The Key Components to Your Annual Report + The Case to Move Digital - Josh Kligman

3:35AM Nov 6, 2021

Speakers:

Julie Confer

Becky Endicott

Jonathan McCoy

Josh Kligman

Keywords:

report

nonprofits

annual report

donor

community

people

story

content

digital

create

yearly

josh

world

podcast

good

put

organization

year

annual reports

growing

Hey, I'm John.

And I'm Becky.

And this is the we are for good podcast.

Nonprofits are faced with more challenges to accomplish their missions and the growing pressure to do more work, raise more and be more for the causes that improve our world.

We're here to learn with you from some of the best in the industry, bringing the most innovative ideas, inspirational stories, all to create an impact uprising.

So welcome to the good community. We're nonprofit professionals, philanthropist, world changers and rabid fans who are striving to bring a little more goodness into the world.

So let's get started. How's it going, Becky?

Oh, my gosh, today is the day someone made the invention that I've been looking for my whole storytelling,

nonprofit marketer could have this desire, we have brought

someone on the podcast folks who has created the way for you to have a digital Annual Report roadmap and it is going to change your life. I hope you all are ready for this conversation today. We are thrilled to have Josh Kligman on the podcast today. He is the founder of yearly this is like a pandemic baby kind of like we are for good. And they are running all of these marketing efforts and communication efforts. And they're just trying to elevate nonprofits into looking better and showing up in a digital way. And by taking all the wonderful content, all the meaningful impact that you have in your organization, they have created a template and a platform for you to almost drag and drop all of your incredible content into a really amazing experience. Have you ever thought about your annual report being an A donor experience for your end user, and he's going to talk about how we're going to be able to use it not just one time one and done. So we love that Josh is like a marketing and promotions problem solver. He's been 20 years in the branding and development world. He's launched partnerships. He knows how to interpret data, which is something that we're very, very upfront about being very weak on and something we don't like to do. And he knows all about brand loyalty. So I'm really excited to have this conversation with a future storyteller who is going to bring us into the next age of communication. So Josh, welcome to the podcast.

Thanks for having me. I've never heard someone put, you know, put an invention like that quite so busy asked. But you're right. Only only a nonprofit market, get really excited about this. But I am to

oh my gosh, I think about the years I would build my annual report. And it would just be it would be such a labor for the team. But let's just

say we grew up in nonprofit era when truly our CEO wanted it dipped and UV coating like this glossy donor role, real expensive, real laborious to produce. And then it would sit on the shelf of only donors of $1,000. And above. You know, it's like, this is the new way.

Yeah. So we're gonna unwind your mindsets here on what you think about annual reports. So for those people thinking annual reports are dead. Oh, they're not dead. The way we used to deliver them are dead. So Josh, before we dive into this incredible discussion, we just kind of want to get to know you a little bit. So can you just tell us a little bit about where you grew up? And how you kind of got this heart for marketing and for philanthropy? Yeah, well,

I grew up in New Jersey, and I met my wife and Washington DC on the first day of classes in the cafeteria, actually, and I care deeply about getting good bagels and pizza, the New York Jets, you try to go back to New Jersey. Yeah. And, you know, I actually started out selling radio ads, and then worked in, in advertising and at AOL, but as a marketer, with more recent nonprofit experience, I just started having this fest nation with companies that help nonprofits from behind the scenes and the companies behind the nonprofits that support their work, especially in technology, which we're seeing such a small boom in the last couple years.

Oh, yeah. Well, I love that you came to this space, because we feel the same way. We think that this is a moment in time. And we were seeing people with all sorts of creative ability and innovative ideas, stepping into the sector and reimagining it. And so thanks for following that calling. Because I think clearly what you've built has really resonated. And so I'd love to talk a little bit about the story of yearly kind of like paint the picture for us of what shall provide and kind of what led you to the current iteration that it is today?

