I recently came across a real goody: A blog post by Scott Gillum, contributing author to the Forbes network, offering wisdom collected over 20 years of work with some of the best, and worst, companies in the world. He found certain consistent themes regardless of company, industry or geography. It got me thinking about how…
DetailsFailure to iver on your promise. This is the cardinal sin in branding. I promised this blog would not just be about philanthropy, but sometimes also about phasion and fun. So… I am following through. Plus I am PROMISING that if you to the Clairification e list, and add a comment to this blog…
DetailsYou say you want a revolution? A lot of us in the public sector have to confess we’ve long had a affair with our top tier major donors. And this may be a problem. We’ve entered an era of power to the people –which dovetails nicely with the definition of philanthropy, from Greek phil…
DetailsBranding used to connote something done with a hot iron to mark ownership of a steer. If there was a relationship quality to this it was only in the fact of being an owner of the thing possessed. It was certainly not about building a relationship, or any important social bonds, with your livestock. In…
DetailsThe fact that development and marketing are charged with making the same relationship-building and communications decisions means that it is time, once and for all, to actively align these functions. Yesterday in Part 1 we discussed the natural linkages between these functions and that, first and foremost, everything we do is about the customer experience. Today,…
DetailsThere’s no difference. There’s never been a difference. It’s time to call a spade a spade. When the term “development” came to be used in fundraising it was at a time when folks working in nonprofits wanted little to do with the world of “business”. Since marketing was a business term, nonprofits invented their own…
DetailsYesterday I asked if you or your Executive Director are writing your own fundraising letters. We discussed the fact that you and your key staff are simply too close to the organization to write effective, persuasive copy. And we talked about the fact that the lion’s share of your supporters – let’s call them the…
DetailsAre you writing your own fundraising letters? Worse still, is your Executive Director writing them? According to Jeff Bros “insiders” like you and your key staff are simply too close to the organization to write effective, persuasive copy. Why? Because over time you/they have developed a certain way of thinking, and a certain proprietary knowledge,…
DetailsI just read an eye-opening Harvard Business Review blog article about the Six Attitudes Leaders Take to Social Media, demonstrating how business leaders are beginning to embrace the real opportunities social media offers. Most, however, are still on the wrong side of the fence (the article includes an assessment tool link to help you figure…
DetailsThis morning I opened the newspaper and read about how the Occupy movement can take advice from marketing and branding gurus. They’ve been criticized for being all over the place, and not having a distinct message or rallying cry. Too often, businesses – nonprofit or otherwise – do the same thing. The inevitable result when…
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