This guide will cover the top types of educational resources for nonprofit professionals.

Top Educational Resources for Nonprofit Professionals

Nonprofit professionals are used to wearing many hats while working for their organization—from serving as event planners to social media managers to volunteer coordinators. At times, however, nonprofit team members will encounter projects and tasks that they don’t have prior experience in handling. What do they do then?

While some recommend that nonprofits outsource specialized work, such as leveraging a marketing agency to take charge of creating collateral, not all organizations have the budget to do so. That’s where educational resources come in. These resources provide nonprofit professionals, such as yourself, with a lower-cost way to develop their skills and grow professionally.

In this guide, we’ll go over the most helpful resources for nonprofit professionals by discussing each of their unique benefits and drawbacks. Let’s get started!

This image lists three types of nonprofit educational resources: blog posts, books, and conferences, covered in more detail in the text below.

1. Blog Posts

In this age of technology, you likely look toward blog posts and other websites whenever you’re out of your element, including searching for new fundraising ideas or event planning tips. Blog posts are a top educational resource because they serve as a first stop for professionals seeking more information about specific nonprofit topics. Let’s take a closer look at the benefits and drawbacks of this resource:

Benefits

Here are some of the benefits of blog posts as an educational resource:

  • Easily accessible. Blog posts are accessible to everyone through search engines such as Google or Bing. It’s super convenient for you to type in the right keywords and click on the relevant blog posts, empowering you to kickstart your learning journey.
  • Lively visuals. Authors of blogs often embed multimedia elements into their posts, such as video walk-throughs, resulting in a more engaging and academically enriching experience for the reader. For example, an all-text blog post describing how to apply for Google grants might be difficult to parse. But if it’s broken up with relevant images and videos, then the information becomes much easier to digest.
  • Cost-effective. For the most part, access to blog posts is free, making this option extremely cost-effective. This is extremely valuable for nonprofit professionals who may not have access to a learning budget or stipend.

Though blog posts have a variety of benefits for nonprofit professionals, they also have some drawbacks.

Drawbacks

Here are some of the drawbacks of blog posts as an educational resource:

  • Questionable authority. Depending on which blog you’re looking at, it may be difficult to gauge the authority of the writer. Not everyone who writes nonprofit content is involved in the industry, making it crucial for you to vet blog authors and websites before you take their word as fact.
  • Varying depth. Blog posts may vary in quality and length even on the same blogroll. Many posts may cover surface-level topics such as fundraising, but may not dive more deeply into actionable tips your organization can take today. For example, a post could cover the benefits of hybrid fundraising events, but not how to organize a hybrid event.
  • Unstructured content. A blogroll will likely cover many different topics rather than go in-depth on a single topic. If you’re specifically interested in one topic, this resource’s format can hinder your learning, as you may need to access multiple blogs to gain the depth of knowledge you seek.

If you’re looking for a surface-level overview of a nonprofit topic, then blog posts are a great educational resource for you due to their accessible and cost-effective nature. However, if you’re looking for more robust educational materials, then consider one of the next resources.

2. Books

Elevate Nonprofit explains that books can impart a wealth of knowledge and inspire your organization’s fundraising strategy. They are an invaluable resource to learn new strategies and practices and glean insights from the past. However, like blog posts, they have their unique benefits and drawbacks.

Benefits

Here are some of the benefits of books as an educational resource:

  • Depth of knowledge. Books usually thoroughly cover a single topic, allowing you to gain the depth of knowledge you seek. For example, if you’re researching how to boost event revenue, a book might cover common pitfalls, best practices, and even top event ideas for generating revenue.
  • Wide range of topics. Although books generally dive deeply into one subject, that doesn’t mean that you’re out of luck if you’re researching multiple subjects. There are millions of unique books out there on a variety of topics, making it easy for you to find one that suits your needs. Plus, books give you access to many different perspectives, as it’s common to read two books on the same topic with very different viewpoints.
  • Variety of formats. While you may be thinking of the traditional paperback or hardback, books come in a variety of formats to fit your needs. If you’re looking for a way to maximize the value of your commute time, for example, you could purchase audiobooks and listen to them as you drive.

There’s a reason why books are an enduring learning resource for all types of industries. However, they also come with their drawbacks.

Drawbacks

Here are some of the drawbacks of books as an educational nonprofit resource:

  • Outdated information. Once a book is published, it could take months or years for new editions to come out. Depending on the age of the book, you may come across outdated information, making it difficult to use this resource to learn about new and trendy topics.
  • Difficult to find specific information. If you’re looking to learn about one specific topic, you might find that some books cover many miscellaneous subjects that are irrelevant to your nonprofit’s situation. This is especially true if you’re seeking information on a niche or specific topic.
  • Single perspective. Since most books have just one author, books often suffer from having a single perspective. Aside from personal biases, this can be an issue if the author does not have direct experience with your situation. For example, if you’re a small nonprofit, the advice of an author who has only worked in large organizations may not be applicable.

If you’re looking for a nonprofit educational resource on age-old topics such as starting fundraisers or appealing for donations, books are a great way to find the information you seek. However, if you’re seeking more specific advice or knowledge on trends that are just cropping up, then you may want to consider a different type of resource.

3. Conferences

Nonprofit conferences are large gatherings of nonprofit professionals and philanthropic-minded business professionals. They are an excellent way to gain knowledge, advance professional development, and acquire the training you need to excel in your field. Plus, they cover a wide range of key nonprofit areas to help your organization grow, from marketing to donor stewardship. Let’s learn more about the specific benefits and drawbacks of conferences.

Benefits

Here are some of the benefits of attending a nonprofit conference:

  • Newest information. One of the greatest selling points of conferences is that they often cover the newest information and trends occurring in the industry. If you aim to stay up-to-date with cutting-edge best practices, conferences are a great place to gain that knowledge.
  • Networking. Another benefit of conferences that most other nonprofit educational resources don’t offer is networking. Conferences are a gathering of like-minded individuals, making them great opportunities to connect with other professionals who you might work with or ask for mentorship. Plus, Getting Attention advises to connect with business professionals as well, as these relationships can lead to future corporate sponsorships.
  • Capacity building. Capacity building is defined as improving your organization’s ability to serve your beneficiaries. This involves developing competencies and skills that make you and your nonprofit more effective and sustainable. Conferences offer workshops and panels that will point you and your nonprofit in the right direction.

What makes conferences such great educational resources is that it’s a concentrated learning experience—you receive tons of new knowledge that you can then bring back and apply to your nonprofit. However, that’s not to say that they don’t have their drawbacks.

Drawbacks

Here are some of the drawbacks of conferences as an educational resource:

  • Expensive. Conferences are by far the most expensive educational resource in this article. From travel costs to ticket prices, attending a conference can quickly become unaffordable, making it difficult for professionals from smaller organizations to attend.
  • Stressful. Conferences are jam-packed with tons of activities, panels, and workshops. While that’s great for learning-focused professionals, it can also be very stressful to manage your schedule and plan out everything you want to experience. Plus, there might be event rescheduling or cancellations to contend with.
  • Implementing learning. After the conference is over and you return to normal life at your nonprofit, it can be difficult to implement the practices or strategies that you learned. There may be logistical challenges or even a lack of motivation, for example.

If you can afford it, attending conferences is a great way to expand your knowledge of the nonprofit industry and keep up to date with trends. However, if your budget is limited, that doesn’t mean that you’re unable to access the information conferences offer. Look out for conferences held in a hybrid or virtual format, as they drastically reduce costs by removing travel expenses.

Aside from these three, there are a variety of other nonprofit educational resources available to the curious professional, including webinars and podcasts. If, after reading this guide, you believe that none of these top types of resources are the best fit for you, don’t be afraid to do more research and seek out the knowledge you need. After all, you know what’s best for your personal development and what you need to better support your nonprofit’s beneficiaries!

To understand how your grantmaking organization can award funds quickly during a crisis, explore the tips and strategies in this guide.

Crisis Grantmaking: How to Manage and Award Funds Quickly

Crises can strike communities and organizations at any moment. When a natural disaster occurs, nonprofits scramble to gather the resources needed to aid their constituents and get them on the road to recovery. Grantmaking organizations like yours provide the funding that powers these relief efforts.

Because grantmakers are so integral to the work nonprofits do during crises, it’s paramount that you have a way to award grants with urgency. In this guide, we’ll cover strategies and considerations to keep in mind when a crisis happens:

  • Use grant management tools.
  • Be flexible.
  • Proactively prepare for the next crisis.

To award timely grants during a crisis, your standard grantmaking process must be streamlined. To get started, we’ll cover how you can efficiently use grant management tools to carry out tasks like administrative oversight and budget management.

Use grant management tools.