Yeah, well, you know, I was working at a nonprofit building in your reports, and realized that our team was spending so much time and so much effort and budget creating the reports and didn't really know of, you know, a better way at the time. And there's a couple there's a couple solutions out there but I sat down one day with my now co founder, Jeff from and we were in Fez de Maryland at the silver diner. And he said to me that he had clients that his marketing firm that were looking for more engaging or more interactive versions of annual reports that will be web based. And he was building them out for them. And the costs several years ago was was really high. And most nonprofits can afford $10,000 to build out a whole web experience for your annual report. And we realized it was such a pain point for for nonprofits and foundations, even associations to build these and have them look really nice and polished. And it's really only for nonprofits with large budgets. And we thought we just have to change this. And we have to find a way for the playing field to be level so that all nonprofits can have have that same great access to build something really nice, because at the end of the day, the stakeholders would find, you know, more engaging, more interactive, I think platforms, particularly interesting. And that's where we decided that we could build something like this out and try to scale it.

You know, Josh did a hard pivot. Or at least that's my understanding from your Forbes article, that you know, the way that y'all had designed this, maybe decided to take a different turn when you saw the opportunity that so many nonprofit budgets were slashed. We see this, we know this, we've been on the inside, that everybody's looking for something to help, but maybe they don't have the budget allocated. So y'all kind of responded in a really powerful way, would you kind of talk about that pivot of your organization?

Yeah, it was about a week or two before giving Tuesday last year. And we were trucking along with our regular sales process. But the pandemic was in full swing. And we realized that, you know, nonprofits at that time, you know, weren't looking to spend extra money, because budgets were, you know, a stopping point, really. And what we decided to do was go back to our mission for our company, which is really to help nonprofits, while their stakeholders and increase their support, to help their communities thrive. And as we think about trying to be the person behind the scenes, we just decided, you know, what, for now, let's, you know, have our company, focus on making a free platform, and just give that access point out to as many nonprofits as possible, and then work on building like a really great model for nonprofits do extra things with with more features down the line. So that just enabled us to focus on the product and r&d, so to speak, and make the report process, you know, that much easier.

So I want to talk a little bit just about the secret formula for a good annual report, can you walk us through just some of those key elements, what are some hallmarks of a great annual report and I and I want to throw that net really wide, because as John alluded to, in the past, I mean, before you had a very static, I almost call it the coffee table book, it's something that goes in the mail, it plops down on the table, somebody will pick it up, maybe they won't maybe let them through it. You go digital, the world is your oyster, I mean, the things that you can pull out the way you can bring in video and sound and the way things can animate just open up a world of what I think would be emotion and connectivity. And there's all these things that you can bring to bear that have never been there before. So kind of walk us through what are those core elements that can make up a really great annual report specifically through the lens of what your platform is offering,

your why. And your report should be a simple linear type expression of who your organization is, and how you affect your community. And the reports have to tell a story, but need the basic components like an introduction from the head of your organization, information about how you use your budget throughout the year in terms of telling stories of the change made through programs and events, of course, followed by like your financial expenses and revenue and thanking your donors. But to me the reports that really tend to break the mold and find either those interactive or graphic elements to do so. Tell a story in some kind of different format to stand out. And that's where I think digital really can shine for nonprofit.

Yeah, I think just even thinking of it, as you know, a place to tell story I think is a disruptive thing to think about. And I think Dulari Gandhi broke this down really well to have like, how your financials tell a story is a story and how your impact tells a story and the donor story like there's a lot that can be pulled together in this annual kind of celebration or pointing back to what it all is accomplishing. And I think the you can give it a vessel like that really opens up your mind for what form it could take like it doesn't have to be in a book you can On and how do we experience anything these days, obviously, it's on mobile device or on computer and it should look great. And those experiences.

