your recipients to take the next defined step, whether that’s to join a prospective member Q&A or sign up for a yearly conference.
Personalize your emails: Include recipient names and personalized recommendations that recognize individual recipients and take note of their experience with your organization.
Maintain consistency and frequency: Make sure every email is scheduled at a rate that keeps recipients informed without overwhelming them.
Track your email open rates to discover your campaign’s effectiveness and make any adjustments as necessary. For example, you might find that emails with short YouTube video explainers perform better than simple images. Using that information, you might seek to edit more video content that inspires new members to join.
3. Website Content Marketing
82% of marketers actively use content marketing, so join them by utilizing your existing website to add relevant content that educates and fascinates users. For example, start a blog that provides organizational insights, information, or case studies highlighting how your organization actively furthers its mission.
Doing this will boost your credibility and differentiate your association or nonprofit from similar organizations that might not offer the same valuable resources.
Additionally, consider how to drive current and potential members to your website through targeted marketing efforts on social media, email, Google Ads, and other channels. Just ensure your content is centralized behind your membership portal to attract new members while keeping existing ones engaged.
By maintaining an active online community, posting regular digital content, and hosting virtual events, you can keep your members on your website. When compared to associations that use social media to manage their members, you won’t need to constantly fight for your community’s attention once they’re logged in.
To accomplish this, we recommend investing in a community engagement platform, and we recommend our favorite solution, Tradewing. Let’s take a look at Tradewing’s membership homepage.
Tools like Tradewing create a social media-like interface where members can interact with each other in between your annual events. This keeps engagement high throughout the entire year and encourages members to become active members of your association’s community.
4. Social Media Marketing
Aside from promoting your blog posts, social media can be a powerful tool to convince prospective members to convert as there are 4.80 billion social media users worldwide. The key is to regularly post engaging content to make your organization stand out, such as:
Testimonials: Share stories from existing members that highlight their unique experiences with your organization. With permission, post the member’s photo along with quotes or relevant video content.
Member spotlights: Highlight your most engaged members and what makes them irreplaceable to your organization. This will communicate to prospects that they would enter into a community that appreciates and recognizes their unique contributions.
User-generated content: Encourage your followers to create and share their own content such as videos, stories, or posts. You can incentivize them by creating contests and awarding the most creative submissions.
Remember to respond to comments and repost tagged content to engage with current and potential members. Doing this will establish credibility and show prospects that your organization is dedicated to providing an interactive and fruitful experience.
5. Corporate Partnerships
Another effective way to reach new supporters is through corporate partnerships. This method helps you expand your reach by teaming up with organizations that have the same target audience as you. In the past, these relationships took the form of sponsorships only.
However, they have evolved since then and now represent opportunities for your organizations to meaningfully collaborate beyond providing brand name promotion. Today, you can research opportunities such as volunteering or skills sharing.
6. Search Ads
Search ads target prospective members who are already interested in your organization. Specifically, the Google Ad Grant is aimed toward nonprofit organizations and can help your organization spread awareness and attract new members. The best part? This program has donated more than 1.8 million dollars worth of search ads to nonprofits.
Basically, the Google Ad Grant program for eligible nonprofits provides funds to spend on search ads in Google. Meaning your organization will show up at the top of the results when someone is looking for additional information relating to your nonprofit’s mission.
More specifically, you can use the Google Ad Grant program to:
Educate and inform your audience: If your organization focuses on increasing public awareness about a certain topic, you can use the Google Ad Grant program to launch educational campaigns.
Attract new donors or members: Donors and members will be able to find you when they search for your organization online in no time.
Promote events: You can use the Google Ad Grants program to let your audience know about upcoming events like conferences, workshops, or fundraisers.
Although the Google Ad Grant program offers serval advantages, ensuring eligibility and maintaining your account can take some time. That’s why many organizations partner with agency experts like Getting Attention to get the most out of their accounts.
Membership Marketing Ideas for Member Retention
It can be tempting to think that once you’ve converted a new member the marketing work is over. However, it’s much more cost-effective to place additional effort into member retention than only focusing on member acquisition. Members also tend to stick with organizations that make them feel valued for their individual contributions. To up your member retention rate, try these strategies:
7. Personalized Communication
Indicate to your members that they are not just another number with personalized communication efforts. Refer to your existing member data to guide your communication efforts according to your member’s membership type, demographics, and unique contributions.
For example, if your organization is focused on environmental conservation, you might invite local members to an environmental clean-up and educational seminar that’s conveniently located for them.
8. Tiered Membership Levels
Give new members flexibility with how they choose to engage with your organization by offering them tiered membership levels. This also provides an upselling opportunity for you to use when collecting dues from your member base. Here is what your tiers could look like:
Basic Membership: Offers a basic package that gives members access to your directory, newsletter access, virtual event invitations, and recognition as a supporter on your website.
Premium Membership: Offers all benefits of the Basic Membership and exclusive access to workshops, training sessions, and online resources.
Platinum Membership: Offers all benefits of the Premium Membership, one-on-one expert consultations, VIP access to in-person events, and the opportunity to serve on an advisory board.
By offering members these options, they can select to engage in a way that works best for their goals. Each level provides different perks which can also incentivize members to increase their level later down the road.
9. Exclusive Content
Exclusive content deals can prompt prospective members to sign up or convince existing members to increase their membership level. Here are a few exclusive content examples:
Premium resources: Recent and compelling e-books, white papers, or other downloadable resources can offer expert advice.
Webinars and workshops: Exclusive workshops and webinars can facilitate networking opportunities amongst members, enabling them to build a flourishing community.
Early access and discounts: Provide members with early access to events and new products or offer discounted merchandise or services.
Member spotlights: Recognize individual member accomplishments through a “member of the month” spotlight.
Member-exclusive content should offer unique benefits that are available only through your organization. Plan your benefits ahead of time and advertise them to prospective, new, and experienced members.
On your website, specify which pages are members-only and which are open to the public. Strategically offer specific pieces of content or access to opportunities to the general public to entice them to learn more about your association and want to upgrade to a membership.
If you plan to make your membership database accessible to the public, ensure members have adequate privacy features. For example, Tradewing allows associations to create custom profile fields for their members. Once members set up their profiles, they can decide which information they want public and which will be private.
10. Appreciation Events
Celebrate member milestones with dedicated appreciation events. Members who have achieved 5, 10, 15, or more years of membership, have dedicated a large number of volunteer hours, or have given a large number of donations should be recognized for their loyalty.
You can host a wide variety of appreciation events including:
Virtual happy hour
Brunch with your organization’s leaders
Annual member retreat
Special interest workshops or classes
Formal dinner
Define the standards members need to achieve ahead of time before finalizing your guest list. Creating events like this will show your members that you are dedicated to going above and beyond to exceed their expectations.
Conclusion + Additional Resources
Your ideal membership experience should directly inform your marketing efforts.
Use marketing tools like social media, search ads, and many other channels to activate a tailored marketing strategy for member acquisition and retention. Track and monitor each marketing strategy and note the ones that produce the most engagement for your outlined target audience.
We hope you enjoyed this guide to membership marketing! Check out these articles to keep learning:
Nonprofit Catalog: Membership Benefits: Does your organization need a set benefits program? What benefits should you include? Learn the answers to these questions and more in this guide to membership benefits.
How to Apply for Google Ad Grants: Interested in learning more about the Google Ad Grant? Read this comprehensive guide to learn how to apply.
As a nonprofit professional, you know that every dollar gets you closer to achieving your goals. You can boost funding and attract more volunteers for your nonprofit with a dedicated volunteer grant strategy.
We’ve put together this guide to walk through everything you need to know about volunteer grants. We’ll cover the following:
If you’re not familiar with volunteer grants or aren’t sure how to maximize revenue from this channel, look no further! Let’s dive right in by answering frequently asked questions about volunteer grants.
Volunteer Grant FAQs
What are volunteer grants?
Volunteer grants are a type of corporate giving program in which employers provide monetary grants to organizations where their employees volunteer regularly. These programs are also known as Dollars for Doers, Dollar for Hour, Matching Time, and Grants for Time programs.
For example, if your nonprofit has a dedicated volunteer who devotes 5 hours a week to your organization and their company has a volunteer grant program, the company will pay you for those hours.
The exact amount of time a supporter needs to volunteer to earn a grant for your nonprofit depends on their employer’s specific program requirements. Work with your volunteers to help them discover their eligibility and take the steps necessary to secure a volunteer grant.
What are the benefits of volunteer grants?
The main draw of volunteer grants is extra funding for your organization at no cost to supporters. Beyond that, volunteer grants have benefits for everyone involved in the process:
Individual volunteerscan make an even bigger impact with the hours they give to your nonprofit. Volunteers already care about your mission and purpose; now they can give you twice the support through the work they’re already doing.
Companies that offer volunteer grants benefit from maintaining a positive public image. This positive reputation also means their consumers and employees will be happier to work with them.
Nonprofits benefit by building stronger relationships with both companies and volunteers. Volunteer grants give supporters another way to support your nonprofit, increasing their investment in your organization. And if you have a lot of volunteers who all work for the same employer, you may secure a corporate relationship that could turn into a sponsorship!
Some companies even offer team volunteer grants, where groups of employees from the same company can volunteer together and secure a larger grant for your cause.
Why do businesses offer volunteer grants?
To secure corporate support, nonprofit organizations usually rely on companies to already have corporate social responsibility (CSR) programs like volunteer grants or volunteer time off in place. However, by understanding why businesses offer volunteer grant programs and researching the employers your supporters work for, you or your donors may be able to persuade certain companies to start new CSR initiatives.
Reports show that employees who work at companies with volunteer programs are five times more engaged than those who don’t. When pitching a volunteer grant program to businesses, emphasize statistics like this and how they can lead to improved business outcomes, such as increased employee productivity and retention.
Additionally, remain open to other types of corporate volunteerism. For example, some businesses arrange organized corporate volunteer groups, which serve as team-building activities for their employees while also providing your nonprofit with extra help for your ongoing programs.
Are volunteer grants common?
Yes, volunteer grants are a common business practice! We’ve pulled together some key statistics from Double the Donation that demonstrate how common and impactful these programs are:
40% of Fortune 500 companies offer volunteer grant programs. Plenty of other businesses and corporations also have some sort of volunteer grant program.
80% of companies with volunteer grant programs give between $8-$15 per volunteer hour. Those dollars add up! If you have a dedicated group of volunteers, those accumulated hours can result in a nice annual sum.
The average corporate volunteer participation rate is 33%. About a third of eligible employees currently take advantage of corporate volunteer opportunities. However, when it comes to volunteer grants, that rate drops to just 3%, indicating that volunteers don’t know about this opportunity. Nonprofits are working to increase these numbers by marketing their volunteer programs.
From these statistics, it’s clear that there are plenty of volunteer grant opportunities that your organization and its supporters can take advantage of.
How to Get Volunteer Grants for Your Nonprofit
To secure volunteer grants, you first need to understand how the process works. From your nonprofit’s perspective, it happens in four steps:
An individual volunteers with your nonprofit. This can include helping with your programs, volunteering virtually, or participating in any other roles your organization offers.
That individual looks up their volunteer grant eligibility. If they qualify, they’ll submit a request to their company for the grant.
The employer looks over the application and confirms eligibility.
Once the company has verified the hours with your nonprofit, your nonprofit gets a check!
Companies’ volunteer grant requirements vary, but there’s generally a minimum number of hours that must be volunteered to qualify for a grant. Once the volunteer hours threshold has been met, the company will either pay by the hour or a set amount. For example, one company might pay $15 per volunteer hour, while another pays a flat $500 after 40 hours have been contributed.
Unfortunately, most volunteers don’t even know whether they’re eligible for a grant or how to check their eligibility. That means it’s up to your nonprofit to help volunteers earn the grants they rightfully deserve.
Best Practices for Securing Volunteer Grants
How do you get the word out about this mutually beneficial opportunity? Just follow these three best practices:
1. Market volunteer grants to your supporters
You can’t secure volunteer grants if your supporters don’t know what they are or how to request them. That’s why it’s crucial to create a marketing plan that promotes these opportunities to your supporters.
As you develop your plan, consider these strategies:
Create a page on your website that explains the volunteer grant process and how to submit a request. This can be added to your volunteer sign-up page, “Ways to Give” page, or a new page. Additionally, this is a great place on your website to add a volunteer grants search tool, which we’ll discuss soon.
Launch a social media campaign that educates donors on volunteer grant basics and encourages them to check their eligibility. Try sharing statistics about volunteer grant participation and impact, as well as stories from beneficiaries about their positive experiences with your volunteers.
Highlight volunteers and companies who contribute volunteer grants in your monthly newsletter. This creates social proof and can inspire supporters to check their own eligibility.
Once you’ve created basic volunteer grant marketing materials for your website, you can expand your reach by leveraging the Google Ad Grant. The Google Ad Grants program provides eligible nonprofits with $10,000 a month in credits to spend on Google search ads.
Through the Google Ad Grant program, your organization can create ads that show up at the top of Google search results pages for relevant terms, like “volunteer opportunities near me” or “animal shelter volunteering.” Highlight volunteer grants in these ads, and you’ll promote the opportunity to a whole new audience of potential volunteers!
2. Offer a variety of volunteer opportunities
Ensure you have volunteer activities that supporters find interesting to encourage continued support. Consider creating various ways to get involved that fit various skill sets, time slots, and physical requirements.
For example, you might have a physically intensive volunteer opportunity for supporters to work in a community garden where they can learn about plant care on the job. In contrast, you might also offer a remote volunteer opportunity for data entry.
Additionally, have activities that groups of volunteers can participate in. This will accommodate corporate volunteer teams to secure more corporate volunteers, increase the grant money you receive, and help your nonprofit build a long-term relationship with the company they came from.
3. Use corporate giving software
Whether you’re looking to secure volunteer grants, matching gifts, or any other kind of corporate support, streamlining the application process is a surefire way to maximize donations. And you can do just that with a volunteer grant database.
Our favorite volunteer grant database is 360MatchPro by Double the Donation. 360MatchPro offers nonprofits support for both matching gifts and volunteer grants. Here’s how the volunteer grant component of this platform works:
The volunteer searches for their employer. Volunteers can enter their company’s name into 360MatchPro’s employer search tool. This tool can be embedded on any page of your website. That way, you can put it wherever you think volunteers are most likely to check, like your volunteer information page.
The search tool identifies the employer. If the employer is in 360MatchPro’s database, it will autofill to streamline the search process. 360MatchPro’s database currently covers 99.68% of match-eligible donors, meaning your volunteers will likely be able to find their employers.
Volunteer grant information is provided. 360MatchPro provides detailed volunteer grant information for every employer. This includes which employees are eligible, how many hours must be volunteered, how much the grant will be, and if the company offers other corporate volunteer opportunities like team volunteer grants and volunteer time off.
From there, the software will direct volunteers to the next steps they need to take to request a volunteer grant. This will usually be to complete a form for their employer that documents their volunteer hours and details about your nonprofit like your mission statement and contact information.
Some companies may reach out to your nonprofit for confirmation, while others might consider the process done after reviewing an employee application. Either way, be ready to work with your volunteers to answer their questions and support them through the volunteer grant process.
Examples of Top Companies with Volunteer Grant Programs
Take a look at some of the top companies with volunteer grant programs to get an idea of how much businesses invest in corporate philanthropy.
Verizon’s Volunteer Grant Program
Verizon offers a Volunteer Incentive Program (VIP), which awards $750 to an organization after an employee volunteers 50 hours with that organization. Even better, Verizon employees can request up to two of these grants per year.
Microsoft’s Volunteer Grant Program
Microsoft has a generous volunteer grant program with no minimum hours required. Microsoft employees can earn $25 per hour they commit to a nonprofit. Last year, almost 30,000 employees took advantage of this program and volunteered over 1 million hours in total.
ExxonMobil’s Volunteer Grant Program
ExxonMobil has multiple volunteer grant programs: an individual volunteer grant program through which employees can secure a $500 grant after volunteering 20 hours with an organization and team volunteer grant opportunities for groups of five or more.
Additional Volunteer Grant Resources
Tapping into volunteer grants doesn’t have to be daunting. The more knowledge your team has about these opportunities, the more successful you’ll be at locating and securing these valuable contributions.
We hope this guide has helped your organization realize all the untapped volunteer grant opportunities you can benefit from! If you want to continue your research, we’ve picked some great resources to get you started:
https://gettingattention.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/Volunteer-Grants_Feature-New-2.png7001450Jessica Kinghttps://gettingattention.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/getting-attention-logo.svgJessica King2024-06-27 09:06:222024-11-15 14:29:42Corporate Volunteer Grants: The Basics & How to Secure Them
When it comes to making professional connections, LinkedIn is the go-to website for individuals, businesses, and nonprofits like yours. Often, LinkedIn is used as a platform for job recruiters and job seekers to connect. However, along with finding valuable new employees, there’s even more your nonprofit can do with a LinkedIn account.
To discover how to make the most of programs like LinkedIn for Nonprofits, expand your network, and build your brand, this guide will explore:
First, let’s answer a few questions nonprofits are likely to ask about LinkedIn.
LinkedIn for Nonprofits FAQ
What is LinkedIn for Nonprofits?
LinkedIn for Nonprofits is a program offered by LinkedIn that provides nonprofits with free and discounted resources. These resources and tools are designed to help enhance your nonprofit’s LinkedIn experience and ability to connect with donors, job applicants, and sponsors.
Through LinkedIn for Nonprofits, your organization can access:
Resource Hub. The Resource Hub consists of informative guides about how to use LinkedIn to its fullest potential. This includes resources on how to build connections, grow your engagement, and create compelling content.
Recruiter Lite. Turn LinkedIn into a hiring platform with recruitment tools like daily recommendations, alerts, and job posting and messaging templates. Once you scout top talent, get in touch with them through direct InMail messages and start building professional relationships.
Sales Navigator Core. You can connect with donors and sales prospects just like you would with job candidates. Sales Navigator Core provides access to highly refined filter and search options, lead recommendations, and the ability to track prospects’ activity. This lets you identify and stay in touch with high-value prospects to grow your audience and cultivate relationships.
LinkedIn Learning. Along with recruiting new employees, LinkedIn strives to help job seekers and the currently employed improve their skills with LinkedIn Learning. This program consists of online courses for skills relevant to nonprofit professional development, such as courses on marketing, fundraising, grant management, and organizational management.
LinkedIn advertising. LinkedIn offers businesses (and nonprofits!) the opportunity to advertise their services to users across the platform. We’ll explore more about how to advertise on LinkedIn later.
You can use LinkedIn without applying for LinkedIn for Nonprofits. However, these tools make almost every aspect of your LinkedIn strategy more efficient, whether you’re looking for new hires, sponsors, donors, or customers.
Is LinkedIn for Nonprofits free?
Some LinkedIn resources are free to verified nonprofits. For example, the Resource Hub is available to all LinkedIn users, including nonprofits, for free.
In contrast, nonprofits will have to pay for Recruiter Lite, Sales Navigator, and LinkedIn Learning. Fortunately, LinkedIn does offer a 75% discount on Recruiter Lite and Sales Navigator, as well as other discounts for LinkedIn Learning.
Nonprofits will need to pay for all advertising services, including text ads, sponsored content, dynamic ads, and sponsored messaging. However, LinkedIn does provide dedicated support to help nonprofits plan their ad campaigns to give them a greater chance of success.
What can nonprofits do on Linkedin?
Nonprofits can use LinkedIn like any other professional organization would. Use the platform to:
Post job openings
Advertise your products and services
Assess job candidates
Network with potential business partners, donors, employees, and other nonprofit professionals
Post content about your cause
Stay up to the latest trends in your field
Ultimately, how you decide to use LinkedIn is up to your nonprofit. You can use it exclusively as a hiring tool whenever you have a job opening, or you can make it a part of your annual marketing strategy by posting regularly.
How to Set Up Your LinkedIn Profile
Setting up a LinkedIn profile for your nonprofit is easy and should only take a few minutes. Just follow these steps:
Start a new company page. If you already have a personal LinkedIn profile, open the “For Businesses” menu, scroll to the bottom, and click the “Create a Company Page” option. If you don’t have a LinkedIn account (though you should if you plan to create a professional page for your nonprofit), go to LinkedIn pages and click the “Create your Page” button.
Select the “Company” page option. All nonprofits except for educational institutions should click the “Company” option, while schools should select “Educational Institution.”
Fill out the profile information. Most of the entry fields are straightforward. For organization type, select “Nonprofit.” You can also choose “Non-profit Organizations” for your industry if there is no option that matches your services. Your LinkedIn address must follow a few rules including being original and it must be unambiguous. In most cases, the URL should be the name of your nonprofit.
Launch your page. Preview your page before launching it to ensure everything is formatted correctly. Remember that you can continue editing and adding information to your page after making it live, so as long as your page is presentable, you are likely safe to publish it.
Your page is now live, and with it, you can start building connections on LinkedIn! However, getting your page up and running is just the first step in turning LinkedIn into the networking, lead-sourcing, and brand-building channel it can be.
7 Linked Strategies for Nonprofits
1. Fill out your profile as much as possible.
Completed profiles look more trustworthy and professional than unfinished ones. Unfortunately, there are scams on LinkedIn, and you can reassure job candidates, donors, and prospective sponsors alike that your organization is legitimate by adding detailed and accurate information about your nonprofit.
You can improve your profile by:
Adding a logo and cover image.LinkedIn shares that optimal dimensions for a profile are that logos should be 300px x 300px and cover images (the image that appears at the top of your page as a header) should be 1536px x 768px.
Completing your “About” section.The “About” section is your opportunity to explain what your nonprofit does, why it matters, and why your organization is uniquely suited to tackle these challenges. Remember that this description will be shown to every audience your nonprofit is attempting to reach through LinkedIn, so it should be a general summary of your nonprofit rather than a recruitment or fundraising pitch. Here’s an example from WWF’s LinkedIn page:
Listing your specialties. Don’t stress about explaining everything your nonprofit does in your “About” section since you can go into detail about your services in the “Specialities” section. This can be a list of services your nonprofit offers or you can go into detail about general projects your nonprofit does. For reference, check out the difference between the WWF’s and a local humane society’s services:
Essentially, your profile is an opportunity to market your nonprofit to a professional audience. Follow your brand principles and consider the LinkedIn audience. For most nonprofits, this will mean presenting your organization with a more professional tone than you might otherwise. This shows job candidates and business partners that you are a serious and reputable organization.
2. Join nonprofit-related groups.
Groups are private LinkedIn channels where members can post content and interact with one another. Some groups have open acceptance policies and anyone can become a member by hitting the “Join” button whereas others review join requests or are even invite-only.
Fortunately, there are many nonprofit-centric groups your nonprofit can join almost immediately. For example, to start developing a network of nonprofit professional connections and stay up to date on the latest nonprofit trends, you might join the following groups:
The Chronicle of Philanthropy. The Chronicle of Philanthropy is a group run by a digital magazine of the same name. The group is focused on the latest news and developments in the nonprofit sector. Plus, this group has a green “Active Group” tag, which indicates a high level of member activity. That means more people to start building connections with!
Nonprofit & Philanthropy Jobs. For nonprofits ready to jump into recruiting, groups dedicated to job opportunities in the nonprofit sector can help you promote your open positions and chat with prospective candidates.
