Ep. 100: Celebrating 100 Episodes: Top 10 Lessons for Nonprofit Success
EPISODE 100
Celebrating 100 Episodes: Top 10 Lessons for Nonprofit Success
About the Episode:
In this special 100th episode, I’m so excited to share ten powerful lessons and trends that I’ve observed among successful organizations, leaders, and social entrepreneurs over the past year and a half. These insights are designed to help you elevate your revenue, visibility, and overall impact. From the importance of partnerships and unwavering belief in your mission, to the need for faster donor cultivation cycles and effective marketing strategies, I am covering it all. I also highlight the significance of handling objections, embracing grit, and thinking upstream to solve problems efficiently. Plus, I celebrate the remarkable achievements of one of our Purpose and Profit Club members, showcasing how innovative fundraising strategies can lead to unexpected and significant gains. Join me to find greater success in your nonprofit journey! If you’ve been a longtime listener, or if you’re brand new, thank you so much for being here. These past 100 episodes are really all thanks to you!
Topics:
Celebrating wins from nonprofit leaders within the Purpose & Profit Club™
Why your scaling (or your revenue growth) is defined by partnerships and how you can find new and profitable partnerships with a street team
Two different ways Christina sees organizations approach online fundraisers and/or email campaigns
Refreshing your marketing so that you are the voice of your organization and taking out the ominous feeling of it all
Crafting an iron will and grit that will allow you to uplevel and keep forward momentum
Reframing your mindset around objections to find where the opportunity for growth lies
Believing that being a part of and working for a nonprofit organization doesn’t have to be heavy and hard (even if your cause is)
Think you’ve reached out to “everyone” in your network? Out of ideas to get noticed and get funded? Generate leads for your nonprofit or social impact business: https://www.splendidcourses.com/prospect
Christina’s Favorite Takeaways:
"Unwavering belief in your organization and your goal is crucial. People want to help; you just need to believe it."
"Slow donor cultivation cycles are out. Donors don’t want to go through a long process; ask them directly and confidently."
“Marketing should not be something that feels hard or antiquated…the core of your own internal marketing is all about stories that are the voice of you, not the ominous organization.”
“The organizations, the fundraisers, especially those that really see exponential growth have this grit or this iron will of motivation and determination that keeps forward momentum.”
"Stop plugging leaks and go upstream instead. Create a strategy that prevents problems rather than constantly fixing them."
"Handling objections could be your superpower. Objections are just questions and opportunities to clarify and engage."
"People are rooting for you and your cause. Imagine if you truly believed that everyone wants to support your mission."
Episode Resources:
Listen: Relentless Optimism & 7-figure Success with Fearless CEO Founder Mariah Coz [Pt 2]
Listen: Laura Belgray on Momentum, Engaging Emails, and Quieting Your Inner Critic
FREE Resources from Splendid Consulting:
How to Work with Christina and Splendid Consulting:
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*Links may be affiliate links which means I may earn a commission at no cost to you.