Grant management technology aims to streamline the necessary yet time-consuming tasks involved in managing grants, such as practicing due diligence, balancing budgets, and following up with grantees. During a crisis, these tools can work overtime to help your organization handle community outreach and a sudden influx of applications.

Investing in its full-featured grants management solution is the logical next step for organizations already using Salesforce. Salesforce Grants Management has everything grantmakers need to oversee grant management, works seamlessly with other Salesforce tools, and helps grantmakers plan for special circumstances.

The Grants Management package offers the same features included in the Outbound Funds Module, which is used by any organization that awards funding as a part of its mission. According to Fíonta’s guide to grants management, Grants Management includes more specific features for grantmakers, such as:

  • Fully customizable application templates. Build a unique application process based on your organization’s values and philanthropic priorities. Additionally, you can create abbreviated versions of your standard application form for times of crisis and mark them for expedited review.
  • Tools that standardize due diligence tasks. Due diligence tasks, like confirming tax-exempt status, are essential to determining each applicant’s eligibility. If your organization does not have a clearly defined process for completing these tasks, they could hinder the grantmaking process. Grants Management allows you to set up action plans defining the necessary steps and documents that anyone reviewing applications must complete. This ensures that due diligence tasks are completed the same way across your team without additional communication.
  • Budget management tools. Keeping a close eye on your budget is crucial to ensuring you have the funding available to deliver the grants promised. Grants Management allows you to track the grants you’ve awarded against your organization’s budget in minutes, keeping the process fast even in times of crisis.

With technology that streamlines and automates administrative tasks, your organization can balance awarding funds quickly and efficiently while still following all necessary procedures.

Be flexible.

During a crisis, nonprofit organizations desperately need supplies, volunteers, and funding. In these situations, be flexible to prioritize getting funding to the right organizations as quickly as possible.

Your organization might opt for more flexible grant-seeking requirements during a crisis by:

  • Shortening your application
  • Offering unrestricted funding and general operating support
  • Fast-tracking approval processes by limiting administrative requirements
  • Temporarily relaxing follow-up procedures until the crisis has passed
  • Offering extensions on existing grants
  • Adjusting evaluation criteria and expectations for this time

As with other aspects of the grant management process, technology can help you make these changes quickly. For example, by integrating your website with your CRM, you can ensure applicants receive the most up-to-date information possible about your grant process and available funding. Doing so ensures that you make the application process as convenient, timely, and hassle-free as possible.

Proactively prepare for the next crisis.

Crises and their impact are indeed unpredictable. While this makes it challenging to pinpoint when a disaster might strike, you can prepare for it by being proactive. This approach allows you to develop a standardized grantmaking procedure that runs smoothly for grantmakers and grant-seekers.

Learn from past events and put a standardized crisis grantmaking procedure in place. As a part of these preparations, your organization should:

  • Determine adjusted guidelines and requirements. If your organization chooses to relax some of its guidelines during a crisis, decide how you will do so before the crisis. For example, under these special circumstances, you might not ask grant applicants to include a cover letter, a detailed budget breakdown, and their organizational background.
  • Plan its rapid response protocol. Application reviews and approvals need to be fast-tracked during these scenarios. Determine who will be responsible for each step in the review process and outline your adjusted procedures, so staff members understand how and why it deviates from the standard process.
  • Conduct risk assessments. While many crises, like natural disasters, are unpredictable, you can still determine levels of risk in advance. This will help you identify potential crises that could arise and develop plans for those scenarios. If you regularly award grants to nonprofits that offer aid in areas prone to flooding, your organization can closely monitor the weather, identify grantees whose constituents are likely to be by flooding, and proactively contact trusted long-time grantees who may need emergency funding.

Additionally, consider setting aside funds specifically reserved for crisis situations. Analyze data from past crises to determine how much funding is needed, and weigh this number against your organization’s budget. Setting aside this money in advance will save you from shifting funding around or adjusting your budget.

Once the dust has settled, take the time to reflect on your approach during the crisis. Identify strengths and weaknesses, ranging from your timeliness to how easy it was for nonprofits to find your grants. If possible, continue to support the affected organizations after the crisis to fuel their efforts as other donations trail off.

Read this guide to be inspired by these sports-themed fundraising ideas.

4 Fundamental Tips for Hosting a Sports-Themed Fundraiser

Sports have a way of bringing people together that’s unlike anything else. People also tend to be passionate about sports, so when you combine that passion with a good cause, you have a winning option for a fundraising event. Whether you’re raising money for a school team, your nonprofit’s general fund, a new outreach initiative, or other funding need, these tips for a sports-themed fundraising event will engage your community and get folks competing for a good cause.

Tip 1: Be Strategic About the Sport You Choose

The possibilities for a sports-themed event are endless, you’ll want to be strategic when choosing the focus of your sports-related event. The key is understanding your audience and the sport that they’ll best respond to. You don’t necessarily have to limit yourself to a physical sport either—esports, fantasy teams, or bracket challenges are also possibilities. Some popular charity sports events include:

  • Charity golf tournament
  • Volleyball tournament
  • Soccer shootout
  • Softball or baseball tournament
  • 3-on-3 basketball tournament
  • Walkathon or bikeathon
  • Fun run or walk
  • Dodgeball tournament
  • Mini-March Madness bracket challenge
  • Swim-a-thon
  • Online e-sports tournament

When choosing the sport that will work best for your organization or audience, you might first conduct a quick survey to garner feedback from your donors and constituents to see what interests them. Next, take the following considerations into account as you start planning:

  • Time of year. If your sport is played outdoors, you’ll need to choose a time of year with favorable weather in your area. If you’re hoping to involve families, be sure the event doesn’t overlap with the school day.
  • Budget. Some sports-related events come with a fair amount of overhead, including facility rental, signage, trophies or awards, food and beverage, advertising, and equipment rental. Create a loose budget so you have an idea of how much you’ll need to spend to get the event off the ground.
  • Facility availability. Research host facilities in your area and check their availability. You might ask the facility about the days and times of year they recommend to maximize participation.
  • Donor preferences. Use the results of your surveys and informal conversations with your audience to see what option is the most appealing (and they’re most likely to support with their participation). 
  • Relevance to your cause. Consider how the type of event relates to or can be connected to your mission in some way. This helps participants better understand what they’re helping raise money for. 

Tip 2: Incorporate Revenue-Boost Elements

Think about how you’ll generate revenue from your event. Participant registration fees, spectator tickets, sponsorships, and donation appeals are common, base revenue sources, but you’ll want to think broader and find other ways to boost fundraising. These revenue boosters often add additional fun and excitement to the event, making registrants eager to participate. GolfStatus recommends the following ideas to raise more dollars from your event:

  • Sport-specific contests. Add one or more contests that are specific to the sport, such as a hole-in-one or putting contest for a charity golf tournament or a three-point shot contest for a basketball tournament. Participants love testing their skill (or luck!) for the chance to win a prize.
  • Live or silent auctions. Seek donations for the items you’ll include in your auction to raise even more money. Consider using a mobile bidding platform so folks can make bids during the sporting event itself.
  • Raffles. Much like auction items, you can boost fundraising by selling raffle tickets for donated prizes. Make it easy for folks to buy raffle tickets when they register, when they check in for the event, and throughout the event.
  • Food and drink tickets. Work with a sponsor to donate food and beverages and sell tickets to attendees. Be sure to check with the host facility on any restrictions or regulations about outside food and drink.
  • Mini-games. Have fun and get creative in creating mini-games or contests to add to your event! Look for ways to incorporate your nonprofit’s cause in the games to help participants make a tangible connection to your cause. For example, if your nonprofit helps build homes for underprivileged families, you could hold a putting contest using building tools like sledgehammers or levels. 

Tip 3: Sell Sponsorships & Create Partnerships

Sponsorships are an incredibly powerful component of fundraising events. They provide a sizable portion of the event’s income, offset hard costs, add credibility to the event and your organization, and help forge partnerships with businesses for additional support down the road. Sports-focused events are particularly appealing to prospective sponsors—sponsorships are a well-known part of sports culture and provide a ton of brand exposure and lift to the sponsoring business while raising dollars for your nonprofit.

  • Make a list of event costs. Look at all the hard costs associated with the event, from facility rental, signage, and meals to entertainment, games, and attendee gifts, and sell sponsorships to cover them. 
  • Create sponsorship levels and packages. Offering different sponsorship levels allows more businesses to get involved and support your event at a dollar amount that fits into their marketing or charitable budgets.
  • Reach out to past supporters. Start with local businesses who have supported you in some way in the past, whether it was for another fundraising event or general support for your organization.
  • Use your networks. Tap into your planning team, staff, or board of directors to see who might have contacts at area businesses to make a short list of potential sponsors to go after.
  • Create personalized pitches and sponsorships. Work with businesses to determine what their goals are for sponsoring your event and find ways to help them get the biggest ROI. That might mean creating a custom sponsorship and corresponding pitch for some sponsors, but both you and the business will end up meeting your goals.
  • Outline the benefits of corporate philanthropy. When you communicate with potential sponsors, be sure to highlight how corporate philanthropy benefits your sponsors just as much as it does your event.

