WGHA’s Agency (formerly “Party with a Purpose”) is an annual event targeted to Seattleites ages 25-34. Each year the party raises awareness and funds for a particular global health issue (different issues are chosen each year).  Kristen and Jessica and the Agency board have learned a lot about what makes young donors tick.  The biggest question to ask when you start thinking about attracting young donors: are you really ready to attract young donors? We’re a different breed than what you may be used to, and it may require a whole new set of strategies for your organization.

• We’re much more likely to get involved because of our friends instead of your mission. For a while, I happened to be the only 20-something I knew carrying a torch for circus in Seattle, but after bringing my friends to events like Circus Open Mic and SANCA (School for Acrobatics and New Circus Arts) trapeze shows, they can speak about the impact of circus on childhood obesity, and some are even on the heels of attending their first circus fundraiser (and first fundraiser, for that matter). Help us get our friends involved by creating a social aspect to your fundraising (and friend-raising) approach.
• Forget about snail mail. “If we get mail from you, we’ll wonder why you spent the time and money to print and stamp it. A witty email will catch our attention much better,” says Kristen. Email also gives us an instant chance to follow up with you by providing us with a link to register for your event, donate to your organization, or just learn more via your website or social media. Plus, you’ll earn major environmentalism points.
• Don’t expect major gifts—yet. Gifts of $25 or $50 are big for us: encourage giving at this level. If ten of our friends throw $50 your way at your event, you’ve earned what for many organizations is a major gift with almost no solicitation time. Remember, in the two years since this party started, many young donors have gone from interns to coordinators to managers, which means we have a lot more discretionary money than we used to. Keep us coming back every year and you’ll see a return on your investment.
• Entertain us. Agency had elements like a silent disco (where everyone puts on headphones and dances in a big group to their own tunes) and a red carpet photo booth. Mission-centric? Nope. Hilarious and memorable? You bet. Agency’s “purpose” in 2010 was diarrheal disease among kids around the world – not the sexiest topic, or the easiest to raise money for, but Agency made it work. The party sold out and was able to raise awareness for through lots of creative educational opportunities before and during the event, not to mention donate 100 percent of ticket proceeds to organizations that fight this disease. When’s the last time you saw an organization with enough moxie to get folks all dressed up and out for a night on the town to talk about poop problems?
• Appeal to our creativity. We’ll volunteer for your organization, but we don’t want to be licking stamps (see earlier tip on disdain for printed solicitations). Chances are we studied something really cool in college and are eager to trot it out: we might be experts on graphic design, or DJing, or underwater basketweaving, and you can bet we can help make your organization more innovative and get noticed with these skills. Spend some time getting to know us.
• Not ready for us yet? That’s okay. We can be a lot to handle when you start from scratch. But all nonprofits, especially organizations with a focus on arts, education, or with a membership base, may want to think about getting ready for us as your current donors and subscribers age out.
• Oh, and a really cool video never hurt anyone.

How does your organization approach young donors? Have you had successes (or utter failures)? We at TCG want to hear about it! Email me at blairf@collinsgroup.com, or, better yet, continue the conversation with TCG (@CollinsGrp) and me (@feehanbe) on Twitter.

You can read more about the 2012 Agency event here: it’ll be a shining example of throwing conventional fundraising out the window to make way for new and as-yet un-thought-of ideas about targeting millennials.

Research tells us that the primary reason new and loyal donors give, or give again, is because they understand the impact of their gift.  How can your organization communicate its impact effectively? As your holiday appeals come to a close, schedule time in January to see if you can answer the following five questions about your top donors. Then take the time to tweak or perhaps revisit your existing stewardship plans, or to make 2012 the year you formalize your stewardship efforts.

1. Why is your organization a philanthropic priority? From the Seven Faces of Philanthropy to newer approaches to different types of donors, research indicates that donors give for complex reasons, and that those reasons may vary within a household.
2. What does the donor hope to better understand from their partnership with you? Some donors may care about a specific program, while others may take a more holistic view of your mission. Still other donors may look to your organization to keep them informed about the sector or community context in which you work.
3. How does your donor prefer to receive information about your organization’s impact? Some donors may highly value regular face-to-face encounters; others may prefer a personal note they can read at their convenience.
4. With whom does the donor wish to stay connected? Some donors expect to develop a relationship with your organization’s professional leader; others may prefer the opportunity to meet periodically with program staff, or a board member.
5. When does the donor want to hear from you? Some donors welcome monthly contact; other donors may feel bombarded if you reach out to them more than a few times a year.