Christina Edwards 00:00
We are celebrating the 100th episode today, I'm thrilled, I just can't even believe that it's already been a year and a half of the podcast and 100 episodes in. So today I'm going to share with you 10 of the lessons 10 of the trends that I'm seeing that successful organizations, leaders and social entrepreneurs really have in common. So this 10 This list of 10 lessons will be a huge guiding post for you as you go. Okay, I'm ready for a revenue up level, I'm ready for a visibility up level, I'm ready to serve and see and increase our impact year over year, I want you to look at these 10 lessons and go okay, where can I focus on leveling up using these lessons. But before we get into that, we're going to celebrate one of our amazing members inside the purpose and profit club coaching program. This organization at the time that I'm recording this, we haven't even finished the month, they already hit their revenue goal. They are rocked and online event that was so so successful, that resulted in things they hadn't even imagined would come in revenue wise. So here's what I mean. Oftentimes, you'll run an online fundraiser and maybe an event a gala something and you're thinking how we will get our revenue will be through this one main source. Well, that's not what happened. They not only had that one main source, but they actually had a huge surge. And monthly members come in a huge surge that is recurrent reoccurring donations come in as really a collateral positive effect of this online event. So that happened. And they also got an annual sponsor, they didn't even know when they were planning the event. They didn't even have a plan to solicit annual sponsors. This turned into a $5,000 annual sponsor. So kudos to them. I'm so proud of the work that they've done. This is the work that we're doing inside the club. So whether you are doing one to one fundraising, whether you're running these online marketing storytelling, you know, fundraisers whether you want to upgrade and reengage lapsed donors or just get comfortable courageously asking for more. That's the work we do in the club, you can always visit the show notes for more information. All right, let's go over the 10 lessons I want to share with you today. So these 10 lessons are really centered around how to land more donors, more visibility more super fans on and offline. Lesson number one, scaling, aka revenue growth requires partnerships. Now, how you decide to define partnerships will depend on your organization. So partnerships can be your social street team, which is how my method of how I teach partnerships, your social street team can be digital influencers, you know, those accounts, those foodie accounts, those lifestyle accounts that have hundreds of 1000s of followers online, finding alignment with them, it may be paid on. It may be social media ambassadors, volunteers, anyone who wants to be an advocate for your organization. It may be local businesses, this has been a huge way. Many organizations I've worked with have taken my method and partnered and seeing exponential growth in the revenue. So it may be local businesses, it may be securing sponsorships. The point is, if you want to get to let's say your your half a million, and you want to get to the million dollar mark, or you're at a million and you want to get to a million and a half, partnerships, partnerships, partnerships, doing it siloed off where you're just coldly trying to acquire traffic coldly trying to acquire new prospects is the slow way to do it. Instead, when you have a street team who is advocating boosting up the visibility for your organization, but on their own channels, whether that's online or whether that's in person, it goes so much faster. And honestly it feels better. Because it's kind of like having a group of friends, a group of community members, you you feel like you have literally a team supporting you. All right, lesson number two, unwavering belief, okay, unwavering belief in your organization, and your goal in your mission and what you do and more micro unwavering belief in the thing you're working on. So let's say you're working on a summer event. Let's say you're working on a brand new email campaign that is leading into your monthly giving program or some sort of online fundraiser. There are two two ways that I see a lot of organizations have go about this campaign. One way is like I hope it works. I hope it works. I hope it works. We need to get to our goal. We need this funding. The other way is so interesting that was the other way is unwavering. In belief, commitment of it's going to work, this is happening. This is happening. People want to help people want to support this cause you really believing in it. Another way to think about this as my cause I said before is relentless optimism really going to bat for why it's going to work, instead of going to bet as to why it's not going to work, right? That may seem like Well, of course, of course, I would go to bat for why it would work. But you'd be surprised when you really start being aware of your inner monologue and the people around you. This could be staffers, board members, etc, how they're thinking about your next fundraiser, how they're talking about it, right? We want to really align your thoughts with ones that are in belief. This is going to work this is working, versus Oh, right. That nervousness, okay. Another way