Once the event is over, it’s crucial to follow up with sponsors to thank them for their support and continue to cultivate the relationship for broader organizational support.

Tip 4: Use Technology to Manage Your Event and its Data

The information you collect as part of your fundraising event is powerful and paints a picture of who is supporting you through sports-related events, your organization’s ROI fundraiser, and where you should focus your event fundraising in the future. Nonprofit event planners should make data collection and management a priority and find ways to streamline and simplify its collection and management. Some fundraising metrics to monitor include:

  • Event signups (teams and individual participants and spectators)
  • Attendee conversion rate 
  • Total dollars raised
  • Average donation amount
  • Cost per participant
  • Attendee retention rate
  • Volunteer signup and retention rate

Collecting this important information is easier than you might think with event management software tailored for nonprofit needs. Look for platforms that are designed specifically for the sport your event is leveraging. For instance, if you’re hosting a charity golf fundraiser, you might consider using software with golf tournament planning and execution in mind.

Final Thoughts

These tips will set you up for success if you’re considering a sports-related fundraising event. Start by determining which sport you’ll focus on, look for ways to boost revenue, create and sell sponsorships, and track metrics. With a little preparation and data-driven thinking, your fundraiser can be a hole-in-one and make everyone feel like winners!

This image shows the title of this post — 6 Tips to Create an Ambassador Program for Your Nonprofit — next to cartoon people representing nonprofit ambassadors.

6 Tips to Create an Ambassador Program for Your Nonprofit

The nonprofit marketing space isn’t as straightforward as it once was. It’s easier than ever for nonprofits to connect with their supporters, but that also means there’s a lot of competition for donors’ attention.

One effective way to make your organization stand out is to create an ambassador program. Ambassadors can take the reins during fundraising or marketing campaigns, promoting your organization to their personal networks. This form of peer-to-peer marketing is highly compelling because people are more likely to support a cause that’s recommended by someone they know and trust.  

To ensure your ambassador program gets up and running quickly and yields a high return on investment, we’ll explore these top tips: 

  1. Identify the right recruits.
  2. Brand your ambassador program.
  3. Create clear roles and expectations for ambassadors.
  4. Empower ambassadors with training and resources. 
  5. Promote recognition and a sense of community. 
  6. Evaluate and adapt your program as needed. 

Supporters often want more than just to help promote your nonprofit’s cause — they want to feel like members of your community. An ambassador program gives them an outlet to express their passion for your mission and share their enthusiasm with others. 

1. Identify the right recruits.

Effective nonprofit influencers can be found almost anywhere. The best recruits for your ambassador program will all share one trait in common: a deep sense of commitment to your cause. 

Search for individuals who have a strong existing relationship with your organization and are particularly vocal about their love for your cause. Potential ambassadors could be: 

  • Donors 
  • Volunteers
  • Peer-to-peer fundraisers
  • Beneficiaries of your programs
  • Social media followers 

Use software solutions like your donor management system and volunteer management platform to identify long-time, highly engaged supporters. Filter your database by length of involvement or number of interactions to find your top supporters.

Then, personally reach out to these individuals with an invitation to join your ambassador program. Reference their past involvement to explain why you’re reaching out. For example, you might say: “Eliza, we are so excited to invite you to join our new ambassador program. Your passionate volunteer involvement and past peer-to-peer fundraising experience make you a perfect fit for our new program.”

2. Brand your ambassador program.

You’ll have an easier time bringing recruits on board when your ambassador program looks official and professional. Create an eye-catching brand for your program by thinking through the program’s: 

  • Name
  • Logo 
  • Tagline
  • Colors

Incorporate these brand elements into your promotional materials, such as your social media posts and personal emails to potential participants. 

For example, here’s a flyer for a fictional environmental nonprofit ambassador program with a cohesive brand:

This image shows a flyer representing a fictional “Wildlife Warriors” ambassador program. It’s encouraging people to get involved by scanning a QR code.

This flyer features the organization’s brand name, logo, and a QR code that potential participants can scan for more information.

You can also boost the sense of community by creating branded merchandise for your program, such as hats, T-shirts, or name tags. Offering new ambassadors matching items will help them feel like members of an exclusive team.

3. Create clear roles and expectations for ambassadors.

Ultimately, your ambassador program shouldn’t just provide new engagement opportunities for supporters — it should also tangibly support your marketing and fundraising efforts. 

Take the following steps to ensure your ambassador program bolsters your existing strategies: 

  • Set goals for your ambassadors internally. Determine the metrics you will track to assess your ambassador program’s effectiveness. For instance, you may track key performance indicators like peer-to-peer fundraising participation rates, donations that can be attributed to ambassadors’ influence, or social media engagement rates. 
  • Define clear roles and responsibilities. For example, will ambassadors promote your peer-to-peer fundraisers? Will they share social media content? Will they speak on your behalf at events? All of the above may be possible. Delineate clear roles so that potential participants understand what will be expected of them. 
  • Establish guidelines for program membership. Create clear regulations that ambassadors should follow when acting on behalf of your cause. For example, you might establish rules regarding the type of content ambassadors can share on behalf of your organization, such as pre-approved images or messages. 

When potential ambassadors understand what your program entails, you can narrow down your recruit list to just individuals who feel comfortable with the role expectations. And with clear metrics to guide your program, you can determine whether it’s a worthwhile use of your time and resources. 

4. Empower ambassadors with training and resources. 

Invite your new ambassadors to a training session to help them get up and running in their new roles. Depending on how spread out your ambassadors are, you might host a video or in-person meeting. Reiterate the role expectations and let ambassadors get to know one another with some icebreaker activities. 

Also, craft a training manual for ambassadors to follow while promoting your organization. Your manual should include your brand guidelines and ambassador program regulations. You should also include marketing materials that ambassadors can use in their promotional efforts, such as: 

  • Personalized donation page links. Give each ambassador a personalized donation page link with a custom URL. You can even let them personalize the page with information about their connection to your cause and photos of themselves participating in your events or volunteer opportunities. 
  • Custom graphics. Create branded graphics that ambassadors can use in their promotional materials, such as fundraising thermometers or infographics. You can use a tool such as the Bloomerang fundraising thermometer generator to quickly create a graphic with your nonprofit’s brand colors. 
  • Messaging guidelines. Provide ambassadors with a variety of messages they can use in social media posts or emails. Make sure they’re clear about your nonprofit’s tone and brand voice. For example, you might advise them to strike a friendly, approachable tone in their social media posts.

Let ambassadors know that they can come to you at any time with questions or concerns. You may even set up a mentorship or buddy program within your ambassador group to ensure each participant has at least one peer they can turn to for support. 

5. Promote recognition and a sense of community. 

Fostering a strong community among your ambassadors can encourage program retention. Plus, when ambassadors have fun supporting your mission and feel engaged in your cause, their promotional efforts will be much more genuine. 

Pull from your donor recognition playbook to develop an appreciation approach for your ambassador program. Show your gratitude by: 

  • Offering ambassadors-only communication avenues, such as a Facebook group or group chat
  • Publicly recognizing ambassadors on social media and within blog posts
  • Sending thank-you gifts and personalized gratitude messages
  • Sharing wins with ambassadors, such as donation increases, to highlight their impact

Celebrate your ambassadors’ accomplishments through meet-ups and events such as a happy hour or picnic. You can even host an award ceremony to honor your most successful ambassadors and thank them for their hard work. 

6. Evaluate and adapt your program as needed. 

As your ambassador program gets underway, you might find that certain strategies aren’t working out as expected. Remain flexible and adjust your program when necessary to continue offering a high-quality experience to participants and ensure that your program effectively supports your nonprofit. 

Continuously evaluate your program by taking the following steps: 

  • Survey ambassadors to ask for their feedback on your program. Ask questions about their level of satisfaction with the program, any suggestions they have for improving the program, and areas where they may need more support. Highlight any trends in their responses and incorporate their feedback as applicable. 
  • Track metrics to assess progress made toward your goals. Keep an eye on the key performance indicators you identified during the planning process. Note any drastic increases or decreases in your metrics, investigate potential causes, and adjust your approach accordingly. 

Supporting your ambassadors every step of the way is one of the most effective ways to ensure a high ROI for your program. Take ambassadors’ feedback seriously to ensure you’re continuing to meet their needs and providing a positive experience.

Once your ambassador program gets up and running, it can be a powerful addition to your marketing strategy. Your ambassadors can help you connect with new potential donors and spread awareness of your mission more effectively. With these tips, you’ll make sure they have everything they need to perform their roles at a high level.