Remember that you can also join groups not specifically about nonprofits to expand your knowledge in general. For example, you might join a group dedicated to social media marketing.
Plus, your nonprofit can create its own group! This allows individuals who are interested in your nonprofit to connect with one another and form a community. Encourage both donors and your staff to connect with you on LinkedIn and join your new group.
3. Encourage your entire team to connect.
Like any social media platform, LinkedIn is lonely when it’s just you. Start boosting your online presence and cementing your nonprofit as a reputable organization by encouraging your employees to sign up for LinkedIn or connect their pre-existing profiles to your nonprofit’s new page.
When a member of your staff enters your nonprofit as their employer on their page, they’ll show up under the “People” tab of your company page as long as their profile isn’t set to private. Plus, they can also follow your page to receive updates whenever you post on LinkedIn.
These activities help present your nonprofit as an active, reputable organization.
Plus, when a member of your staff interacts with your nonprofit on LinkedIn, whether it’s liking a post, leaving a comment, or tagging you in one of their posts, the rest of their network might get alerted to it. Posts from members of your network show up in your LinkedIn feed and LinkedIn regularly sends update emails to users that highlight various recent comments and posts. This means the bigger your staff’s networks and the more active they are on LinkedIn, the more chances you have to grow your nonprofit’s network.
4. Post engaging content.
Like any social media platform, you can only gain a following by posting regularly. Resources from LinkedIn recommend following these best practices to create the most engaging content possible and start earning followers:
Diversify your content.LinkedIn recommends nonprofits follow the “2-2-1” rule for content posting. This means dividing your posts into groups of five, and each of these groups should contain two pieces of educational content about your mission and work, two stories that evoke emotion and demonstrate your impact, and one call to action. This ensures your nonprofit doesn’t forget to make fundraising appeals, but also ensures your followers aren’t bombarded with requests for money every time they open LinkedIn.
Add hashtags. LinkedIn’s search feature considers many factors, including hashtags. For each post, add no more than five hashtags to increase its reach. These hashtags might be related to your services and industry, like #environmentalprotection, or related to an ongoing initiative at your nonprofit, like #matchinggifts.
Post regularly. LinkedIn has found that profiles that post at least once a day have the highest engagement rates. However, creating a quality post every day may be a challenge for nonprofits without a dedicated marketing team. Try to aim for at least once or twice a week to keep your profile active.
When creating content for LinkedIn, consider the audience you want to target. The LinkedIn audience tends to be serious and generally has one of these motivations: find a job, advance in their current career, or find business opportunities.
Some individuals do post about non-job related content, such as news trends, which means fundraising appeals and nonprofit impact stories won’t be out of place. However, keep the core audiences of job seekers, donors, and businesses in mind when creating new content or adapting content to LinkedIn.
5. Promote your LinkedIn profile on other platforms.
To start growing your audience on LinkedIn—and thus attract qualified job candidates, sales leads, and business partners—promote your new page on platforms where you already have an audience.
For example, to get your current supporter base to start following your LinkedIn profile, you might:
Add a social media button on your website
Promote it in your email newsletter
Make announcements on other social media platforms
Organizations serious about expanding their LinkedIn networks make promoting their page a regular part of their marketing. For example, some professionals add their LinkedIn profile to their email signature!
6. Consider LinkedIn ads.
We briefly touched on LinkedIn ads earlier, but are LinkedIn ads worth it for nonprofits?
The answer depends on your organization as well as what type of ads you want to purchase and create. LinkedIn offers four types of ads for sale:
Sponsored Content.Usually, the only content that shows up in your feed is posted by your network. However, occasionally, LinkedIn will add sponsored posts. These allow you to share your content with users who aren’t part of your network, getting your nonprofit in front of brand-new audiences.
Sponsored Messaging.Rather than hoping your audience stumbles across your posts on their feeds, you can get in touch with them directly via Sponsored Messaging. Send out messages to your entire network about upcoming events, urgent fundraisers like GivingTuesday, and breaking news about your cause.
Text Ads. Text Ads have a smaller scope than Sponsored Content but can be a useful alternative for nonprofits on a tight budget. Rather than taking the form of an entirely new post, they show up on the side of users’ feeds as they scroll.
Dynamic Ads. Normally, social media is not a direct marketing tool as your ads are shown to a wide audience. However, Dynamic Ads are personalized that LinkedIn generates for you. These ads address specific users by name and even feature their LinkedIn profile pictures in the ad. For example, these ads might ask someone to imagine themselves with a job at a specific company or explain that they could learn a lot by following a specific organization’s page.
LinkedIn has about an 11% return on investment rate for paid ads. However, it can be difficult to measure your ads’ success for several reasons. For example, a business sponsor might discover your organization through an ad but decide to message you directly rather than interact with the ad.
Ultimately, ads are about expanding your nonprofit’s online presence to get on the radar of more prospective connections. As with any nonprofit ad campaign, your ads’ success depends on how well you tailor them to your audience and your ability to finely tune who they get shown to.
7. Engage, tag, and comment.
Social media is about social interactions, and while LinkedIn has a more professional user base than other platforms, this still applies.
You can grow your follower count, build connections, and show visitors that your nonprofit is a professional, dynamic organization by engaging with others. Comment on posts made by members of your network and news stories that are related to your cause. These are easy opportunities to share your expertise in your industry.
You can also invite others to interact with you by tagging them in your content. For example, you might create a volunteer spotlight highlighting the hard work a specific member of your volunteer team did. By tagging them in this post, you can be sure that they’ll see it and potentially share it with the rest of their network. Here’s what this might look like:
What Other Platforms Should Nonprofits be Using?
LinkedIn is an incredibly valuable platform for nonprofits, but LinkedIn for Nonprofits is not completely free. While it can be a worthwhile investment, especially for nonprofits that are currently hiring, organizations looking for marketing channels with lower investment costs might want to consider other options when it comes to advertising.
The Google Ad Grant is completely free for nonprofits, providing them with $10,000 in credits to spend on search advertising every month, all at no cost. Create ads targeting the keywords your audience searches every day to bring in new supporters, sales leads, and beneficiaries.
However, like LinkedIn, it might be tricky to know where to get started with the Google Ad Grant, let alone how to maintain an active Google Ads account. That’s where Google Ad Grant agencies, like Getting Attention, come in!
Our team of Google-certified experts can help you apply for the Google Ad Grant, maintain your account, and get your account back up and running if it ever lapses. With our extensive knowledge of Google advertising best practices and how to connect with nonprofit audiences, we can help you create search ads targeting your highest-value keywords to earn your nonprofit not just more clicks but valuable conversions.
Additional Resources
LinkedIn is a social media site for professional networking. Resources from LinkedIn for Nonprofits, along with your own communication skills, can put your nonprofit in touch with talented job candidates, sympathetic donors, and eager business partners. If you haven’t already, the first step in your LinkedIn journey is to sign up and create your nonprofit’s profile.
In addition to LinkedIn, discover other platforms that offer nonprofits free and discounted resources:
Google Workspace for Nonprofits: Everything You Need to Know. In addition to the Google Ad Grant, Google also provides nonprofits with free access to other Google Workplace tools. Check out these tools and how your nonprofit can leverage them.
https://gettingattention.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/linkedin-for-nonprofits_feature.png8102330Jessica Kinghttps://gettingattention.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/getting-attention-logo.svgJessica King2024-06-25 15:30:372024-11-15 14:29:50Expand Your Professional Network: LinkedIn for Nonprofits
Have you ever encountered an advertisement so compelling that it convinced you to purchase something right then and there? Nonprofits can harness this same persuasive force. Instead of driving sales, nonprofit ads inspire us to support causes that make the world a better place.
To inspire your ads, this post will explore a variety of innovative nonprofit advertising examples:
When it comes to nonprofit marketing, the challenge isn’t just to capture attention but to ignite passion and inspire action. Let’s take a look at ads that do just that, so your nonprofit marketing team can imagine its own.
Environmental and Animal Protection Nonprofit Advertising Examples
Glacier National Park Conservancy
Type of Nonprofit Ad: Google Ad
The Glacier National Park Conservancy (GNPC) supports the Glacier National Park by fundraising for preservation, education, and research initiatives that protect the park’s natural and cultural resources. To drive purchases through its online store, GNPC partnered with Getting Attention.
We created Google Ads that target GNPC’s mission-centric keywords like “Glacier National Park Campgrounds” and “Glacier National Park Backpacking.” That way, anyone searching for things to do at Glacier National Park would come across the organization’s offerings like campground reservations and tours. The ads drove 2,570 clicks and 8 purchases in just one month, and they even appear above the National Park Service’s website.
What Nonprofits Can Learn: The Google Ad Grant program has limitations regarding commercial activity. While you must limit commercial activity on your site, you can still offer products and services that have fees. You just have to say how those funds will benefit your mission. If you run an online store that directly funds your work, you can promote it with Google Ads!
The International Bird Rescue (IBR) partnered with Illumination to advertise its mission in connection with The “Migration” movie. The animated children’s movie follows a family of ducks as they convince their overprotective father to leave their safe pond and embark on an adventurous trip to Jamaica. IBR wanted to communicate that their nonprofit helps care for birds who are sick, injured, and oiled.
Today Show host Al Roker served as the face of the campaign and made a televised PSA to highlight the organization’s commitment to “helping our winged friends preserve their way of life.” He then directed people to visit birdrescue.org/migration to learn more.
What Nonprofits Can Learn: Nonprofits can benefit from partnerships with celebrities and companies that resonate with their cause. For instance, having a well-known media personality as the face of your campaign can add credibility and draw attention to the cause. Search for opportunities where corporate sponsors can integrate their products or services into your nonprofit’s mission.
World Wildlife Fund’s Google Ad Campaign
Type of Nonprofit Ad: Google Ad
As part of its efforts to create a safer world for wildlife, the World Wildlife Fund sells symbolic adoption kits, which feature merchandise of the animal the kit’s proceeds help protect. In the WWF’s Google ad above, you can see their Adopt A Penguin kit, which includes a plushie, gift bag, adoption certificate, and photo of a penguin.
Below the WWF’s ad, you’ll notice The Penguin Foundation taking a similar approach by advertising its Adopt A Penguin offering.
Even if your nonprofit can’t purchase nonprofit ads, you might be eligible for the Google Ad Grant, which provides up to $10,000 in monthly ad credits to nonprofits! This means your nonprofit, regardless of size, can compete with giants in the space like the WWF.
What Nonprofits Can Learn: Products that relate to your mission bolster brand awareness and give supporters a tangible reminder of your cause. Try advertising fun products like WWF did!
Community Development Nonprofit Advertising Examples
Literacy Empowerment Foundation
Type of Nonprofit Ad: Google Ad
The Literacy Empowerment Foundation promotes literacy by providing books and educational resources to children, parents, and teachers. Read Across America Day is an important holiday for nonprofits in the childhood literacy space, so our team of Google Ad Grant experts designed Google Ads that target key terms like “free books for Read Across America” and “free books for kids.”
These ads boast impressive engagement metrics, such as:
1,320 clicks during March, which is when Read Across America Day occurs
45 conversions during that month, including 16 visits to the foundation’s online books and 26 requests for donation options
What Nonprofits Can Learn: If there’s an awareness day associated with your cause, create search ads that target those terms. People who want to learn more about those awareness days will Google related terms and find your organization.
Lean In’s #38PercentCounts Campaign
Type of Nonprofit Ad: Advocacy and Corporate Partnership
Lean In focuses on women’s empowerment and gender equality in the workplace. The nonprofit launched its #38PercentCounts campaign to highlight that black women are paid an average of 38% less than their white male counterparts. At that time, the disparity meant that black women effectively earned 62 cents for every dollar paid to white men.
The campaign was timed to coincide with Black Women’s Equal Pay Day, which was August 7. This day marks the extra time black women must work into the new year to make what white men earned in the previous year. Lean In partnered with various businesses to raise awareness.
This nonprofit advertising example created a visceral reaction to pay gap injustices and encouraged serious discussions. Today, the pay gap sits at 36%, and Lean In aims to continue drawing attention to this slowly closing gap until it’s gone.
What Nonprofits Can Learn: Anchoring an advocacy campaign around a significant, easily understood statistic has incredible power to highlight a pressing issue.
Best Nonprofit Advertising Campaigns From Health Organizations
Erika’s Lighthouse Foundation
Type of Nonprofit Ad: Google Ad
Erika’s Lighthouse Foundation promotes awareness about adolescent depression and mental health to break down the stigma around mental illness. To promote its mission, the foundation teamed up with Google Ad Grant experts.
Our team created Google Ads that promote awareness of Erika’s Lighthouse Foundation’s mission by targeting keywords like “mental health nonprofit.” That way, anyone searching for services can find them. In just one month, our ads drove 300 clicks. The campaigns had an incredible 15.8% CTR, which is higher than the average search ad CTR of 3.17%.
What Nonprofits Can Learn: Drive interest by choosing specific keywords for your Google Ads. Conduct thorough research to determine what keywords will connect you with your beneficiaries or supporters.
Doctors Without Borders’ Giving Tuesday Campaign
Type of Nonprofit Ad: Facebook Ad
Doctors Without Borders, also known as Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), is an international humanitarian medical organization that provides emergency aid in areas affected by conflict, epidemics, disasters, or a lack of health care.
The nonprofit created a Facebook Fundraiser and designed Facebook Ads to amplify its Giving Tuesday efforts. It also leveraged matching gifts to drive even greater engagement. For context, GivingTuesday is a global generosity movement and has generated more than $13 billion for nonprofits. Considering that companies donate $2.86 billion via matching gift programs each year, combining the two opportunities was a smart move that paid off for Doctors Without Borders!
Within the two weeks the nonprofit ran its ads, the campaign generated these metrics:
Ad spend: $26,000
Donation value from ads: $72,000
2.8x return on ad spend
60% new donors and 40% recurring donors
2x the revenue as its previous year’s Giving Tuesday campaign
What Nonprofits Can Learn: Use your ads to promote attention-grabbing fundraising opportunities. By combining the power of digital ads with corporate giving opportunities during key philanthropic events, you can create powerful ads that drive donations!
The National Kidney Foundation: Are You The 33%?
Type of Nonprofit Ad: Influencer Ad
The National Kidney Foundation launched an influencer ad campaign to bring awareness to the fact that 33% of U.S. adults are at risk for kidney disease. The nonprofit partnered with Social Native creators to spread awareness and invite users to take a quick “kidney quiz” to assess their risk level.
This campaign was supported by a partnership between the National Kidney Foundation, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, and the American Society of Nephrology. Together, these organizations raised awareness and mobilized people affected by kidney disease.
With the help of 45 influencers, the campaign reached 1 million+ Instagram users and produced over 675 comments, 20,000 in-feed engagements, and 15,000 likes!
What Nonprofits Can Learn: Influencer marketing can help you tap into new audiences. Plus, it tends to be a cost-effective form of nonprofit advertising. Influencers spend time cultivating a loyal following, so partner with those ones who have communities that are likely to be passionate about your cause.
The Truth Initiative’s Ads Throughout The Years
Type of Nonprofit Ad: TV and Video Ads
The Truth Initiative’s mission is to encourage young people to reject smoking, vaping, and nicotine. This nonprofit is renowned for its effective public education ad campaigns that spread awareness and prevent tobacco use among young adults.
The Truth Initiative has launched several impactful TV ads, such as:
“Finish It” Campaign: This campaign launched at the 2017 MTV Video Music Awards and encouraged U.S. youth to be the generation that ends smoking. The campaign featured ads like “Finishers,” which was shot in the style of a video manifesto, promoting youth empowerment and social change.
“Unpaid Tobacco Spokesperson”: This series of ads highlighted how celebrity smokers inadvertently act as free marketing for tobacco companies. The campaign encouraged young people to think before posting smoking selfies.
“CATmageddon”: This ad tied smoking to the well-being of pets, warning that smoking is bad for animals and could lead to a world without cats and consequently, no cat videos. It was designed to resonate with teens’ passions for internet memes and animal welfare.
Recently, the nonprofit launched a new short-form ad series in which it shows the connection between nicotine dependence and “toxic therapy.” The Toxic Therapist character encourages teens to believe their friends are excluding them and also shows that vaping nicotine is associated with sleep problems.
What Nonprofits Can Learn: Consider how your team can tap into current trends and use shock factor to create clever nonprofit ads.
Claire’s Place Foundation
Type of Nonprofit Ad: Google Ad
Claire’s Place Foundation organizes assistance for individuals and families affected by Cystic Fibrosis, a chronic disease that affects the lungs and digestive system. The foundation partnered with our Google Ad Grant experts to connect with supporters and promote involvement opportunities, like starting fundraisers. Their ad campaign targets broad, high-volume terms like “charity events” and “fundraising for nonprofits.”
Their ads use ad assets like sitelinks (the links at the bottom of the ad as pictured above) to direct users to specific pages on their website beyond the main landing page, such as the donation page and an informational page about Cystic Fibrosis. The ads successfully sparked interest and have a CTR of 10.3%.
What Nonprofits Can Learn: Google Ads can be great for inspiring involvement opportunities like donations! If you’re eligible for the Google Ad Grant, try using them to encourage supporters to launch fundraisers, volunteer, or take other actions to support your cause. Don’t forget to build out your ads to take up more real estate with sitelinks.
Fundraising Advertising Examples For Humanitarian Efforts
charity: Water’s UnTasty Dishes
Type of Nonprofit Ad: Cause Marketing
This nonprofit advertising example reimagined BuzzFeed’s viral Tasty Dishes videos. The original series provided quick, easy recipes and generated millions of views. Then, charity: Water’s version, called UnTasty Dishes, added a substituted ingredient: dirty water.
This campaign helped charity: Water tap into BuzzFeed’s, at the time, 63 million followers. The video featured above generated 893K views, not to mention the others in the series, like a typhoid bacteria-infested smoothie jar and an algae cornbread. In its first two weeks, this nonprofit ad campaign generated 5 million views across Facebook and Snapchat.
What Nonprofits Can Learn: This nonprofit advertising example demonstrates the power of tapping into viral trends to reach large audiences quickly.
Champions Against Bullying’s NiceBot
Type of Nonprofit Ad: Social Marketing Ad
Champions Against Bullying is an international nonprofit that helps families and schools address bullying. With reports showing that something mean was posted on X (formerly Twitter) every 60 seconds at the time of this campaign, Champions Against Bullying programed the NiceBot, a Twitter bot, to send kind messages to random users every 30 seconds.
The NiceBot won a Shorty Award, making it the “first-ever use of spam for good.” The campaign reached over 7.5 million people in 76 countries. It had over 436,000 engagements and over 250,000 mentions and was featured in major advertising publications as well as TechCrunch, Upworthy, the Huffington Post, and the Today Show. Champions for Bulling extended its campaign’s impact by 3D-printing physical NiceBots and sending them to supportive influencers and celebrities.
What Nonprofits Can Learn: Leveraging technology creatively can transform how nonprofits address social issues. Plus, connecting with social media influencers can elevate your reach substantially.
ACT International
Type of Nonprofit Ad: Google Ad
ACT International is a nonprofit organization that equips artistic missionaries and ministers with essential support, helping churches utilize the arts for spiritual transformation and redemption worldwide. To increase interest in ACT International’s programs, our Google Ad Grant agency launched an ad campaign. By targeting specific keywords such as “how to start a church ministry,” ACT International reaches its ideal audience, those interested in starting church ministries.
The ads summarize the organization’s mission, highlight its coaching courses, and use sitelinks to promote other important website pages, such as its Prayer Guide. In one month, these ads drove 942 clicks and 12 inquiries.
What Nonprofits Can Learn: In your nonprofit’s ads, communicate key information in a way that’s easy for potential supporters or clients to understand. This clarity will help attract users directly interested in your services..
Common Questions About Nonprofit Advertising
How do nonprofit organizations advertise?
Nonprofits can use a wide variety of advertising methods to raise awareness, engage with beneficiaries, and solicit donations. Double the Donation’s nonprofit advertising guide shares statistics regarding how nonprofits distribute their advertising budgets:
22% on display ads
35% on search ads
36% on social media
8% on video ads and other forms of advertising
Among those, Google Ads are highly effective because they allow for precise targeting based on keywords, demographics, location, and user behavior, ensuring that advertisements are shown to qualified leads. Additionally, the platform’s pay-per-click model enables organizations to maximize their budget, paying only when users actually engage with their ads.
How do you advertise a nonprofit event?
You can create social media ads, collaborate with community influencers, engage local media for coverage, and distribute flyers and posters in community spaces.
But when it comes to online advertising, Google Ads is one of the best platforms for marketing your events. Create an event page that explains what your event is, what funds collected during it will support, and how supporters can participate. Then, create Google Ads that target relevant keywords potential attendees are likely to use when searching for events like yours.
Additionally, use targeted ad settings to set the geographical location and demographic characteristics of your ideal audience, enhancing the likelihood that ads reach people who are interested and able to attend the event.
Is nonprofit advertising worth the cost?
Yes, nonprofit advertising generates incredible results for nonprofits that create effective ads. Our nonprofit advertising guide shares these insightful statistics:
Search ads have an incredible ROI of $4.78 for every dollar spent by nonprofits.
53% of nonprofits pay for social media ads, indicating these platforms’ importance in nonprofit outreach.
Nonprofits can receive up to $120,000 each year with Google Ad Grants for free.
56% of donors say Facebook is the social media channel that influences them most to donate, making it a smart place to advertise.
To see positive results, we recommend working with a nonprofit marketing professional like those here at Getting Attention! Our Google Ad Grant experts create winning ads that target the right keywords and make the most of your advertising dollars.
Final Thoughts on These Nonprofit Advertising Examples
These nonprofit advertising examples demonstrate the power of strategic communication in advancing social causes. From leveraging pop culture to harnessing the influence of Google Ads, these examples provide valuable lessons in how nonprofits can creatively reach their audiences.
Whether through emotionally driven campaigns or the smart use of technology, the strategies we’ve covered offer actionable insights for nonprofits looking to amplify their voices and accelerate their missions in the digital age.
Now that you have examples to model your ads after, refine your campaigns! If you need more guidance, check out these free resources:
Facebook boasts an average of over 3 billion monthly visitors, and the platform generated $135 billion in ad revenue in 2023. Consider how many of your nonprofit’s current and future supporters currently contribute to these staggering figures.
Your nonprofit may already have a Facebook account it uses to connect with supporters and spread awareness of your cause. Using Facebook ads can supercharge these efforts by reaching and engaging a larger audience. In this guide, we’ll cover everything you need to consider when using Facebook ads to promote your mission:
Before diving into the best Facebook ad strategies, you need to understand how these ads work and get your account up and running. Let’s get started!
Understanding the Basics: Facebook Ad FAQs
What are Facebook ads?
Facebook ads are ads hosted through Facebook’s advertising platform. The ads can appear on mobile and desktop feeds, in the Messenger app, and even on other apps. They can be single images, image carousels, and videos (but formatting options are always changing).
The anatomy of a typical Facebook ad is as follows:
Primary text: This is the body text of the ad. Usually, it is located above the ad’s image or video. Convey your campaign’s message, explain why you need donors’ support, and motivate them to take action.
Headline: The headline entices users to engage further. This should be a quick sentence or phrase (more on headlines later).
Description: This text appears below the headline. While it may be a disclaimer like in the example above, you can also use it to further explain the headline or nudge users to learn more. For example, Save the Children could swap this description for “Your support brings clean water to children.”