to look at this as grit, grit, grit, grit, I believe it's going to work I'm going to I'm really going to think on purpose, think thoughts that are positive and really work towards building the grid that this is gonna work. Lesson number three. Now, when I was speaking at the Boys and Girls Club of America's national conference, we had time for a q&a. And in the q&a, one executive director had such a good share slash question. And so we were talking about recurring giving, we were talking about email marketing, and how you know, the two, peanut butter and jelly, right. And what she was saying was for her, when she thinks about partnerships, when she thinks about social streamers, who can help get people into their monthly giving program, she historically would reach out to like, people that she wasn't directly personally connected with. So this could be like colleagues, associations, etc. Right? neighborhood groups. She said one day, her best friend goes, How can you never asked me to join? How come you never asked me to join? And it was such a like, Oh, right. Such a moment where her own best friend said you never asked me to join. Why? What's that about? And let's go into our best friend's shoes. Her best friend shoes is saying, Wow, I see all the incredible work that Mary's doing. I mean, is this for me? Can I support her work? Well, gosh, she's never even asked me. So I guess. Hmm. Interesting, right. And what this executive director shared is she's like, I just and this is so normal. This is like the default. She's like, well, I didn't want her to feel like she had to I didn't want to bugger. I didn't want her to feel like make it weird by asking her for money, right? Oh, and instead, she made it weird by not asking. She made it weird by not air quotes, bugging her. So you really want to think about? What if I believed? What if I had unwavering belief that my friends want to help? My friends want to help? It's crazy. If you just believed that thought we talked about on the podcast thoughts. You want to think on purpose? If you believe that one thought my friends want to help, like, what would you do? What would be your next step that you would take? What action would you take next? Because it would probably be different from what you did last week. Right? That one's like that one hits that one hits. Alright, lesson number four, slow donor cultivation cycles are out. Slow donor cultivation cycles are dead. Okay. What I mean is this very old school way of fundraising, this very old school way of growing your organization, you can just ditch you can just throw away that rulebook because that is a recipe for the slowest growth possible. And that's inside your organization outside your organization, your donors don't want it. They do not want to have to get in a coffee meeting, and then follow up email, and then a handwritten thank you note, and then a drip email, and then a phone call and the tech, oh my god, can they help you today? Ask them, ask them. So really being willing to show yourself evidence and being willing to lean into a strategy that isn't slow, will not only make your organization a lot of money, but it will actually make your donor and your donor prospect experience better? Okay. I've, I'm the perfect example of this. I don't want to go through that long cultivation cycle. I don't want you to send me a lot of direct mail pieces. I don't want you to just nurture nurture, nurture, nurture, nurture, nurture, nurture, nurture, nurture. It's great. No, no, no, no, no, no. So how else does this show up? This shows up in the fact that like, we are on line more than ever before, we are tech forward as a world more than ever before. So we take those two things, those two factors, and then we go, why are we trying to do it this low way, right how think about how much now you've moved to zoom or Google meets or any sort of teleconferencing. Just since 2020, I used to drive across town to meet my Atlanta based clients. I don't do that anymore. Or, right, why when we could have a 15 minute zoom, right? It's the best use of everybody's time. But there's probably some rulebook out there that would say you need to have face to face that needs to be in person, and you need to do it this way. No. So really saying to yourself, how can I increase their satisfaction in really recreating a donor cultivation cycle that feels good for us, feels good for them, and is way more scalable, it is so much more scalable to when you're not doing this, like old school handshaking, meeting, blah, blah, blah, we don't want that. So that doesn't mean you ask them to get married on the first date, right? It doesn't mean you pop the question on the first date, it does mean that there is some nuance to it. This is what we teach inside the club. So if you want some help with that, I can walk you through that inside the club. But it does mean that it should not take six months, one year to upgrade a donor to convert a donor to the no sponsor, same thing. Right, number five, marketing should be Hang on, let me do that again. Number five, marketing can be and should be easier than ever before, similar to the previous one, and it doesn't take a long time for it to work. Okay, it doesn't take a long time for your marketing and your ultimately your campaign to come in sync and work. So here's what I mean. There's an organization that is inside of the club that I'm thinking of that