In this guide, we'll explain how to optimize a Google Grant account in 7 easy steps.

How to Optimize a Google Grant Account in 7 Easy Steps

The Google Ad Grant is an invaluable tool for reaching potential donors and supporters online. While receiving the grant and setting up your account is a great first step, it takes more work to leverage the full potential of your free ad spend.

For the best results, you need to maintain and optimize your account. Here are seven steps to get started:

Whether you’re a seasoned digital marketer or a nonprofit professional new to Google Ad Grants, these insights will help you improve your online visibility, attract more donors and volunteers, and make a greater impact in the communities you serve.

Looking to optimize your Google Grant account? Click here to partner with our recommended agency, Getting Attention.

Before diving into the seven strategies for optimizing a Google Grant account, let’s answer some frequently asked questions.

What is a Google Grant Account?

The Google Ad Grant provides eligible nonprofits with $10,000 worth of in-kind advertising on Google Search each month, helping them reach a wider audience and connect with more potential supporters online.

After applying for the grant and being accepted into the program, nonprofits receive an account through which they can create and display ads on Google without the need to make any payments.

The Importance of Optimizing a Google Grant Account

If you want to make the most of $10,000 in free ad spend per month, you need to be willing to adapt and make improvements on an ongoing basis. Here are a few reasons why optimizing a Google Grant account is important:

  • Improved ad performance: Optimization techniques, such as keyword research, ad copy testing, and audience targeting, will help your ads appear in relevant searches and attract clicks.
  • Maximum impact: By optimizing your Google Grant account, you can ensure that your ads reach the right audience and attract engaged users who are interested in your nonprofit’s mission and services. This, in turn, can lead to increased donations, volunteer sign-ups, and support for your cause.
  • Compliance with Google’s requirements: Google has specific requirements and guidelines for participating in the Google Ad Grant program. Failure to meet these requirements can result in account suspension, making optimization crucial to maintaining eligibility.

Remember, even with the Google Ad Grant, your nonprofit is competing with paid advertisers for ad space. Optimization helps level the playing field, allowing you to stand out and succeed in the highly competitive digital advertising landscape.

7 Steps to Optimize Your Google Grant Account

Now that you understand the importance of optimizing a Google Grant account, let’s explain how to actually do it!

1. Partner with a qualified Google Ad Grants agency.

Without prior experience, optimizing a Google Grant Account can be a daunting task. Thankfully, there are Google Ad Grants agencies that provide valuable expertise and insight into the process.

Here are just a few areas of our recommended agency, Getting Attention’s expertise:

  • Account setup: Getting Attention assists nonprofits in setting up their Google Ad Grants account correctly, ensuring compliance with all program policies and eligibility requirements.
  • Google Grant reactivation: If your account lapses or is disabled, Getting Attention will get your Google Ad Grant reactivated in no time, so you can continue doing the work that matters.
  • Keyword research: Getting Attention conducts thorough keyword research to identify relevant and high-impact keywords aligned with your mission and goals.
  • Campaign monitoring: The Getting Attention team will regularly monitor the performance of ad campaigns, identify areas for improvement, and make data-driven optimizations to enhance results.

By working with an agency like Getting Attention, you can leverage the expertise of professionals who specialize in mission-driven marketing and digital advertising. This partnership will help your nonprofit create more impactful ad campaigns and attract support for your cause.

For more information on the benefits of working with a Google Ad Grant agency, watch this video:

2. Conduct regular keyword research.

Keyword research helps nonprofits understand which search terms and phrases are most frequently used by their target audience and allows them to optimize their ad campaigns accordingly. By regularly conducting keyword research, you ensure that your online content is optimized for the search terms and phrases that are most relevant to your cause.

Keep these tips in mind as you choose your keywords:

  • Understand your nonprofit’s goals. Start by clarifying your nonprofit’s advertising goals. Determine what specific actions you want users to take when they visit your website. For example, do you want them to donate, sign up for a newsletter, volunteer, or learn more about your programs? Understanding your goals will help you identify the most relevant keywords to target.
  • Brainstorm relevant keywords. Consider what potential supporters might search for when looking for organizations like yours and compile a list of relevant keywords. Include general keywords as well as specific terms that align with your goals. For instance, if you run an animal shelter, you might target the keywords “pet adoption” and “how to adopt a rescue dog.”
  • Use Google’s Keyword Planner. Google’s Keyword Planner is a free tool within Google Ads that helps you find relevant keywords and get insights into their search volume and competition. Enter your list of keywords into the Keyword Planner to see how frequently they are searched and get suggestions for other related keywords.

It’s also important to update the negative keywords that you want to exclude from triggering your ads. For example, if your nonprofit focuses on environmental conservation, you may want to add “hunting” or “pollution” as negative keywords to ensure your ads are shown only to the most relevant audiences.

3. Create well-structured ad groups.

Google Ad Groups are a way of organizing ads within your account. An ad group typically contains a set of ads that share similar targets, such as keywords, locations, or devices.

This diagram illustrates the required Google Ad Grant account structure.

Well-defined ad groups allow for better targeting, ensuring that the right messaging is delivered to the right people.

Here’s an example of how a marine conservation nonprofit might organize ads according to the two different programs they offer:

Ad Group 1: “Marine Wildlife Conservation”
Keywords: Marine wildlife conservation, ocean conservation, marine species protection
Ad Copy: “Help Protect Marine Wildlife. Support Our Ocean Conservation Efforts Today!”

Ad Group 2: “Beach Cleanup Volunteers”
Keywords: Beach cleanup, ocean cleanup volunteer, coastal cleanup
Ad Copy: “Join Our Beach Cleanup Volunteers. Make a Difference for Our Oceans.”

Continuously review and refine your keyword list for each ad group. Add new relevant keywords and remove irrelevant or low-performing ones.

4. Write compelling ad copy.

Well-crafted ad copy encourages users to click on the ad to learn more about your organization. To maximize your click-through rate (CTR), take these steps:

  • Craft compelling headlines. Write attention-grabbing headlines that are concise, clear, and highlight the unique value proposition of your nonprofit.
  • Use relevant keywords. Incorporate relevant keywords into your ad copy, especially in the headline and description. When users see the keywords they searched for in your ad, it increases the ad’s relevance, making them more likely to click.
  • Include a strong call-to-action (CTA). Include a clear and persuasive CTA that encourages users to take the desired action. Use verbs to prompt action, such as “Donate Now,” “Volunteer Today,” or “Learn More.”

If you’re in need of inspiration, review other top-ranking ads to see what they’re doing right.

For instance, let’s say you’re trying to target keywords related to food insecurity. Do a quick Google search to see what’s ranking number #1 for these queries:

This screenshot of a SERP shows the top ranking headlines for the search term "how to fight food insecurity" and is an example of how to optimize a Google Grant account.

Then, craft your ad copy with these top-ranking ads in mind, possibly emulating those popular “How to” statements in the headline.

5. Establish a landing page strategy.

Landing pages that you link in your ads should be designed to convert visitors into donors, volunteers, or supporters. For the best results, ensure that your landing pages are:

  • Relevant: The content and messaging on the landing page should directly align with the ad copy and the user’s search intent. Make sure visitors receive the information they’re looking for after clicking on the ad.
  • Mobile-friendly: Given the prevalence of mobile users, it’s crucial to have a mobile-friendly landing page. Ensure that the page is responsive and displays correctly on various screen sizes.
  • Visually appealing: The landing page should feature design and branding elements that reinforce your nonprofit’s identity and create a cohesive user experience. This includes using your organization’s logo, typography, and color scheme to establish brand recognition.

Conduct A/B testing (also known as split testing) on your landing pages to identify which elements resonate best with your audience. Continuously re-test and optimize these elements over time to improve the page’s performance.

6. Use conversion tracking.

Google Ads conversion tracking allows advertisers to measure the effectiveness of their ad campaigns by tracking specific actions that users take after clicking on their ads. Not only is setting up conversion tracking beneficial to your ad performance, but it’s also a requirement of the Google Ad Grant. Here’s how it works:

  • Advertisers define the specific actions they want to track as conversions. This could be completing a donation, filling out a contact form, signing up for a newsletter, or any other valuable action that aligns with the campaign’s objectives.
  • Once the conversion actions are defined, Google Ads generates a unique snippet of code called a “conversion tag” or “tracking pixel” for each conversion action. This code needs to be placed on the relevant web page or confirmation page that users see after completing the desired action (i.e., the “thank you” page after a successful donation).
  • When a user clicks on an ad and performs the desired action on the website, such as donating, the conversion tag on the confirmation page is triggered.
  • The triggered conversion tag sends data back to Google Ads, indicating that the conversion action has been completed. Google Ads then associates this data with the specific ad click that led to the conversion.

