Advertise on podcast: Messaging on a Mission

This episode of Messaging on a Mission, is a conversation on copywriting! Spencer Brenneman Lead Copywriter Anthon Greer sits down with Douglas Spencer to talk about why he loves copywriting, what it can do, and how to start, even when you have a block.   Episode Guest(s): Anthony Greer specializes in content writing and brand messaging development. By listening to what you’re saying (and not saying), he creates content worth remembering and tells stories worth repeating. By creating engaging, optimized, on-brand content, Anthony helps you captivate your audience and convey the awesome work that you do. Anthony has a background in journalism and started his own business, AG Creative Publishing, in 2014. He's a published author, a board game lover, and a coffee addict. He earned a Bachelor's in Business Management.     Key Takeaways: Hiring a copywriter. Before hiring a copywriter, get crystal clear on why you need one. What do you want them to deliver?   Writer’s Block. First, either switch to working or something different. If that’s not an option, just start writing. Even if you never use it, it’s important to create momentum.   DYI Copywriting. Start with why it’s important to say what it is you have to say. Then think about your audience. Consider creating personas, imagined details about an audience member’s life, such as what they do, how old they are, what they do in their spare time, etc. Then write to that person.   Know who you are. Make certain that whatever you write is in line with who you are as an organization. At every opportunity reinforce what it is you do exactly, why you do it, and how you do it differently than everyone else.   Stay consistent. From the tone of your writing to the language you use to describe your world, stay consistent. Don’t have a serious tone in one piece, and a completely frivolous one in the next. Don’t call the people you serve clients and patients. Pick one, etc.,   Always have a call to action. Make it clear what you want people to do with the information you’re sharing, even if it’s to reach out and ask questions.   Less is more. I cannot overstate that enough. Stay focused on “the one thing” your writing sets out to accomplish. No one has an attention span anymore and not having a focus is a sure way to get people to hit delete, or whatever the equivalent is.     Useful Links: Anthony Greer www.anthony-greer.com [email protected] LinkedIn   Check out this project Anthony worked on with Spencer Brenneman: spencerbrenneman.com/case-studies/massachusetts-childrens-alliance/

We’re doing something a bit different this week! No guest, just host Douglas Spencer talking about some of the most common ways that messages fail the organizations they’re created to support. You’ll hear about specific actions you can take to see if your message is up to the task of supporting your important work.     Episode Guest(s): Douglas Spencer is president of Spencer Brenneman, LLC, which helps lo mission-driven organizations reframe their focus and remaster their messages to thrive in any environment. In 2021, Douglas launched the podcast, Messaging on a Mission. In it, he talks to leaders of nonprofits, social enterprises, and associations about their journeys and the messages they’re using to thrive. He is also the author of Do They Care? The one question all brands should ask themselves, continually, a book that shows leaders how they can create meaningful connections with everyone important to their organization's success.    Key Takeaways: Four ways your message can fail you: It is out of date, too jargony, too broad, or doesn’t have a clear purpose.    Messages must reflect the personality of the organization, make sense to everyone, differentiate your work and connect to a high purpose.    In fundraising and business development, try:  Benchmarking  Research A/B Testing  Messaging Audit   For talent management, try:  Employee surveys Messaging Audit Exit Interviews Useful Links: [email protected] https://spencerbrenneman.com/