basically, they double their revenue every year. Hmm. They're a newer organization, not only have their subscriber rates, I think tripled year over year, their website visits have doubled year over year their revenue is on track to at least double this year. Right? Right. Why? Because they are showing up online. They are courageously creating partnerships and courageously creating relationships with funders in a way that is not this boring, slow cultivation cycle. And it's working. Boy do they have a street team right a vocal advocates just ready to raise and raise money and awareness for their cause. That's, that's what's next for them. So marketing should not be something that feels hard or antiquated. The way that I teach marketing is really using and leaning on this social Street Team method. So the core of your own internal marketing is all about stories that are the voice of you, not the ominous organization. stories that are relatable. As Laura Bell Gray said on the podcast, hear stories that are awesome stories that actually show your unique personality. Those are the stories we'll want to hear. And those are the stories that convert and get people to click the donate button. So you can tell those stories. And you should be telling those stories frequently over email, you can create very simple social media strategy and leave the rest to your social street team. And then the back end tech wise, if you ever need a tech recommendation, whether it's a fundraising tool or CRM, something like that, make sure you send me a message because I feel like I've been in a demo for all of them. And I've been in the back end of so many of them. I'll tell you the ones I love, I'll tell you the ones to steer clear of. So just send me a message on that. But there are so many good tech solutions that not only reduce friction, so that I can make a donation from my couch, but also create automations in a way that you do not have to be a tech expert. So literally in your sleep, someone's subscribing to your email list somebody's making a donation for the first time and you're nurturing them because you set up a welcome series one time, one time and your lapsed donors are going through a lapse and donor sequence that can be automated to you guys like it's it's these one time lifts that there is now tech here for that is worth this one time effort to create just to have it rocking and rolling in the background that is literally getting days, hours, weeks, months of your life back. So, so fun and I can help you with that if you ever have questions on that. All right, number six, channeling the iron will of a child. Another way to say this is the organization's the founders, the fundraisers, especially that really see exponential growth have this grit or this iron will of motivation and determination that keeps forward momentum. So for example, when my daughter was learning she out of the blue was just like I'm going to I'm going to figure out the monkey bars. I've shared this story before on the podcast but she started she could barely reach the monkey bar she wasn't even five years old yet and you know she grabbed one fall grab to fall. Initially then got up through one circuit but one and two to figure out how to go there and back without, you know, falling or getting tired. She started develop these calluses on her hands. She didn't know what they were, I was like, Oh baby, those are calluses. Like your your skin is literally reacting and getting stronger to help you out on these metal bars. So very, very quickly. She became just so determined, and so hyper focused and so relentless at figuring this out. So high end belief. I'm going to figure it out. It's going to work. Right? That she she kind of nailed it very, very, very quickly. And then she had a fall off the monkey bars. It was one of those falls that landed us in the ER we didn't know if it was broken or sprain. We got the X ray, gratefully, it was sprained, but they put her in a splint and she had to take a rest she had to take a couple weeks off. And that was a turning point for her where I said to myself, this race our her whole, you know, her hola determination, her whole Iron Will on being a monkey bar master. And sure enough, when we took that splint off, boom, she ran straight back. Now she has up leveled so high that she literally climbs to the top of the monkey bars, and has like a squad meeting every day with her two friends that can also make it to the top. Now she we bought her a pull up bar at home, She's five years old, she can do four pull ups in a row. It's like quite relentless. My husband jokes, she has an iron will. And how has that served her it served her exponentially. Because she came to this this goal. She believes she could do it. When she fell when She hurt herself. She didn't make it mean it was a total failure. And it's never going to work. In fact, she just said I'm gonna figure it out, I'm gonna get back on. Right. So children are such beautiful examples of this. And I do think that organizations who have founders and fundraisers who and for profits, by the way who are well pass the multimillion dollar mark, they have this, they have this iron will. Lesson number eight. Oops, hang on. Lesson number seven, stop plugging leaks, and go upstream instead. Now, Dan Heath wrote a book called upstream which really goes into this, but so many organizations are stuck troubleshooting at the