Donate button: This is your Facebook ad’s call to action (CTA), or the part of the message that prompts users to take action. This next step is usually donating, but it could also be to volunteer, sign up for your newsletter, or anything else your nonprofit needs.
Keep in mind that your nonprofit can link its Facebook and Instagram accounts and have ads appear on both platforms. This creates a seamless experience for your supporters and helps you establish more touchpoints with donors.
Does Facebook offer free ads for nonprofits?
Facebook does not offer free ads or discounted options to nonprofit organizations. However, we’ll explore strategies your organization can use to make your Facebook ads effective and see a return on investment (ROI).
Keep in mind that there are other cost-effective methods of advertising available to nonprofits, such as the Google Ad Grant. Later in the guide, we’ll discuss a Facebook ad alternative you can use in place of or alongside Facebook ads to make the most of your marketing budget.
How do nonprofits get started with Facebook ads?
Because Facebook does not have special offers for nonprofits, you’ll set up your account the same way a business would. The steps for getting started are:
Create a Facebook Business Page. A Business Page is different from a personal Facebook page. These accounts are designed for businesses, organizations, and other groups to engage their customers and supporters. Because each Business Pay comes with an Ads Manager account, you won’t need to worry about setting it up manually.
Confirm account information. Visit the Ads Manager account settings to confirm that the information you entered in step one is accurate.
Set up your payment method. Because Facebook ads cost money, you’ll need to have a payment method on file to purchase ad space.
Start your first campaign! You’re ready to start buying ads, writing copy, and connecting with your audiences.
Now, it’s up to you to learn how to make your Facebook ad campaigns as effective as possible. Let’s explore a few strategies for creating stand-out ads that will lead to support.
Maximize Your Success with Facebook Ads for Nonprofits
Facebook determines ad pricing based on two factors:
Cost per click (CPC): A click occurs when a user clicks on your ad (e.g., clicking a donate button and navigating to your website). In this case, Facebook would price the ads based on how many clicks your ads receive. In other words, the more clicks on your ad, the more expensive it is to run.
Cost per mille (CPM): Also referred to as cost per thousand, this metric refers to the cost of 1,000 impressions. An impression occurs when a user sees your ad. Like with CPC, the more impressions, the higher the cost.
The cost of Facebook ads varies widely depending on how many ads your campaign has, how many people your ads are shown to, how many people engage with the campaign, seasonality, competition, and more. On average, however, Facebook ad pricing is about 69 cents per click and $9.88 per 1,000 impressions.
While these prices may seem low at first glance, costs can quickly add up. Additionally, you’ll need to consider other marketing expenses, like paying a designer to create attractive graphics and staff time spent managing your ads.
To help you stick to your budget and see great results, use the following strategies to maximize your success:
Target specific audiences.
Facebook has billions of users. However, most of these users are not qualified leads. You need to attract and engage the small subgroup of Facebook users who have the means and desire to support your cause.
Before drafting your first ad, it’s critical to identify and understand your audience. To do so, start with your data.
Here are some tips for getting to know your audience:
Develop audience personas. You likely have multiple distinct audiences within your existing donor base, each with varying preferences and affinities. To properly target each of these audiences, consider creating audience personas. Personas are fictional representations of a supporter in each audience segment, and allow you to pinpoint the most important traits, motivations, and obstacles and influence supporter behavior. With this information condensed into a profile for one hypothetical supporter, personas help you better understand how to tailor your campaigns to that segment.
Consider a wide range of audience characteristics. Go beyond simple demographic data and giving behaviors. While these factors are important, they don’t always give you a holistic picture of your audience or why they give. Analyze factors like engagement level such as how often a donor interacts with your nonprofit and the weight of those interactions (e.g., attending every event versus donating occasionally). Additionally, pay attention to psychographic traits like their beliefs, hobbies, and interests and non-financial contributions such as volunteering to avoid missing key insights that might not be as obvious.
Segment your existing audience. Next, divide your audience into segments based on shared characteristics. For example, you might create a segment of donors who almost always donate to a specific project and target them with calls to support a similar, new initiative.
Don’t forget about new donors. Consider which new audiences you want to reach, and perform preliminary research about those prospective supporters. To learn more about untapped audiences, you may have to make some inferences or use third-party data to fill in the gaps.
Armed with these insights about who your donors are, why they are passionate about your cause, and what drives them to give, you can start crafting headlines that grab their attention.
Write short, snappy primary text and headlines.
Like marketing email subject lines, Facebook ad primary text and headlines should be short, compelling, and clear. According to Facebook, headlines should be no more than 40 characters to avoid being truncated while primary text can be around 125 characters.
Supporters will likely read the primary text in your ad before anything else. To grab users’ attention, many organizations inspire a sense of urgency in this part of the ad with copy like “Every night, 1 in 5 American children go to bed hungry. You have the power to help.” Balance these creative and persuasive appeals with additional context as most users need to know what they are donating to and why before taking action.
Headlines are meant to be descriptive first and clever second. For example, the organization from the previous example might use a description like “Just $5 provides 20 meals.”
Use images and videos.
Including images, slideshows, or videos is strongly recommended. Data indicates that using images or video in your Facebook ads can boost ad clicks by 26.47% and 67.65% respectively.
For ads with images and video, aim to:
Make it authentic. Avoid using generic stock photos or videos just for the sake of adding them to your ad. Instead, use meaningful visuals your nonprofit has captured of its beneficiaries and facilities to add a personal, authentic touch. Remember to check that you’ve obtained a photo release from individuals featured in the photos and videos before launching the ad.
Keep branding consistent. Does the media align with your branding and overall voice? Did you add your logo and brand colors to images, videos, and graphics in your ads? Being able to say “yes” to these questions ensures that your supporters will easily recognize your branding when they come across the ad in their feed.
Optimize for mobile. Most of your supporters will view your ads on their phones. After all, more than 80% of Facebook usersonly browse the platform via their mobile device. Optimize any media you use for smaller screens by using square or vertical formats and ensuring text is large and legible.
Make sure media elements complement the ad copy rather than detracting from it. Images and videos should neatly align with the ad’s primary text and headline so users understand your message and feel compelled to take action.
Make different kinds of appeals.
To appeal to different audiences, you’ll need different methods to convince each segment to donate. You may be familiar with the three types of appeals used in persuasive contexts: logos, pathos, and ethos. Here’s how to use each one in your Facebook ads:
Logos, or logical appeal: This appeal relies on logic and hard evidence to motivate your audience to give. Present factual information like impact metrics and statistics about the issue you combat to make a logical case for support. For example, the ASPCA might highlight that 6.3 homeless animals enter shelters each year.
Pathos, or emotional appeal: This argument appeals to supporters’ feelings and deeply held values to elicit an emotional response, such as anger, fear, or compassion. You can make emotional appeals through storytelling, testimonials from beneficiaries, and real-world images and videos. The ASPCA’s iconic commercial featuring Sarah McLachlan’s “Angel” is an example of emotional storytelling.
Ethos, or ethical appeal: Ethos appeals to the audience’s perception of the speaker’s credibility. Build credibility with users by establishing your nonprofit’s expertise about your cause by highlighting past successes. The ASPCA could reference its annual report with a message like, “In the wake of Hurricane Ian, the APSCA assisted more than 2,800 animals—join us to support more animals impacted by natural disasters.”
You can combine these appeals within the same ad or even use them to move prospective supporters through the conversion funnel. For example, you may use an emotional appeal to catch a donor’s attention in your initial ad and link to a page that contains facts and statistics to make a logical argument to secure the donation. Your supporters are complex, multi-faceted people who rely on logic, emotion, and ethics to make decisions. The right blend of appeals will help you inspire them to take action.
Tell powerful stories.
Many organizations make emotional appeals through vivid storytelling. After all, research shows that stories tend to be memorable, increasing the chance that your ad will stick with users long enough to motivate them to take action.
Because you won’t be able to include a very long story in an ad, it’s imperative to start with a strong hook. Additionally, use visual elements that can communicate the story more succinctly than words alone, such as a narrative video. Always use real people, experiences, and challenges in the stories to present your nonprofit as authentic, credible, and trustworthy.
Leverage Ad Scheduling.
Facebook offers a scheduling tool to accounts that use a lifetime budget rather than a daily budget. By setting a lifetime budget, you tell the platform how much you plan to spend throughout the entire campaign. A daily budget, on the other hand, is the average amount you aim to spend on a specific set of ads each day.
Navigate to the Budget & Schedule section and ensure you’ve selected “Lifetime Budget.”
Select “Show More Options,” hover over the “Ad Scheduling” option, and click “Edit.”
Then, click “Run ads on a schedule” and customize the times for when each ad will run!
Scheduling your ads will help you reduce wasted ad spend. You can time ads to appear when your supporters are most likely to respond. Additionally, you can limit how much you spend on ads that appear during times with more competition or high costs to maximize your budget.
Add donate buttons.
Always make sure your ads have an obvious CTA. These are usually in the form of a donate button that users can click to reach your donation page.
This button should contain no more than one to two words. If your desired next action is for users to give to your cause, “Donate Now” is likely the best option. For campaigns with different objectives, adjust your CTAs accordingly. For example, a campaign centered around spreading awareness might link to a blog post and use a “Learn More” button. A volunteer recruitment campaign would link to the volunteer application and state “Sign Up.”
Top Alternative to Facebook Ads for Nonprofits
While Facebook ads can be highly effective, they may also require funding that your nonprofit just can’t spare at this time. In this case, you may need to opt for more nonprofit-friendly advertising methods. When it comes to reach and cost-effectiveness, the Google Ad Grant is a great alternative.
Google Ad Grants
Google Ads are used to promote products, services, content, and more to search engine users. Typically, organizations using these ads will bid on keywords related to their product or offering, hoping to appear in the search results for that term. Here’s what a Google Ad looks like on the search engine results page (SERP):
The Google Ad Grant is a program that awards $10,000 in free Google Ads credits to qualifying charitable organizations each month. The eligibility requirements for joining the program stipulate that your nonprofit must:
Hold valid charity status within your country. If your organization is based in the U.S., you’ll need to be a 501(c)(3) organization.
Register with Google for Nonprofits.
Agree to certain terms regarding nondiscrimination and donation receipt and use on the application.
Have a functional website with valuable content.
To learn more about eligibility for the grant, check out this video:
Once you secure the grant, your nonprofit will need to put together a plan for using the grant to its full potential.
To make the most of your ad credits, consider working with an agency that specializes in the Google Ad Grant. These professionals can help you confirm your eligibility, apply for the program, perform keyword research, and craft compelling ads. They’ll also ensure that you remain compliant with program guidelines and can even reactivate your account if it gets suspended. To learn more about these services and get in touch with a Google-certified Google Ad Grant agency, reach out to our team at Getting Attention for a free consultation.
Additional Resources
Chances are, many of your supporters already scroll Facebook every day. Why not try to land messages about supporting your cause on their feed? Facebook ads can help you deepen your connections with existing supporters, reach new audiences, and garner more funding from online fundraising.
To learn more about nonprofit marketing and the Google Ad Grant, check out these resources:
https://gettingattention.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/Facebook-ads-for-nonprofits_Feature.png6901450Jessica Kinghttps://gettingattention.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/getting-attention-logo.svgJessica King2024-05-13 21:23:342024-11-15 14:35:24How to Optimize Your Facebook Ads for Nonprofits: 7 Tips
From raising funds and spreading awareness to informing beneficiaries about your services, marketing is essential to helping your nonprofit fulfill its mission. However, knowing how to market your cause, what platforms to use, and if your marketing strategy is effective requires expertise your nonprofit’s team might not have.
Fortunately, nonprofit marketing agencies are in large supply. These professionals bring their years of expertise working with nonprofits to supercharge their clients’ current marketing efforts, brainstorm new strategies, and provide long-term support.
To help your nonprofit understand if now is the right time to partner with a nonprofit marketing agency, this guide will answer basic questions about these professionals and review core types of marketing agencies.
What is a nonprofit marketing agency?
A nonprofit marketing agency is a publicity and fundraising consulting firm that works with charitable organizations. These organizations work specifically with nonprofits and provide a variety of services, such as:
Donor acquisition
Fundraising and gift acquisition training
Website and online presence development
Strategic planning
Event planning
Brand development
Campaign strategy
And more
To sum up, if you need help reaching out to your donors, a marketing consultant can help.
Some nonprofit marketing firms are full-service agencies, whereas others specialize in specific areas. Whether your organization should partner with a full-service or specialized nonprofit marketing firm depends on both your immediate and long-term needs. For example, many full-service agencies become long-term partners that provide their clients with general marketing assistance for years.
However, full-service agencies often lack specialized expertise, such as knowledge of how to run an effective Google Ad Grants account. As such, if your nonprofit needs help writing ads or getting your Ad Grants account reactivated, you’re likely better off working with a specialized Google Ad Grants nonprofit marketing agency.
Should my nonprofit work with a marketing agency?
Nonprofit budgets are often tight, especially when it comes to non-mission-related expenses like marketing. While nonprofit marketing agencies offer prices that accommodate charitable organizations, they are still an expense you’ll need to weigh the pros and cons of paying.
For some nonprofits, the results of working with a marketing agency will more than pay for itself, while others may not receive maximum benefits in their current state. A few situations where you can benefit from a marketing agency include when your nonprofit:
Tries a new marketing strategy. If your nonprofit is new to marketing or looking to try a new marketing strategy, it can be worthwhile to partner with an external agency that has experience with that strategy. For example, if you want to add a direct mail element to your multichannel marketing strategy, you may want to reach out to an agency with expertise in traditional mail fundraising.
Needs help improving marketing results. If your nonprofit already has a marketing team and strategy but isn’t seeing the results you would like, insight from an objective third party can be useful. However, when approaching a marketing agency, your nonprofit should present a specific problem or project you need assistance with rather than asking for help in general. This approach gives the agency the guidance needed to tailor their recommendations and ensures the collaboration has a clear, measurable goal.
Has the budget for a consultant. Nonprofit marketing agencies are mindful of their clients’ budgets, but they don’t work for free. When assessing agencies, look at their prices and what level of service is offered at each price. You’ll get what you pay for, so consider what level of relationship you want with any agency you consider.
Additionally, before approaching a marketing agency for nonprofits, you should know what kind of support you’re looking for. Do you need a short-term partner for a specific fundraiser, or are you looking for third-party services that will act as a permanent extension of your team?
The answer to this question will depend on several factors, such as the type of agency you need.
Types of Nonprofit Marketing Agencies
Nonprofit marketing is a complex, multi-faceted topic, and there are agencies that specialize in different fields, strategies, and nonprofit types. To provide a general overview of nonprofit agencies, we’ll explore five core kinds of agencies and provide our top recommendation for each one.
Google Ad Grant
The Google Ad Grant is a corporate social responsibility program run by Google that allows nonprofits to buy ad space on Google search results pages for free. With this resource, nonprofits can expand their reach without needing to dip into funds allocated for other projects.
Google Ad Grant agencies help nonprofits manage every aspect of this unique marketing opportunity, including:
Applying for the Google Ad Grant
Creating and managing their ad accounts
Maintaining compliance and reinstating suspended accounts
Consultants bring specialized expertise related to keyword research, search engine optimization, and Google policies. As Google Ad Grant management and Google Ads are fairly unique even compared to other digital marketing channels, nonprofits that need assistance should seek out consultants that are specifically Google Ad Grant agencies.
Our Favorite Google Ad Grant Agency: Getting Attention
We, of course, have to recommend our own nonprofit marketing firm: Getting Attention.
As a Google-certified partner, our team has extensive knowledge of the Google Ad Grant regulations and stays up to date on the latest developments from Google’s team. This means our experts can make sure your account is always in line with the latest trends, compliant with Google policies, and set to make the most of your allotted monthly funds.
When it comes to marketing, our services include:
Keyword research
Google Grant management
Google Grant application
Data hygiene upkeep
Account reactivation
Interested in Getting Attention is the right nonprofit marketing agency for you? Request a free consultation with our team!
Technology
Technology is a core part of many nonprofit’s marketing efforts. After all, basic nonprofit marketing tools like your CRM and email platform are complex software solutions that need to be implemented, cleaned, optimized, updated, and integrated with additional tools to maximize their functionality.
Some marketing strategies also revolve around technical solutions. For example, nonprofits interested in running complex virtual events, creating interactive websites, or collecting granular donor data can all benefit from working with a nonprofit technology consultant.
Our Favorite Technology Agency: DNL OmniMedia
For nonprofits that use CRMs and other tools created by top vendors Blackbaud and Salesforce, we have to recommend DNL OmniMedia as our number one nonprofit technology agency.
DNL OmniMedia not only advises nonprofits on technology-driven marketing strategies but can also implement software solutions, design custom software, and create custom integrations. Their services include:
CRM implementation. DNL shines when it comes to CRM implementation for Blackbaud and Salesforce products. When working with DNL, nonprofits will receive assistance integrating their software, migrating data, and customizing their platform.
Website development and ongoing maintenance. From getting your site up and running to creating new features to maintaining its functionality, DNL’s experts can handle every part of your website.
Custom software products. Team DNL are nonprofit technology experts, especially when it comes to Blackbaud and Salesforce products. As such, they offer a wide range of tools and apps built on these platforms that can help nonprofits improve their websites. Additionally, Team DNL can build fully customized solutions for clients to meet their specific needs.
DNL OmniMedia is ready to be a long-term partner to its clients. Along with ongoing maintenance and support, Team DNL also offers multiple training sessions for nonprofits each year to get new team members up to speed with its latest technology.
Branding
Your nonprofit’s brand is essentially how your organization communicates with your audience. A strong brand identity will make supporters see your nonprofit as a coherent, professional, and trustworthy organization worth supporting.
Branding consists of multiple elements nonprofits may need a consultant’s help with, including:
Brand strategizing and planning
Logo and other graphic assets creation
Website creation
If your nonprofit already has a brand identity, a consultant can help refine your approach and create new assets to expand and solidify your brand. These nonprofits should primarily look at agencies that focus on graphic design and website development.
Nonprofits that lack a clear brand or are looking to rebrand can partner with marketing agencies that will help brainstorm and build a new brand identity from the ground up. These agencies are also graphic designers but provide additional services related to strategic marketing planning, focus group testing, and brand rollout.
Our Favorite Branding Agency: Loop
No matter where your nonprofit currently stands with its brand identity, Loop is our go-to recommendation. Loop aims to provide its clients with strategic guidance for every part of their brand identity.
When working with Loop, nonprofits will have a nonprofit marketing agency that’s ready to walk them through a four-step process for creating and rolling out a successful brand identity:
Discovery. Instead of blindly creating new brand materials, Loop will engage your community and staff in authentic conversations about your organization, its services, and its values.
Conception. Loop uses the information collected in the discovery phase to create concepts for logos, color palettes, typography, and other graphic design elements.
Guide creation. With assets chosen, Loop will compose a brand guide that your nonprofit can use to establish how it will use various elements of its brand.
Implementation. To roll out your new brand, Loop will create a strategic communication plan for announcing your brand and updating external communication to reflect it.
Loop is ready to be a long-term partner for its nonprofit clients. Their general timeline for brand-related partnerships consists of a three-month period for initial brand activities, followed by ongoing support for brand rollout which can last as long as the nonprofit needs.
Digital Fundraising
Modern nonprofit marketing strategies focus heavily on digital fundraising. As a result, digital marketing varies widely and consists of a number of services an agency might offer, such as:
Most nonprofit marketing agencies have at least some focus on digital marketing channels as a result. However, some agencies have more expertise and specialty services than others. When assessing digital fundraising consultants, explore their portfolios and case studies of past clients to see what kinds of work and projects they specialize in.
Our Favorite Digital Fundraising Agency: Fifty & Fifty
Fifty & Fifty is a full-service digital marketing agency for nonprofits that can help your team with nearly any component of digital fundraising, making it our top pick.
When it comes to marketing, Fifty & Fifty helps nonprofits with the following:
Campaigns
Social media
Email
Search engine optimization
User experience optimization
Analytics and reporting
But Fifty & Fifty’s services don’t end there. For more advanced digital fundraising campaigns, Fifty & Fifty offers:
Website development
Landing page optimization
Microsite creation
Web application development
With this wide range of options, Fifty & Fifty is ideal for nonprofits interested in working with an agency for almost any aspect of digital fundraising.
Capital Campaigns
Capital campaigns are unique fundraising campaigns that require specialized marketing and consulting services. These campaigns are meant to accumulate a large amount of capital for a major project, such as constructing a new building or launching a brand new initiative.
While a regular fundraising campaign falling short of its goal is disappointing, a failed capital campaign can be a serious blow to your nonprofit’s reputation and ability to run future fundraisers. As such, seeking third-party assistance from professional agencies is a standard part of running a capital campaign.
Our Favorite Captial Campaigns Agency: Donorly
Donorly is the go-to agency for nonprofits running their first capital campaign. If your nonprofit’s team lacks experience with capital campaigns, Donorly is here to guide you every step of the way with the following services:
Leadership and fundraising training
Three-month intensive training and strategic planning
Campaign kick-off assistance
Additionally, if your nonprofit lacks the resources to run your capital campaign, Donorly’s team can act as an extension of your team. Think of the Donorly team as temporary members of your staff rather than an external service!
How to Hire a Nonprofit Marketing Agency: 5 Steps
With knowledge of what types of agencies are out there, your nonprofit is ready to assess whether you should partner with a marketing agency and learn how to start that partnership.
In most cases, this follows a five-step process:
1. Understand your needs.
Before beginning the hiring process, determine whether your nonprofit needs to partner with a marketing agency and how that agency would help you if you did. Even if you are fairly certain that working with an external nonprofit marketing firm is the right move, this process still provides useful direction when you hire a consultant.
To assess your nonprofit’s marketing needs, follow these steps:
Assess metrics. How are your nonprofit’s current marketing efforts performing? Use your CRM, website analytics, email platform, and social media profiles to analyze core metrics related to outreach and donor engagement. Specifically, look at metrics such as donor acquisition, recurring giving rates, donor lapse, and donor engagement.
Speak with various team members. The more perspectives you have on your nonprofit’s current marketing strategy, the more accurate your internal assessment will be. While your marketing team will likely provide the most insight, consult with team members in other related departments, such as technology and donor cultivation. This allows you to get a broader view of your current strategies and how your organization as a whole feels about them.
Consider your goals. You should approach nonprofit marketing agencies with specific goals in mind. These might include increasing your donor acquisition rate by a certain percentage or implementing an entirely new marketing strategy.
Assess your current marketing technology stack. Look at all of the solutions your nonprofit has at its disposal for outreach activities. What function does each tool offer? Is there any overlap between solutions? When working with a marketing consultant, you may need to consolidate your technology stack or invest in new tools to expand your team’s abilities and reach.
Along with helping to decide whether you need to work with an agency and what kind, this step also involves compiling information about your nonprofit an agency will likely need. By having information about your current strategies, technology, and marketing concerns ready, you save your consultant the time they would otherwise need to spend collecting it.
2. Research agencies.
Once you know what services you need from a nonprofit marketing agency, you can research consulting firms. Basic Google searches should bring up recommended provider pages and reviews, but we also recommend these additional research best practices:
Ask for recommendations. If your nonprofit has connections to other organizations and leaders in your field, reach out to them for recommendations. They can offer firsthand accounts of their experiences working with various agencies or point your nonprofit toward agencies they’ve heard positive things about.