The relationship between data and your message is an important one. If your message cannot reach the right people, what good is it? And how do mission-driven organizations ensure that their message is reaching the right audience? By carefully managing the data behind the people most important to your success. In this episode of Messaging on a Mission, we talk to Isaac Shalev about the kind of technology considerations nonprofits need to keep top of mind when developing both their messaging and their technology strategies.   Episode Guest(s): Isaac Shalev is the founder and President of Sage70, Inc., a boutique consultancy devoted to making data work for nonprofits. Isaac has over twenty years of experience in the nonprofit sector, where he has developed a reputation for helping organizations get clarity on their thorniest problems in data and technology. Sage70's past clients include the US Golf Association, The LA Phil, Mount Holyoke College, UJA-Federation of NY, The Trust for Public Land, and IEEE.      Key Takeaways: Email marketing platforms must connect that back to donor databases in order to segment correctly and create the best messages for the best person at the right time. (Some platforms do both.)   Consider all the other places integrations are needed, such as where the money comes into the organization (e.g., website forms).   Not all nonprofit organizations have the same needs. It's different by sector and there are bespoke tools and different vendors serving those different markets. It is a good idea to see what similar organizations are using.   When budgeting for your CRM, keep in mind how people’s jobs may change as a result.   Consider reporting needs when selecting a system. Do the canned reports ask the questions you need to have answered? If not, is the customization or extra staff time worth it?   People want to be spoken to in a way that feels authentic to them. That's a big ask of a database. It's an even bigger ask at a policy level. What are our policies? You can't have database and database structures that have any consistency or do the job you want them to do without policy. To define that, to say, what are we trying to achieve?   One of the places from which organizations can start is by asking themselves about their process for updating biographical information.   Taxonomies of your crucial attributes are an important step in managing your contact data effectively.   The 80/20 rule for your work. What are those small number of attributes or data points or behaviors that are important to us to track because they explain 80% of why a person wants to support your organization?   “If you take an inefficient process and you automate it, you will magnify its inefficiency. If you take an efficient process and automate it, then you will get a lot more scale,” paraphrased from Bill Gates.   State laws apply to the residents of the state, not necessarily the sender’s state.   Organizations must have a data breach policy in place.   It's not a great idea to collect a lot of data and have no clear way to use it. It's not a good idea from a data management perspective, but it's also not clear from a data privacy perspective that you'd want that.     Useful Links: Isaac Shalev [email protected] sage70.com  

According to Forbes (https://www.forbes.com/lists/top-charities/?sh=1b5c50295f50), the top two charities in the United States are United Way Worldwide and Feeding America. The United Way started slowly over time as more and more “federated giving” organizations came together. Feeding America had a faster, but still slower start as one man’s volunteerism took on a life of its own.    Not all organizations start slowly. Many are borne out of a specific need. Such is the case with The Kindness Project, which we’ll hear about today. Grassroots organizations, in my mind, demonstrate the best in humanity: people stepping up to the plate to help others in the moment. However, with everyone and everything happening sometimes in split seconds, the message could easily get distorted.    Episode Guest(s): Alex Bromberg founded the original group that became the Kindness Collaborative in March of 2020. Long before that, he'd been involved in activism dating back to 2000. In 2009 he formed "The Liberty Project" which focused on shedding divisive labels and teaching people to work together toward key/shared concepts of individual liberty and social equality. After witnessing the amazing organic action of all the regular people throughout the community who had stepped up to help one another in the original group, Alex teamed up first with Darcie Nuttall, and then the other founders, to establish the Kindness Collaborative. Their goal of creating a way to channel all the kindness and compassion of the community and organizing it into a major force of good has been realized in the movement it has created.   Useful Links: The Kindness Collaborative  https://www.facebook.com/groups/kindnesscollaborative http://kindnesscolab.org/

Inclusion decisions are made when everyone those decisions impact are included in the process. Today’s episode focuses on inclusive decision-making and—perhaps just as importantly—the conversations that enable it.   Episode Guest(s): Mer (pronounced “mair”) Joyce is the Founder and Principal of Do Big Good, a Seattle-based firm that trains and facilitates inclusive decisions. Mer has committed her life to social change innovation. She was New Media Operations Manager on President Obama’s 2008 campaign, led the creation of the 2010 book, and managed a first-of-its-kind activism data set as a fellow of the National Science Foundation. Mer has collaborated with nonprofits, foundations, think tanks, and firms in North America, Eastern Europe, Latin America, and the Middle East, including the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard, the Open Government Partnership, Microsoft, and Google. Her graduate studies in Public Policy and Communication and undergraduate studies in History and Africana Studies were at the Harvard Kennedy School, the University of Washington, Vassar, and the University of Ghana. Having also lived in Morocco, Chile, and India, Mer now lives in Seattle, where she enjoys biking and intentional communities.    Key Takeaways:   Inclusivity is about voices, not faces. Just because someone has a face that matches an excluded community doesn’t mean you are hearing their voice.   An absence of trust from people who are brought into a room for the first time is an obstacle to inclusion because they may not share their true opinions.   It's very important to make certain that you are transparent with your motivation.   Think of inclusive decision making through the lens of “trust dials.”   Types of decisions needed include: Fixed: Already created and cannot be altered by stakeholders; Flexible: Already created, but can still be altered according to stakeholder input; and Formable: Not yet created and need to be created with stakeholders.   When seeking feedback and input, remember to close that communication loop and say, “thank you for coming to this session. This is how we integrated your suggestions into our [fill in the blank].”   Structure the decision-making process in a way that gives power over the outcome or over the agreement, such that the outcome could look different because of what people say.    Inclusive decision-making starts well ahead of the decisions. It starts with building relationships.   Useful Links: Mer Joyce, [email protected]   Do Big Good Website Do Big Good YouTube Channel Do Big Good on Facebook