The Collins Group will be closed from December 26 – January 2. Watch for our Mid-Year Checklist in early January! It will include several tips for refocusing and recharging your staff and volunteers to get the most out of your organization’s fundraising efforts.

Particularly helpful were the “Solutions Salons” roundtables where each of us were able to share a vexing social media problem and receive immediate feedback from our peers. The conference was held at Microsoft’s beautiful Conference Center in Redmond which offers giant coolers of free sodas. Free sodas are very tempting to those who work for and with nonprofits as evidenced here.  Read a full recap of the day using storify.com, courtesy of Mixtape Communications‘ Zan McColloch-Lussier.

Another great presentation I was lucky enough to be part of recently was Maria Ross of Red Slice explaining the “Seven Deadly Sins of Branding” at the Association for Women in Communications luncheon. Maria succinctly explained the steps of building a brand identity in understandable terms. Repeat after me, “A logo is not a brand. A brand is your promise to your community.”

Have to started planning for 2012? TCG has some helpful presentations coming up in the next few weeks. If you happen to be in Medford next week, check out TCG’s Natalie Lamberjack and James Plourde presenting “Developing Annual and Long-Range Fundraising Plans” as part of our ongoing partnership with the Nonprofit Association of Oregon. We’re excited to have a full day to explore this topic with our Southern Oregon friends.

Aggie Sweeney will present on “Trends in Giving: What Can We Expect in Our Community?” for the North Sound Development Association on November 15th. She will  share national, regional, and local leading indicators for giving and the direction it is expected to take through 2012, highlighting key findings from the Giving USA 2011 report, the most recent Philanthropy 400 and High Net Worth Donor studies, and mix that with knowledge of our local community to help us see what ahead.

As part of WVDO’s ongoing Development Series (of which we are the sponsor), Aggie and James will present a two-part presentation (November 17 and December 1) on launching successful campaigns. Click here to register!

What have you attended lately? What should we mark our calendars for next? Share, please!

I must admit: this quote definitely summed up my first week on Google’s newest contribution to the social networking field. No one was quite sure why they were on Google+, but by golly they were going to talk about how empty it felt, or how it was sort of like Facebook (but not really), or how they were packing up all their other online identities and becoming devoted Google+ disciples. I joined to satisfy my curiosity, finally have a social network I felt comfortable enough on to connect to everyone I know (instead of only friends or only family), and to see whether Google+ really is the end-all, be-all to social networking for both businesses and individuals.

So far I’ve joined, made a few circles (closed networks-within-networks that allow you to pick and choose whom you share posts and information with), posted links and videos to my “stream” (the centralized place where friends’ posts pop up), +1’d (a wordless affirmation of someone else’s post akin to “liking” something on Facebook), checked in at a location, changed my profile picture (no small feat), used the mobile Google+ app,  and participated in a “hangout” (video chat for up to ten people).

Some things I like:

• Selective sharing: It’s nice to be able to let only my family know I’ve touched down safely after a flight without polluting my friends’ “streams,” or to share a work link with coworkers.
• Integration with other Google products: If someone shares a YouTube video with me, or I come across a fantastic article thanks to news-aggregator Google Reader, I can reshare with the click of a button instead of having to sign into Facebook and post it manually. I’m someone who’s increasingly reliant on Google for reading the news, sharing and editing documents, and chatting and emailing with my friends, so I appreciate this seamless integration.
• The idea of “starting over”: Facebook is bloated with information we didn’t post ourselves because we can tag our friends in posts, photos, videos, and more, which means there’s information on Facebook that’s extremely hard to control.  Google+ gives us a chance to recreate our online identities from the ground up with the wisdom of five or six years of learning about online privacy via other social networking. Maybe I’ll finally be able to run for president now that my social network doesn’t show a picture of me with a box on my head from a theatre production I was in from high school.