Explore past clients. When assessing a potential agency, check if they have a portfolio of past work available on their website. Many consultants will provide case studies of successful clients. These can give insight into the types of projects the agency typically works on, and your nonprofit can assess if similar solutions to the ones described in the portfolio would work for you.
Look at credentials. Several organizations provide awards and certifications for nonprofit consulting agencies. For example, many agencies offer Google Ad Grant services, but not all are Google-certified.
During this process, assemble a list of potential agencies to reach out to. Research reviews and past projects to narrow down this list to a handful you are serious about potentially working with.
3. Introduce your nonprofit.
Hiring an agency is not like making a simple purchase, and your nonprofit should never jump straight to a hiring decision before reaching out to and speaking with an agency’s team.
Introduce your nonprofit and get acquainted with your top potential marketing agencies by filling out their contact forms, sending an introductory email, or giving them a call based on what communication channels they have available for new and potential clients.
Your introduction should explain your nonprofit’s mission, share why you are looking for a marketing agency, and invite the agency to tell you more about its services. This is also an opportunity to further your research. Ask agencies about:
Past clients and if you can even contact some of them to ask them about their experiences with the agency.
Questions you have about their service model.
What types of nonprofits the agency typically works with and if they can share past details about past projects they are proud of.
You may also start to establish a rapport with agencies during this step, which will help you assess if they are a good fit for your nonprofit’s working culture and style.
4. Submit a request for proposal.
Once you have a shortlist of agencies you’re interested in working with, you can send out your request for proposal (RFP). This document outlines your nonprofit’s current problems and goals and invites agencies to respond with a proposed solution that they would implement if you hire them.
Some consultants may have specific RFP forms for you to fill out, but for others, you will need to write your RFP from scratch. The general outline of an RFP includes these five elements:
An overview of your organization. There’s no need to provide a complete retelling of your nonprofit’s history. Instead, focus on background information relevant to your current project and the potential obstacles it’s facing. At the very least, this should include your mission statement and a general overview of your organization’s size and structure.
Description of your project. Explain what your nonprofit wants the agency to accomplish. Be as specific as possible when explaining your goals and why you want to achieve them. This will provide context that agencies will find useful when crafting their responses.
Project scope. Share your timeline, budget, relevant resources, and any other factors and limitations consultants should be aware of. For example, if your project involves technology in any capacity, you should explain what your current software setup is.
Selection criteria. Explain how you will assess responses to your RFP. This might include adherence to the specified scope of your project, how well the agency’s proposal aligns with your goals, and the agency’s overall experience working with nonprofits like yours. If you plan to assess proposals based on multiple factors, explain which are your top priorities and what are nice-to-haves.
Submission directions. Let agencies know how they should respond to your RFP. This includes how they should format their response, how to send it to you, and when they must send it.
For reference, submitting an RFP is standard procedure for hiring most types of nonprofit consultants outside of just marketing. For example, if you need to hire an HR and compensation consultant, you would also write and submit an RFP.
5. Review responses.
Assemble a team to review agencies’ responses after your submission deadline. This team should consist of leadership members, the head of your marketing team, and any other stakeholders who need to sign off on a hiring decision.
Assess the responses to your RFP according to your stated criteria. Additionally, consider whether each nonprofit marketing firm’s work model would mesh well with your team’s and lead to a successful long-term partnership.
Rank the responses, and contact the top agency to officially hire them for your project. To ensure agencies aren’t left wondering about your decision, add a note in your RFP about when your team expects to contact the chosen consultant.
Nonprofit Marketing Agencies: More Resources
Consultants come in all shapes and sizes, and nonprofit marketing agencies play the vital role of helping nonprofits boost awareness, increase outreach, and experiment with new strategies. To find the agencies that work best for you, assess your marketing needs and how a consultant can help you achieve them.
Marketing is a broad and complex topic. To improve your understanding before working with an agency, explore these resources:
https://gettingattention.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/nonprofit-marketing-agency_feature-1.png4051165Jessica Kinghttps://gettingattention.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/getting-attention-logo.svgJessica King2024-05-10 19:48:342025-01-24 22:09:00Why and How to Work with a Nonprofit Marketing Agency
Picture this: You see an ad on social media for a nonprofit. You click on it, but the website has a different logo. For most of us, this would seem suspicious, and the donor journey would stop there, even if the organization was completely legitimate.
When it comes to marketing your nonprofit, consistent branding is essential. Most nonprofits are aware of this, and as such, many have style guides. But what is a style guide and how can your nonprofit put one together?
To answer these questions, this guide will explore:
These actionable strategies will transform your nonprofit’s marketing strategy into a professional, cohesive, and consistent plan. By doing so, you can better connect with donors, sponsors, volunteers, customers, beneficiaries, and other important stakeholders.
What is a nonprofit style guide?
A style guide is a document that explains how individuals creating content for your nonprofit should present your organization. Nonprofit style guides vary in complexity and level of detail. In particular, there are three main types of style guides to consider creating:
Cheat sheets are short documents, often just one or two pages, that provide a quick overview of key aspects of your brand. These documents are easy to share and help you find what you’re looking for quickly (as long as it’s included in the cheat sheet). For example, a visual style guide cheat sheet might look like this:
Style guides can vary in length but are often between five and ten pages. While you can create a style guide for just visual or editorial branding, many style guides touch on both of these core topics and provide a moderate level of detail and examples.
Brand books are long documents that cover every part of your branding, provide examples, and go into minute details where necessary. These documents tend to be long. For example, charity: water’s 2016 brand book clocks in at 86 pages. Think of a brand book as the ultimate source of truth that your other style guides take excerpts from.
When putting together your first style guide, take the middle-of-the-road option. While you should aim to create a brand book if you have a firmly established brand identity, putting this document together is not practical if you lack any form of style guide and need to create one fast.
Why does my organization need a nonprofit style guide?
When your nonprofit is just getting started or if you haven’t solidified your brand identity yet, creating a style guide might not be your priority. However, this is a core document for your marketing team, and creating one helps your nonprofit’s communication strategy by providing:
Consistency. Your style guide is a set of rules that ensures key brand elements, such as your logo, colors, and typography, always appear the same way every time you use them. By improving consistency, you also improve brand recognition, trustworthiness, and professionalism.
Brand building. Creating a style guide is an opportunity to solidify your brand. Longer guides, like brand books, require nonprofits to talk through nearly every aspect of their branding. When putting your style guide together, think critically about how and why you have and use the brand elements that you do. This can help you better understand your target audience, mission, and marketing approach.
Easy sharing. If you have a marketing team of more than one, plan to run a peer-to-peer campaign, or want to work with an external marketing agency, you need a style guide. Rather than communicating your brand specifications piecemeal, you can easily send stakeholders your complete or abridged style guide when they help out with your marketing efforts.
Completing a style guide is your nonprofit’s first step to establishing and standardizing your brand. By building up brand recognition, you can increase both supporter acquisition and retention. New supporters will recognize your nonprofit’s ads each time they see one, increasing the chance they’ll decide to make a conversion.
Elements of a Nonprofit Style Guide
To help your nonprofit understand what goes into a style guide and the level of detail needed for each section, this guide will take a look at the core elements of a nonprofit brand book. We hope you like birds because we’ll be taking a deep dive into The National Audubon’s brand book for examples.
Brand Overview
Most style guides and almost all brand books begin with a brief introduction that explains the guide’s purpose and how it should be used. This might include a description of the nonprofit, its values, and its overall brand identity. Or, it may simply state why the nonprofit feels having a consistent brand design is important.
Let’s take a look at Audubon’s introduction:
Many Nests, One Audubon
Audubon’s reach is hemispheric, with our many state offices, sanctuaries, and nature centers creating a powerful network of conservation.
Because of the many ways and places people may experience Audubon’s work, it is critical that we communicate as a single, unified brand—that we are One Audubon. Each time someone sees our materials, visits a nature center, attends a state lobby day, or uses our mobile app, the look and feel of their experience should be consistent, meaningful, and unmistakably Audubon.
This overview provides examples of situations where supporters may interact with Audubon’s brand identity and emphasizes that because Audubon is a nonprofit with chapters across the country, maintaining consistency is especially important for building brand recognition.
Logo
The logo section of a nonprofit style guide usually goes over three main topics:
Variations of the logo. Most nonprofits have several versions of their logo they use in various contexts. Audubon has four primary variants of its main logo, including their primary logo, one for social media, a text-only version, and an image-only variant.
Spacing of logo elements. How much space do you want between your logo and other text? This might seem arbitrary, but mandatory spacing and sizing can help your logo stand out and ensure it’s always legible.
How the logo should not be used. It’s generally agreed that logos can be resized or even recolored depending on the context. However, most nonprofits have explicit directions for how the logo should not be distorted, like adding additional text, changing the font, adding unapproved colors, or removing elements.
Depending on the size of your nonprofit, you may need additional logo guidelines. For example, if you have multiple regional offices, it may be necessary to explain how these groups can add their chapter name or location to the logo.
Colors
Name each brand color, provide a swatch example, and share its hex code and CMY and RBG values. This is especially important since colors appear differently on different monitors and in print format.
It can be helpful to add examples of what various brand elements look like in practice, and this is especially true for color. After all, you may have several brand colors that your graphic design team can use but likely shouldn’t use in certain combinations.
It can also be useful to explain your design philosophy when discussing color. For example, Audubon discusses that their approach is to pair one bright color with muted and neutral tones. This context guides graphic designers to ensure they apply colors in ways that make sense for your brand.
Typography
What fonts and typefaces does your nonprofit use? Share the name of the fonts you use and type out the alphabet in capital and lowercase letters, numbers 0-9, and common punctuation marks in that font.
Some fonts have multiple font weights, and nonprofits might use these for various situations. For instance, you might show what the font looks like in light, medium, and bold for comparison so your marketing team can choose which version will look best for the materials they’re creating.
Additionally, if you use different fonts for different contexts, explain that as well. For example, you might have a font that is used for digital communication and a separate one for print.
Photography
There are four things you should include in your style guide’s photography section:
Your photo library, if you have one.
Your photography guidelines. For new photos, explain what you will and won’t accept when it comes to composition and quality.
Advice for using newly taken photos of various subjects. For example, Audubon has directions for how to use photos of birds, people, habitats, and visuals that tell a story.
Crediting and copyright procedures. You should have legal permission to use all photos in your nonprofit’s marketing materials. Get releases from everyone involved in a photoshoot, and add credits to photographers and illustrators in a readable but unobtrusive format.
Graphic Design
Many nonprofit style guides lack a dedicated graphic design section and instead rely on their colors and photography sections to guide illustrators. However, if your nonprofit has specific icons or graphic design elements you regularly use, a section detailing how to access and incorporate them can be helpful.
For example, Audubon’s brand book has a section on the various icons the organization regularly uses:
Mission
Your nonprofit’s full mission statement may be several sentences explaining what your organization does, the impact your services have, and why your organization is uniquely suited to tackle these challenges.
However, for marketing purposes, it’s often useful to have a shortened version of your mission that can be easily used whenever you need to explain what your nonprofit is and make your cause for support quickly.
For example, Audubon’s short mission statement is: “The National Audubon Society protects birds and the places they need, today and tomorrow.” This is short, punchy, and can be added to marketing materials without taking up too much space.
Tone and Style
For the editorial section of your nonprofit style guide, your goal is to explain your nonprofit’s writing voice in a way that allows multiple writers to replicate it. This guide can be extensive and usually includes:
Tone. What impression do you want supporters to have of your nonprofit and how can you present that in writing? For example, is your nonprofit casual, playful, professional, profound, or something else? Provide example sentences and phrases that demonstrate your tone so writers will understand what subjective descriptors like “approachable” mean to your nonprofit.
Punctuation and grammar. Provide direction for how to use common acronyms associated with your nonprofit, whether you use the Oxford comma, and whether headlines should be sentence case or title case.
Capitalization, italics, bolding, and others. Writing is complex, and many edge cases will crop up. This means that brand books for major organizations tend to have very detailed style guides. For instance, the U.S. Figure Skating Style Guidelines is a 17-page PDF that addresses as many writing concepts related to figure skating as possible, including a paragraph about when and how to use ellipses, whether “gold” should be capitalized when referring to a gold medal, and the differences between “long time, longtime, long term, long-term.”
Your nonprofit’s editorial style guide does not need to be as intensive as those of Audubon or U.S. Figure Skating, but use these examples for the types of writing concepts and scenarios you should consider.
Terminology
The terminology sections of nonprofit style guides often look like annodated glossaries. These sections list various words and phrases likely to come up in writing and provide direction for how they should be used. These sections discuss:
Brand-related terms. List terminology that you feel needs explaining (such as an acronym) or may cause confusion. For example, Audubon’s style guide specifies that “birdbath” is one word while “bird feeder” is two.
Terms to avoid. This can be a matter of stylistic preference, such as using “okay” over “OK,” but there may be other stipulations related to your brand identity and inclusivity to specify. For example, public radio and journalistic publications, like NPR, usually have extensive guidelines on what terms to use and avoid, such as “undocumented” over “illegal aliens.”
Abbreviations. Many nonprofits use acronyms and have specifications for what these acronyms are and when they should be used. For example, The National Audubon Society is abbreviated to “Audubon” not “NAS” or any other acronym. In contrast, NPR is clear that the organization’s full name is National Public Radio but is much more relaxed at being referred to as NPR.
Extensive writing guidelines might seem like overkill, but remember that writing is a part of almost all of your nonprofit’s external communication. As such, maintaining consistency in writing tone and style is essential for building a cohesive brand identity.
If your nonprofit intends to work with external marketing agencies, such as an SEO marketing firm, the more detailed the editorial sections of your style guide are, the better. This will help these agencies properly showcase your nonprofit’s expertise, mission, and products and services.
Social Media
Social media has its own stipulations to ensure your brand comes off well on a variety of platforms. Most organizations advise marketing teams to follow their normal tone, style, and terminology rules when posting on social media.
Nonprofits with multiple regional offices, like Audubon, might encourage specific branches to get creative and find their own voices, whether that means one group posts research reports and another exotic bird photos. However, they do have a few stipulations for social media marketing, such as not posting fundraising appeals for other organizations or making political statements.
If your nonprofit has just one organization under its banner, your digital communications should remain consistent across all platforms, including social media, search engine ads, and email communications.
Print Materials
How should your branding translate to physical documents? Consider what print materials your nonprofit regularly produces and provide exact measurements and formatting directions for them. For example, a few common types of print materials include:
This is a section that needs lots of templates. Visual references can help marketers ensure they’re inputting the right measurements, decreasing the need for reprints.
Video
Video is a newer medium than illustrations and text, but it’s still one you should consider, especially as video marketing continues to soar in popularity. For video, provide branding details about:
Screen ratio, pixel resolution, and video orientation. These details might be consistent for all platforms, but you may also have some exceptions, such as allowing portrait orientation for social media sites like TikTok and Instagram.
Production credits. Generally, any text, including production credits and opening titles, should be in one of your brand fonts. If you have unique preferences for video, add that information.
Content. If there is a specific way you want parts of your nonprofit, target issue, or message to be presented, explain why and how it should be done. For instance, this might be details about how your calls to action are displayed.
Just like you would share your style guide with graphic designers and writers, this section should be shared with your video production team. You may even consider creating a video-specific cheat sheet rather than sharing your entire style guide.
Nonprofit Style Guide Best Practices
Knowing the core elements of a nonprofit style guide is a strong first step in creating one. However, some style guides are more helpful than others. To ensure your nonprofit makes use of yours, follow these best practices:
Include templates and examples. Certain branding and design concepts, such as your nonprofit’s editorial voice, may be hard to explain without examples. After all, a “casual tone” could mean using emojis, slang, or just opting to use “hi” instead of “hello.” Templates, boilerplates, and examples show how your brand should be displayed in various contexts, making it easier for anyone using your brand guide to apply it to their unique marketing situations.
Make your guide searchable. If you plan to create a long style guide, like a brand book, ensure you choose a format that is easy to search. For instance, Audubon has a searchable PDF with a table of contents, letting users find the content they need quickly.
Work with an external agency. If you need help forming your nonprofit’s brand or putting together a style guide, consider partnering with a nonprofit branding agency. Whether you need support with messaging, graphic design, or content writing, professional consultants can help you create a brand identity that fits your organization.
Remember, you can edit your style guide after creating it, and many nonprofits regularly refresh their brand books to reflect any changes. If you plan to rebrand, it may be necessary to start from scratch, but in most cases, if you realize there’s something you forgot or want to change, you can update your style guide without issue.
More Marketing Resources
Your nonprofit’s style guide is an essential document that allows your team to keep your brand consistent and expand your marketing efforts. Continue to follow and update your guide as your brand changes alongside your nonprofit.
With your brand resources ready to go, nonprofits can then launch their marketing campaigns. To get more marketing help, try these resources:
Most nonprofits are familiar with matching gifts. But how many organizations actually pursue them with a dedicated strategy? According to Double the Donation, $4-$7 billion in corporate matching gift funds goes unclaimed every year. When 78% of donors have no idea if their employer matches gifts, the group is not completing the matching gift forms their companies require to secure corporate revenue.
In order to bridge the gap, nonprofits are taking increasingly proactive approaches to educate donors and provide them with the matching gift forms they need. We’re here to show you how to do just that. Supply donors with the right forms, streamline the request process, and drive more matches to completion.
In this guide, we’ll cover all the essentials of matching gift forms, including:
In the end, you’ll know how to raise more revenue for your nonprofit by strategically promoting matching gifts. Let’s get started!
What Are Matching Gifts?
Matching gifts are a unique and impact-driven fundraising initiative in which one donation is matched by another, ultimately producing double the value. These contributions take place when a company or other entity agrees to match individual donations—either to a specific organization (such as with a one-off matching gift program) or a range of charitable missions.
While various types of programs include personal matching gifts (e.g., a generous supporter matches donations up to a certain amount for an organization during a campaign) and larger matching gift campaigns (e.g., a business, foundation, group of supporters, or another benefactor matches gifts up to a certain amount), the most common by far is corporate matching gifts.In these programs, employers match the donations their employees make to eligible nonprofits, thereby incentivizing philanthropy among their staffs.
Most companies have a set match ratio (usually 1:1, though it can be higher or lower), but lots of employees don’t know their companies even offer these programs. That’s why it’s important to promote matching gifts in your marketing strategy. Many supporters won’t know to check with their employers until you suggest it!
Generally, the corporate matching gift process looks like this:
An individual donates to a nonprofit.
The individual looks up their eligibility for a matching gift and accesses the forms needed to submit their request (this is a big part of it, and the purpose of this article!).
The individual submits the match request to their employer.
Their employer reviews the request and verifies the donation with the nonprofit.
The employer matches the donation.
But as you get into the nitty-gritty details of matching gift policies, there are a few other things you need to keep in mind.
Eligibility
Both your donors and your organization have to be eligible for a matching gift. First, donors should confirm that their employment status (full-time, part-time, or retired) allows them to submit a match request. From there, you’ll want to verify that your organization falls into one of the specific nonprofit categories the company donates to. (Hint: most registered 501(c)(3) organizations will qualify!)
Minimum and maximum gift amounts
Most matching gift companies establish a limit on the amount of money they’ll match, typically stating the maximum each employee can request each year. Businesses also determine a minimum amount, though this is generally set at around $25 or less.
For an employee’s matching gift request to be approved, their recent gift should fall within the threshold their company has defined.
Match ratios
Though it ranges from one company to the next, most employers offer a dollar-for-dollar (or 1:1) match, with most ratios ranging from .5:1 to 4:1.
Before a donation can be matched, all of those considerations must be addressed. That’s where matching gift forms come into play!
What Are Matching Gift Forms?
Matching gift forms are a specific type of document completed by an individual donor and used by a matching gift company to review the individual’s eligibility. This form generally captures specific information regarding the donor, their recent gift, and the recipient organization to ensure the requested match adheres to the company’s program guidelines.
As donors initiate their requests, there are a few kinds types of matching gift forms they might expect to use: paper, electronic, and automated. Let’s take a look at each format below.
Paper Matching Gift Forms
While paper matching gift forms aren’t very common these days, it’s still important to offer access to a paper version if it’s available. This is especially crucial for older supporters who prefer paper materials or for certain (though few) companies that require them.
Regardless, the paper form includes the following key components:
Donor Name
Employee Identification Number
Mailing Address
Phone Number
Donation Amount
Recipient Organization
Donation Date
Here’s how it works: The donor will typically need to provide official documentation of their gift (such as a donation receipt, which your nonprofit will need to create), as well as information about the type of organization (cultural, educational, etc.) and the donation date.
Once the paper form has been filled out, the donor can submit it via the employer’s preferred method (mail, fax, etc.), and the company will review the request.
Electronic Matching Gift Forms
Electronic matching gift forms make it easier for employees to submit their matching gift requests, which is great for your organization! The entire process is more streamlined, which results in more donors filling them out.
Plus, electronic forms can be used in conjunction with matching gift software (more on that below), which nonprofits use to encourage matching gift request submissions and automate the entire process.
Here are the key components of electronic matching gift forms:
Employee sign-in page: In order to access their employer’s electronic matching gift forms, employees typically need to sign into the company website using their employee username and password. Retirees might have to register and log in using a third-party company, but from there, it’s pretty simple to navigate.
Submission form: Similar to paper forms, employees will be asked to provide information about their donation. This might include the recipient organization’s name and info along with the donation amount and date.
Once the electronic form has been submitted, the employer reviews it and determines whether the donation is eligible for a match. Then, your organization will need to verify the donation for the matching gift company by confirming receipt of the original gift and verifying your 501(c)(3) status.
Automated Matching Gift Forms (From Double the Donation)
The final category of matching gift forms are those exclusive to Double the Donation, the industry’s leading provider of matching gift software. They’ve recently rolled out a few new types of matching gift forms that can make a significant difference in overall program participation rates.
These include Double the Donation’s standard matching gift form (for one-off matching gift programs*) and complete auto-submission functionality (for companies using CSR platforms that integrate with 360MatchPro).
From a donor’s perspective, the key difference between this type of automated submission is that the request process takes place entirely behind the scenes. In fact, the donor is not required to provide additional information about their donation to complete their match submission. Instead, Double the Donation leverages data from the transaction record itself, along with details provided directly by nonprofit organizations, to complete the form behind the scenes.
All the donor typically needs to do is enter their corporate email address to verify their identity and authorize Double the Donation to submit a match request on their behalf. From there, the standard match form is automatically completed and emailed to the donor’s employing company to review, approve, and disperse funding as usual.
*One-off matching gift programs are a unique form of corporate matching gifts in which a company partners with a single organization to encourage employee giving to the cause. It’s a great way to engage companies that don’t currently offer standard matching gift programs but are interested in growing their philanthropy. Check out Double the Donation’s complete guide on the topic here!
How Can Matching Gift Software Help?
You might have heard the term matching gift software floating around in the fundraising landscape. But has your team ever invested in or really considered these options?
Most leading matching gift software solutions (including our top recommendation, Double the Donation) encompass a few key components.
Donation page widget or search tool
A matching gift database houses information on thousands of companies that offer matching gift programs. This means the database includes details about the company, their match ratio, minimum and maximum amounts, and, most importantly, a link to their matching gift form.
Through an embeddable search tool that can go anywhere on your website, donors type in the name of their employer. The tool then pulls up all of the info they need about submitting a match request.