Although we all believe—and know—that reinventing the wheel is bad, we all do it none-the-less. Why is that? Most often it’s because we don’t think we have enough time to stop and think about our work more broadly. The content we produce certainly falls into that category. So in addition to having a well-thought-out messaging strategy, our guest today gives us clear steps on how to repurpose content smartly and efficiently.   Episode Guest(s): Stephanie Cory, CAP®, CFRE, is Principal of Stephanie Cory Consulting. She has dedicated her career to the nonprofit sector for nearly 20 years. She has served as an executive director for a health advocacy organization as well as held development and program management roles for organizations serving seniors and people with disabilities. She expanded programming, strengthened infrastructure, and grew fundraising revenue in these roles. Stephanie is an adjunct faculty member for Villanova University’s College of Professional Studies where she teaches fundraising. She is also is a BoardSource Certified Governance Consultant and a Licensed Standards for Excellence® Consultant. Stephanie authored a chapter on boards and fundraising for the second edition of The Handbook of Board Governance, which was published by John Wiley & Sons in 2020.   Key Takeaways: The goal is to think about what makes your organization unique and what do you want to put out there? What, what do you want to talk about?   Decide your content’s tone of voice: Are you serious and research-focused? Are you lighthearted and friendly? Certainly grant applications are a different animal, but your website should and your fundraising appeals should reflect who you are.   Introduce board members to all the programs, but let them find the ones that resonated the most with them and go in depth on those. They can talk about them with a better sense of understanding.   With board members and employees, try to engender an understanding and appreciation for social media. Help them understand how it works and why it’s important to the organization. Then, provide them with content to share.   Ensure a robust new board member training program from the beginning and include instructions on how to (and not to) reuse the content you produce.   Consider having a content library beyond grants, but be certain to not simply repeat content verbatim each time.   For new executive directors, think about what content responsibilities you can outsource and which you cannot.     Useful Links: [email protected] LinkedIn.com/in/stephaniecory/ StephanieCory.com The Handbook of Board Governance

Despite the fact that data show being asked by someone to support an organization is one of the most effective ways to fundraise, many nonprofit board members are not comfortable asking their communities for support. This episode of Messaging on a Mission looks at why as well as how to change that.   Episode Guest(s): Scottie Seawell is Principal Consultant and Co-founder of Leading and Governing Associates, a governance education and leadership consulting practice working with public purpose governing boards – nonprofit and elected – on public engagement, public values decision-making, strategic planning, and navigation, and organizational capacity building. Scottie works with folks of all political stripes to effectively engage their communities and with each other. She has worked at the federal, state, and local levels in policy areas focused on children, families, and education. She believes passionately in the power of a well-educated citizenry, engaged in democratic processes and representative governance, to build a better future for all.     Key Takeaways: Organizations often do not recruit new board members with this expectation. It's more than a monthly or quarterly meeting. They cannot assume that potential board members have that kind of experience.   When considering a board position, one should also ask questions about expectations.   Help board members by having them foster the invitation and someone else—ideally another volunteer, not a staff member—do the ask.   The board chair should have an intentional conversation with the board and leadership staff to say, “Here's our situation financially. Here's why it's important that we raise money, in order to do what we say we want to do in order to meet our mission or advance on our vision of how our community should look or we want it to look from there.”   Provide them with the coaching and tools they would need to become effective fundraising board members.   “There's just a lot more handholding that needs to do in prep that needs to happen before you can kind of expect a board member to really understand and feel the confidence that they could help you in this way.”   Organizations have to want and have an intention about the community and how they want to engage with it.   A  public values framework is useful in helping people listen with intention, to what somebody else is saying is important to them.   Useful Links: Scottie Seawell, [email protected]   @leadingandgoverning @preservingthepublic @scottieseawell   https://www.leadingandgoverning.com  