very, very bottom, it is literally like plugging a leaky bucket. And every time you plug one leak, another one spits out and another one sports out here, right. And so you are constantly spending a lot of your time plugging these micro leaks, instead of saying we're going to press pause, we are going to invest in tech, we're going to invest in a coaching program, we're going to invest in skill building, whatever it is, or we're actually going to look at our strategic plan and realize that plugging leaks is not the strategic plan. And we're going to go upstream to create an SOP to create a process to create a strategy and stop doing this and start doing this instead. So in his book, Dan talks about how I think it was a I think it was Expedia or one of those travel booking sites, what they noticed is, is there's this like crazy large percentage of increase customer customer tickets that were happening after a customer was booking something. And so their call center was just constantly fielding the same or they was constantly fielding customer inquiries. And what they noticed was okay, well, I guess we need more customer service representatives, right, plugging leaks, that's plugging leaks, instead of saying, what are the customers calling about? Why is it that within 24 hours of them booking they are calling? Okay. What they realized was most customers were calling because they weren't getting an email with our itinerary was something like that. It was something that was like, Oh, well, let's put in some code and an automation and something like that. Let's go upstream, instead of just plugging leaks by hiring more customer service representatives, right. And it's really hard sometimes to see the forest for the trees to actually step back and go, What links are we plugging? And where do we actually need to go upstream? So a coach can help you do that? A consultant can help you do that. Maybe even a board could help you do that. So you really want to say where am I plugging leaks and where do I want to go upstream? All right, I have a call. So we're gonna go back. We're going to make this take one
Okay, lesson number seven handling objections could be your superpower. So many fundraisers retreat when they hear the objection. An objection, by the way is not a no an objection is maybe the donor is like uncertain. A really common objection is, let me get back to you. And when you hear, let me get back to you. What do you do? Do you say, Okay, sounds good bye, click. Do you say Alright, sounds good. And then I asked you the next week, hey, whatever happened in that meeting? And you say, Christina, they said, let me get back to you. So you know, they're gonna get back with me. And no, no, no, no, that is an objection, that is an objection we actually want to handle and have a process for that doesn't mean that you like strong on arm them and force them into a yes or no in the meeting. But that there, you do follow up that you do have a process of following up that feels aligned with your organization feels aligned with your values and feels good. And by the way, raises you more. So handling objections is not a problem. handling objections doesn't make you freeze or retreat. In fact, you just realize that's just part of the process, and it's not a problem and you get really good at hearing them, you actually start to expect them. And then the best part is you learn that objections are just questions. objections are just curiosities. objections are often just confusion, they weren't really clear, they're not really sure they need to know more information. And objection is just where you lean in and the conversation begins. Number nine, people are rooting for you and your cause. Imagine that imagine if you believed that people are rooting for me and my cause? And if you thought that and then write to them, like they are, what have you created content with that belief in place? So many times, especially in emails, this thought can be the exact opposite. And it can be really pervasive it can be people are going to think of bugging them, people are going to be tired of getting our emails, people, our subscribers already know about our campaign, right? What is that loop for you? That you think that your staff thinks that your board thinks, Okay, think about that? What do you think people think on your list? And when you're thinking that you're writing to your worst customer instead of your best, right? So if you believe people were rooting for you and your cause, which by the way they are, because they signed up for your email list they donated, they've donated multiple times, they care about your cause they are rooting for you, they literally want to see it succeed. Because if it succeeds, if you succeed, more people are impacted. If we can all agree on that. Then what email would you write? What social posts would you write? Who would you call? What video would you record? You with me? So if you believe people were rooting for you, what would you do differently? That's like a super thought, by the way, people are rooting for me. That's why I sign off my emails very often. I'm rooting for you, cheering you on. I literally have my favorite emails are the ones where you hit reply, and you tell me what you've created a celebrate a win with me. But those are the best ones. Hey, I just listened to this podcast and I just got the courage to make the call. And it was a