Yeah, and I think that storytelling really could be focused around some sort of hero. And the the idea of gearing up towards your Annual Report season is, is really taxing. So I say, Don't overthink it, because there's a lot of hard work involved and, and thinking of your overall theme and writing relevant stories, your audience wants to hear proofreading, graphic design, budgeting, but at the end of the day, you really have to think about what your audience wants to hear. And you're competing for their time, I mean, your donors time really with them going out to dinner, washing the dish dishes, watching TV of their kids, and, and what like 100 other emails coming in their inbox at that moment, and then they get interrupted by a text on their phone while they're reading your report. So just focus on tell telling, like a really captivating story, but focus on a hero that saving the day in your community or being positively affected by your cause. So you know, we're talking about financials, of course, you need to state those, and maybe a donor list, but it won't move most people if you boast about how great your organization is in your, in your opening letter when they only care about the changes you're making, and those you're affecting. So I'll give you an example. Let's say you put up your organization is putting up a new swing set for the town, the story in your annual report. And this could be for any, any channel you're marketing through. But that story should not be about how you collected the money. And finally put up the swingset. It should be about the kids that now get to play with it. And the problem that was solved from that stakeholders perspective. So you can keep this kind of idea as you as you create, and reports and create a strategy to have individuals or groups of people as the lead characters to tell your story.

I feel like Josh gave us the freedom to take the shackles off the intro letter who reads the intro letter of the annual report? I don't know. But I have to tell you. I've written many of them in my day for the executive director. But you're right, if we can just kind of throw out the old formula and sort of reimagine what people want. And how do we deliver that in unique ways? I mean, I would love for you to kind of give us some counsel about how people can create innovative and surprising and engaging Report reports for donors that you know, kind of delight them and make them want to lean in more.

Yeah, well, it's funny, there's a a school in Maryland outside DC called the McDonogh. School and they they did a welcome video instead of from a head of their school instead of a written letter. And I still think the written letter, you know, as an intro is, is is good as long as it it looks good, right? It shouldn't be a long narrative, but finding a video in replace, that's really interesting to me that I remember I had a middle school English teacher that always told us to show with example, not just tell the story, let your organization be the supporting character that happens to be in the background, also helping to to save the day. So those interactive elements could also be social media posts. You know, think of a post you had six months ago that aligns with a story that you're already telling, incorporating that into into your annual report, you know, is something that will keep your audience reading your report. And now that we're in a digital age with reports, you can track those metrics. You know, if your reports getting red, where last year, maybe you didn't know.

Yeah. And I think it's kind of the same concept that's behind just like social proof, you know, when you're putting different reviews or kind of transparency, I think showing the impact through snapshots of things that happened, you know, throughout the year through social posts, tying that back just as an additional layer of like legitimacy or way to go deeper. I mean, you can click through and go explore that post and kind of see what the comments were and see what was happening in the moment. So I love that advice. I think that's kind of a unique way to go about it.

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Let's dive in deeper into digital nonprofit storytelling. This is something that it's a super big passion around here, we believe story is just, you know, the path to growing empathy into growing understanding. And so we just always are really leaned into it. Would you talk about the importance of storytelling through this lens? And what are ways that maybe you've seen some of those clients do this really well,

you know, you know, storytelling through a digital lens is, I think, a little bit different than than print. And you can do this in both ways. But, you know, you just got to think about ways you can get people to click and follow, etc, when you're when you're incorporating certain elements into digital reports. And by the way, like, these, these tactics that we'll talk about aren't necessarily limited to annual reports. I see, you know, impact reports, which are obviously similar. But then there's quarterly updates or board presentations or recaps of events. And I think all all those could be easily put together in kind of a digital sense. But we've seen a lot of interesting tactics that are helping to show the story in kind of a deeper manner. And I'll give one example here that I've seen on our platform from Harvard University's Center for African Studies, they said that there were 3650 Harvard alumni in Africa. And that's great. The way they show that is amazing, because they have an interactive map on their annual report, and they tell you to click the pins in the map to view the number of alumni from that individual country. So you're not only kind of playing with that report, but you're kind of browsing around with your eyes. And, and you're able to really visualize what they're trying to get across about kind of the, the depth and importance of where all their alumni go off in the world and do great things.