Automated email follow-ups
Some matching gift software automates the entire process. When a donor makes a gift to your organization using a form equipped with this type of tool, the platform automatically scans the information they provide to determine if they qualify for a match.
Then, depending on their eligibility, the platform triggers outreach outlining the next steps the donor should take. For match-eligible individuals, emails generally contain the recipient’s company-specific program guidelines, links to the appropriate matching gift forms, and encouragement to complete the process.
When choosing matching gift software, you’ll want to look at a few different factors:
Level of database comprehensiveness, to ensure maximal donor coverage
Number of matching gift forms, to simplify the submission process and drive more matches to completion
Data accuracy and recency, to enhance the quality of the information provided to donors and produce more completed matches
Search tool ease of use, to provide a positive user experience for your donors interacting with the widget
Integrations with current fundraising software, to streamline the onboarding and data management processes
Once you’ve settled on a solution, you’re ready to get started!
If you need a little extra advice, our suggestion is Double the Donation’s complete automation system, 360MatchPro. (Take our word for it! Get a demo of Double the Donation here.)
Double the Donation is the leading provider of matching gift solutions. Its matching gift database has collected data on more than 24,000 companies and subsidiaries, along with each one’s matching gift program information. These businesses employ nearly over 26 million individuals, who make up an estimated 99.68% of all match-eligible donors.
TLDR:You’re likely already aware that the right tools can boost your nonprofit’s ability to raise support and donations for its cause. When you employ matching gift tools alongside your donation form, you can further heighten your chances of receiving matching gifts!
How to Incorporate Matching Gifts into Your Donation Form
When people come to your donation page, they’re seriously considering donating to your organization They’re engaged with your mission and therefore receptive at this time to learning about matching gift opportunities.
Take the following scenario to help this point:
Joe, a prospective donor, visits your donation page, ready to make a gift to your organization.
While on the page, Joe notices a search tool on the donation form that says, “See if your employer will match your donation!”
Joe types in the name of his employer (Microsoft), and Microsoft’s matching gift guidelines and a link to the form come up on his screen.
Joe completes his donation and fills out the electronic form to submit a match request.
This is one of several ways you can incorporate matching gifts into your donation process. Alternatively, you can embed your matching gift search tool into your…
Donation page
Confirmation page
Dedicated matching gift page
Ways to give page
And more!
From there, an automation platform will automatically follow up with match-eligible donors and encourage them to submit a matching gift request. Using tools like these, such as Double the Donation’s 360MatchPro, you can:
Make it easier for donors to access the matching gift forms they need.
Boost the number of matching gift forms ultimately submitted.
Grow your organization’s matching gift revenue.
Increase engagement and individual generosity among donors.
Incorporating matching gifts into your donation form and giving process will raise even more awareness around matching gifts. And that’s exactly what needs to happen if you want donors to submit their match requests!
How to Market Matching Gifts Effectively
So you’ve invested in matching gift software and paved the way to start accepting matched gifts. But, besides promotional tactics on your donation page, how do your donors know to get on board?
Like any other opportunity to give, your nonprofit must do its part to inform supporters and request their donations by spreading the word about your fundraising efforts. The good news is that the message about matching gifts can be incorporated into all of your classic marketing channels. Here’s how!
Social media:
Especially since matching gift forms and the right software make the process so easy, a quick explainer post about matching gifts on your social media channels can encourage followers to check their eligibility and submit a request!
Email marketing:
Whether you’re sending a post-donation acknowledgment or scheduling a mass digital newsletter, your organization’s email communications provide an excellent opportunity to promote matching gifts to your audience. It’s impactful, cost-effective, and can be automated with your matching gift platform.
Your website:
Create a page dedicated solely to matching gifts. Include everything your site visitors need to know, like a definition of matching gifts, the most frequently asked questions, your organization’s contact information and tax identification number, and your embedded matching gift database.
The Google Ad Grant:
If you’re already leveraging Google’s Ad Grant program for nonprofits to draw more traffic to your website, it’s a great place to increase visibility and awareness of matching gifts. If you haven’t already taken steps to secure $10,000 worth of free advertising space for your organization, now’s a good time to look into it. Then, use your credits to promote your matching gifts page or donation form!
Flyers and promotional materials:
Pique supporters’ interest by adding a small section or reminder about matching gifts in any of your promotional materials. Include a link on your fundraising flyers or promotional posters to more information about matching gifts so supporters are reminded to check into it.
Inspiring Matching Gift Form Examples
Interested in exploring the process donors will take to request matching gifts on your organization’s behalf? We’ve pulled a sample entry for you.
Step #1: A donor locates the matching gift search tool plugin on a nonprofit’s website or donation form.
Step #2: The individual types the name of their employer into the search tool and selects the appropriate company.
Step #3: Their employer’s matching gift program information populates, offering a direct link to the electronic matching gift form (or an option to auto-submit the request from the giving page).
Step #4: The donor logs into their company giving portal to access the matching gift form and submit all of the necessary information.
From there, your nonprofit will be on its way to securing more matching gift revenue!
Final Thoughts & Additional Resources
Understanding how to use matching gift forms is essential for your nonprofit. For the best results, your team should be able to guide donors to their correct forms, provide additional support when requested, and raise more revenue for your cause as a result.
When you use matching gift software to streamline this entire process, you’ll make it easier on donors and yourself.
To learn more about matching gifts, top companies that offer the programs, or corporate giving in general, check out the resources below!
https://gettingattention.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/Getting-Attention_How-to-Use-Matching-Gift-Forms-101-A-Nonprofit-Guide_Feature-2.png8002060Jessica Kinghttps://gettingattention.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/getting-attention-logo.svgJessica King2024-03-08 16:06:222024-11-15 14:35:56How to Use Matching Gift Forms 101: A Nonprofit Guide
What To Know About Google My Business for Nonprofits
/in Nonprofit Marketing, Nonprofit Tools /by Jessica KingWhat if you could provide Google users looking for your nonprofit with all the relevant details they need to get in touch with you right from the search engine results page? With Google My Business, now called Google Business Profiles, this has fortunately been a reality for some time.
Despite the name of this feature saying “business,” your nonprofit can also create a Google Business Profile! To help you get started, this guide will dive into Google Business Profiles, answering the following questions:
Ultimately, Google Business Profiles are incredibly simple and easy to set up. Once complete, your nonprofit can attract new supporters, increase its visibility, and present itself as a trustworthy, reputable organization to Google users.
What is Google My Business?
If you’ve ever Googled a business, you’ve likely noticed something appear above or to the side of search results that provides a lot of information about the organization you just searched for. This is a Google Business Profile.
A Google Business Profile is a summary of your business that Google will show users searching for your organization. These profiles are primarily managed by the organization they’re about, and they can contain as much or as little information as you want about your nonprofit. Although, it’s better to lean on the side of more information.
For example, let’s take a look at all of the elements of nonprofit Erika’s Lighthouse’s Google Business Profile:
Plus, there’s even more you can add to your profile, such as:
Plus, in addition to appearing in Google search results, Google Business Profiles also appear in Google Maps. For instance, here’s Erika’s Lighthouse again, but on Google Maps:
Is Google My Business Free?
Yes! Any organization can create a Google Business Profile for free. Google wants as many organizations as possible to create and maintain Google Business Profiles because of how they improve the user experience.
Can Nonprofits Use Google My Business?
Yes again! While Google Business Profiles were created with businesses in mind, nonprofits can use them as well.
Through this no-cost program, your nonprofit receives the following benefits:
Boosted visibility.
If you’re serious about search engine advertising, creating a Google Business Profile should be one of your first priorities.
When creating your profile, you will need to choose the “Business Category” that best fits your nonprofit. “Non-profit organization” is included as a category, but thanks to the extensive list, you may be able to select a category that aligns more closely with your mission and services, like “Environmental protection organization,” “Mental health service, and “Food bank” to name just a few options relevant to nonprofits.
This categorization is primarily for search engine optimization purposes. Picking the right category improves the chances that your pages and business profile will be shown to individuals searching for organizations like yours.
This means users looking specifically for your nonprofit will receive additional information about your organization immediately after Googling you, and Google will also have additional indicators of what keywords to push your content for, increasing your page rankings.
Plus, if your nonprofit has services, products, or programs for sale, you are at least slightly operating like a business! As such the opportunity to showcase product photos, respond to customer reviews, and get your organization literally on the map is just as important for your nonprofit as it would be for a for-profit organization.
Location-based traffic.
You’ve likely had the experience of searching for a specific service, product, or type of organization without referencing your location. However, Google still pulls up results for local businesses.
Google has extensive location data for both individual searchers and the various organizations using Google Business Profiles. As such, it uses geolocation to connect searchers with businesses and nonprofits near them to improve the user experience.
Additionally, as mentioned earlier, Google Business Profiles also apply to Google Maps. If you’ve ever opened up your map app to see what’s nearby, Google pulls from Google Business Profiles to direct you toward local organizations.
By sharing your address with Google, you can increase your chances of connecting with local volunteers, customers, beneficiaries, and donors.
Plus, your nonprofit doesn’t need a physical storefront to participate either. If you have a physical location you want donors, beneficiaries, volunteers, and anyone else to know about, you can add your address to your account. If not, you choose your city or area code instead. For instance, if you’re a small organization working out of someone’s house, you likely don’t want to share your address.
Improved credibility.
Almost every organization around has a Google Business Profile due to either setting it up themselves or having an unverified listing created (more on that later). As such, organizations that come up blank on Google can seem suspicious. After all, would you buy from a business with hundreds of reviews or one with none? Chances are the former since 75% of consumers “regularly” or “always” read online reviews before doing business with an organization.
Maintaining a Google Business Profile shows supporters that your organization is active, trustworthy, and has real humans behind it. Plus, with the reviews, the Question & Answer, and Highlights sections, you have plenty of opportunities to talk to customers, supporters, and beneficiaries directly, address their questions, and promote your nonprofit.
How Can My Nonprofit Get Started With Google My Business?
Generally, your nonprofit can create a Google Business Profile using one of two methods:
Set up a business profile.
If your nonprofit doesn’t already have a Google Business Profile, you can create one by navigating to Google Maps, opening the menu, and clicking “Add your business.”
From there, either sign into your business account if you already have one. If not, you can create one by following these steps:
During this process, you can also choose whether to opt in to receive updates and recommendations from Google about how to improve your profile. These can be useful if you are new to Google Business Profiles or want to stay in the loop when it comes to Google’s recommended best practices.
Claim an unverified listing.
To be as compressive as possible, Google will auto-generate listings for some organizations that have yet to create Google Business Profiles themselves. If you’ve ever seen the buttons that say “Own this business?” you might be looking at an unverified listing.
To claim an unverified listing, follow these steps:
Google can take up to five business days to confirm your verification, and updates to your profile may start appearing a few weeks after your verification. Fortunately, you can start updating your profile before verification is confirmed. The changes will only go live after Google confirms your ownership.
How Can Nonprofits Make the Most of a Google My Business?
Ultimately, your Google Business Profile is as useful as you choose to make it. To get the most out of this free service, we recommend:
If your nonprofit is ready to expand its presence on Google by creating a Google Business Profile, we recommend taking just one more step and applying for the Google Ad Grant.
The Google Ad Grant provides participating nonprofits with $10,000 in ad credits every month, allowing you to promote your nonprofit on search engine results pages for free. By targeting keywords related to your nonprofit, you can connect with high-value leads who are likely to be interested in your cause, make a donation, or purchase your offerings.
To get started with the Google Ad Grant, partner with a Google-certified Ad Grant agency, like Getting Attention! As an officially recognized Ad Grant agency, we’re in the loop with any changes to Google’s Ad Grant program. This means we bring the latest knowledge on what’s trending on Google to help your nonprofit apply for the ad grant, create ads, and reinstate your account if it ever gets deactivated.
More Google Resources for Nonprofits
A Google Business Profile literally puts your nonprofit on the map. Supporters can learn more about your nonprofit as soon as they search for you, while your local community will start noticing you popping up nearby. In other words, Google Business Profiles lets you expand your audience and source high-quality leads just by filling out basic information about your nonprofit.
To take advantage of even more Google resources for nonprofits, explore these resources:
Nonprofit Content Marketing: Create Content Supporters Love
/in Nonprofit Communications, Nonprofit Marketing /by Jessica KingNonprofits operate in a unique intersection of passion and practicality, striving not only to champion their causes but also to engage a community of supporters who are just as dedicated. At the core of this engagement lies an integral yet underappreciated tool: nonprofit content marketing.
While many nonprofits recognize the necessity of marketing for donor acquisition and retention, the content of these materials often gets brushed over. This oversight can mean missed opportunities in an environment where every interaction counts.
To help, we’ll explore everything you need to know about creating a successful nonprofit content marketing strategy that incites passion for your mission, including:
Whether your goal is to inspire a first-time visitor to become a lifelong donor or to re-engage lapsed supporters, the right content can make all the difference. Let’s dive in!
Content Marketing FAQ
Before you craft your strategy, let’s explore the fundamentals and importance of this type of marketing.
What Is Nonprofit Content Marketing?
Nonprofit content marketing is a type of marketing that involves creating and distributing written and multimedia collateral that’s valuable and relevant to an organization’s cause. This type of marketing focuses on telling the organization’s story, showcasing impact, and building trust among potential and current donors, volunteers, and advocates.
Content can take many formats, including long and short-form ones. Common types of nonprofit content marketing include blog posts, emails, social media posts, videos, case studies, and eBooks. The best content aims to help the reader and educate them on the cause, rather than pushing them to take action.
What Are The Benefits of A Nonprofit Content Marketing Strategy?
Generally, nonprofit content marketing helps deepen connections by fostering trust and engagement through storytelling and information sharing. By understanding best practices for content creation, your organization can enhance its narrative, connect meaningfully with its audience, and drive its mission forward.
Although most nonprofits engage in some form of content marketing, having a specific strategy can greatly boost its effectiveness. Here are some key benefits of implementing a well-defined nonprofit content marketing strategy:
Essentially, implementing a dedicated content marketing strategy will allow your nonprofit to maximize its outreach and drive passion for its mission.
What Can Nonprofit Content Marketing Strategy Accomplish?
A well-crafted approach to nonprofit content marketing can achieve several objectives that are vital for the growth and sustainability of your organization, such as:
By strategically employing content marketing, your nonprofit can ensure a broader reach and deeper connections, turning passive observers into active supporters. This approach not only drives your mission forward but also builds a sustainable foundation for future impact.
Types of Nonprofit Content Marketing
There are several types of content your nonprofit can create. While this gives your nonprofit plenty of options, it can be overwhelming trying to find the perfect mix that inspires your audience.
The best combination depends on your nonprofit’s mission, audience, and goals. With that in mind, here are the core types to consider:
Written Content
Written content is a cornerstone of an effective nonprofit content marketing strategy. It offers a variety of formats to engage different segments of your audience. Each type of written content serves a unique purpose and can be tailored to meet specific organizational goals:
Each type of written content offers unique benefits and can be strategically integrated into your overall marketing plan to achieve your nonprofit’s goals. Do you want to enhance donor appreciation? Try thank-you eCards. Do you want to drive traffic to your latest fundraising campaign? Create Google Ads that highlight your campaign’s purpose and feature your fundraising page.
By diversifying your channels and tailoring messages to different audience segments, you can enhance outreach, deepen connections, and drive more meaningful actions.
Video
The rise of video content in digital marketing is undeniable, with marketing research showing that viewers retain 95% of a message when they watch it in a video compared to 10% when reading it in text. This visual and dynamic medium can significantly enhance engagement and message recall, making it a powerful tool for nonprofits.
Plus, video is only growing more popular. Wistia’s video platform reported a 15% increase in video plays and a 44% jump in watch time in 2023.
To create impactful video content, consider the following strategies:
Tap into this form of nonprofit content marketing with YouTube for Nonprofits. This program offers special features like linkable donation buttons directly in videos, the ability to broadcast live events, and access to powerful analytics tools. These features help maximize the reach and impact of your videos, making it easier for your nonprofit to connect with a global audience, spread its message, and drive donations.
Images
Visual storytelling through images can significantly enhance the way your nonprofit communicates its mission. Decorative images not only capture attention but also convey emotions and narratives more effectively than text alone.
Here are a few types of images that can be particularly impactful:
Using these types of images strategically can enhance your nonprofit’s storytelling and deepen understanding and empathy toward your cause. If you don’t have a graphic designer in-house, consider outsourcing the work. Kwala’s nonprofit graphic design guide suggests choosing a company that offers a wide range of creatives, provides web and print designs, and has mission-driven expertise. That way, you can focus your energy on your work rather than attempting to master different design tools.
Events
Whether virtual or in-person, events serve as dynamic content that engages audiences, provides valuable experiences, and communicates key messages about your nonprofit’s mission. Events offer unique storytelling opportunities that can be captured and leveraged in future marketing efforts to showcase success stories backed by direct quotes and video content.
Here are a few types of events that serve as content marketing opportunities:
Incorporating these nonprofit events into your nonprofit’s content marketing strategy can provide a rich source of content for ongoing outreach efforts.
7 Content Marketing Strategies
With these types of content in mind, you can develop a strategy that promotes your mission and inspires support. Let’s walk through seven easy steps to create your plan.
1. Have Clear Goals.
It’s essential to align the objectives of your nonprofit’s content marketing with your broader strategic goals. This alignment ensures that every piece of content—whether a blog post, video, or social media update—contributes directly to overarching fundraising targets, volunteer recruitment, or awareness campaigns.
Assess your strategic plan to determine how these objectives translate into specific marketing goals. For example, if your goal is to reach a certain fundraising milestone, your nonprofit’s content marketing strategy might focus on:
In a broader marketing context, these specific goals can translate into measurable marketing objectives, such as generating sales leads from new donor segments, increasing traffic to your donation page, or boosting social media engagement.
2. Establish Your Target Audience.
Creating content with a specific audience in mind is essential for effective nonprofit content marketing. Here’s how to determine the materials that will appeal to your target audience:
This multi-angle approach ensures your content strategy is data-informed and tailored to your audience’s evolving expectations.
3. Personalize Content.
In direct marketing, personalizing content ensures your material resonates on an individual level. Start by segmenting your audience into groups like donors, volunteers, and customers. Then, refine those segments even further, such as by dividing donors into recurring, lapsed, and prospective major donors.
To enhance your segments, consider using data appends, which improve your existing databases with additional details like preferences and behaviors, allowing for even more precise and impactful content customization.
Beyond only considering common characteristics, you’ll want to tailor the messaging to address the specific interests and needs of each segment. This is known as personalization, and it’s a powerful way to produce content that resonates with your audience. For instance, someone who would potentially purchase your nonprofit’s professional development courses might need to read testimonials and impact metrics to understand the value of investing in your product.
4. Use Storytelling Strategies.
Emotions can influence supporters’ behaviors. One donor behavior study found that positive emotions tend to elicit higher total donation amounts, while negative emotions can lead to higher individual donation amounts.
Here’s how to effectively use storytelling to tap into these emotional drivers:
These storytelling tactics will enhance emotional connections and align with the observed impacts of different emotional appeals on donation behaviors.
5. Demonstrate Your Thought Leadership.
The best content is original and insightful. When posted on your nonprofit’s website, this not only appeals to search engines but it also builds trust with supporters.
Here’s how to accomplish just that:
Once you produce valuable content, drive immediate visibility to those key pages by promoting it with Google Ads. If eligible for the Google Ad Grant, your nonprofit can promote these pages for free. You’ll receive up to $10,000 each month to promote valuable pages that advance your mission.
6. Follow SEO Best Practices.
Search engine optimization (SEO) is vital for increasing the visibility of your nonprofit’s website content. A comprehensive SEO strategy is particularly useful for nonprofits that sell programs, products, and services, because people searching for terms related to your nonprofit already know exactly what they’re looking for. SEO puts your nonprofit front and center.
When someone searches for a word, phrase, or question on Google, they’re directed to a search engine results page (SERP) that’s comprised of relevant ads and organic results. If your website’s content is optimized for SEO, it’ll ideally appear under the Google Ads on the SERP.
A strong SEO strategy consists of several elements, including:
SEO is a long-term strategy, meaning it will take time to see results compared to paid ads. Google constantly recrawls content, so you have endless opportunities to study results and improve your approach.
Getting Started With SEO
To elevate your SEO strategy, we recommend partnering with Nexus Marketing. Their team of skilled SEO experts and content creators has over a decade of experience in the mission-driven sector.
Not to mention, Nexus boasts an incredible network of 500+ partners in the mission-driven space, meaning they can scale your authority-building strategy rapidly through valuable backlink and guest posting opportunities.
In fact, they helped the Christian publishers at David C Cook rank for 187 of their most important keywords on page one of Google, compared to just five at the start of the partnership. And those numbers account for only the keywords they’re tracking! Now, the organization can rely on its SEO strategy to drive sales for its curriculum.
Please note that Nexus is best suited for nonprofits selling products, programming, or services. While they excel at increasing online engagement, they’re not well-suited for local SEO or exclusively attracting donors.
7. Work With A Marketing Consultant.
Creating professional content and managing a comprehensive content marketing strategy can be a full-time endeavor. Hiring a marketing consultant or agency can offer several advantages:
Leveraging professional assistance ensures that your nonprofit’s marketing efforts are both strategic and effective, allowing you to focus more on your mission and less on the complexities of content marketing.
Additional Marketing Resources
Nonprofit content marketing is an essential tool for engaging supporters and expanding your reach. From creating powerful Google Ads to developing SEO blog content, your opportunities are endless!
Continue your journey in mastering nonprofit content marketing with these resources:
10 Solid Nonprofit Membership Marketing Ideas to Drive Impact
/in Nonprofit Marketing /by Jessica KingIn the fast-paced world of nonprofit, trade, and professional association membership programs, you need to create and sustain long-lasting relationships. That’s why membership marketing is essential—it paves the way to a thriving, sustainable membership base.
To help your organization attract members and build brand recognition, we’ll explore the purpose of membership marketing. Then, we’ll provide the tools and tips you need to acquire, retain, and actively engage your members. Here’s what we’ll cover:
At Getting Attention, we specialize in helping nonprofits reach their marketing potential with the Google Ad Grant Program (which we’ll cover in more detail later). With our professional guidance, you can amplify your message and connect with more prospects in no time.
Why Membership Marketing Matters
Membership marketing describes the strategic marketing efforts that focus on acquiring, engaging, and retaining members within a nonprofit organization. Effective membership marketing can help your organization make these benefits a reality:
A long-term member marketing strategy can help your organization tap into these advantages and many more. However, to achieve these benefits, you’ll need to create a plan that caters to your individual members’ needs. That means you’ll need to take a step back and understand the full picture of the member experience.
Membership Marketing Funnel: Understanding The Member Experience
What does the current journey look like for prospective members to become active and engaged supporters? These questions will help guide you to create an actionable membership marketing plan that prioritizes member experience above all else.
If you provide a positive and memorable experience, you’ll give your members every reason to take the next defined step and engage. You can use a membership funnel to visualize your member’s journey:
Every organization should have set marketing efforts based on each of the above stages of the member journey. That way, your team will have a well-rounded strategy that enriches your member’s experience from start to finish.