guess, Hey, I just attended your training. And I booked a sponsor for the first time for this campaign. I recently got a response from somebody who said that they attended the training, they learned more in three days and they applied what they learned in three days and they had they felt like they had all year. That's what I want to see. We want to celebrate you we want to celebrate your success. So really writing from that place, it changes the whole like energy behind the stories, the words you choose the stories you tell where you put a call to action because if you think people are rooting for you, you don't put the call to action at the bottom. You don't say like if you could donate that would be okay. No, you lead with it. You put it more than once you say it in a way that's unapologetic. Okay, number 10 final lesson to land more donors more superfans to have an epic growth year. Optimize your mindset and success will follow. Optimize your mindset and success for a follow. If you get your mindset on board. Everything else becomes so much easier. If you get your beliefs on board. If you shift from it's not going to work till to it's going to work if you shift from I don't know. I have a wavering belief to unwavering belief. And when the wobbles come in Because the wobbles do like no one is 100% in belief all the time. But if you can be in belief at least half the time, you will have the superpower and growth. So really working on your mindset gets you in the room to courageously ask for more gets you in the room when somebody says, I don't think so, to where are you like, tell me more about that. Tell me more. I want to know, give me feedback, you start to realize the feedback is just data. The start the feedback is just a way for you to improve the pitch. Optimize your mindset and success will follow. When I was at the conference recently, and I had the chance so this was the Boys and Girls Club conference. And I'm literally going down the escalator. And like, a stare in front of me like that's Al Roker. That's all Roker Mr. Today's show, right Mr. weatherman Al Roker? Like how fun would it be to get my picture taken with him? So I can have one fork in the road? That's like, don't bother him. He's gonna say no, you don't really need that picture anyway, what's the matter? Or I can just be like, this would be so fun. Let's go. So boom, snapped a picture with him. He was so nice. He was so kind. He had no handlers or anything like that. It's just a regular dude. So fun. So fun. Now, I've also been on the receiving end of that, where I've haven't made the ass where I haven't felt whether it's a celebrity, or whether it's just putting yourself out there and making the introduction, or asking for doing the hard thing with your prospect or in a meeting right where you're like you just retreat. Right. So that's the mindset piece, the mindset piece is the secret to your revenue growth, really optimizing your mindset. And that's why I've incorporated it in every single aspect of what I do in my program. Like it's part of the club for that reason. Because you have the templates, you have the tools, but the coaching, that's what gets you into daring action, daring action makes you money during action, make sure that you have those partnerships, you're not doing it alone. And so it feels good. And so at the end of the day, you're not crashing on the couch going that was a train wreck and said you're crashing on the couch going, I did that and you're texting your friend, I did that you're celebrating in our Facebook group, you're like, look what I did. Right? That's what I want to see for you. So really working on your mindset. And you can interpret mindset however you want. It can be woowoo. And you can be into self development like I am. Or it can't be, you know, if that's not your speed, really just saying like, what are some thoughts that I'm thinking that are unhelpful? And what are some beliefs I could try on or take on that don't feel like I'm carrying around this like heavy cloak, right, that don't feel so heavy that don't feel so? Like that don't Don't, don't feel so isolated, right, or don't feel so hard. A lot of times organizations come with this mindset and this belief system that makes the entire process so hard. And if there's one thing you leave with today, I just want to offer like, it doesn't have to be that way. It doesn't have to be heavy and hard. The people you serve the cause you have may feel heavy and hard. And that may that very much could be true. Like so many organizations are doing deep, heroic, hard work. And it feels hard. I'm sure I know that I've ended calls where I'm like, well, I need a cry. Right? Or it's like it doesn't mean it's not emotional. But be going through this process of fundraising going through this process of getting more donors, supporters influencers in your pipeline. That's the part that doesn't have to feel punitive. It doesn't have to feel grinding, it doesn't have to feel hard, right. And so it's like, bridging the gap between those hard conversations you are having on like the program side, telling those stories in a way that really connects with your audience, and then practicing that inner kind of self kindness, giving yourself a soft place to land. Right? That's the trick. That's how we end churn. That's how we end burnout in this in this. That's how we end burnout. That's how we end churn in this sector.