Successful Marketing Strategies for Nonprofit Organizations

Winning in the Age of the Elusive Donor

Barry J. McLeish

• Publisher: Wiley
• Year: 2010
• Print ISBN: 9780470529812
• eBook ISBN: 9780470925539
• Edition: 2
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Nonprofit Organizations & Charities
• Index: Business

From a leading expert on nonprofit marketing, the only marketing handbook a nonprofit manager will ever need-now fully revised and updated

In Successful Marketing Strategies for Nonprofit Organizations, Second Edition, nonprofit marketing guru Barry J. McLeish shares everything he's learned during more than two decades managing and consulting nonprofits of every shape and size. Skipping all the arcane theory and the business school jargon, he gives you clear, step-by-step advice and guidance and all the tools you need to develop and implement a sophisticated marketing program tailored to your organization's needs and goals.

• New sections on the new media available to nonprofit marketers
• Techniques for analyzing your market and developing a comprehensive marketing plan
• Marketing strategies that will support fund-raising, promote new services, and enhance your organization's reputation and visibility
• Methods for developing a marketing program that reaches both the consumers of your service and the donors who support your organization

Do you need to breathe new life into your existing marketing department? Successful Marketing Strategies for Nonprofit Organizations, Second Edition gives you the tools, the know-how, and the confidence you need to succeed.

PART I
INTRODUCTION

CHAPTER 1
A New Way of Doing Business for the Nonprofit Organization

Whereas the nonprofit sector used to be regarded as a sort of backwater to the business world, as a poor cousin to the formidable public sector, it is now increasingly becoming a destination of first resort. Not only is talent flocking there—giving the other sectors a run for their money in terms of employees—but with its emerging blend of businesslike discipline and government-like compassion, the nonprofit sector may yet arise to be the one the others look to.

Penn, Mark J. and Zalesne, E. Kinney, Microtrends
(New York: Twelve, 2007), p. 232

Could anyone have predicted some of the cataclysmic changes that have occurred in the nonprofit marketplace during the past 10 years? Nonprofit practitioners today face social, governmental, and economic changes of an unprecedented magnitude and variety. Such changes are based on the following facts:

• A global donor community has become a reality for many nonprofit organizations as advertising platforms have multiplied.
• Increased media fragmentation has led donors to demand that nonprofit organizations change their methods of communication or suffer the consequences of their nonparticipation.
• Even though the world’s superrich are growing numerically, fund raising has become a battlefield as nonprofit organizations compete for scarce resources.
• Data base fund raising changed the way nonprofit organizations have conducted business during the past 10 years; now the challenge is to use what agencies know about their stakeholders to customize their nonprofit experiences.
• The growth in the number of nonprofit organizations causes competition for the same audiences, and in many causal fields has led to commoditization among causes.

Not only have these changes forever altered the way nonprofit organizations must operate—requiring innovative responses that practices of the past simply cannot accommodate—but marketing and media considerations in particular have arrived at an evolutionary convergence. The ideas and actions associated with “marketing,” central to many nonprofit institutional actions and counteractions in the past, are now being challenged by newer, vibrant, and groundbreaking alternatives. In this chapter, the developments that have brought marketing to this transition point are discussed, as are preliminary marketing concepts and definitions in order to lay a good foundation for a more in-depth discussion of marketing analysis, planning, and implementation.

The Need for a New Marketing Orientation

Traditionally, marketing has not been a popular subject in nonprofit circles; competition even less so. Marketing issues tend to lay our organizational souls bare and put them on trial. However, with flourishing competition in the nonprofit world, marketing and its attendant strategies must be taken into account to ensure the success—even the survival—of most nonprofit organizations. Today, nonprofit organizations are operating under more changes and pressures than ever before. Without closely monitored and implemented marketing strategies designed to take the organization through a particular course of action, and without the ability to change that course should the need arise, an organization risks being lost in the throes of internal and economic upheaval.