Some things I don’t like:

• Unintuitive user interface: It took me ten minutes to figure out how to change my profile picture because of all the ways there are to share information on Google+. I certainly acknowledge the learning curve, but Google+ isn’t without its frustrations around posting and interacting with your friends.
• No businesses allowed: Google+ is only allowing people with Gmail addresses onto the site right now (along with a few lucky businesses, like Ford), which means it’s much harder for businesses to set up pages and start plugging. As a marketing professional, this is frustrating: I want to reach the people, and this is where the people are going! (As a consumer, though, this friends-only feature is pretty delightful.)
• Is it really more private? Sure, you can control who sees what better than on Facebook, and it’s touted as protecting your information better. But Google is just as savvy (if not more so) about reading our emails and posts and targeting its services at us. I always find it a little eerie when Google suggests a product to me or tells me to add an event to my calendar based on the contents of my email. We’ve already passively allowed Google into our private lives: is that why it’s easier for us to laud its privacy controls while continuing to fight Facebook’s?

Google+ isn’t a fully-realized networking site just yet, but it gives us a great glimpse into the future of online interaction. How might our time on the web be different if we could both work and play on one network while keeping these lives in separate “streams”? How many more people would we be able to actively interact with if Google+ becomes a “trusted” social network?

I think the marketing impact is pretty negligible at this stage. Many of the early adopters to Google+ are technically-inclined social media gurus already inundated with information via Facebook and Twitter: no need to target them a new way, especially since there isn’t enough critical mass on Google+ just yet.  If Google+ continues to keep businesses out, Google+ could become a resource for friend-generated recommendations without corporate bias. I’d certainly rather learn about a trendy new restaurant or concert because a friend +1’d it instead of a targeted, impersonal Facebook ad. As of right now, though, there simply aren’t enough people on Google+ to warrant an all-out marketing barrage (to the relief of TCG’s Marketing Director), and I doubt Google will keep businesses away from the table for long.

But what about fundraising? How would the power of an ask change if it were face-to-face via Google+ hangout instead of by phone? Is Google+ intimate enough to act as an external database, to keep track of and ultimately engage donors in a way Facebook and Twitter can’t?

In the meantime, are you on Google+? If so, find me so we can continue to learn about its capabilities together. After all, what’s a social network without a gaggle of people to interact with?

A few weeks ago, I was at the Washington State Nonprofit Conference listening to the much-lauded keynote speaker, Jabez LeBret, give a talk about millennials. After an hour of over-generalizations about my generation — that made me blush with shame at the very thought of being born in the 1980s — I left astonished at some of his sweeping conclusions about millennials:

1.      Millennials wear jeans, Chaco sandals, and Gore-tex rain jackets to work every day (he even found an unsuspecting millennial in the crowd wearing this outfit and brought him up onstage to illustrate his point).

2.      The best way to motivate millennials is food.

3.      Armed with nothing but a bachelor’s degree and hubris, millennials will come into your workplace and try to change things because we think we “know better.”

4.      Millennials use a company or a job as a means to our personal end instead of looking out for the company as a whole.

I thought about throwing my lunch at Jabez, but vowed to write a blog post refuting his claims instead. In order to avoid falling into the trap of speaking about an entire generation, I wanted to counter his points with my own experiences, but trust me: I am not the only misrepresented millennial with an opposing viewpoint or two.

1. I wear business casual clothing to work, because 1) it’s professional, 2) it’s expected of me, and 3) because my colleagues and clients do the same. Sure, I wish I could wear jeans to work every day, but then again you probably do too.  I promise to dress professionally if you promise not to make fun of my jeans and Chacos when I wear them on casual Friday. (Our Marketing Director, who is a Gen Xer, says she cannot promise this.)

2.      The idea that food is the best way to motivate me is insulting (and I really, really like food). You want me to go to your meeting or networking event?  No bribery necessary: just ask me nicely. For the record, what motivates me is probably the same thing that motivates you: the promise of learning something, growing professionally, and meeting like-minded people.

3.      The idea that I know enough to turn your systems on their heads is ludicrous: while I do plan to change the world eventually, I humbly realize I’ve got a lot to learn, and the only way to do that is with eyes wide open. Expect great things from me and my generation, but only after I’ve learned everything you have to teach me, so I can then put my own spin on expectations.

4.      The millennials I know don’t do something unless they honestly care about it. If we aren’t concerned your company or its mission, why are we interning for free for months (and sometimes years) on end? If we’ve gone through the trouble of tracking you down and convincing you (in the toughest economy in nearly a century, no less) that you should give us a job, you better believe we care about what you’re working on.