In the Google Ads dashboard, your team can view conversion data, including the number of conversions, conversion rate, and cost per conversion. Armed with that data, evaluate the performance of your campaigns and identify which ads are driving the most valuable actions.

7. Stay up-to-date on Google Ad Grant policies.

The main policies of the Google Ad Grant program include maintaining a minimum 5% click-through rate (CTR) across the account, adhering to a maximum cost-per-click (CPC) bid limit of $2, and using only text-based ads without images or videos. Nonprofits must also comply with Google’s website policy, ensuring transparency and relevance in their ad campaigns and website content.

Since these policies are subject to change, it’s important to stay informed. To keep up with Google Ad Grant policies and maintain compliance, follow these steps:

  • Visit the Google Ad Grants website. Regularly check the official Google Ad Grants website for the most up-to-date information on program policies, eligibility requirements, and guidelines.
  • Subscribe to certified Google Ad Grant newsletters. Sign up for newsletters to receive updates, announcements, and insights directly from Google.
  • Follow Google Ads and Google for Nonprofits on social media. Follow Google Ads and Google for Nonprofits on social media platforms like LinkedIn. They often share important updates and news about the Ad Grant program.

Set regular calendar reminders to check for policy updates and review your Google Ad Grant account’s compliance.

Subscribe to Getting Attention’s Google Ad Grant Newsletter

A Final Note About Optimizing Your Google Grant Account

Although optimizing a Google Ad Grant account requires consistent time and effort, it will ultimately lead to increased visibility for your nonprofit.

If you’re still not sure where to start, remember there are Google Ad Grant agencies like Getting Attention that will work alongside your nonprofit to create a digital advertising strategy that aligns with your goals.

For more information on Google Ad Grants, check out these additional resources:

Ready to make the most of your $10,000 a month in free ad spend? Click here to partner with our recommended agency, Getting Attention.
Learn how to apply for the Google Ad Grant in this comprehensive guide.

How to Apply for the Google Ad Grant: A Comprehensive Guide

If you’re a nonprofit professional looking for an affordable way to expand your organization’s online presence and reach a wider audience, then you’re in the right place. The Google Ad Grant offers eligible nonprofits up to $10,000 a month in free advertising on Google.

But with so many organizations vying for the grant, how do you stand out from the competition and secure the funding you deserve? That’s where this guide comes in.

Whether you’re a tech-savvy marketer or a nonprofit newbie, we’ll teach you how to apply for the Google Ad Grant and ensure that you’re prepared to maximize the benefits of free ad spend. Let’s get started!

FAQs About the Google Ad Grant Application

Before we dive into the specifics of the Google Ad Grant application process, let’s answer some frequently asked questions.

1. What is the Google Ad Grant?

The Google Ad Grant is a powerful digital marketing tool that provides eligible nonprofits with up to $10,000 in free ad spend per month. The grant can be used to create search ads in order to drive more traffic to the nonprofit’s website or to attract more donations and volunteers.

Here’s how it works: With a Google Ad Grants account, you create ads to show on Google Search. When a user searches for terms relevant to your nonprofit’s cause, your ads will appear either independently or in positions below paid ads.

For more information on the Google Ad Grant, watch this video:

2. What are the benefits of applying for the Google Ad Grant?

The Google Ad Grant program empowers nonprofits to target specific keywords relevant to their cause and optimize their online presence. That way, when someone searches for a term related to your mission, your content is most likely to appear at the top of the search results and attract their attention (as well as their support).

Plus, the Google Ad Grant program provides access to free ad spend. Rather than having to allocate a significant portion of your budget to digital marketing, you can invest in other critical areas of your organization’s operations and programs.

3. How long does the Google Ad Grant application process take?

The timeline for the application process can vary based on several factors, including the responsiveness of your nonprofit, the completeness of your application, and the volume of applications being reviewed by Google.

How to Apply for the Google Ad Grant in 5 Steps

Now that you know what the grant is and how it can benefit your nonprofit, let’s explore how to effectively apply for the Google Ad Grant:

This graphic lists 5 steps to applying for the Google Ad Grant, which will be written out in the text below.

1. Verify your organization’s eligibility

To be eligible to apply for the Google Ad Grant, your organization must:

  • Be a verified nonprofit. Nonprofits need to be a verified nonprofit in their country of operation. In the United States, this means achieving 501(c)(3) status.
  • Enroll in Google for Nonprofits or TechSoup. If your organization is not already registered with TechSoup or Google for Nonprofits, sign up and complete the registration process. These platforms help validate your nonprofit status.
  • Have a functional and secure website. You must have a functioning website with substantial content related to its mission and programs. The website should also be HTTP-certified.
  • Comply with Ad Grants policies. Agree to comply with all Google Ad Grants policies and guidelines, including those related to acceptable content, quality standards, and website requirements.

Keep in mind that eligibility requirements may vary slightly depending on the country or region where the nonprofit operates. Review the specific guidelines provided by Google for Nonprofits in your respective country to ensure you’re compliant.

3. Complete the Google Ad Grants enrollment process

Visit the Google Ad Grants website and follow the instructions to enroll your organization. Provide the necessary information about your nonprofit, such as:

  • Basic information about your nonprofit organization, such as its name, address, and website.
  • Your organization’s registered charity number or equivalent legal status documentation.
  • The location and type of activities your nonprofit conducts.
  • Your organization’s mission statement and how Google Ads will help further that mission.
  • A brief summary of your current online advertising efforts, if any.
  • A description of the target audience for your ads.
  • Your marketing goals and what you hope to achieve with the Ad Grants program.

It’s important to fill out the eligibility form accurately and completely, as incomplete or inaccurate information may delay or prevent your nonprofit from being approved for the Google Ad Grants program.

3. Build a strong website

Ensure that your website has relevant and high-quality content that aligns with your organization’s mission and the keywords you plan to target in your ad campaigns.

In addition to designing informative and engaging pages that provide value to visitors, you should:

  • Write clear calls to action (CTAs). Place clear and compelling calls to action throughout your website to encourage visitors to take desired actions, such as donating, signing up for newsletters, volunteering, or attending events. Make the CTAs prominent, easily clickable, and enticing, so visitors are more likely to engage with your organization.
  • Ensure a mobile-friendly design. Optimize your website for mobile devices as a significant portion of online traffic comes from mobile users. Ensure that your website is responsive and provides a seamless user experience across different screen sizes and devices. Mobile-friendly websites are preferred by Google and offer a better experience for your visitors.
  • Set up conversion tracking. Implement conversion tracking and use analytics tools, such as Google Analytics, to measure the effectiveness of your Google Ad Grant campaigns and website performance. Track key metrics like click-through rates, conversions, and bounce rates to gain insights into the impact of your ads and identify areas for improvement.

By following these tips, you can enhance the user experience, increase engagement, and maximize the impact of your Google Ad Grant campaigns. Remember to regularly review and optimize your website based on user behavior and campaign performance data to continuously improve your results.

4. Craft compelling campaigns

Develop an effective advertising strategy to promote your organization and its initiatives. This involves:

  • Identifying target keywords. Conduct thorough keyword research to identify relevant and targeted keywords for your ad campaigns. Use tools like Google Keyword Planner to discover keywords with high search volume and low competition. Focus on keywords that align with your nonprofit’s mission, services, or target audience.
  • Creating engaging ad copy. Craft compelling ad copy that grabs the attention of your audience. Highlight your nonprofit’s unique value proposition and include a clear call to action. Use language that resonates with your target audience and showcases the impact of their support.
  • Designing compelling landing pages. Ensure that your ad campaigns direct users to relevant landing pages on your website. For instance, if you’re asking users to donate, the CTA should link to the donation page on your website. These pages should have clear and concise information and easy navigation to encourage conversions.

Continuously test and optimize your ad campaigns to improve performance. Conduct A/B testing by creating variations of your ads and measuring their effectiveness. Test different headlines, ad copy, call to actions, and visuals to identify what resonates best with your audience and drives higher click-through rates and conversions.

5. Submit your application

Once you submit your application for the Google Ad Grant program, it will be reviewed by Google to ensure compliance with the program guidelines and policies. As previously mentioned, the approval process varies but typically takes a few weeks. During this time, Google may request additional information or clarifications.

Then, you’ll receive a notification from Google regarding the status of your application. If approved, you can begin using your Google Ad Grant to run ads and promote your nonprofit!

A Final Note About the Google Ad Grant Application

The Google Ad Grants program offers a valuable opportunity for nonprofit organizations to promote their missions online with free Google Ads. If you need assistance throughout the application process, consider working with our recommended Google Ad Grants agency: Getting Attention.

Their team of experts will ensure that your nonprofit meets the eligibility requirements, submits a successful application, and leverages the Google Ad Grant effectively.