Discussing mental health has never been easy, especially in the workplace. After two years living under the weight of a deadly pandemic, it’s more important than ever. In this episode of Messaging on a Mission we speak with Workplace Mental Health Strategist Michelle Dickinson about how organizations create and promote psychological safety within their workplaces.     Episode Guest(s): Michelle E. Dickinson is a Workplace Mental Health Strategist and passionate mental health advocate. She is also a TEDx speaker and a published author of a memoir entitled​ Breaking Into My Life​. Michelle goes first and sees herself as the bridge that helps people get comfortable with their mental health so that they reach out and get the support they need before they hit a crisis. She makes it ok to not be ok and thrives on making a real difference in the lives of others – especially around their wellbeing.    After years of playing the role of child-caregiver to her bipolar mother, Michelle embarked on her own healing journey of self-discovery. She went on to spend years working to eradicate the mental health stigma within her own workplace by elevating empathy and compassion, causing more open conversations, and leading real change in how mental illness is understood. She was instrumental in building the largest and fastest-growing employee mental health resource group while at her fortune 500 company.    She also knows first-hand what it feels like to struggle with a mental illness after experiencing my own depression due to her divorce. This has provided her with a rich perspective.    She partners with innovative organizations that really care about their people to recenter their staff through her powerful people leader resilience programs that provide tangible daily strategies to preserve well-being. She believes that every organization can have a culture of compassion. Her signature Resilience workshop has made a positive impact on thousands of employees throughout COVID-19.   Key Takeaways:   The pandemic and social isolation are negatively impacting employee mental health, creativity, problem-solving, and productivity.   Organizations can eliminate the stigma by normalizing the mental health and wellbeing conversation within the workplace.   It is incumbent upon organizational leaders to drive the conversation around mental health in the workplace.  Useful Links: www.careforyourpeople.com  www.michelleedickinson.com www.breakingintomylife.com    Mental Health Series “Michelle’s Conversations that Matter” on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCn6Yaq3AqLUebGmfZoRdB4Q   LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michelle-e-dickinson-mm-%F0%9F%A7%A0%E2%99%A5%EF%B8%8F-7882013/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/mdickinson13 Free chapter of her book: http://breakingintomylife.com/excerpt/ From the Center for Disease Control:   Helplines If you are in crisis, get immediate help:   Call 911 National Suicide Prevention Lifelineexternal icon: 1-800-273-TALK (8255) for English, 1-888-628-9454 for Spanish, or Lifeline Crisis Chat Crisis Text Line: Text SIGNS to 741741 for 24/7, anonymous, free crisis counseling Disaster Distress Helpline: CALL or TEXT 1-800-985-5990 (press 2 for Spanish)  

Is it possible to create an ethical digital landscape? Katrina German of EthicalDigital.ca believes so. In this episode of Messaging on a Mission, she outlines how her organization is using research and strategy to create an internet that is respectful and kind. From increasing the number of women in technology-focused venture capital to expanding the number of indigenous women pursuing technology careers, she and her colleagues have a plan.   Episode Guest(s): Katrina German is an award-winning entrepreneur specializing in communications, technology, and digital strategy. As the CEO and founder of EthicalDigital.ca, she and her team are changing the trajectory of the internet through digital strategy, research, and big action. Katrina is in the CBC Future 40 Under 40, has won the YWCA Women of Distinction Award for Entrepreneurship, Startup Canada Prairie Award for Innovation, represented Canada at the G20 YEA Summit in Berlin, Germany, and has won the prestigious international Women in Tech award for "Women in Communications". Katrina is a strong believer in measured results, radical creativity, and using technology to improve workflow.   Key Takeaways: We should be holding Facebook accountable to those same levels that we're holding other corporations to be ensuring that what they're doing and the activities that they're participating in are actually enhancing our society because they have such a strong role right now that's just beyond than anybody could have ever imagined.   Look at the Facebook issue not just from the perspective of public wellbeing, but also from a corporate law perspective. Hold the board of directors responsible for making certain their product is not harming people.   EthicalDigital.ca is doing a large research study with the diversity Institute at a Ryerson university to talk about what are the barriers for women entering into venture capital.   They are also working on a certification program for ethical digital marketing.   For ways to support a more ethical digital experience: Think about the kind of content you are putting out there. Are you creating unhealthy feelings of FOMO (fear of missing out)? Instead of posting just about yourself, post about others who are doing important work.   Try to inspire people, not scare them.   Turn off your phone notifications and only check your phone when you have time.     Useful Links:   ethicaldigital.ca   [email protected]  