Sure, there are millennials who fit Jabez’s stereotypes. But there’s also a group of seriously hardworking young professionals out there who are misrepresented in these over-generalizations, and on behalf of us all, I’m shouting, “We’re mad as hell and we’re not going to take it anymore!” (See, we can even make a good “Network” reference now and then—how’s that for bridging the generational gap?)

If you’d like to know more about us, just ask. Send me an email at blairf@collinsgroup.com, and I’ll be more than happy to share my experiences in the workplace with you, and hopefully broaden your perspective on millennials beyond what you’re reading or hearing about.

Amnesty International iPhone App

In my rural Idaho high school, I was one of perhaps five members of our local Amnesty International club.  Though we were few in number, we were a mighty force under the inspired leadership of our president Holly, who was also my biology lab partner. During several of our lunch hours, we took messages of criminal justice and human rights to our classmates in an effort to raise awareness and encourage them to sign a petition applying citizen activism in an effort to create change.

Amnesty International’s new iPhone app shows a very creative, highly symbolic resource for building an army of activists.  Modeled around a symbolic burning candle (which virtually smokes when you interact with it) the app displays the organization’s newest headlines along with an immediate opportunity for the user to take action in support of the causes of greatest significance to them. In doing this, they’ve made activism as simple as a click and as private as the activist desires.

While iPhone apps can be costly to develop, the outcomes are important: convenient ways for your supporters to show their support of your work, an opportunity to give each supporter a voice in your work, and a “reward” for their support (the candle is lit after you read articles or take action).

Reporters without Borders

The next interesting innovation in the use of iPhones comes from Reporters without Borders .  In print ads, larger-than-life headshots of Muammar Gaddafi, Vladimir Putin, and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad were printed along with a QR Code (little black and white squares that link to data sources) which would load a video of a talking mouth that when strategically placed over the headshot gave the impression of the world leader speaking.  With the tag “Some mouths will never speak the truth” the content of the speech was actually that of a reporter informing the listener of the injustices that foreign journalists face at the hands of these governments.  Learn more about it here.

While political activism is not for everyone, the key lesson from the Reporters without Borders strategy is this: creativity doesn’t have to be costly to make a significant impact.

A little controversy always helps to spice up the debate. Recently, the Chronicle of Philanthropy reported that new data from the IRS shows that giving by individuals dropped approximately 10.6 percent in 2008 compared to 2007, and an additional 9-14 percent in 2009 compared to 2008, for a combined two-year decrease of approximately 20 percent.  The IRS figures are in sharp contrast to the 2.4 percent drop estimated by the Giving USA report released in June 2010.

Giving USA is a leading benchmark for nonprofits and fundraisers, and the only record of American philanthropy that spans more than 50 years. It is the only annual data report on both sources and uses of contributions and its model of estimating total giving has been remarkably accurate over time. In fact, since the Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University began researching and writing the report in 2001, estimates of giving have been on average within 1.1 percent of the final IRS reported number and over the past four decades the average accuracy has been within 2 percent. As the two groups have been historically aligned, this anomaly warrants more examination.

We assembled the brain trust within our firm late last week to discuss what all of this means. Clearly, during the Great Recession, we have seen a bit of a drop off in giving, especially among mega-gifts of $25 million in more. The reports during 2010 are much more encouraging, and several $100 million and more gifts have been announced. Most donors that we interviewed in campaign studies in 2008 and 2009 indicated that their giving was holding steady or increasing as the recession ended and the economic recovery started. Most of our firm’s current and recent nonprofit clients are meeting and surpassing their annual fundraising goals, and those in major capital and expansion campaigns are making good progress.

However, the number of major campaigns that have started in our Northwest region since mid-2008 has been less than during the economic expansion of 2003-2007. The successful campaigns are ones conveying urgency and the promise of strong outcomes addressing critical issues facing our community, and the sponsoring organizations have a base of committed supporters and are able to clearly engage them in why the campaign is important today.

When we ask board members and nonprofit leaders how much they believe giving dropped off during the Great Recession years of 2008 and 2009, we typically hear that it must be 40 percent, 50 percent, maybe even more.

Perception is reality. If there is a belief that giving has decreased by a really significant amount, and that confidence is not yet restored, why would nonprofit leaders have confidence in taking bold steps to address critical missions and advance projects that can help drive the economic recovery?