Membership Marketing Tools
It’s one thing to know marketing can transform your organization, but it’s another thing to know which tools will help you get there. That said, let’s explore the top tools you should keep handy in your member marketing toolkit:
This last point bears emphasizing as your website is essential for other onsite content strategies, including Google Ads. This means a clean, organized website should not only engage your current members but also attract new ones. With this in mind, let’s explore our top ten nonprofit membership marketing ideas.
Is your website set up for success? Download Getting Attention’s Website Checklist for tips
10 Solid Membership Marketing Ideas
Below are ten membership marketing ideas your organization can leverage. Let’s break down each according to member acquisition and member retention:
Membership Marketing Ideas for Member Acquisition
Member acquisition refers to the process of attracting and acquiring new members to your organization and is represented in the “capture”, “nurture”, and “convert” steps of the marketing funnel. Note that membership acquisition is notoriously tricky as 68% of organizations face challenges in growing their member base.
Try these ideas to help your organization get its feet off the ground and hit its acquisition goals:
1. Referral Programs
People trust people more than they trust organizations. For example, if a trusted friend told you that you need to check out a new restaurant, you’d be more likely to go than if the restaurant reached out to you personally.
That said, consider leveraging your existing member relationships by creating a referral program. You can do this by:
Ideally, your referral program is a win-win-win situation for your referrer, referee, and organization as your referrer and referee enjoy the program’s incentives and your member acquisition rate keeps climbing!
2. Email Marketing Campaign
Send out a dedicated email marketing campaign to nurture your existing contacts and lead them one step closer to conversion. To nudge your prospective members using email marketing, follow these best practices:
Track your email open rates to discover your campaign’s effectiveness and make any adjustments as necessary. For example, you might find that emails with short YouTube video explainers perform better than simple images. Using that information, you might seek to edit more video content that inspires new members to join.
3. Website Content Marketing
82% of marketers actively use content marketing, so join them by utilizing your existing website to add relevant content that educates and fascinates users. For example, start a blog that provides organizational insights, information, or case studies highlighting how your organization actively furthers its mission.
Doing this will boost your credibility and differentiate your association or nonprofit from similar organizations that might not offer the same valuable resources.
Additionally, consider how to drive current and potential members to your website through targeted marketing efforts on social media, email, Google Ads, and other channels. Just ensure your content is centralized behind your membership portal to attract new members while keeping existing ones engaged.
By maintaining an active online community, posting regular digital content, and hosting virtual events, you can keep your members on your website. When compared to associations that use social media to manage their members, you won’t need to constantly fight for your community’s attention once they’re logged in.
To accomplish this, we recommend investing in a community engagement platform, and we recommend our favorite solution, Tradewing. Let’s take a look at Tradewing’s membership homepage.
Tools like Tradewing create a social media-like interface where members can interact with each other in between your annual events. This keeps engagement high throughout the entire year and encourages members to become active members of your association’s community.
4. Social Media Marketing
Aside from promoting your blog posts, social media can be a powerful tool to convince prospective members to convert as there are 4.80 billion social media users worldwide. The key is to regularly post engaging content to make your organization stand out, such as:
Remember to respond to comments and repost tagged content to engage with current and potential members. Doing this will establish credibility and show prospects that your organization is dedicated to providing an interactive and fruitful experience.
5. Corporate Partnerships
Another effective way to reach new supporters is through corporate partnerships. This method helps you expand your reach by teaming up with organizations that have the same target audience as you. In the past, these relationships took the form of sponsorships only.
However, they have evolved since then and now represent opportunities for your organizations to meaningfully collaborate beyond providing brand name promotion. Today, you can research opportunities such as volunteering or skills sharing.
6. Search Ads
Search ads target prospective members who are already interested in your organization. Specifically, the Google Ad Grant is aimed toward nonprofit organizations and can help your organization spread awareness and attract new members. The best part? This program has donated more than 1.8 million dollars worth of search ads to nonprofits.
Basically, the Google Ad Grant program for eligible nonprofits provides funds to spend on search ads in Google. Meaning your organization will show up at the top of the results when someone is looking for additional information relating to your nonprofit’s mission.
More specifically, you can use the Google Ad Grant program to:
Although the Google Ad Grant program offers serval advantages, ensuring eligibility and maintaining your account can take some time. That’s why many organizations partner with agency experts like Getting Attention to get the most out of their accounts.
Membership Marketing Ideas for Member Retention
It can be tempting to think that once you’ve converted a new member the marketing work is over. However, it’s much more cost-effective to place additional effort into member retention than only focusing on member acquisition. Members also tend to stick with organizations that make them feel valued for their individual contributions. To up your member retention rate, try these strategies:
7. Personalized Communication
Indicate to your members that they are not just another number with personalized communication efforts. Refer to your existing member data to guide your communication efforts according to your member’s membership type, demographics, and unique contributions.
For example, if your organization is focused on environmental conservation, you might invite local members to an environmental clean-up and educational seminar that’s conveniently located for them.
8. Tiered Membership Levels
Give new members flexibility with how they choose to engage with your organization by offering them tiered membership levels. This also provides an upselling opportunity for you to use when collecting dues from your member base. Here is what your tiers could look like:
By offering members these options, they can select to engage in a way that works best for their goals. Each level provides different perks which can also incentivize members to increase their level later down the road.
9. Exclusive Content
Exclusive content deals can prompt prospective members to sign up or convince existing members to increase their membership level. Here are a few exclusive content examples:
Member-exclusive content should offer unique benefits that are available only through your organization. Plan your benefits ahead of time and advertise them to prospective, new, and experienced members.
On your website, specify which pages are members-only and which are open to the public. Strategically offer specific pieces of content or access to opportunities to the general public to entice them to learn more about your association and want to upgrade to a membership.
If you plan to make your membership database accessible to the public, ensure members have adequate privacy features. For example, Tradewing allows associations to create custom profile fields for their members. Once members set up their profiles, they can decide which information they want public and which will be private.
10. Appreciation Events
Celebrate member milestones with dedicated appreciation events. Members who have achieved 5, 10, 15, or more years of membership, have dedicated a large number of volunteer hours, or have given a large number of donations should be recognized for their loyalty.
You can host a wide variety of appreciation events including:
Define the standards members need to achieve ahead of time before finalizing your guest list. Creating events like this will show your members that you are dedicated to going above and beyond to exceed their expectations.
Conclusion + Additional Resources
Your ideal membership experience should directly inform your marketing efforts.
Use marketing tools like social media, search ads, and many other channels to activate a tailored marketing strategy for member acquisition and retention. Track and monitor each marketing strategy and note the ones that produce the most engagement for your outlined target audience.
We hope you enjoyed this guide to membership marketing! Check out these articles to keep learning:
Corporate Volunteer Grants: The Basics & How to Secure Them
/in Nonprofit Communications, Nonprofit Fundraising, Volunteers /by Jessica KingAs a nonprofit professional, you know that every dollar gets you closer to achieving your goals. You can boost funding and attract more volunteers for your nonprofit with a dedicated volunteer grant strategy.
We’ve put together this guide to walk through everything you need to know about volunteer grants. We’ll cover the following:
If you’re not familiar with volunteer grants or aren’t sure how to maximize revenue from this channel, look no further! Let’s dive right in by answering frequently asked questions about volunteer grants.
Volunteer Grant FAQs
What are volunteer grants?
Volunteer grants are a type of corporate giving program in which employers provide monetary grants to organizations where their employees volunteer regularly. These programs are also known as Dollars for Doers, Dollar for Hour, Matching Time, and Grants for Time programs.
For example, if your nonprofit has a dedicated volunteer who devotes 5 hours a week to your organization and their company has a volunteer grant program, the company will pay you for those hours.
The exact amount of time a supporter needs to volunteer to earn a grant for your nonprofit depends on their employer’s specific program requirements. Work with your volunteers to help them discover their eligibility and take the steps necessary to secure a volunteer grant.
What are the benefits of volunteer grants?
The main draw of volunteer grants is extra funding for your organization at no cost to supporters. Beyond that, volunteer grants have benefits for everyone involved in the process:
Some companies even offer team volunteer grants, where groups of employees from the same company can volunteer together and secure a larger grant for your cause.
Why do businesses offer volunteer grants?
To secure corporate support, nonprofit organizations usually rely on companies to already have corporate social responsibility (CSR) programs like volunteer grants or volunteer time off in place. However, by understanding why businesses offer volunteer grant programs and researching the employers your supporters work for, you or your donors may be able to persuade certain companies to start new CSR initiatives.
Reports show that employees who work at companies with volunteer programs are five times more engaged than those who don’t. When pitching a volunteer grant program to businesses, emphasize statistics like this and how they can lead to improved business outcomes, such as increased employee productivity and retention.
Additionally, remain open to other types of corporate volunteerism. For example, some businesses arrange organized corporate volunteer groups, which serve as team-building activities for their employees while also providing your nonprofit with extra help for your ongoing programs.
Are volunteer grants common?
Yes, volunteer grants are a common business practice! We’ve pulled together some key statistics from Double the Donation that demonstrate how common and impactful these programs are:
From these statistics, it’s clear that there are plenty of volunteer grant opportunities that your organization and its supporters can take advantage of.
How to Get Volunteer Grants for Your Nonprofit
To secure volunteer grants, you first need to understand how the process works. From your nonprofit’s perspective, it happens in four steps:
Companies’ volunteer grant requirements vary, but there’s generally a minimum number of hours that must be volunteered to qualify for a grant. Once the volunteer hours threshold has been met, the company will either pay by the hour or a set amount. For example, one company might pay $15 per volunteer hour, while another pays a flat $500 after 40 hours have been contributed.
Unfortunately, most volunteers don’t even know whether they’re eligible for a grant or how to check their eligibility. That means it’s up to your nonprofit to help volunteers earn the grants they rightfully deserve.
Best Practices for Securing Volunteer Grants
How do you get the word out about this mutually beneficial opportunity? Just follow these three best practices:
1. Market volunteer grants to your supporters
You can’t secure volunteer grants if your supporters don’t know what they are or how to request them. That’s why it’s crucial to create a marketing plan that promotes these opportunities to your supporters.
As you develop your plan, consider these strategies:
Once you’ve created basic volunteer grant marketing materials for your website, you can expand your reach by leveraging the Google Ad Grant. The Google Ad Grants program provides eligible nonprofits with $10,000 a month in credits to spend on Google search ads.
Through the Google Ad Grant program, your organization can create ads that show up at the top of Google search results pages for relevant terms, like “volunteer opportunities near me” or “animal shelter volunteering.” Highlight volunteer grants in these ads, and you’ll promote the opportunity to a whole new audience of potential volunteers!
2. Offer a variety of volunteer opportunities
Ensure you have volunteer activities that supporters find interesting to encourage continued support. Consider creating various ways to get involved that fit various skill sets, time slots, and physical requirements.
For example, you might have a physically intensive volunteer opportunity for supporters to work in a community garden where they can learn about plant care on the job. In contrast, you might also offer a remote volunteer opportunity for data entry.
Additionally, have activities that groups of volunteers can participate in. This will accommodate corporate volunteer teams to secure more corporate volunteers, increase the grant money you receive, and help your nonprofit build a long-term relationship with the company they came from.
3. Use corporate giving software
Whether you’re looking to secure volunteer grants, matching gifts, or any other kind of corporate support, streamlining the application process is a surefire way to maximize donations. And you can do just that with a volunteer grant database.
Our favorite volunteer grant database is 360MatchPro by Double the Donation. 360MatchPro offers nonprofits support for both matching gifts and volunteer grants. Here’s how the volunteer grant component of this platform works:
From there, the software will direct volunteers to the next steps they need to take to request a volunteer grant. This will usually be to complete a form for their employer that documents their volunteer hours and details about your nonprofit like your mission statement and contact information.
Some companies may reach out to your nonprofit for confirmation, while others might consider the process done after reviewing an employee application. Either way, be ready to work with your volunteers to answer their questions and support them through the volunteer grant process.
Examples of Top Companies with Volunteer Grant Programs
Take a look at some of the top companies with volunteer grant programs to get an idea of how much businesses invest in corporate philanthropy.
Verizon’s Volunteer Grant Program
Verizon offers a Volunteer Incentive Program (VIP), which awards $750 to an organization after an employee volunteers 50 hours with that organization. Even better, Verizon employees can request up to two of these grants per year.
Microsoft’s Volunteer Grant Program
Microsoft has a generous volunteer grant program with no minimum hours required. Microsoft employees can earn $25 per hour they commit to a nonprofit. Last year, almost 30,000 employees took advantage of this program and volunteered over 1 million hours in total.
ExxonMobil’s Volunteer Grant Program
ExxonMobil has multiple volunteer grant programs: an individual volunteer grant program through which employees can secure a $500 grant after volunteering 20 hours with an organization and team volunteer grant opportunities for groups of five or more.
Additional Volunteer Grant Resources
Tapping into volunteer grants doesn’t have to be daunting. The more knowledge your team has about these opportunities, the more successful you’ll be at locating and securing these valuable contributions.
We hope this guide has helped your organization realize all the untapped volunteer grant opportunities you can benefit from! If you want to continue your research, we’ve picked some great resources to get you started:
Expand Your Professional Network: LinkedIn for Nonprofits
/in Nonprofit Communications, Nonprofit Tools /by Jessica KingWhen it comes to making professional connections, LinkedIn is the go-to website for individuals, businesses, and nonprofits like yours. Often, LinkedIn is used as a platform for job recruiters and job seekers to connect. However, along with finding valuable new employees, there’s even more your nonprofit can do with a LinkedIn account.
To discover how to make the most of programs like LinkedIn for Nonprofits, expand your network, and build your brand, this guide will explore:
First, let’s answer a few questions nonprofits are likely to ask about LinkedIn.
LinkedIn for Nonprofits FAQ
What is LinkedIn for Nonprofits?
LinkedIn for Nonprofits is a program offered by LinkedIn that provides nonprofits with free and discounted resources. These resources and tools are designed to help enhance your nonprofit’s LinkedIn experience and ability to connect with donors, job applicants, and sponsors.
Through LinkedIn for Nonprofits, your organization can access:
You can use LinkedIn without applying for LinkedIn for Nonprofits. However, these tools make almost every aspect of your LinkedIn strategy more efficient, whether you’re looking for new hires, sponsors, donors, or customers.
Is LinkedIn for Nonprofits free?
Some LinkedIn resources are free to verified nonprofits. For example, the Resource Hub is available to all LinkedIn users, including nonprofits, for free.
In contrast, nonprofits will have to pay for Recruiter Lite, Sales Navigator, and LinkedIn Learning. Fortunately, LinkedIn does offer a 75% discount on Recruiter Lite and Sales Navigator, as well as other discounts for LinkedIn Learning.
Nonprofits will need to pay for all advertising services, including text ads, sponsored content, dynamic ads, and sponsored messaging. However, LinkedIn does provide dedicated support to help nonprofits plan their ad campaigns to give them a greater chance of success.
What can nonprofits do on Linkedin?
Nonprofits can use LinkedIn like any other professional organization would. Use the platform to:
Ultimately, how you decide to use LinkedIn is up to your nonprofit. You can use it exclusively as a hiring tool whenever you have a job opening, or you can make it a part of your annual marketing strategy by posting regularly.
How to Set Up Your LinkedIn Profile
Setting up a LinkedIn profile for your nonprofit is easy and should only take a few minutes. Just follow these steps:
Your page is now live, and with it, you can start building connections on LinkedIn! However, getting your page up and running is just the first step in turning LinkedIn into the networking, lead-sourcing, and brand-building channel it can be.
7 Linked Strategies for Nonprofits
1. Fill out your profile as much as possible.
Completed profiles look more trustworthy and professional than unfinished ones. Unfortunately, there are scams on LinkedIn, and you can reassure job candidates, donors, and prospective sponsors alike that your organization is legitimate by adding detailed and accurate information about your nonprofit.
You can improve your profile by:
Essentially, your profile is an opportunity to market your nonprofit to a professional audience. Follow your brand principles and consider the LinkedIn audience. For most nonprofits, this will mean presenting your organization with a more professional tone than you might otherwise. This shows job candidates and business partners that you are a serious and reputable organization.
2. Join nonprofit-related groups.
Groups are private LinkedIn channels where members can post content and interact with one another. Some groups have open acceptance policies and anyone can become a member by hitting the “Join” button whereas others review join requests or are even invite-only.
Fortunately, there are many nonprofit-centric groups your nonprofit can join almost immediately. For example, to start developing a network of nonprofit professional connections and stay up to date on the latest nonprofit trends, you might join the following groups:
Remember that you can also join groups not specifically about nonprofits to expand your knowledge in general. For example, you might join a group dedicated to social media marketing.
Plus, your nonprofit can create its own group! This allows individuals who are interested in your nonprofit to connect with one another and form a community. Encourage both donors and your staff to connect with you on LinkedIn and join your new group.
3. Encourage your entire team to connect.
Like any social media platform, LinkedIn is lonely when it’s just you. Start boosting your online presence and cementing your nonprofit as a reputable organization by encouraging your employees to sign up for LinkedIn or connect their pre-existing profiles to your nonprofit’s new page.
When a member of your staff enters your nonprofit as their employer on their page, they’ll show up under the “People” tab of your company page as long as their profile isn’t set to private. Plus, they can also follow your page to receive updates whenever you post on LinkedIn.
These activities help present your nonprofit as an active, reputable organization.
Plus, when a member of your staff interacts with your nonprofit on LinkedIn, whether it’s liking a post, leaving a comment, or tagging you in one of their posts, the rest of their network might get alerted to it. Posts from members of your network show up in your LinkedIn feed and LinkedIn regularly sends update emails to users that highlight various recent comments and posts. This means the bigger your staff’s networks and the more active they are on LinkedIn, the more chances you have to grow your nonprofit’s network.
4. Post engaging content.
Like any social media platform, you can only gain a following by posting regularly. Resources from LinkedIn recommend following these best practices to create the most engaging content possible and start earning followers:
When creating content for LinkedIn, consider the audience you want to target. The LinkedIn audience tends to be serious and generally has one of these motivations: find a job, advance in their current career, or find business opportunities.
Some individuals do post about non-job related content, such as news trends, which means fundraising appeals and nonprofit impact stories won’t be out of place. However, keep the core audiences of job seekers, donors, and businesses in mind when creating new content or adapting content to LinkedIn.
5. Promote your LinkedIn profile on other platforms.
To start growing your audience on LinkedIn—and thus attract qualified job candidates, sales leads, and business partners—promote your new page on platforms where you already have an audience.
For example, to get your current supporter base to start following your LinkedIn profile, you might:
Organizations serious about expanding their LinkedIn networks make promoting their page a regular part of their marketing. For example, some professionals add their LinkedIn profile to their email signature!
6. Consider LinkedIn ads.
We briefly touched on LinkedIn ads earlier, but are LinkedIn ads worth it for nonprofits?
The answer depends on your organization as well as what type of ads you want to purchase and create. LinkedIn offers four types of ads for sale:
LinkedIn has about an 11% return on investment rate for paid ads. However, it can be difficult to measure your ads’ success for several reasons. For example, a business sponsor might discover your organization through an ad but decide to message you directly rather than interact with the ad.
Ultimately, ads are about expanding your nonprofit’s online presence to get on the radar of more prospective connections. As with any nonprofit ad campaign, your ads’ success depends on how well you tailor them to your audience and your ability to finely tune who they get shown to.
7. Engage, tag, and comment.
Social media is about social interactions, and while LinkedIn has a more professional user base than other platforms, this still applies.
You can grow your follower count, build connections, and show visitors that your nonprofit is a professional, dynamic organization by engaging with others. Comment on posts made by members of your network and news stories that are related to your cause. These are easy opportunities to share your expertise in your industry.
You can also invite others to interact with you by tagging them in your content. For example, you might create a volunteer spotlight highlighting the hard work a specific member of your volunteer team did. By tagging them in this post, you can be sure that they’ll see it and potentially share it with the rest of their network. Here’s what this might look like:
What Other Platforms Should Nonprofits be Using?
LinkedIn is an incredibly valuable platform for nonprofits, but LinkedIn for Nonprofits is not completely free. While it can be a worthwhile investment, especially for nonprofits that are currently hiring, organizations looking for marketing channels with lower investment costs might want to consider other options when it comes to advertising.
We recommend the Google Ad Grant!
The Google Ad Grant is completely free for nonprofits, providing them with $10,000 in credits to spend on search advertising every month, all at no cost. Create ads targeting the keywords your audience searches every day to bring in new supporters, sales leads, and beneficiaries.
However, like LinkedIn, it might be tricky to know where to get started with the Google Ad Grant, let alone how to maintain an active Google Ads account. That’s where Google Ad Grant agencies, like Getting Attention, come in!
Our team of Google-certified experts can help you apply for the Google Ad Grant, maintain your account, and get your account back up and running if it ever lapses. With our extensive knowledge of Google advertising best practices and how to connect with nonprofit audiences, we can help you create search ads targeting your highest-value keywords to earn your nonprofit not just more clicks but valuable conversions.
Additional Resources
LinkedIn is a social media site for professional networking. Resources from LinkedIn for Nonprofits, along with your own communication skills, can put your nonprofit in touch with talented job candidates, sympathetic donors, and eager business partners. If you haven’t already, the first step in your LinkedIn journey is to sign up and create your nonprofit’s profile.
In addition to LinkedIn, discover other platforms that offer nonprofits free and discounted resources:
Powerful Nonprofit Advertising Examples To Inspire Your Ads
/in Google Ad Grants, Nonprofit Communications, Nonprofit Marketing /by Jessica KingHave you ever encountered an advertisement so compelling that it convinced you to purchase something right then and there? Nonprofits can harness this same persuasive force. Instead of driving sales, nonprofit ads inspire us to support causes that make the world a better place.
To inspire your ads, this post will explore a variety of innovative nonprofit advertising examples:
When it comes to nonprofit marketing, the challenge isn’t just to capture attention but to ignite passion and inspire action. Let’s take a look at ads that do just that, so your nonprofit marketing team can imagine its own.
Environmental and Animal Protection Nonprofit Advertising Examples
Glacier National Park Conservancy
Type of Nonprofit Ad: Google Ad
The Glacier National Park Conservancy (GNPC) supports the Glacier National Park by fundraising for preservation, education, and research initiatives that protect the park’s natural and cultural resources. To drive purchases through its online store, GNPC partnered with Getting Attention.
We created Google Ads that target GNPC’s mission-centric keywords like “Glacier National Park Campgrounds” and “Glacier National Park Backpacking.” That way, anyone searching for things to do at Glacier National Park would come across the organization’s offerings like campground reservations and tours. The ads drove 2,570 clicks and 8 purchases in just one month, and they even appear above the National Park Service’s website.
What Nonprofits Can Learn: The Google Ad Grant program has limitations regarding commercial activity. While you must limit commercial activity on your site, you can still offer products and services that have fees. You just have to say how those funds will benefit your mission. If you run an online store that directly funds your work, you can promote it with Google Ads!
International Bird Rescue + “Migration” Team-Up
Type of Nonprofit Ad: Cause Marketing
The International Bird Rescue (IBR) partnered with Illumination to advertise its mission in connection with The “Migration” movie. The animated children’s movie follows a family of ducks as they convince their overprotective father to leave their safe pond and embark on an adventurous trip to Jamaica. IBR wanted to communicate that their nonprofit helps care for birds who are sick, injured, and oiled.