Most leaders of organizations—especially small ones, startups, not-for-profits— know that digital marketing is critical to an organization’s success. Still, its complexity and perceived expense hold leaders back from taking advantage of the channel. This episode of Messaging on a Mission dives into how and why digital marketing is a must-have for any organization with a message on a mission.   Episode Guest(s): Jeff Kelly is the Strategy Director at Butterflyly, a fundraising and digital marketing agency for nonprofits. We are a small passionate team on a mission to help nonprofits grow in the face of unique fundraising challenges and rapidly changing marketing strategies. Jeff graduated from a corporate technology career to start Butterflyly and away from work he is a husband, father, big picture systems thinker, beekeeper, blueberry farmer, and shipping-container home owner.     Key Takeaways: Digital marketing is certainly more important than it has ever been given that so much of our relationship building right now is online and remote and between people who are not physically in the same room together.   Digital marketing tools—your website, your social media, your advertising—can help you reach your strategic objectives, to reach your annual goals, to reach your fundraising targets.   Advertising is a huge area of opportunity for nonprofits. Advertising as a channel can build awareness, tell a story, bring people to an event, seek registrations, or build an audience or an email list. It can build relationships with an audience of people that have been at a particular event.   Know your audience: who they are, where they are, what’s important to them, and how they want to communicate.   When we talk about marketing and what's the biggest gap and how can organizations be moving forward in this space, if you're unsure who your audience is and how to communicate with them, that is potentially the biggest problem your organization is going to face.   Think about what the donor or follower wants to accomplish by following or giving to the organization.   What works for any one organization is different than the next. If you are trying to reach a young audience and you are not on social media, you are going to fail to reach that audience. You don’t need to be on every platform. If your audience is not on Twitter, don't spend any time on Twitter.   Email is ending its usefulness as a communication tool. It's never going to go away, but it's not near as effective as it used to be.   Be consistent with how frequently you post content to the platforms your audience is active on.   There is a lot of benefit from posting on consistent days of the week, consistent types of messages, and content consistent.     Useful Links: Butterflyly, https://butterflyly.com/   [email protected]     Messaging on a Mission episode on sponsorships: https://spencerbrenneman.com/messaging-on-a-mission/e19-associations/  