For more information on the Google Ad Grant, check out these additional resources:

Incorporating Events into Your Member Recruitment Strategy

Event planning is one of many important parts of effective association management. A well-planned association event not only boosts your revenue and engages existing members, but it can recruit new ones as well.

Members make an association. And recruiting new members is just as important as retaining current members! Recruiting helps association growth and keeps numbers up when old members leave.

In this guide, we’ll discuss five essential ways your organization can incorporate events into your member recruitment strategy to enhance your results.

1. Determine your target audience

Before you begin planning an upcoming event to increase member recruitment, it’s important to understand your association’s target audience. There are different reasons for someone to attend an association event. Here are some common motivations:

  • Education: For attendees who want to learn more about a specific subject, consider having a speaker or a workshop on a specific topic relevant to your association.
  • Professional networking: For those who want to build connections for their professional social network, hold roundtable discussions, lectures, and workshops. Just make sure attendees have ample downtime between activities to socialize.
  • Socializing: Many people attend events to meet new people. Almost any kind of event will work for this! Try holding trivia or other fun activities that get people involved and talking.
  • Community involvement: Many attendees are interested in giving back to their community, so consider holding charity events that help them make a positive difference.

By understanding how to appeal to potential members’ values and interests, you can choose the right type of event to attract them.

2. Plan how you’ll engage potential members

Plan your association event with potential members in mind. You should always be thinking about the specific individuals you’re trying to draw in. It’s always a good idea to plan as much of your event in advance as possible. This way, everyone helping at the event knows exactly what they’re meant to be doing and how they can connect to potential members.

Consider hosting an event that both members and non-members are free to attend. Or consider inviting potential members to attend a members-only event as guests. No matter the event, you can prepare welcome packets containing important membership details to pass out to these non-members at the event.

To provide added convenience to potential members, consider making your event hybrid or virtual so that even those who may be unable to attend in person can participate.

At this point in time, most people are very familiar with attending virtual events, which makes it easy and convenient. This also broadens your audience and lets you reach more people. You can reach people who may live further away but are still excited to join. 

Having this option is a great way to attract people who are interested in your association but haven’t been able to make it to in-person events previously. They’ll be even more excited for this one! 

3. Enlist your current members to help at your event

Make the most of your existing members’ connections by enlisting them to help with member recruitment at your next association event.

Having current members there is a great way to introduce potential members to your association. It’s also a great way for potential members to form connections within the association through current members. A personal connection goes a long way.

Ask for volunteers from your members to become ambassadors at the event. They can encourage potential members to join your association by:

  • Welcoming guests
  • Sharing their experience as a member
  • Answering membership-related questions
  • Introducing them to other members at the event

Furthermore, encourage existing members to invite a non-member acquaintance, work colleague, or friend who might be interested in becoming a member.

Using existing networks is a great way to find new members. A person coming to an event through someone they know is more likely to join up if they have a personal connection to your organization already. 

4. Emphasize member benefits

Make it easy for event attendees to embark on their membership journey to your association by highlighting specific member benefits at the event. Show them why they should join! 

At the event, you can include benefits in your welcome packet. You can also consider passing out one-page sheets listing the benefits. Having the benefits highlighted in their own handout can be helpful to make them more clear.

You can also go into more detail if they’re separate, rather than trying to fit it all into the welcome packet, which should be concise. Provide a link to your website on anything you hand out, or another place where they can learn more.

Just a few member benefit ideas you can highlight include:

  • Discounts and coupons
  • Member directory
  • Mentorship programs
  • Exclusive online content
  • Professional training and certifications

Member benefits will be different for every association. Again, think about your audience. Who are they? What do you think would benefit them? What do you think they’d be most interested in?

5. Follow up with event attendees

In addition to your usual thank-you emails to everyone who attended your event, follow up specifically with your non-member event attendees about joining your association.

Give them a clear path, both during and after the event, for how to join your organization. Make the process as easy and clear as possible. Nothing stops a potential member more than a lengthy and difficult-to-understand application process. Having a straightforward application process should always be an important part of your member recruitment strategy.

There are many things you can fit into a thank you email. Here are some suggestions:

  • First of all, thank them for coming!
  • Tell them about the next event they can attend.
  • Link them to further information about your organization. This could be your website, which should have benefits laid out again, and a clear way to join your association.
  • Invite them to subscribe to a regular newsletter so they can hear about what’s happening next. These little updates and reminders help keep your organization in their mind and make them more likely to join.

Show them that you care about their experience with your organization by sending out post-event surveys to gather their feedback and make improvements for future events.

Events can give potential members a clearer picture of what membership in your association looks like. Therefore, it’s critical to plan an enjoyable and memorable event experience for all attendees. In this article, we’ve given five ways to help you improve your member recruitment strategy. Following these five tips will help turn your next recruitment event into a success!

Understanding the Fundraising Consultant Hiring Process

Understanding the Fundraising Consultant Hiring Process

Working with the right consultant can change the trajectory of your organization’s fundraising. No matter what kind of support you need, whether it’s planning a capital campaign or conducting a fundraising assessment, a fundraising consultant can help. 

But how do you find the perfect consultant for your organization, and how exactly do you hire one? To help you understand what the fundraising consultant hiring process looks like, we’ll cover the most important elements:

  • Assessing Your Organization’s Needs
  • Requests for Proposals (RFPs)
  • Consultant Research
  • Making Your Decision

Once you go through the hiring process, your nonprofit will end up with a valuable resource who can help you make lasting changes to your organization’s fundraising approach. Let’s dive in so you can start reaping those benefits!

Assessing Your Organization’s Needs

Similar to the process you go through when choosing new fundraising software to invest in, you’ll first need to determine exactly what you need from the consultant. Assess your resources, goals, and recent campaign performance to determine which areas of fundraising you need help with. 

Some common focus areas that fundraising consultants can assist you with include: 

  • Major donor research and cultivation: If you’re not meeting your fundraising goals because you don’t have enough major donors, a consultant can help you find the most likely prospects and strategically build relationships with them.
  • Capital campaigns: Need to fund a major building or project? Your fundraising consultant can conduct a feasibility study to make sure you’re ready, work with you to develop an effective case for support, and see you through the entire planning stage. Plus, they can provide you with ongoing guidance throughout the campaign.
  • Strategic planning: No matter what size campaign you’re planning, a qualified consultant will get familiar with your nonprofit’s needs and goals to develop a thorough campaign strategy designed to drive success.
  • General approach to fundraising: Maybe your team is new to hosting fundraisers or your traditional tactics just seem to be falling flat. Consultants can train your team on today’s fundraising best practices or even hire new staff members to support your organization’s long-term development.

After determining the type of fundraising support you’ll need from your consultant, be sure to  define specific goals for their involvement. What outcomes do you want to achieve with their help? Set concrete goals, such as securing 10 major gifts within the next year or increasing the total value of individual donations by 20%.

Request for Proposals (RFPs)

Next, you’ll use the goals you set to create an RFP, or Request for Proposals. RFPs are documents your organization creates to outline why you’re searching for a consultant, explain what you’re looking for, and ask prospects to send in proposals for consideration. 

RFPs keep your search on track and give prospective consultants a clear idea of the services you require. To write one effectively, Donorly’s fundraising consultant hiring guide breaks down everything your RFP should include:

  • Purpose: Explain why you’re hiring a consultant, what your specific needs are, and what you ultimately hope to achieve. If you need them to work on a specific campaign, explain the basic purpose of the campaign here.
  • Organizational information: Give a quick overview of what your nonprofit does and the causes you support. Include information on how long you’ve been operating and the fundraising strategies and tools you already use, as well. 
  • Details about the project: Outline the scope, timeline, work expectations, and budget for the project the consultant will work on, including as much detail as possible.
  • Goals for the relationship: Define specific success measurements for the project and the consultant’s work. Include how and when you’ll evaluate progress. 
  • Submission guidelines: Let prospective consultants know everything their proposals need to include, and set a due date. 

Once you’ve created a draft, run the RFP by your board for final approval. After researching options and selecting consultants you’re interested in learning more about, you’ll send your RFP to each one. Each consultant will then use these guidelines to create their own proposals, which you’ll use to determine the best fit.

Consultant Research

Now that you’ve outlined your needs and goals in your RFP, you can begin searching for potential consultants!

There are multiple avenues for consultant research. Start by reaching out to your colleagues and connections at other nonprofits to ask for recommendations. You might attend nonprofit panels that fundraising consultants participate in to hear about their services. Or, conduct research online using general Google searches or by visiting reputable websites like The Giving Institute or AFP’s fundraising consultant directory. 

As you research consultants, pay attention to each one’s:

  • Services and specialties
  • Case studies and examples of their work
  • Type of organizations they typically work with 
  • Fundraising philosophies
  • Location or ability to work with you remotely

Take notes on every consultant that stands out throughout your research, then bring your team together to discuss your findings. Based on these factors, narrow down your options to a list of 5-10 consultants you think could be the best fit.

