Nonprofit marketing is quite unlike for-profit marketing. Nonprofits are not selling a product; they aim to get people to do something, get people to donate, and bring together a group of people who believe and share a mission or cause.
Nonprofit marketing is quite a specialized process, one that combines emotionally compelling storytelling and strategy and planning with each other. A successful campaign doesn’t just occur by serendipity; it arrives as the end product of an intentional process both designed and crafted toward communicating with people and touching them emotionally and persuading them to donate for the greater good.
Here, we lay out the full process the non-profit marketing professional undergoes when developing campaigns that don’t just reach the target group, but truly impact them as well. If you lack resources, outsourcing to a professional may be the push you need toward your goals.
Identifying the Nonprofit’s Mission and Goals
At the very center of a successful nonprofit marketing campaign is an overriding understanding of the mission of the organization. Even before any work of creativity ever gets underway, a strategist will inquire and establish what success actually is. Does the foremost goal include stimulating more donations, garnering more volunteers, positioning an issue top-of-mind, or facilitating policy change? When specific, measurable objectives are established, all subsequent decisions – from message through vehicle – can be built upon the nonprofits’ core mission.
Identifying the Target Audience
Once you’ve identified your goals, the second step is figuring out who you need to reach. A campaign for large corporate sponsorships will be quite different from one for small grassroots supporters in the community. A strategist will identify narrow personas for the target population based on demographics, what motivates them, and what their communication preference is. This enables the campaign to target the people who are most likely to impact the cause firsthand and make the message more powerful for reaching and engaging them into it.
Crafting a Winning Message
Now that you have an understanding of the target population, you can now develop a message that will resonate. Nonprofit marketing is based on narrative. A good campaign narrative can pull an emotionally felt reaction and plant feelings of compassion among the target population. The message must be clear, authentic, and grounded on the impact the supporter contributed. Rather than simply revealing stats, a good strategist will reveal the story of the individual whose life was transformed and make the mission tangible and personalized.
Deciding the Correct Channels
In whose eyes your message will be displayed? A marketing strategist for nonprofits can help you determine the channels that are most favorable for approaching them. It can be an online combination like an email marketing campaign, content marketing by hosting a blog, or targeted social media advertising. Offline channels such as direct mail, local press coverage, or an event in the community can also be taken into account. The idea is that you want to select the channels where your target is already active and present.
Social Media for Social Change
Social media is a nonprofit powerhouse. It provides a one-to-one communication channel with supporters and an arena for creating a thriving community. As a strategist creates a content strategy that doesn’t just promote the campaign, but encourages interaction, there are opportunities for sharing behind-the-scenes anecdotes, mile markers, and recognition of donors and volunteers. Visual storytelling is the specialty of social media platforms such as Facebook and Instagram and can be used to make the impact of the organization more tangible.
Track and Follow Up Campaign Performance
How do you determine if your campaign is succeeding? As a hard-stop final step, professionals will quantify and monitor its performance. A strategist will identify key performance indicators (KPIs) related to the front-end objectives. That might be tracking web visitors, social action, the dollars raised for the donations taken in, or the number of volunteers signing up. Regular examination of the facts enables the strategy, over the longer term, to be adjusted and make the campaign as effective as it can be and deliver the highest return on investment.
The Fulfilling Career of Nonprofit Marketing
Crafting an effective campaign for a nonprofit entity is a stimulating process that combines strategic thinking and the soul of creating impact, and by following the next steps, organizations can construct campaigns that not only meet their goals but also establish an ongoing number of supporters who believe in their mission.