NonProfit News That Matters

Welcome to our NonProfit News That Matters Blog.  Here at Goettler Associates, we are continuously watching developments in the philanthropic marketplace, reviewing new research studies, reading trade publications, and scouring industry blogs. The quantity of available information is a little overwhelming at times, so we though we’d help our friends and colleagues along by sharing the NonProfit News That Matters most.

Let us know what you think, join the conversation.


Category: Marketing & Communications

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Covid-19 Week 5: Zoom in on better etiquette when video conferencing

Category: Marketing & Communications
Zoom in on better Etiquette It is the second day of week five in Covid-19 Fundraising, and like you we visited with family and friends over the past weekend via video conferencing to share Easter/Passover Holiday greetings.  We’ve also been using Zoom for virtual happy hour with friends and colleagues over these past weeks, and it is bec...

Adapting Your Case for Support of the Arts

Category: Case for Support
Top 10 Reasons to Support the Arts Here is an excellent blog post that will help any arts organization refine and adapt their case for support during these unprecedented times brought on by the Covid-19 pandemic. This well organized article can help development professionals adapt the messaging of their arts organizations to our radically and ...

Fundraising is not like Sales…or is it?

Category: Marketing & Communications
Many, many years ago when serving our local AFP (then NSFRE) Chapter as Education and Program Committee Chair, I arranged for a "sales coach" to make the monthly luncheon presentation. People were aghast! What in the world can development officers possibly learn from a ruthless, profit-driven salesman? Granted, fundraising is quite a bit di...

Words Nonprofits Should Avoid – 2018 Edition

Category: Marketing & Communications
We laughed at first and then we winced.  Yes, the truth hurts.  If one is being honest with themselves, we've all done it.  We've all used pointless, undefinable, filler words that help the author complete a task, yet do nothing to actually communicate our point, nor help the reader.  Big Duck has come out with the next article in the...

Example: How to Use Pronouns in Fundraising

Category: Marketing & Communications
We talk a lot about the proper use of pronouns in fundraising communications and fundraising appeals.  Our perspective is based on trying to demonstrate that the nonprofit organization is donor centered.  In some circles this is referred to as adopting the marketplace perspective.  There was a very high profile example today of how to do this co...

Shouldn't Everyone Start with their Elevator Speech?

Category: Case for Support
We don’t think so. In his recent article, "The Pitch is Dead. Long Live the Conversation," Kevin Starr gives a wonderful testimony for why relationship-based fundraising appeals are better than the sales minded approach typified by the elevator speech. Sure enough, fundraisers can learn a great deal from the adroit professional salesman, but few ...

Create Your Key Performance Indicators

Category: Marketing & Communications
This blog post advocating the creation of metrics to track the key performance indicators of nonprofit websites has a much larger application.  This article presents an excellent framework for establishing methodical metrics to guide and evaluate an organization's entire development effort.  Instead of simply doing this year, what you did last ye...

Building your brand through targeted marketing (a.k.a. social media)

Category: Marketing & Communications
The following post makes the broader case for building your brand through targeted marketing. In our view this brief article is packed with supporting facts and figures, and might be an excellent piece for development officers to share with their executive leadership team.   Today, targeted marketing is nearly synonymous with the use of social me...

Enhance the donor experience

Category: Marketing & Communications
Satisfied customers make repeat customers.  So too, satisfied donors make repeat donors.  This article from GuideStar suggests that keeping your donors happy will depend more and more on the organization's online engagement.   The New Donor Engagement Reality: Bottom-Line Priorities for the Online Experience July 2014 Community...

Quantify your Case for Support

Category: Marketing & Communications
We will often tell our clients to Quantify your Case for Support. The following two 'Measuring Up' Blog posts at the Chronicle of Philanthropy beautifully describe why we offer this advice.  If you can work to further measure and quantify your organization's work, you then have a new and exciting means of thanking your donors. Demonstrating the im...

Tips to Avoid Social Media Burnout in 2014

Category: LinkedIn Articles
Here are several tips to avoid social media burnout, and the insatiable beast that it is.  Last week, I was at a reception and someone asked me what I do.  As most development professionals know, it's not always a simple answer. The individual I had just met, having heard my somewhat inadequate description responded, "so I bet you are now using a...

Reminding Fundraisers of the Donor’s Perspective

Category: LinkedIn Articles
A great post reminding fundraisers of the donor's perspective, and further supported by some shocking statistics from the AFP's Fundraising Effectiveness Project.  Go forth and broker love ! Stop Treating Your Donors Like a Cash Cow Meet the typical donor, as charities see the beast: a cash cow. Biddable. Milkable. And — oh, yes — mythical. B...

Conducting Community Health Needs Assessments

Category: Marketing & Communications
This is an excellent post on the origin and history of the Community Health Needs Assessments that all hospitals must now perform. From our viewpoint we are continually surprised to see that the development office and/or hospital foundation has little to no involvement in requesting, directing nor performing these assessments.  Seems to us that t...