An interactive map, I mean, again, there is so much flexibility, and creativity. And I think the more joyful, you can be in these things, it's going to get more eyeballs on this, I think just by virtue of saying Harvard, you know, that intrinsically for that community is going to illuminate so many fun or positive things, you know, whether it's landmarks on the campus or experiences that everybody has, that they're united to, in even just hitching your wagon to those really positive experiences is going to take somebody back to that good place. And it's like, I want to invest in something that created that positive experience for me. So I love the interactivity from it completely. I'm really curious about what advice you have for syndicating all of this annual report content, our listeners are probably tired of John and I talking about syndication. But we think that if you're going to pour a lot of effort, time, money people into creating a really valuable piece of content, it is it would be a missed opportunity to only leverage it once. And so talk to us about how we can break up parts of the annual report and put them in other places that are unexpected, but they're honestly in spaces where our donors and our passionate followers are hanging out.

Yeah, I think that's just it, because each story that you're telling within your report, can be broken out and can be its own post, or can be a the beginning of a teaser that you have within an email that leads to a post on your blog. So if you are telling a story about how you helped build that playground in your community, there may be three different perspectives to that story that you have. I mean, one could be from the donor, one could be from the kids affected. And another could be from a partner, which is the town itself that allows you to use their land to put the playground. So you're telling that you're telling all those stories throughout your report. So each one of those specific stories is an asset that could that could be used as its own social media posts, as its own piece of an email campaign, also placed on a blog on your website. So if you think about your existing marketing channels, and how you can just let the end report provide extra content for you. That'll save you a lot of time, you will have to come up with other content on your own, which is really time consuming to come up with. And don't start adding I wouldn't say that you should start adding tactics and channels on top of what you're already doing. Just see how these stories you're telling you to report can naturally fit into how you're pushing messages out there. And you know, if you're not doing that now, if you're not pushing any messages out there, but you wanted to maybe this could be a whole list of content that can help jumpstart that project.

Yeah, I mean, I agree. So we're big believers in it. We'll jump in the shownotes we did a whole episode on content syndication. And we both before this podcast started, we were talking with Josh that, you know we both would give a nod to Gary Vaynerchuk Shark Who is this real dynamite entrepreneur, if you don't follow him, he will like kick you in the butt, Gary Vee gets your stuff in order. But I love when he talks about this, it really puts the idea in your head of go ahead and invest in making that really deep, good content, like focus on making something really awesome. And like, you could put a lot of work and effort into your annual report, but just don't not get the full syndication out of it. I mean, you know, like, it's worth it to create the good content, if you're going to get the play by breaking it into little snippets and putting it in the channels that you're already on, just compliment what you just said, I think that's so smart. And you could really, you know, we believe get months worth of content out of it, if you look at it through different lenses, and all points back to your website, so people can come in and engage with you. So it's truly a smart like marketing tactic. And it also, even if you have to spend more time in the short term, it's gonna pay off dividends of just not having to, what am I gonna post today, those kind of things.

And I mean, we've talked about content planning before on this, and I think this is something that seems so overwhelming for everybody to have a content calendar. But honestly, if you took your annual report, your impact report, whatever it is, you could literally break that out. And yes, we want to have some timely, relevant information. So we need to hold court for gaps that we know are going to come as they align with campaigns and seasons and those things. But you could almost just front load a lot of your content calendar for the year through the lens of your annual report, I even think about something like I'm going to go back, I'm going to back up, and I'm going to apologize and say if you like your letters in the annual report, keep your letters. But if there's a really powerful quote in there from your executive director, just pull the quote up, you know, make it a graphic and put that on your social media account, ask people if they agree, ask them to pour into it and make comments about it. One quote could be a dynamic engagement tool. So I just think there's lots of ways to iterate this.

It's the type of thing that seems obvious, but you know, probably just missed it so many times when all that content sitting right there in front of you. And you know, what, if you make a mistake, the best thing about digital is you just go back and correct it and refresh your page. You know, I had a I had a boss that told me a long time ago, it's inevitable that we're going to make a mistake on the report. We've had 15 different eyes on this. There's hundreds of donors listed. And we need to accept that. And that was that was true 10 years ago, yeah, it doesn't need to be true anymore. Because before that donor realizes you can go back and just take that extra letter out of their name and make it right.

