Green Article.*
What's up with GIVING TUESDAY!
So what are you doing for GIVING TUESDAY (#GivingTuesday)? In case, you have somehow missed this event/movement over the last few years here is what Wikipedia says about the day – “It is a movement to create a national day of giving at the beginning of the Christmas and holiday season. GIVING TUESDAY was started in 2012 by the 92nd Street Y and the United Nations Foundation as a response to commercialization and consumerism in the post-Thanksgiving season.”
Some major companies and non-profits nationwide participate in GIVING TUESDAY each year and the numbers are growing. Even credit card companies and TV networks have taken to promoting the day. So what can you do?
1. You can gear your Annual Appeal to the day.
2. You can add an extra note to an already prepared Annual Appeal.
3. You can create a #GivingTuesday online and social media campaign.
Let ‘s start with #2. Assuming you have completed design and pre-production for your appeal, and it will drop before Thanksgiving but you didn’t include a #GivingTuesday ask – no worries. Have a quick insert created that simply says something like “Make it a great Tuesday. Make your gift on Giving Tuesday“ and you are done. Short, easy and thoughtful.
I believe that #3 is the key to the day. So much of the promotion for Giving Tuesday is geared toward online giving so why not go with the flow. Initially, I would create a thoughtful pre-Thanksgiving e-news blast that ideally builds off of the design of your annual appeal. Reuse some of the images or the language from your appeal so that it matches and reinforces your Annual Appeal. If your Facebook Page and your Twitter account are a part of your campaign (and I hope they are), you should build a series of tweets and post to go out starting on Thanksgiving Day. Obviously, the Thanksgiving Day one should emphasize the holiday and thoughtfully give a nod to #GivingTuesday. The rest of the series can be more direct.
Remember to talk about “Why” a gift to you is important not just what you can do with the gift but why your organization should get the gift. Be sure to include photos or graphics. These will reinforce your message and typically increase your reach. Plan on sending out some posts/tweets on #GivingTuesday. Maybe these tell a single story, or they are designed to encourage people to tell their story about your organization or cause. Check out this "Shared Article" on social media.
On GIVING TUESDAY plan on spending a good portion of the day sending and responding to post and tweets in real time. It is very important that your posts are pre-planned, but you cannot pre-plan for new opportunities that come from your followers. Be ready to respond quickly.
Also, be sure to send two or three emails that day to your email list. Build them off the same themes as your Appeal and your social media post/tweets.
The next day use both email and social media to thank everyone for donating and commenting. That is the only thoughtful thing to do. In fact, be sure to track your Likes, Re-tweets, and hits for the next few days. Using the hashtag will tell you how well your GIVING TUESDAY campaign did.
And remember to use the #GivingTuesday and your organization’s hashtag in all your post, tweets and even emails to be a part of the movement.
P.S. As for #1 Next year start early and include GIVING TUESDAY in your Annual Appeal planning. Fundraisers today must thoughtfully take advantage of every reasonable opportunity we can to increase support.
* Article originally appeared in 2015
Multiple online donation pages are your friend - really!
Can your organization use a Social Media Expert? I mean really use.
So you plan on hiring a Social Media Specialist for your organization. Well, you have an important question to answer mainly do you have 40 hours of work for this person?
This new person will need to be someone dedicated to your organization who has the flexibility to get posts into your social media streams on a regular and systematic way. They also need to be able to respond when things happen. But, for most non-profits, the answer to is still no. So what might you combine with the positions social media task to create a full-time position?
Is there a person dedicated to keeping your website up-to-date? What do I mean by "up-to-date?" Well, as I am sure you know websites are never actually finished they require constant tweaking and new material. If you are not doing this, then you have a whole different problem, and we will cover that in an upcoming post.
The person in this position can write beyond 140 characters or the few paragraphs in a Facebook Page post. Also keep in mind that being able to curate material derived from other sources like your annual report or program materials can also be the basis of new material for the website. Then this person only needs the technical skill to add articles to the site - and the forethought to think about what to add or the guidance by you to know what to add.
Who knows they may even understand things like meta tags and keywords? Both of which are important if anyone is going to find your website. Understanding this functions opens what might be wholly new and important area of analytics. If you use the Google analysis products, it would be great to have a person dedicated to this work. If you have a Google Ad Words, Grant you know how much time is necessary to manage that asset. If you don’t have a Google Ad Words Grant then maybe this new person can help you get one.
Another distinct area is desktop publishing and graphic design. Would it be helpful to have an in-house design guru, probably? The very nature of creating engaging well-constructed post requires a good design sense and the technical skill to create images and videos. These same skills may well translate into the skills needed to create a newsletter or simple brochure.
And don't forget your social media campaign should be working hand in hand with your events and individual giving programs. Ads and promoted post are assets to the rest of your donor program.
So is there 40 hours of work for a Social Media/Webmaster/Marketing position at your organization. My instinct says yes. And though you might not be able to draw a solid line between the position and income I think you can certainly draw a dotted line.
What could be better than a thoughtful program of social media post, website updates, meaningful analytics and, possibly even design skills?
Catch up on your reading!
August is the ideal time to catch up on your reading. Here are some examples from our shared articles section.
Short Thoughtful Post
It Occurs To Me
August 25, 2022
Quitting Quietly-
I am fascinated by this concept, this movement. I always figured that once you got a job, you did your best at the job, maybe you learned some new stuff and used that to, at some point, move to a higher position. If you are "quietly quitting," are you doing your best at your job? Isn't that our part of the hiring bargain? This NYTimes article examines many of the issues surrounding this movement. What do you think? Click the photo below to read the article.
Please leave a comment, thoughtfully.
Thoughtful Stewardship
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