Today Show host Al Roker served as the face of the campaign and made a televised PSA to highlight the organization’s commitment to “helping our winged friends preserve their way of life.” He then directed people to visit birdrescue.org/migration to learn more.
What Nonprofits Can Learn: Nonprofits can benefit from partnerships with celebrities and companies that resonate with their cause. For instance, having a well-known media personality as the face of your campaign can add credibility and draw attention to the cause. Search for opportunities where corporate sponsors can integrate their products or services into your nonprofit’s mission.
World Wildlife Fund’s Google Ad Campaign
Type of Nonprofit Ad: Google Ad
As part of its efforts to create a safer world for wildlife, the World Wildlife Fund sells symbolic adoption kits, which feature merchandise of the animal the kit’s proceeds help protect. In the WWF’s Google ad above, you can see their Adopt A Penguin kit, which includes a plushie, gift bag, adoption certificate, and photo of a penguin.
Below the WWF’s ad, you’ll notice The Penguin Foundation taking a similar approach by advertising its Adopt A Penguin offering.
Even if your nonprofit can’t purchase nonprofit ads, you might be eligible for the Google Ad Grant, which provides up to $10,000 in monthly ad credits to nonprofits! This means your nonprofit, regardless of size, can compete with giants in the space like the WWF.
What Nonprofits Can Learn: Products that relate to your mission bolster brand awareness and give supporters a tangible reminder of your cause. Try advertising fun products like WWF did!
Community Development Nonprofit Advertising Examples
Literacy Empowerment Foundation
Type of Nonprofit Ad: Google Ad
The Literacy Empowerment Foundation promotes literacy by providing books and educational resources to children, parents, and teachers. Read Across America Day is an important holiday for nonprofits in the childhood literacy space, so our team of Google Ad Grant experts designed Google Ads that target key terms like “free books for Read Across America” and “free books for kids.”
These ads boast impressive engagement metrics, such as:
What Nonprofits Can Learn: If there’s an awareness day associated with your cause, create search ads that target those terms. People who want to learn more about those awareness days will Google related terms and find your organization.
Lean In’s #38PercentCounts Campaign
Type of Nonprofit Ad: Advocacy and Corporate Partnership
Lean In focuses on women’s empowerment and gender equality in the workplace. The nonprofit launched its #38PercentCounts campaign to highlight that black women are paid an average of 38% less than their white male counterparts. At that time, the disparity meant that black women effectively earned 62 cents for every dollar paid to white men.
The campaign was timed to coincide with Black Women’s Equal Pay Day, which was August 7. This day marks the extra time black women must work into the new year to make what white men earned in the previous year. Lean In partnered with various businesses to raise awareness.
This nonprofit advertising example created a visceral reaction to pay gap injustices and encouraged serious discussions. Today, the pay gap sits at 36%, and Lean In aims to continue drawing attention to this slowly closing gap until it’s gone.
What Nonprofits Can Learn: Anchoring an advocacy campaign around a significant, easily understood statistic has incredible power to highlight a pressing issue.
Best Nonprofit Advertising Campaigns From Health Organizations
Erika’s Lighthouse Foundation
Type of Nonprofit Ad: Google Ad
Erika’s Lighthouse Foundation promotes awareness about adolescent depression and mental health to break down the stigma around mental illness. To promote its mission, the foundation teamed up with Google Ad Grant experts.
Our team created Google Ads that promote awareness of Erika’s Lighthouse Foundation’s mission by targeting keywords like “mental health nonprofit.” That way, anyone searching for services can find them. In just one month, our ads drove 300 clicks. The campaigns had an incredible 15.8% CTR, which is higher than the average search ad CTR of 3.17%.
What Nonprofits Can Learn: Drive interest by choosing specific keywords for your Google Ads. Conduct thorough research to determine what keywords will connect you with your beneficiaries or supporters.
Doctors Without Borders’ Giving Tuesday Campaign
Type of Nonprofit Ad: Facebook Ad
Doctors Without Borders, also known as Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), is an international humanitarian medical organization that provides emergency aid in areas affected by conflict, epidemics, disasters, or a lack of health care.
The nonprofit created a Facebook Fundraiser and designed Facebook Ads to amplify its Giving Tuesday efforts. It also leveraged matching gifts to drive even greater engagement. For context, GivingTuesday is a global generosity movement and has generated more than $13 billion for nonprofits. Considering that companies donate $2.86 billion via matching gift programs each year, combining the two opportunities was a smart move that paid off for Doctors Without Borders!
Within the two weeks the nonprofit ran its ads, the campaign generated these metrics:
What Nonprofits Can Learn: Use your ads to promote attention-grabbing fundraising opportunities. By combining the power of digital ads with corporate giving opportunities during key philanthropic events, you can create powerful ads that drive donations!
The National Kidney Foundation: Are You The 33%?
Type of Nonprofit Ad: Influencer Ad
The National Kidney Foundation launched an influencer ad campaign to bring awareness to the fact that 33% of U.S. adults are at risk for kidney disease. The nonprofit partnered with Social Native creators to spread awareness and invite users to take a quick “kidney quiz” to assess their risk level.
This campaign was supported by a partnership between the National Kidney Foundation, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, and the American Society of Nephrology. Together, these organizations raised awareness and mobilized people affected by kidney disease.
With the help of 45 influencers, the campaign reached 1 million+ Instagram users and produced over 675 comments, 20,000 in-feed engagements, and 15,000 likes!
What Nonprofits Can Learn: Influencer marketing can help you tap into new audiences. Plus, it tends to be a cost-effective form of nonprofit advertising. Influencers spend time cultivating a loyal following, so partner with those ones who have communities that are likely to be passionate about your cause.
The Truth Initiative’s Ads Throughout The Years
Type of Nonprofit Ad: TV and Video Ads
The Truth Initiative has launched several impactful TV ads, such as:
Recently, the nonprofit launched a new short-form ad series in which it shows the connection between nicotine dependence and “toxic therapy.” The Toxic Therapist character encourages teens to believe their friends are excluding them and also shows that vaping nicotine is associated with sleep problems.
What Nonprofits Can Learn: Consider how your team can tap into current trends and use shock factor to create clever nonprofit ads.
Claire’s Place Foundation
Type of Nonprofit Ad: Google Ad
Claire’s Place Foundation organizes assistance for individuals and families affected by Cystic Fibrosis, a chronic disease that affects the lungs and digestive system. The foundation partnered with our Google Ad Grant experts to connect with supporters and promote involvement opportunities, like starting fundraisers. Their ad campaign targets broad, high-volume terms like “charity events” and “fundraising for nonprofits.”
Their ads use ad assets like sitelinks (the links at the bottom of the ad as pictured above) to direct users to specific pages on their website beyond the main landing page, such as the donation page and an informational page about Cystic Fibrosis. The ads successfully sparked interest and have a CTR of 10.3%.
What Nonprofits Can Learn: Google Ads can be great for inspiring involvement opportunities like donations! If you’re eligible for the Google Ad Grant, try using them to encourage supporters to launch fundraisers, volunteer, or take other actions to support your cause. Don’t forget to build out your ads to take up more real estate with sitelinks.
Fundraising Advertising Examples For Humanitarian Efforts
charity: Water’s UnTasty Dishes
Type of Nonprofit Ad: Cause Marketing
This nonprofit advertising example reimagined BuzzFeed’s viral Tasty Dishes videos. The original series provided quick, easy recipes and generated millions of views. Then, charity: Water’s version, called UnTasty Dishes, added a substituted ingredient: dirty water.
This campaign helped charity: Water tap into BuzzFeed’s, at the time, 63 million followers. The video featured above generated 893K views, not to mention the others in the series, like a typhoid bacteria-infested smoothie jar and an algae cornbread. In its first two weeks, this nonprofit ad campaign generated 5 million views across Facebook and Snapchat.
What Nonprofits Can Learn: This nonprofit advertising example demonstrates the power of tapping into viral trends to reach large audiences quickly.
Champions Against Bullying’s NiceBot
Type of Nonprofit Ad: Social Marketing Ad
Champions Against Bullying is an international nonprofit that helps families and schools address bullying. With reports showing that something mean was posted on X (formerly Twitter) every 60 seconds at the time of this campaign, Champions Against Bullying programed the NiceBot, a Twitter bot, to send kind messages to random users every 30 seconds.
The NiceBot won a Shorty Award, making it the “first-ever use of spam for good.” The campaign reached over 7.5 million people in 76 countries. It had over 436,000 engagements and over 250,000 mentions and was featured in major advertising publications as well as TechCrunch, Upworthy, the Huffington Post, and the Today Show. Champions for Bulling extended its campaign’s impact by 3D-printing physical NiceBots and sending them to supportive influencers and celebrities.
What Nonprofits Can Learn: Leveraging technology creatively can transform how nonprofits address social issues. Plus, connecting with social media influencers can elevate your reach substantially.
ACT International
Type of Nonprofit Ad: Google Ad
ACT International is a nonprofit organization that equips artistic missionaries and ministers with essential support, helping churches utilize the arts for spiritual transformation and redemption worldwide. To increase interest in ACT International’s programs, our Google Ad Grant agency launched an ad campaign. By targeting specific keywords such as “how to start a church ministry,” ACT International reaches its ideal audience, those interested in starting church ministries.
The ads summarize the organization’s mission, highlight its coaching courses, and use sitelinks to promote other important website pages, such as its Prayer Guide. In one month, these ads drove 942 clicks and 12 inquiries.
What Nonprofits Can Learn: In your nonprofit’s ads, communicate key information in a way that’s easy for potential supporters or clients to understand. This clarity will help attract users directly interested in your services..
Common Questions About Nonprofit Advertising
How do nonprofit organizations advertise?
Nonprofits can use a wide variety of advertising methods to raise awareness, engage with beneficiaries, and solicit donations. Double the Donation’s nonprofit advertising guide shares statistics regarding how nonprofits distribute their advertising budgets:
Among those, Google Ads are highly effective because they allow for precise targeting based on keywords, demographics, location, and user behavior, ensuring that advertisements are shown to qualified leads. Additionally, the platform’s pay-per-click model enables organizations to maximize their budget, paying only when users actually engage with their ads.
How do you advertise a nonprofit event?
You can create social media ads, collaborate with community influencers, engage local media for coverage, and distribute flyers and posters in community spaces.
But when it comes to online advertising, Google Ads is one of the best platforms for marketing your events. Create an event page that explains what your event is, what funds collected during it will support, and how supporters can participate. Then, create Google Ads that target relevant keywords potential attendees are likely to use when searching for events like yours.
Additionally, use targeted ad settings to set the geographical location and demographic characteristics of your ideal audience, enhancing the likelihood that ads reach people who are interested and able to attend the event.
Is nonprofit advertising worth the cost?
Yes, nonprofit advertising generates incredible results for nonprofits that create effective ads. Our nonprofit advertising guide shares these insightful statistics:
To see positive results, we recommend working with a nonprofit marketing professional like those here at Getting Attention! Our Google Ad Grant experts create winning ads that target the right keywords and make the most of your advertising dollars.
Do nonprofits get free advertising?
It depends on the platform! If they are approved for the Google Ad Grant program, nonprofits can receive up to $10,000 in Google Ad credits each month. The Federal Communications Commission also has a rule that allows nonprofits to leverage free radio ads formatted as public service announcements.
Final Thoughts on These Nonprofit Advertising Examples
These nonprofit advertising examples demonstrate the power of strategic communication in advancing social causes. From leveraging pop culture to harnessing the influence of Google Ads, these examples provide valuable lessons in how nonprofits can creatively reach their audiences.
Whether through emotionally driven campaigns or the smart use of technology, the strategies we’ve covered offer actionable insights for nonprofits looking to amplify their voices and accelerate their missions in the digital age.
Now that you have examples to model your ads after, refine your campaigns! If you need more guidance, check out these free resources:
How to Optimize Your Facebook Ads for Nonprofits: 7 Tips
/in Nonprofit Communications /by Jessica KingFacebook boasts an average of over 3 billion monthly visitors, and the platform generated $135 billion in ad revenue in 2023. Consider how many of your nonprofit’s current and future supporters currently contribute to these staggering figures.
Your nonprofit may already have a Facebook account it uses to connect with supporters and spread awareness of your cause. Using Facebook ads can supercharge these efforts by reaching and engaging a larger audience. In this guide, we’ll cover everything you need to consider when using Facebook ads to promote your mission:
Before diving into the best Facebook ad strategies, you need to understand how these ads work and get your account up and running. Let’s get started!
Understanding the Basics: Facebook Ad FAQs
What are Facebook ads?
Facebook ads are ads hosted through Facebook’s advertising platform. The ads can appear on mobile and desktop feeds, in the Messenger app, and even on other apps. They can be single images, image carousels, and videos (but formatting options are always changing).
The anatomy of a typical Facebook ad is as follows:
Keep in mind that your nonprofit can link its Facebook and Instagram accounts and have ads appear on both platforms. This creates a seamless experience for your supporters and helps you establish more touchpoints with donors.
Does Facebook offer free ads for nonprofits?
Facebook does not offer free ads or discounted options to nonprofit organizations. However, we’ll explore strategies your organization can use to make your Facebook ads effective and see a return on investment (ROI).
Keep in mind that there are other cost-effective methods of advertising available to nonprofits, such as the Google Ad Grant. Later in the guide, we’ll discuss a Facebook ad alternative you can use in place of or alongside Facebook ads to make the most of your marketing budget.
How do nonprofits get started with Facebook ads?
Because Facebook does not have special offers for nonprofits, you’ll set up your account the same way a business would. The steps for getting started are:
Now, it’s up to you to learn how to make your Facebook ad campaigns as effective as possible. Let’s explore a few strategies for creating stand-out ads that will lead to support.
Maximize Your Success with Facebook Ads for Nonprofits
Facebook determines ad pricing based on two factors:
The cost of Facebook ads varies widely depending on how many ads your campaign has, how many people your ads are shown to, how many people engage with the campaign, seasonality, competition, and more. On average, however, Facebook ad pricing is about 69 cents per click and $9.88 per 1,000 impressions.
While these prices may seem low at first glance, costs can quickly add up. Additionally, you’ll need to consider other marketing expenses, like paying a designer to create attractive graphics and staff time spent managing your ads.
To help you stick to your budget and see great results, use the following strategies to maximize your success:
Target specific audiences.
Facebook has billions of users. However, most of these users are not qualified leads. You need to attract and engage the small subgroup of Facebook users who have the means and desire to support your cause.
Before drafting your first ad, it’s critical to identify and understand your audience. To do so, start with your data.
Here are some tips for getting to know your audience:
Armed with these insights about who your donors are, why they are passionate about your cause, and what drives them to give, you can start crafting headlines that grab their attention.
Write short, snappy primary text and headlines.
Like marketing email subject lines, Facebook ad primary text and headlines should be short, compelling, and clear. According to Facebook, headlines should be no more than 40 characters to avoid being truncated while primary text can be around 125 characters.
Supporters will likely read the primary text in your ad before anything else. To grab users’ attention, many organizations inspire a sense of urgency in this part of the ad with copy like “Every night, 1 in 5 American children go to bed hungry. You have the power to help.” Balance these creative and persuasive appeals with additional context as most users need to know what they are donating to and why before taking action.
Headlines are meant to be descriptive first and clever second. For example, the organization from the previous example might use a description like “Just $5 provides 20 meals.”
Use images and videos.
Including images, slideshows, or videos is strongly recommended. Data indicates that using images or video in your Facebook ads can boost ad clicks by 26.47% and 67.65% respectively.
For ads with images and video, aim to:
Make sure media elements complement the ad copy rather than detracting from it. Images and videos should neatly align with the ad’s primary text and headline so users understand your message and feel compelled to take action.
Make different kinds of appeals.
To appeal to different audiences, you’ll need different methods to convince each segment to donate. You may be familiar with the three types of appeals used in persuasive contexts: logos, pathos, and ethos. Here’s how to use each one in your Facebook ads:
You can combine these appeals within the same ad or even use them to move prospective supporters through the conversion funnel. For example, you may use an emotional appeal to catch a donor’s attention in your initial ad and link to a page that contains facts and statistics to make a logical argument to secure the donation. Your supporters are complex, multi-faceted people who rely on logic, emotion, and ethics to make decisions. The right blend of appeals will help you inspire them to take action.
Tell powerful stories.
Many organizations make emotional appeals through vivid storytelling. After all, research shows that stories tend to be memorable, increasing the chance that your ad will stick with users long enough to motivate them to take action.
Because you won’t be able to include a very long story in an ad, it’s imperative to start with a strong hook. Additionally, use visual elements that can communicate the story more succinctly than words alone, such as a narrative video. Always use real people, experiences, and challenges in the stories to present your nonprofit as authentic, credible, and trustworthy.
Leverage Ad Scheduling.
Facebook offers a scheduling tool to accounts that use a lifetime budget rather than a daily budget. By setting a lifetime budget, you tell the platform how much you plan to spend throughout the entire campaign. A daily budget, on the other hand, is the average amount you aim to spend on a specific set of ads each day.
Facebook’s instructions for scheduling an ad set are:
Scheduling your ads will help you reduce wasted ad spend. You can time ads to appear when your supporters are most likely to respond. Additionally, you can limit how much you spend on ads that appear during times with more competition or high costs to maximize your budget.
Add donate buttons.
Always make sure your ads have an obvious CTA. These are usually in the form of a donate button that users can click to reach your donation page.
This button should contain no more than one to two words. If your desired next action is for users to give to your cause, “Donate Now” is likely the best option. For campaigns with different objectives, adjust your CTAs accordingly. For example, a campaign centered around spreading awareness might link to a blog post and use a “Learn More” button. A volunteer recruitment campaign would link to the volunteer application and state “Sign Up.”
Top Alternative to Facebook Ads for Nonprofits
While Facebook ads can be highly effective, they may also require funding that your nonprofit just can’t spare at this time. In this case, you may need to opt for more nonprofit-friendly advertising methods. When it comes to reach and cost-effectiveness, the Google Ad Grant is a great alternative.
Google Ad Grants
Google Ads are used to promote products, services, content, and more to search engine users. Typically, organizations using these ads will bid on keywords related to their product or offering, hoping to appear in the search results for that term. Here’s what a Google Ad looks like on the search engine results page (SERP):
The Google Ad Grant is a program that awards $10,000 in free Google Ads credits to qualifying charitable organizations each month. The eligibility requirements for joining the program stipulate that your nonprofit must:
To learn more about eligibility for the grant, check out this video:
Once you secure the grant, your nonprofit will need to put together a plan for using the grant to its full potential.
To make the most of your ad credits, consider working with an agency that specializes in the Google Ad Grant. These professionals can help you confirm your eligibility, apply for the program, perform keyword research, and craft compelling ads. They’ll also ensure that you remain compliant with program guidelines and can even reactivate your account if it gets suspended. To learn more about these services and get in touch with a Google-certified Google Ad Grant agency, reach out to our team at Getting Attention for a free consultation.
Additional Resources
Chances are, many of your supporters already scroll Facebook every day. Why not try to land messages about supporting your cause on their feed? Facebook ads can help you deepen your connections with existing supporters, reach new audiences, and garner more funding from online fundraising.
To learn more about nonprofit marketing and the Google Ad Grant, check out these resources:
Why and How to Work with a Nonprofit Marketing Agency
/in Nonprofit Marketing /by Jessica KingFrom raising funds and spreading awareness to informing beneficiaries about your services, marketing is essential to helping your nonprofit fulfill its mission. However, knowing how to market your cause, what platforms to use, and if your marketing strategy is effective requires expertise your nonprofit’s team might not have.
Fortunately, nonprofit marketing agencies are in large supply. These professionals bring their years of expertise working with nonprofits to supercharge their clients’ current marketing efforts, brainstorm new strategies, and provide long-term support.
To help your nonprofit understand if now is the right time to partner with a nonprofit marketing agency, this guide will answer basic questions about these professionals and review core types of marketing agencies.
What is a nonprofit marketing agency?
A nonprofit marketing agency is a publicity and fundraising consulting firm that works with charitable organizations. These organizations work specifically with nonprofits and provide a variety of services, such as:
To sum up, if you need help reaching out to your donors, a marketing consultant can help.
Some nonprofit marketing firms are full-service agencies, whereas others specialize in specific areas. Whether your organization should partner with a full-service or specialized nonprofit marketing firm depends on both your immediate and long-term needs. For example, many full-service agencies become long-term partners that provide their clients with general marketing assistance for years.
However, full-service agencies often lack specialized expertise, such as knowledge of how to run an effective Google Ad Grants account. As such, if your nonprofit needs help writing ads or getting your Ad Grants account reactivated, you’re likely better off working with a specialized Google Ad Grants nonprofit marketing agency.
Should my nonprofit work with a marketing agency?
Nonprofit budgets are often tight, especially when it comes to non-mission-related expenses like marketing. While nonprofit marketing agencies offer prices that accommodate charitable organizations, they are still an expense you’ll need to weigh the pros and cons of paying.
For some nonprofits, the results of working with a marketing agency will more than pay for itself, while others may not receive maximum benefits in their current state. A few situations where you can benefit from a marketing agency include when your nonprofit:
Additionally, before approaching a marketing agency for nonprofits, you should know what kind of support you’re looking for. Do you need a short-term partner for a specific fundraiser, or are you looking for third-party services that will act as a permanent extension of your team?
The answer to this question will depend on several factors, such as the type of agency you need.
Types of Nonprofit Marketing Agencies
Nonprofit marketing is a complex, multi-faceted topic, and there are agencies that specialize in different fields, strategies, and nonprofit types. To provide a general overview of nonprofit agencies, we’ll explore five core kinds of agencies and provide our top recommendation for each one.
Google Ad Grant
The Google Ad Grant is a corporate social responsibility program run by Google that allows nonprofits to buy ad space on Google search results pages for free. With this resource, nonprofits can expand their reach without needing to dip into funds allocated for other projects.
Google Ad Grant agencies help nonprofits manage every aspect of this unique marketing opportunity, including:
Consultants bring specialized expertise related to keyword research, search engine optimization, and Google policies. As Google Ad Grant management and Google Ads are fairly unique even compared to other digital marketing channels, nonprofits that need assistance should seek out consultants that are specifically Google Ad Grant agencies.
Our Favorite Google Ad Grant Agency: Getting Attention
We, of course, have to recommend our own nonprofit marketing firm: Getting Attention.
As a Google-certified partner, our team has extensive knowledge of the Google Ad Grant regulations and stays up to date on the latest developments from Google’s team. This means our experts can make sure your account is always in line with the latest trends, compliant with Google policies, and set to make the most of your allotted monthly funds.
When it comes to marketing, our services include:
Interested in Getting Attention is the right nonprofit marketing agency for you? Request a free consultation with our team!
Technology
Technology is a core part of many nonprofit’s marketing efforts. After all, basic nonprofit marketing tools like your CRM and email platform are complex software solutions that need to be implemented, cleaned, optimized, updated, and integrated with additional tools to maximize their functionality.
Some marketing strategies also revolve around technical solutions. For example, nonprofits interested in running complex virtual events, creating interactive websites, or collecting granular donor data can all benefit from working with a nonprofit technology consultant.
Our Favorite Technology Agency: DNL OmniMedia
For nonprofits that use CRMs and other tools created by top vendors Blackbaud and Salesforce, we have to recommend DNL OmniMedia as our number one nonprofit technology agency.