Every year new communicators join the workforce—which is desperately needed. But what are the college communication curricula that are preparing them for the world we have today and the world we’ll have tomorrow? This episode looks at what today’s students are learning and how are they preparing for careers in communications.   Episode Guest(s): Dr. Cody Clemens’ primary research and teaching foci are in Health, Organizational, Relational, and Gender Communication. His scholarly work has appeared in the Journal of Communication Pedagogy, Health Communication, Ohio Communication Journal, The Forensic of Pi Kappa Delta, and Carolinas Communication Annual. He also published a book chapter in The Handbook of Communication Training (Routledge) with his co-authors on Belbin Team Roles. His doctoral dissertation research focused on the experiences and identities of individuals living with the chronic autoimmune disease, Hashimoto’s Thyroiditis. Dr. Clemens actively presents and participates at the International Congress of Qualitative Inquiry Conference, the International Association of Autoethnography and Narrative Inquiry Conference, the National Communication Association Conference, and the Ohio Communication Association Conference.   For his research and service, he has been awarded numerous awards from institutions like Bowling Green State University and the National Communication Association’s Training & Development Division. He is currently the Vice President for the Ohio Communication Association, and he serves as a reviewer for the Ohio Communication Journal, Journal of Autoethnography, Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, and Women & Language.   He has Ph.D. in Health & Organizational Communication from Bowling Green State University, an MA in Corporate Communication, Duquesne University; and a BA-Organizational Communication & Public Relations, from Marietta College where he serves as an Assistant Professor. And, he and I are both members of the MCAA Board of Directors.   In his free time, he enjoys spending time with his many horses, and his dog, Betty.     Key Takeaways:   Careers in communication can play a key role in promoting important public health initiatives.   We should approach different generation cohorts because they have different expectations for media consumption, different levels of digital literacy, and digital access.   Communication curricula should include helping students in ways such as standing up for themselves and what they believe in, knowing the difference between credible and identifying non-critical research, and ethical and unethical behavior.   They also need to help create powerful leaders, writers, readers, and impactful communicators.   Future college communication curricula should focus on the developing strategic digital world. However, they should not lose sight of core elements like interpersonal communication, ethics, and being good colleagues and team members.   Managing new communication graduates requires listening, mentorship programs, challenges, and socialization opportunities.       Useful Links:   Dr. Cody Clemens [email protected]   https://www.linkedin.com/in/codymclemens/   Marietta College https://marietta.org   Connect Four Panel Discussion on the Marietta College Communication Department https://youtu.be/tQVSBP71beQ

POSTSCRIPT: This episode of Messaging on a Mission was recorded in November of 2021, slightly more than a month before our guest’s untimely death from a heart attack. We are airing the episode to honor his memory and share his insights with those who can benefit from them.    For most organizations, the end of the calendar year is when you do a fundraising push. People can get that last bit of tax benefit before they file their returns. Now is the time organizations are interpreting the results of that end-of-year campaign. In this episode, we look at:    What you can learn from a campaign that exceeded expectations?   Ascertaining what went wrong when they didn’t.    Trends in annual giving campaigns, and    Some best practices around continued engagement throughout the new year.  Episode Guest Christopher Marrion was a senior not-for-profit executive with more than two decades of experience as a leader in cultural organizations. Before his passing in December of 2021, he was the Vice President of Advancement for the Hanover Theatre and Conservatory, a historic theatre and presenter in Worcester, MA.    Prior to joining THTC, Chris served as the Assistant Dean for Development and Alumni Relations at his graduate school alma mater, the Boston University College of Fine Arts. Chris served for eight years under Artistic Director Yo-Yo Ma as Deputy Director of Silkroad, where his responsibilities included strategic planning, program assessment, and fundraising for concert tours, recordings, and commissions by the Silk Road Ensemble, a multi-year education initiative in NYC public schools, and a collaboration with the Harvard Business School to promote innovative cultural enterprise. Additional experience includes Boston Lyric Opera (Director of Development), Boston Children’s Hospital (Major Gifts Officer), and AIDS Action Committee (Director of Individual Giving).   Chris studied at the New England Conservatory of Music (BM) and the Boston University College of Fine Arts (MM). Prior to entering the development field, he was a freelance musician active in the U.S. and Europe.   To remember Chris, please consider a donation to the Hanover Theater & Conservatory (thehanovertheater.org), AIDS Action (AAC.org), or a charity that is important to you. Key Takeaways: Fundraising is both art and science.   What you learn relies a lot on what you intended to learn before you started.    Base your decisions on what you know about donor behavior and their history to identify who might be the most likely people to respond to this campaign.    Don’t be afraid to try something different.    No matter what the short-term results are, remember to consider the lifetime value of the donor.    From a data perspective, it’s important to have a baseline.    Major gifts offer an opportunity to write a short story.   If something hasn't worked often, the first thing to do is go back and ask, was it the right? Was it the right message? Was it powerful enough to really explain what we do?   Always keep your audience first.    Have your baseline data in place before you start. Know what segments didn't perform well, what didn't do as well as expected, and why didn't an experiment pay off. Then you can figure out what to do next.  Useful Links:   The Hanover Theatre & Conservatory for the Performing Arts https://thehanovertheatre.org/   AIDS Action Committee https://aidsaction.org