Yes, giving has dropped some during the Great Recession. Is a decrease – whether it be two or 20 percent – sufficient reason to derail your plans and not be true to your mission? Donors are continuing to give, and many have a renewed appreciation for the difference they can make.

Twitter:

• Tweet late in the day and late in the week
• Think about followers in the Eastern time zone—50% of tweets originate from the East Coast
• Tweet as often as possible—followers are used to a barrage of info, and if they don’t like what they see they’ll just skip that tweet
• Have you heard about www.tweetwhen.com?  If you plug in your Twitter handle you’ll get a neat graph showing your most retweetable days and times

Facebook:

• Post on weekends—many employers block Facebook at work, so you’ll have a more captive audience on the weekend
• Don’t overwhelm your fans!  Posting every other day is best
• Update your pages around midday—your followers will cruise their Facebooks over their lunch hours

Email:

• Did you know 80% of people don’t have separate personal and work inboxes?
• Email open rates are highest on the weekend, when people have more time to pore over emails
• Open rates are also high early in the morning—who doesn’t prefer sifting through email when armed with coffee and a bagel?
• Don’t be afraid of unsubscribers: you didn’t want them anyway!
• Take the time to woo your new subscribers with a personal email welcoming them to your list—they’ll appreciate it and stick around longer

Blogging:

• Blog early in the morning (around 6am) or mid-morning (around 10am)—most people read blogs when they sit down for coffee or lunch
• Consider a blog survey to find out when people read your blog and what they’d like to read more about—they’ll appreciate being asked, and you’ll get some really valuable feedback
• Blog more–there’s no benefit to blogging less often

In case you’re having a panic attack about having to wake up at 6am to post your blogs each day, fear not!  You can schedule your communications ahead of time so they hit your subscribers at exactly the time they’ll be likeliest to read it.

If you’d like to view the full Hubspot webinar, you can check it out here.

In sum, and against everything I thought I knew about web timing: “Tweet late, Facebook on weekends, email early, blog around lunchtime.”

In this January 11 blog post, Charity Navigator CEO Ken Berger discusses those changes. In short, the site is moving from a financial evaluation model to incorporating financial performance with accountability and transparency and, soon, results. The site will partner with Great Nonprofits and Keystone in order to develop the evaluation metrics.

On the positive side, this represents a departure from self-reported 990 data alone, which many nonprofits argue doesn’t begin to convey effectiveness. On the potentially negative side, those organizations that publish their own results and track their effectiveness in a similar way to that which Charity Navigator proposes will receive the earliest and potentially the highest marks.

So what do you think?  Is this change a step in the right direction to measure effectiveness and results over the financial dollars? Or might this be yet another way for large organizations to take the spotlight?

So, I wasn’t too surprised when I received a letter from the IRS asking for a modified audit of my 2008 tax return. We are outliers in our income bracket for the amount we give to charity and the number of charities we support. The IRS did not want to audit our complete return; they just wanted documentation of the 40 charitable gifts we reported that totaled over 10 percent of our income.

Benchmarking is another aspect of my annual January tasks. What can I learn about what other households in my income bracket give? The best source for this information is research commissioned by Bank of America Merrill Lynch and conducted by the Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University (COP). This past November, COP released the “2010 Study of High Net Worth Philanthropy.” If you are involved in major gifts in any way, as a donor, nonprofit leader, or a fundraising professional, and have not yet read the 75-page report, please make it a priority.

Half of all giving in America and 65-70 percent of all individual giving is made by high net worth households (HNWH). So, you may wonder, what is the criteria to be one? In the COP research, a HNWH is a household with income of at least $200,000 annually and net worth of at least $1 million excluding the primary residence. Nearly all HNWHs give, and the amount increases as the level of income and wealth increases. Most high net worth individuals are volunteers as well as donors, and their giving to specific organizations typically follows their volunteerism.

Giving by the wealthiest dropped in 2009 compared to 2007, as did the stock market and confidence in financial security. However, giving as a percent of income did not change significantly except for the wealthiest ($20 million and more in assets) households.

What did I learn about my giving compared to the median giving for other high net worth households in my level? Median giving by all HNWH is only $12,000, but the totals for the wealthiest households are much higher. (Please refer to the full report for more info). Now I understand why we received the letter from the IRS. Our giving is much higher than peers in our income range! For my husband and I personally, it’s not about our net worth, but rather our values. High net worth or not, I encourage you all to give to the best of your ability.