Making Your Decision

As soon as you have your list of prospective consultants, you can jump into the process of sending RFPs and evaluating the candidates. To make a decision, follow these steps:

  1. Reach out to consultants and send RFPs: Email or call everyone on your list before sending your RFP to state your interest. Introducing yourself upfront will help you get to know candidates and start relationships off on the right foot. After this initial outreach, send RFPs and give the consultants at least two weeks to send their proposals in.
  2. Review proposals: Compile a team of staff members to review the submitted proposals together and discuss each one’s merits. Then, select a few consultants you feel confident about and want to interview.
  3. Conduct interviews and check references: Sit down with each of your top contenders and ask them anything more you need to know. For example, if they’ll be training your team, ask them detailed questions about their fundraising training process. Ask for a few references at the interview, then use them to verify the quality of their work. 
  4. Create and send a contract: Once you’ve made your final decision, you can draft a contract! Include information about compensation, key performance indicators, and the scope of their responsibilities. 

To make your final choice, consider factors like the quality of the consultant’s previous work, how their proposal aligns with your needs, and their personal fit with your nonprofit’s culture. According to eCardWidget, your company culture is made up of your organizational values, attitudes, and practices. It’s important that everyone working with your nonprofit aligns with its culture to ensure satisfaction. 

The consultant hiring process can feel like a big time commitment, but think of it as an investment. The more careful thought and dedication you put into the process, the better results you’ll see when you find the right fit. Fundraising consultants can give your organization the tools to thrive for years to come and ultimately do more of what matters, so they’re worth taking the time to find.

The Damage of Nonprofit Employee Churn & How to Prevent It

We’re living in an unusual labor environment—historically low but rising unemployment rates, high inflation, conflicting signs that may or may not point to an impending recession. We’re also seeing highly active labor movements and changing norms following the significant changes brought about by the pandemic and Great Resignation.

Economic anxieties are at a high, so nonprofits naturally have a lot on their minds. When instability is on the radar, most organizations know to strengthen their donor and partner relationships while seeking new ways to diversify their revenue—but look inward, too.

The internal health of an organization is essential for its overall health. Employee retention plays a critically important role. 

Let’s take a closer look at the state of employee turnover for nonprofits. Why is it so harmful, and how can you prevent it?

What’s the average nonprofit turnover rate?

The voluntary turnover rate for the nonprofit sector averaged 19% in 2022. It also sits consistently higher than turnover at for-profit businesses.

Historically, 19% turnover is typical, but looking at recent years, we can see some interesting trends. The turnover rate rose to a high of 21% in 2019 but dropped to a low of 14% in 2020 (NonprofitHR). One possible explanation is that the disruptions of the pandemic and the drastically increased need for nonprofit services during that time kept many nonprofit professionals in their jobs. 

Since then, the turnover rate has steadily increased to pre-pandemic norms as part of the Great Resignation, with many employees across sectors finding new opportunities. Perhaps your own organization saw the same trends play out at a reduced scale since 2019—a good reminder that while there are many causes of turnover that you can control, there are also external forces that you can’t. 

But just because you can’t directly control the forces that drive turnover doesn’t mean you can’t adapt to them! After the disruptions of recent years, nonprofits are already making positive changes. 

Specifically, NonprofitHR’s 2022 retention survey found that more nonprofits are now actively tracking employee retention metrics (+4%) and developing formal retention strategies (+13%) than in 2021.

This is great news—it’s impossible to reduce turnover and mitigate its damage without a concrete plan or data to inform it. It would seem that many nonprofits have learned from the lessons of the pandemic years to improve their employee management approach.

So what were those lessons exactly? What are the extended negative impacts of churn?

Why is employee churn so harmful?

There are many reasons why a high turnover rate is harmful to organizations, and they can amplify each other over time if left unchecked, making it increasingly difficult to retain talent. The key risks to consider include:

  • Financial cost. First, losing employees is costly. The hiring process to find replacements takes time and resources.
  • Opportunity cost. Time spent rehiring is time that could otherwise go towards revenue-generating activities. Not to mention, it takes time for new hires to begin reaching the same productivity as more senior team members who departed. For example, The Chronicle of Philanthropy estimates that it takes four years for fundraisers to reach full productivity in their roles.
  • Cultural and brand damage. Poor retention harms morale, especially if employees feel overworked when empty roles aren’t filled, creating an environment prone to further turnover. These impacts can then spread to harm your organizational brand as a whole, with employees feeling burnt out or disengaged from the mission.

For nonprofits specifically, these risks are heightened. Nonprofits usually operate on tight budgets, making the felt effects of turnover-related financial and opportunity costs especially pronounced. Nonprofits also rely heavily on relationships with donors, sponsors, and funders to sustain their work—relationships built by individual fundraisers or development officers. If these relationships are too siloed, that fundraiser’s departure can make it very difficult to maintain their valuable relationships.

Not to mention, nonprofits need positive public perceptions to continue fundraising and operating their programs effectively. Inconsistent staffing and a reputation as a place where people don’t want to work can cause your community to become disengaged or even lose trust in your nonprofit.

How can you reduce or eliminate these risks?

Enough of the gloomy stuff—what are the steps you can take to prevent these negative impacts from taking root in your organization?

1. Combat turnover.

It seems self-evident, but to avoid the damage of employee turnover, you should actively combat it by prioritizing retention. 

Although more nonprofits now actively develop retention strategies, many still don’t. And those that do often haven’t been able to devote much attention to management in the past, so their retention approaches may not be rooted in best practices. What do you need to know about employee retention?

Start by understanding the key elements of an effective strategy. According to Graham-Pelton’s retention guide for nonprofits, these include:

  • Benefits and compensation
  • Learning and development
  • Organizational culture
  • Employee engagement
  • Career progression
  • Recruiting practices
  • Management styles

Within these categories fall a wide variety of tactics you can use to engage and retain employees. There’s no one specific arrangement that will work for every nonprofit. Rather, each organization should seek to find the right ratio of tactics that mesh with their cultures, values, and communities. Ensuring that each category is represented will make your overall strategy more effective and well-rounded. 

But there are a few big-picture best practices that successful retention strategies share. As you develop your unique configuration of retention tactics, keep these in mind:

  • Foster an engaging environment that prioritizes communication and transparency. Explain whyyour organization makes the decisions it does and how employees play roles in its success. 
  • Create meaningful opportunities for development and progression. Offer actual new skills, responsibilities, and certifications, not just empty new titles or busywork, to help grow new leaders internally.
  • Strengthen your recruiting practices. Hiring the right individual for a role will boost the odds of long-term retention. If you feel that your current hiring process is often rushed or not very thorough, give it an update.
  • Offer the benefits that you can and that employees want. Nonprofits often aren’t in positions to offer highly competitive salaries and financial benefits, and employees drawn to nonprofit work understand this. But you must still make an effort to stay competitive in whatever ways you can—modest raises, workplace perks, hybrid work flexibility, etc.
  • Recognize employee achievements. Make recognition a cornerstone of your culture. Acknowledge valuable employee contributions, express gratitude, and explain to that individual or the whole team why their actions were impactful. A variety of recognition tools and platforms make it easy to build out a sustainable approach.

Building out a retention strategy to reduce turnover in the first place is the single best step you can take to mitigate its damage to your nonprofit. 

The best part is that your strategy doesn’t have to be perfect. It should instead be dynamic and adaptive—you won’t know what works best for your unique organization until you try it out, so approach your strategy as a continual learning experience.

2. Reduce knowledge and relationship silos.

With a solid preventative framework in place, we’ll now look at the infrastructural steps you can take to reduce the negative impacts of turnover when it does happen.

The siloing of knowledge and relationships creates undue risks—a departing employee takes their skills and contacts with them. And even if you’re still in touch with a donor after the departure of the gift officer who built that relationship, the relationship may now need to start from square one. To reduce silos, try these best practices:

  • Document your internal processes. All kinds of processes and workarounds develop organically over time, but they shouldn’t just live in one employee’s memory—record them in handbooks, manuals, flowcharts, or notes to simplify the work of other (and future) employees.
  • Develop concrete reporting protocols, specifically for donations and donor interactions. Clear records of who’s given, when, how much, and all other touchpoints that have occurred are essential for proper stewardship, and they’ll allow your team to seamlessly maintain relationships with donors even if a donor’s primary contact leaves your organization.
  • Keep your data clean. Data hygiene ensures your records are actually useful. Meticulously recording donor touchpoints will only be helpful if any gift officer on your team can successfully interpret them, so notes should be recorded in clear, straightforward language. Quantitative data points should also all be entered into your system in a consistent way.
  • Standardize your moves management process. Similarly, your gift cultivation and stewardship process should follow a few standardized steps or phases. You likely already have a clear sense of these phases, but is your team referring to them with the same language? Are they designated in your record system? Systematizing this process will ensure that donor relationships can be quickly understood and continued by anyone on your team when needed. 