At one point in our history, it may have been possible for a nonprofit organization to achieve competitive success despite having diminished resources, increased constituent reticence, changing societal needs, and unflagging competition. Today, however, the combined difficulties associated with these “four horsemen” are leading many nonprofit agencies into financial distress. Traditional marketing responses have often contributed to these problems by being neither sufficiently precise nor innovative. How can these missteps be averted? This book explains in subsequent chapters how marketing principles can be used to develop a strong market and constituent orientation for any cause by providing a series of rational steps and arguments aimed at nonprofit practitioners who, traditionally, have not considered themselves as being part of the “marketing” team.

Dealing with Nonprofit Organizations in Flux

Consider the state of most nonprofit organizations in operation today. Many are experiencing both internal and external turbulence. Internally they are weighed down by a top-heavy hierarchy of executives; they offer little opportunity for subordinate employee advancement and are beset with numerous other human resource inequities. Externally, these same organizations are dealing with the need to reorganize, cut costs, improve collaborative communications, and involve their constituencies in more profitable ways. The need in most agencies is for their marketing units to drive change and create efficiency and stakeholder engagement within their causal ecosystem. Sadly, this is often not the case.

A Changing Domain: Constituents and Supporters Want More Control

In today’s climate of clutter and fragmentation, nonprofit organizations must serve at minimum four distinct groups: clients, constituents, volunteers, and donors. Clients are the individuals whom the nonprofit organization serves directly and who are the immediate beneficiaries of its output. Constituents represent the consuming public that purchases some output from the organization—perhaps a book or another product. Volunteers and donors (also called supporters by some organizations) supply or lend the nonprofit organization various types of resources: time, money, knowledge, encouragement, or facilities.

Although each of these groups is distinct, it is not unusual to observe some overlapping of roles. A friend of a nonprofit organization may take on the role of donor, volunteer, or constituent during that person’s tenure, receiving benefits from the organization at some time, providing a volunteer service at another time.

Although stakeholder insights are now more important than ever, most nonprofit organizations struggle to know how to use this information to leverage and activate their constituents. This problem in serving these groups is compounded because of their increasing lack of sustained loyalty to causes, as well as the perceived and increasing similarity of causal offerings. Given the vast number of worthy causes an individual can choose to support, volunteer for, or seek services from, nonprofit organizations can no longer assume that today’s constituent, volunteer, or donor will be theirs forever. In addition, organizations can no longer assume that the primary concern of their constituency is simply to see the organization “continue as usual.” Nonprofit “friends” not only want to know where their dollars are going but are also more concerned about realizing value benefits as a result of their participation. In some cases, this concern translates into asking for, or expecting, more control over or at least more say in agency operational matters.

Networking Systems Are Less Reliable

Traditional nonprofit networks are changing as well. Nonprofit organizations can no longer assume that certain individuals or corporations will supply volunteers, money, and publicity for their causes and activities just because they’ve done so in the past. Time, money, and the “good name” of an individual or business have become premium possessions in our society, and individuals and corporations are no longer willing to part with them easily. For example, church donations can no longer be counted on to fund many activities and causes outside of the church. Clerics of all faiths typically shy away from fundraising; as a result, many houses of worship are not in good financial condition. Organizations must look elsewhere for support. A new client has historically gained almost 50 percent of its funding from events; now individuals are less likely to attend, stores are less likely to sponsor, and loyal “friends” of the organization are harder to come by.

Hyper-Competition and the New Stakeholder Dialog Contribute to the Turbulence

External changes are also generating this growing uncertainty at an alarming rate. New restrictive policies imposed by the state and federal governments co...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Table of Contents
• Title
• Copyright
• Series
• Dedication
• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• PART I: INTRODUCTION
• PART II: THE EXTERNAL ANALYSIS
• EPILOGUE: Rethinking How We Do Nonprofit Marketing
• Notes
• References
• About the Author
• Index
• End User License Agreement