DNL OmniMedia not only advises nonprofits on technology-driven marketing strategies but can also implement software solutions, design custom software, and create custom integrations. Their services include:
DNL OmniMedia is ready to be a long-term partner to its clients. Along with ongoing maintenance and support, Team DNL also offers multiple training sessions for nonprofits each year to get new team members up to speed with its latest technology.
Branding
Your nonprofit’s brand is essentially how your organization communicates with your audience. A strong brand identity will make supporters see your nonprofit as a coherent, professional, and trustworthy organization worth supporting.
Branding consists of multiple elements nonprofits may need a consultant’s help with, including:
If your nonprofit already has a brand identity, a consultant can help refine your approach and create new assets to expand and solidify your brand. These nonprofits should primarily look at agencies that focus on graphic design and website development.
Nonprofits that lack a clear brand or are looking to rebrand can partner with marketing agencies that will help brainstorm and build a new brand identity from the ground up. These agencies are also graphic designers but provide additional services related to strategic marketing planning, focus group testing, and brand rollout.
Our Favorite Branding Agency: Loop
No matter where your nonprofit currently stands with its brand identity, Loop is our go-to recommendation. Loop aims to provide its clients with strategic guidance for every part of their brand identity.
When working with Loop, nonprofits will have a nonprofit marketing agency that’s ready to walk them through a four-step process for creating and rolling out a successful brand identity:
Loop is ready to be a long-term partner for its nonprofit clients. Their general timeline for brand-related partnerships consists of a three-month period for initial brand activities, followed by ongoing support for brand rollout which can last as long as the nonprofit needs.
Digital Fundraising
Modern nonprofit marketing strategies focus heavily on digital fundraising. As a result, digital marketing varies widely and consists of a number of services an agency might offer, such as:
Most nonprofit marketing agencies have at least some focus on digital marketing channels as a result. However, some agencies have more expertise and specialty services than others. When assessing digital fundraising consultants, explore their portfolios and case studies of past clients to see what kinds of work and projects they specialize in.
Our Favorite Digital Fundraising Agency: Fifty & Fifty
Fifty & Fifty is a full-service digital marketing agency for nonprofits that can help your team with nearly any component of digital fundraising, making it our top pick.
When it comes to marketing, Fifty & Fifty helps nonprofits with the following:
But Fifty & Fifty’s services don’t end there. For more advanced digital fundraising campaigns, Fifty & Fifty offers:
With this wide range of options, Fifty & Fifty is ideal for nonprofits interested in working with an agency for almost any aspect of digital fundraising.
Capital Campaigns
Capital campaigns are unique fundraising campaigns that require specialized marketing and consulting services. These campaigns are meant to accumulate a large amount of capital for a major project, such as constructing a new building or launching a brand new initiative.
While a regular fundraising campaign falling short of its goal is disappointing, a failed capital campaign can be a serious blow to your nonprofit’s reputation and ability to run future fundraisers. As such, seeking third-party assistance from professional agencies is a standard part of running a capital campaign.
Our Favorite Captial Campaigns Agency: Donorly
Donorly is the go-to agency for nonprofits running their first capital campaign. If your nonprofit’s team lacks experience with capital campaigns, Donorly is here to guide you every step of the way with the following services:
Additionally, if your nonprofit lacks the resources to run your capital campaign, Donorly’s team can act as an extension of your team. Think of the Donorly team as temporary members of your staff rather than an external service!
How to Hire a Nonprofit Marketing Agency: 5 Steps
With knowledge of what types of agencies are out there, your nonprofit is ready to assess whether you should partner with a marketing agency and learn how to start that partnership.
In most cases, this follows a five-step process:
1. Understand your needs.
Before beginning the hiring process, determine whether your nonprofit needs to partner with a marketing agency and how that agency would help you if you did. Even if you are fairly certain that working with an external nonprofit marketing firm is the right move, this process still provides useful direction when you hire a consultant.
To assess your nonprofit’s marketing needs, follow these steps:
Along with helping to decide whether you need to work with an agency and what kind, this step also involves compiling information about your nonprofit an agency will likely need. By having information about your current strategies, technology, and marketing concerns ready, you save your consultant the time they would otherwise need to spend collecting it.
2. Research agencies.
Once you know what services you need from a nonprofit marketing agency, you can research consulting firms. Basic Google searches should bring up recommended provider pages and reviews, but we also recommend these additional research best practices:
During this process, assemble a list of potential agencies to reach out to. Research reviews and past projects to narrow down this list to a handful you are serious about potentially working with.
3. Introduce your nonprofit.
Hiring an agency is not like making a simple purchase, and your nonprofit should never jump straight to a hiring decision before reaching out to and speaking with an agency’s team.
Introduce your nonprofit and get acquainted with your top potential marketing agencies by filling out their contact forms, sending an introductory email, or giving them a call based on what communication channels they have available for new and potential clients.
Your introduction should explain your nonprofit’s mission, share why you are looking for a marketing agency, and invite the agency to tell you more about its services. This is also an opportunity to further your research. Ask agencies about:
You may also start to establish a rapport with agencies during this step, which will help you assess if they are a good fit for your nonprofit’s working culture and style.
4. Submit a request for proposal.
Once you have a shortlist of agencies you’re interested in working with, you can send out your request for proposal (RFP). This document outlines your nonprofit’s current problems and goals and invites agencies to respond with a proposed solution that they would implement if you hire them.
Some consultants may have specific RFP forms for you to fill out, but for others, you will need to write your RFP from scratch. The general outline of an RFP includes these five elements:
For reference, submitting an RFP is standard procedure for hiring most types of nonprofit consultants outside of just marketing. For example, if you need to hire an HR and compensation consultant, you would also write and submit an RFP.
5. Review responses.
Assemble a team to review agencies’ responses after your submission deadline. This team should consist of leadership members, the head of your marketing team, and any other stakeholders who need to sign off on a hiring decision.
Assess the responses to your RFP according to your stated criteria. Additionally, consider whether each nonprofit marketing firm’s work model would mesh well with your team’s and lead to a successful long-term partnership.
Rank the responses, and contact the top agency to officially hire them for your project. To ensure agencies aren’t left wondering about your decision, add a note in your RFP about when your team expects to contact the chosen consultant.
Nonprofit Marketing Agencies: More Resources
Consultants come in all shapes and sizes, and nonprofit marketing agencies play the vital role of helping nonprofits boost awareness, increase outreach, and experiment with new strategies. To find the agencies that work best for you, assess your marketing needs and how a consultant can help you achieve them.
Marketing is a broad and complex topic. To improve your understanding before working with an agency, explore these resources:
Consistency and Impact: Creating a Nonprofit Style Guide
/in Nonprofit Communications, Nonprofit Marketing /by Jessica KingPicture this: You see an ad on social media for a nonprofit. You click on it, but the website has a different logo. For most of us, this would seem suspicious, and the donor journey would stop there, even if the organization was completely legitimate.
When it comes to marketing your nonprofit, consistent branding is essential. Most nonprofits are aware of this, and as such, many have style guides. But what is a style guide and how can your nonprofit put one together?
To answer these questions, this guide will explore:
These actionable strategies will transform your nonprofit’s marketing strategy into a professional, cohesive, and consistent plan. By doing so, you can better connect with donors, sponsors, volunteers, customers, beneficiaries, and other important stakeholders.
What is a nonprofit style guide?
A style guide is a document that explains how individuals creating content for your nonprofit should present your organization. Nonprofit style guides vary in complexity and level of detail. In particular, there are three main types of style guides to consider creating:
When putting together your first style guide, take the middle-of-the-road option. While you should aim to create a brand book if you have a firmly established brand identity, putting this document together is not practical if you lack any form of style guide and need to create one fast.
Why does my organization need a nonprofit style guide?
When your nonprofit is just getting started or if you haven’t solidified your brand identity yet, creating a style guide might not be your priority. However, this is a core document for your marketing team, and creating one helps your nonprofit’s communication strategy by providing:
Completing a style guide is your nonprofit’s first step to establishing and standardizing your brand. By building up brand recognition, you can increase both supporter acquisition and retention. New supporters will recognize your nonprofit’s ads each time they see one, increasing the chance they’ll decide to make a conversion.
Elements of a Nonprofit Style Guide
To help your nonprofit understand what goes into a style guide and the level of detail needed for each section, this guide will take a look at the core elements of a nonprofit brand book. We hope you like birds because we’ll be taking a deep dive into The National Audubon’s brand book for examples.
Brand Overview
Most style guides and almost all brand books begin with a brief introduction that explains the guide’s purpose and how it should be used. This might include a description of the nonprofit, its values, and its overall brand identity. Or, it may simply state why the nonprofit feels having a consistent brand design is important.
Let’s take a look at Audubon’s introduction:
This overview provides examples of situations where supporters may interact with Audubon’s brand identity and emphasizes that because Audubon is a nonprofit with chapters across the country, maintaining consistency is especially important for building brand recognition.
Logo
The logo section of a nonprofit style guide usually goes over three main topics:
Depending on the size of your nonprofit, you may need additional logo guidelines. For example, if you have multiple regional offices, it may be necessary to explain how these groups can add their chapter name or location to the logo.
Colors
Name each brand color, provide a swatch example, and share its hex code and CMY and RBG values. This is especially important since colors appear differently on different monitors and in print format.
It can be helpful to add examples of what various brand elements look like in practice, and this is especially true for color. After all, you may have several brand colors that your graphic design team can use but likely shouldn’t use in certain combinations.
It can also be useful to explain your design philosophy when discussing color. For example, Audubon discusses that their approach is to pair one bright color with muted and neutral tones. This context guides graphic designers to ensure they apply colors in ways that make sense for your brand.
Typography
What fonts and typefaces does your nonprofit use? Share the name of the fonts you use and type out the alphabet in capital and lowercase letters, numbers 0-9, and common punctuation marks in that font.
Some fonts have multiple font weights, and nonprofits might use these for various situations. For instance, you might show what the font looks like in light, medium, and bold for comparison so your marketing team can choose which version will look best for the materials they’re creating.
Additionally, if you use different fonts for different contexts, explain that as well. For example, you might have a font that is used for digital communication and a separate one for print.
Photography
There are four things you should include in your style guide’s photography section:
Graphic Design
Many nonprofit style guides lack a dedicated graphic design section and instead rely on their colors and photography sections to guide illustrators. However, if your nonprofit has specific icons or graphic design elements you regularly use, a section detailing how to access and incorporate them can be helpful.
For example, Audubon’s brand book has a section on the various icons the organization regularly uses:
Mission
Your nonprofit’s full mission statement may be several sentences explaining what your organization does, the impact your services have, and why your organization is uniquely suited to tackle these challenges.
However, for marketing purposes, it’s often useful to have a shortened version of your mission that can be easily used whenever you need to explain what your nonprofit is and make your cause for support quickly.
For example, Audubon’s short mission statement is: “The National Audubon Society protects birds and the places they need, today and tomorrow.” This is short, punchy, and can be added to marketing materials without taking up too much space.
Tone and Style
For the editorial section of your nonprofit style guide, your goal is to explain your nonprofit’s writing voice in a way that allows multiple writers to replicate it. This guide can be extensive and usually includes:
Your nonprofit’s editorial style guide does not need to be as intensive as those of Audubon or U.S. Figure Skating, but use these examples for the types of writing concepts and scenarios you should consider.
Terminology
The terminology sections of nonprofit style guides often look like annodated glossaries. These sections list various words and phrases likely to come up in writing and provide direction for how they should be used. These sections discuss:
Extensive writing guidelines might seem like overkill, but remember that writing is a part of almost all of your nonprofit’s external communication. As such, maintaining consistency in writing tone and style is essential for building a cohesive brand identity.
If your nonprofit intends to work with external marketing agencies, such as an SEO marketing firm, the more detailed the editorial sections of your style guide are, the better. This will help these agencies properly showcase your nonprofit’s expertise, mission, and products and services.
Social Media
Social media has its own stipulations to ensure your brand comes off well on a variety of platforms. Most organizations advise marketing teams to follow their normal tone, style, and terminology rules when posting on social media.
Nonprofits with multiple regional offices, like Audubon, might encourage specific branches to get creative and find their own voices, whether that means one group posts research reports and another exotic bird photos. However, they do have a few stipulations for social media marketing, such as not posting fundraising appeals for other organizations or making political statements.
If your nonprofit has just one organization under its banner, your digital communications should remain consistent across all platforms, including social media, search engine ads, and email communications.
Print Materials
How should your branding translate to physical documents? Consider what print materials your nonprofit regularly produces and provide exact measurements and formatting directions for them. For example, a few common types of print materials include:
This is a section that needs lots of templates. Visual references can help marketers ensure they’re inputting the right measurements, decreasing the need for reprints.
Video
Video is a newer medium than illustrations and text, but it’s still one you should consider, especially as video marketing continues to soar in popularity. For video, provide branding details about:
Just like you would share your style guide with graphic designers and writers, this section should be shared with your video production team. You may even consider creating a video-specific cheat sheet rather than sharing your entire style guide.
Nonprofit Style Guide Best Practices
Knowing the core elements of a nonprofit style guide is a strong first step in creating one. However, some style guides are more helpful than others. To ensure your nonprofit makes use of yours, follow these best practices:
Remember, you can edit your style guide after creating it, and many nonprofits regularly refresh their brand books to reflect any changes. If you plan to rebrand, it may be necessary to start from scratch, but in most cases, if you realize there’s something you forgot or want to change, you can update your style guide without issue.
More Marketing Resources
Your nonprofit’s style guide is an essential document that allows your team to keep your brand consistent and expand your marketing efforts. Continue to follow and update your guide as your brand changes alongside your nonprofit.
With your brand resources ready to go, nonprofits can then launch their marketing campaigns. To get more marketing help, try these resources:
How to Use Matching Gift Forms 101: A Nonprofit Guide
/in Nonprofit Communications, Nonprofit Fundraising, Nonprofit Tools /by Jessica KingMost nonprofits are familiar with matching gifts. But how many organizations actually pursue them with a dedicated strategy? According to Double the Donation, $4-$7 billion in corporate matching gift funds goes unclaimed every year. When 78% of donors have no idea if their employer matches gifts, the group is not completing the matching gift forms their companies require to secure corporate revenue.
In order to bridge the gap, nonprofits are taking increasingly proactive approaches to educate donors and provide them with the matching gift forms they need. We’re here to show you how to do just that. Supply donors with the right forms, streamline the request process, and drive more matches to completion.
In this guide, we’ll cover all the essentials of matching gift forms, including:
In the end, you’ll know how to raise more revenue for your nonprofit by strategically promoting matching gifts. Let’s get started!
What Are Matching Gifts?
Matching gifts are a unique and impact-driven fundraising initiative in which one donation is matched by another, ultimately producing double the value. These contributions take place when a company or other entity agrees to match individual donations—either to a specific organization (such as with a one-off matching gift program) or a range of charitable missions.
While various types of programs include personal matching gifts (e.g., a generous supporter matches donations up to a certain amount for an organization during a campaign) and larger matching gift campaigns (e.g., a business, foundation, group of supporters, or another benefactor matches gifts up to a certain amount), the most common by far is corporate matching gifts. In these programs, employers match the donations their employees make to eligible nonprofits, thereby incentivizing philanthropy among their staffs.
Most companies have a set match ratio (usually 1:1, though it can be higher or lower), but lots of employees don’t know their companies even offer these programs. That’s why it’s important to promote matching gifts in your marketing strategy. Many supporters won’t know to check with their employers until you suggest it!
Generally, the corporate matching gift process looks like this:
But as you get into the nitty-gritty details of matching gift policies, there are a few other things you need to keep in mind.
Eligibility
Both your donors and your organization have to be eligible for a matching gift. First, donors should confirm that their employment status (full-time, part-time, or retired) allows them to submit a match request. From there, you’ll want to verify that your organization falls into one of the specific nonprofit categories the company donates to. (Hint: most registered 501(c)(3) organizations will qualify!)
Minimum and maximum gift amounts
Most matching gift companies establish a limit on the amount of money they’ll match, typically stating the maximum each employee can request each year. Businesses also determine a minimum amount, though this is generally set at around $25 or less.
For an employee’s matching gift request to be approved, their recent gift should fall within the threshold their company has defined.
Match ratios
Though it ranges from one company to the next, most employers offer a dollar-for-dollar (or 1:1) match, with most ratios ranging from .5:1 to 4:1.
Before a donation can be matched, all of those considerations must be addressed. That’s where matching gift forms come into play!
What Are Matching Gift Forms?
Matching gift forms are a specific type of document completed by an individual donor and used by a matching gift company to review the individual’s eligibility. This form generally captures specific information regarding the donor, their recent gift, and the recipient organization to ensure the requested match adheres to the company’s program guidelines.
As donors initiate their requests, there are a few kinds types of matching gift forms they might expect to use: paper, electronic, and automated. Let’s take a look at each format below.
Paper Matching Gift Forms
While paper matching gift forms aren’t very common these days, it’s still important to offer access to a paper version if it’s available. This is especially crucial for older supporters who prefer paper materials or for certain (though few) companies that require them.
Regardless, the paper form includes the following key components:
Here’s how it works: The donor will typically need to provide official documentation of their gift (such as a donation receipt, which your nonprofit will need to create), as well as information about the type of organization (cultural, educational, etc.) and the donation date.
Once the paper form has been filled out, the donor can submit it via the employer’s preferred method (mail, fax, etc.), and the company will review the request.
Electronic Matching Gift Forms
Electronic matching gift forms make it easier for employees to submit their matching gift requests, which is great for your organization! The entire process is more streamlined, which results in more donors filling them out.
Plus, electronic forms can be used in conjunction with matching gift software (more on that below), which nonprofits use to encourage matching gift request submissions and automate the entire process.
Here are the key components of electronic matching gift forms:
Once the electronic form has been submitted, the employer reviews it and determines whether the donation is eligible for a match. Then, your organization will need to verify the donation for the matching gift company by confirming receipt of the original gift and verifying your 501(c)(3) status.
Automated Matching Gift Forms (From Double the Donation)
The final category of matching gift forms are those exclusive to Double the Donation, the industry’s leading provider of matching gift software. They’ve recently rolled out a few new types of matching gift forms that can make a significant difference in overall program participation rates.
These include Double the Donation’s standard matching gift form (for one-off matching gift programs*) and complete auto-submission functionality (for companies using CSR platforms that integrate with 360MatchPro).
From a donor’s perspective, the key difference between this type of automated submission is that the request process takes place entirely behind the scenes. In fact, the donor is not required to provide additional information about their donation to complete their match submission. Instead, Double the Donation leverages data from the transaction record itself, along with details provided directly by nonprofit organizations, to complete the form behind the scenes.
All the donor typically needs to do is enter their corporate email address to verify their identity and authorize Double the Donation to submit a match request on their behalf. From there, the standard match form is automatically completed and emailed to the donor’s employing company to review, approve, and disperse funding as usual.
*One-off matching gift programs are a unique form of corporate matching gifts in which a company partners with a single organization to encourage employee giving to the cause. It’s a great way to engage companies that don’t currently offer standard matching gift programs but are interested in growing their philanthropy. Check out Double the Donation’s complete guide on the topic here!
How Can Matching Gift Software Help?
You might have heard the term matching gift software floating around in the fundraising landscape. But has your team ever invested in or really considered these options?
Most leading matching gift software solutions (including our top recommendation, Double the Donation) encompass a few key components.
Donation page widget or search tool
A matching gift database houses information on thousands of companies that offer matching gift programs. This means the database includes details about the company, their match ratio, minimum and maximum amounts, and, most importantly, a link to their matching gift form.
Through an embeddable search tool that can go anywhere on your website, donors type in the name of their employer. The tool then pulls up all of the info they need about submitting a match request.
Automated email follow-ups
Some matching gift software automates the entire process. When a donor makes a gift to your organization using a form equipped with this type of tool, the platform automatically scans the information they provide to determine if they qualify for a match.
Then, depending on their eligibility, the platform triggers outreach outlining the next steps the donor should take. For match-eligible individuals, emails generally contain the recipient’s company-specific program guidelines, links to the appropriate matching gift forms, and encouragement to complete the process.
When choosing matching gift software, you’ll want to look at a few different factors:
Once you’ve settled on a solution, you’re ready to get started!
If you need a little extra advice, our suggestion is Double the Donation’s complete automation system, 360MatchPro. (Take our word for it! Get a demo of Double the Donation here.)
Double the Donation is the leading provider of matching gift solutions. Its matching gift database has collected data on more than 24,000 companies and subsidiaries, along with each one’s matching gift program information. These businesses employ nearly over 26 million individuals, who make up an estimated 99.68% of all match-eligible donors.
How to Incorporate Matching Gifts into Your Donation Form
When people come to your donation page, they’re seriously considering donating to your organization They’re engaged with your mission and therefore receptive at this time to learning about matching gift opportunities.
Take the following scenario to help this point:
This is one of several ways you can incorporate matching gifts into your donation process. Alternatively, you can embed your matching gift search tool into your…
From there, an automation platform will automatically follow up with match-eligible donors and encourage them to submit a matching gift request. Using tools like these, such as Double the Donation’s 360MatchPro, you can:
Incorporating matching gifts into your donation form and giving process will raise even more awareness around matching gifts. And that’s exactly what needs to happen if you want donors to submit their match requests!
How to Market Matching Gifts Effectively
So you’ve invested in matching gift software and paved the way to start accepting matched gifts. But, besides promotional tactics on your donation page, how do your donors know to get on board?
Like any other opportunity to give, your nonprofit must do its part to inform supporters and request their donations by spreading the word about your fundraising efforts. The good news is that the message about matching gifts can be incorporated into all of your classic marketing channels. Here’s how!
Social media:
Especially since matching gift forms and the right software make the process so easy, a quick explainer post about matching gifts on your social media channels can encourage followers to check their eligibility and submit a request!
Email marketing:
Whether you’re sending a post-donation acknowledgment or scheduling a mass digital newsletter, your organization’s email communications provide an excellent opportunity to promote matching gifts to your audience. It’s impactful, cost-effective, and can be automated with your matching gift platform.
Your website:
Create a page dedicated solely to matching gifts. Include everything your site visitors need to know, like a definition of matching gifts, the most frequently asked questions, your organization’s contact information and tax identification number, and your embedded matching gift database.
The Google Ad Grant:
If you’re already leveraging Google’s Ad Grant program for nonprofits to draw more traffic to your website, it’s a great place to increase visibility and awareness of matching gifts. If you haven’t already taken steps to secure $10,000 worth of free advertising space for your organization, now’s a good time to look into it. Then, use your credits to promote your matching gifts page or donation form!
Flyers and promotional materials:
Pique supporters’ interest by adding a small section or reminder about matching gifts in any of your promotional materials. Include a link on your fundraising flyers or promotional posters to more information about matching gifts so supporters are reminded to check into it.
Inspiring Matching Gift Form Examples
Interested in exploring the process donors will take to request matching gifts on your organization’s behalf? We’ve pulled a sample entry for you.
From there, your nonprofit will be on its way to securing more matching gift revenue!
Final Thoughts & Additional Resources
Understanding how to use matching gift forms is essential for your nonprofit. For the best results, your team should be able to guide donors to their correct forms, provide additional support when requested, and raise more revenue for your cause as a result.
When you use matching gift software to streamline this entire process, you’ll make it easier on donors and yourself.
To learn more about matching gifts, top companies that offer the programs, or corporate giving in general, check out the resources below!