Consider your regulatory context when looking for ways to reduce knowledge and contact silos. For example, grateful patient fundraising programs are subject to more restrictive patient privacy laws that will impact the specific fundraising and data flows that you can use as an organization. 

3. Give employees the tools and frameworks to succeed.

Equipping and empowering your employees to drive the greatest impact will go a long way to improve retention. When team members don’t need to waste time and energy with clunky systems and processes, they’ll feel more engaged and able to focus on their real tasks—engaging with donors and constituents, facilitating programs, and keeping your organization running.

And if turnover does occur, you’ll have more efficient, resilient, and intuitive processes in place that reduce its negative impacts. 

First, upgrade tech or invest in tech as needed. A modern CRM is a must, as is intuitive fundraising or donation software that truly meets your needs. If you’re feeling locked into a legacy platform that either isn’t offering a great donor experience or creates more problems than it solves for your team, an upgrade is likely a smart move.

And keep in mind that investing in your own ability to drive impact sustainably is an important part of stewarding your mission. Consider whether it’s possible to budget for needed upgrades and new purchases, remembering that sometimes overhead is essential. Or consider conducting a special capacity campaign to fund new investments—always an option if a jolt of capital will take your growth to the next level and you can make a compelling, specific case for support.

Aside from technology, you should also equip your team with the processes, frameworks, and strategies they need to thrive in their roles, especially if your small organization is growing. Ad hoc solutions and approaches may work for a while, but they’re often not scalable. Not only do they become more disorganized over time, but they also lead to worse employee experiences.

Increased organization and efficiency will be key. Moves management and prospect portfolio management systems are great examples of more advanced practices that organizations pick up and adapt as they mature. 

Of course, employee churn isn’t 100% avoidable—some employees will always choose to leave for personal reasons or because they’ve found new opportunities. 

What your nonprofit can control are the internal forces that drive churn and its potential negative impacts, and it’s not hard to take the first steps. Outline a concrete retention strategy if you haven’t yet. Consider if you’re unnecessarily siloing important knowledge or contacts and whether you’re offering tools and processes that make work easier rather than harder.

This guide explores the most important features nonprofits should look for in a nonprofit payment processor.

4 Features to Look for in a Nonprofit Payment Processor

From planning a fundraiser to promoting and executing it, your nonprofit likely spends most of its time thinking of ways to boost its revenue. From text campaigns to festive fun runs, your goal is to collect donations that will power your nonprofit’s mission. But communicating the importance of your mission and finding enthusiastic donors is only half the job!

Consider what happens after you swipe that credit card. Between the swipe and the funds landing in your account, a lot has to happen on the backend to ensure payments are processed securely and quickly—and preferably at a low cost to your nonprofit.

Your choice of a payment processor significantly impacts your ability to gain donors’ trust and collect donations with ease. That’s why we’ve compiled four of the most important features to look for when researching payment processors for your nonprofit. 

The choices, it can seem, are endless. There are nonprofit CRMs with built-in payment processors. There’s Stripe and iATS, Paypal, Fundly, and the list goes on. Think about your nonprofit to decide whether a CRM with a payment processor is the best choice, or if it’s easier for you to use a third-party system.

Regardless of which you choose, here are the four features you’ll want to be sure you pay close attention to as you shop around.

Security Certifications

Perhaps the most critical measurement you can take is how secure payments will be with any given provider. Fortunately for consumers and organizations, the Payment Card Industry has standardized security certification so you can tell, at a glance, how secure a payment processor is.

Payment processors should, at the very least, be PCI-compliant. If they have this designation, the payment processor adheres to PCI guidelines and will internally check their processes with a self-assessment. This compliance, achieved in about a month, means the payment processor has:

  • Taken a self-assessment to ensure it’s following the guidelines
  • Installed a firewall between their wireless network and the cardholder data
  • Implemented a strong vulnerability management program

The next step up from PCI compliance is PCI certification. This is a much more stringent certification and one that involves more steps to remain compliant. There’s a rigorous process that includes regular audits by a third party to ensure the software and security measures are safe. This certification isn’t common among payment processors as it takes about six months to complete—and the processor remains under careful watch to ensure compliance is maintained. 

If your payment processor is PCI-certified, it means that:

  • A qualified security assessor (QSA) has inspected and approved the software and security measures in place.
  • The QSA has researched how the software solution was developed.
  • The QSA checked the training the software developers have received.

Moving on from PCI compliance, some payment processors are SOC 2 compliant. A platform that is SOC 2-certified or compliant adheres to security standards that protect all the donor data you collect. Everything from network firewalls to encryption is evaluated to ensure that information about your nonprofit’s donors can’t be compromised.

SOC-2 certification and compliance are voluntary and are based on Trust Services Criteria determined by the American Institute of CPAs. Compliant processors are adhering to strict regulations about how they manage donor data. If you can find a payment processor that is both PCI-certified and SOC 2-certified, you’re looking at a processor that is much more focused on the security and safety of your donor data.

A final piece of the security puzzle is fraud prevention. It’s a fear of many nonprofits because when donor data or dollars are compromised, the reputation of your nonprofit can take a hit.

To give your donors peace of mind and protect their data, look for a platform that is regularly audited and held to the highest security standards. Many nonprofit CRM payment processors will offer some sort of fraud protection to their clients, and it’s advisable to seek out any level of fraud protection to keep your donors safe.

User-Friendliness

Can a payment processor be user-friendly? Yes, if you find the right one! 

Think about it like this: If a supporter donated just once at the end of each year, would they be familiar with the donation submission process? Or would they forget how to use the software after such a long time had lapsed and become frustrated with it?

Your payment processor should make it easy for donors to give, no matter how they choose to submit their donation. What makes it easy to give?

One-click giving, in which a donor enters a name and the system automatically populates the other fields, is a great way to offer donors a user-friendly experience. And having multiple options for donation types can help as well.

At a minimum, allow your donors to give via:

  • Credit card
  • ACH, or check/bank transfer
  • PayPal
  • Google Pay
  • Apple Pay

Other considerations include the ability to accept in-kind donations or donated stock/securities. And for donors worldwide, choose a payment processor that accepts multi-currency transactions.

Availability of Support 

When something in your payment processing software is confusing or just not working the way you expect it to, you’ll want to be able to pick up the phone or click a link and chat with someone.

How a payment processor views support tells you a lot about how the relationship is going to look, long-term. If they just want your signature on a contract, they might not be the best option. But if they offer a lot of support options: email, online chat, ticket system, and even the old-fashioned phone that actually gets answered, you might want to explore that relationship

Think of your payment platform as an investment in a partner who will support your fundraising ventures. This is especially true if you invest in an all-in-one solution that handles multiple fundraising tasks.

For example, if you are running a peer-to-peer campaign, you might appreciate a chat with someone who has seen dozens of nonprofit P2P events. If your nonprofit CRM is also a payment processor, they likely support their clients and offer a multitude of fundraising tools.

A tip is to look for a platform with a professional customer service team. Not only will you want the help to answer any questions you may have, but the right support team will:

  • Offer training: The support team should do more than crisis control—look for a provider who will help you learn the platform.
  • Answer at any time: Support should always be available and easy to reach.
  • Provide thorough information: More than simply answering your questions, the right help team will give you all the context you need to make the most out of the software.

Be sure that you can depend on the provider’s customer service team whenever you need help!

Leveraging a Subscription Billing Model

If you look at gyms or streaming services or the little front-door boxes with all the ingredients for a delicious dinner, you will see evidence of our (increasingly expected) subscription economy.

And what does that mean for your nonprofit? Donors are used to this idea of monthly giving. When your billing software supports automatic monthly donations or sustainers, or even pledges, you’re ahead of the game.

Don’t start your search for a payment processor by thinking about the donation process—observe your fundraising goals in their entirety. Your nonprofit will want to grow donations and retain donors. How can your payment processor support that goal?

According to CharityEngine’s guide to sustained giving programs, “Your nonprofit needs billing software created to maximize the dollars donated to your nonprofit.” To encourage recurring donations, your payment processor should offer a subscription billing model that allows for automated payments or online bill payments. 

Choosing the Right Payment Processor

Is there one payment processor that’s the best choice for every single nonprofit? No, but there is the best choice for your nonprofit. So once you’ve settled on the features that matter most, research your options and request demos from the providers that most impress you. 

More than anything, look for a partner. Check off these four features, of course, because you can leverage them to maximize fundraising. But listen to your gut when you’re asking about support. Having a partner that cares about your success is a sure way to win at the fundraising game.