I love that because I'm like, the biggest optimist that you'll meet. But I have the same personal philosophy, there's always an error in anything you're gonna print. Like, it's just reality. So I love that the it's just like the website, you can just your sandbox, you can course

that's the graphic designer, because John, I'm even going to go back like almost 20 years, and John would probably have iteration version number 52 of the annual report because of vinyl

dash 52 as the file name.

Okay, so I want to know, just a little bit more about yearly like, can you kind of take us through this free design app that you have for nonprofits? How can people leverage it? And yeah, how can how can you they pour into this wonderful tool that you've made,

I would say that building a report yourself is the next iteration of annual reports. And you don't have to have this grand vision for what it looks like we you know, we did all that work for here already in the platform, you just have to have that idea of how you're going to tell your story. And, and input that story and have a little creative vision and get someone to help you if you need that polish. I would say that sharing your story, sharing the report is, is great, because you can track metrics. I talked earlier about not knowing if your report was read when it was printed last year, well, the next year, you can know that, you know, you can know how many people are looking at your report. And I think Google Analytics is a great tool. Because if you are to embedded embedded digital report, right on your website, you will know how much time people are spending on your report. You can just translate all that into what that equals and does that mean that you had more donations than the year prior because people are understanding your brand and your mission and and your programming a little bit better because they're spending a little more time with the report. And you can also justify the time you're spending too because you know, you'll know kind of the input and the output

well and you've already spoken to the free aspect that you're pivoted to. So I just love that y'all show up and there's a resource that if you are ready to go you can get started today and be able to have produce a really beautiful online report with no premium account but if you do want that extra service line that gets available all They're all in one ecosystem. Okay, you know story, we've talked about it already on this podcast, we believe it's such a driver, we'd love to hear maybe a moment or a story of philanthropy that has stuck with you during your career. Would you share that with us today?

Yeah, this is a story I think about often that comes out of Denver, Colorado from a nonprofit called bayaaN enterprises. And they do a lot of employment, employment placement work in their, their community, but they find other other community issues that that need help. And one of them was a problem where a lot of a lot of people in need or homeless don't have a way to do laundry. And they noticed that through working with a lot of their, a lot of their stakeholders as they're trying to train and place them with jobs, and they came up with a concept for a laundry truck, drives around Denver, Colorado, and shows up at certain places at certain times, and people can go into the truck for free, and get their laundry done. And I love that story. Because they found, you know, a real problem in the community and a scalable way to solve it. And it's actually been duplicated in many other cities, and it was so successful, then from there, they launched the shower truck. And it's the same concept, it allows people the opportunity to take a shower that otherwise wouldn't. So you know, it's, it's great, because it's heartwarming, because it's it's solving, you know, this great tangible problem. But, you know, also so practical,

these things come up, because humans who care, look around and they notice gaps in their community, and they rise to fill them, they unite community around it. And that just the beauty of what can come from that in the simple expression of one human giving to another just makes my heart feel so full. So thank you for sharing that. So Josh, we ask all of our guests final question, what is your one good thing. So we're curious what you're going to say if it's a quote, a mantra, which are one good thing,

it's kind of a mantra, which is, don't give up. And, you know, people may tell you that your project is probably not going to get done, and you're not going to find the funding, and they really don't have the same stake in the game as you do. And when I was growing up, and I really had to get something accomplished, my dad always told me to make it my business and, quote, make it my business meant to me that I had to be, you know, laser focused on the task and make sure I got it done. So I tell my kids, this, this concept, and, you know, when I think about my goals for yearly, you know, I really want to, you know, be behind the scenes, you know, helping nonprofits and that's just kind of how I take things in stride one day at a time, because it can get overwhelming, but I tried to try to keep the pedals moving.

Okay, so how can our listeners connect with you connect with yearly point us in all the ways you're involved on social or otherwise?

Yeah, well, easiest way is to go to the yearly website, which is at yearly dot report. That's yearly dot report. And if you want to follow us on social media, you can find all the social links, right, right from there, but yearly reports the

place. Awesome,

thank you. We've so enjoyed visiting with you. Thank you for bringing this wonderful product to the market. I hope that people who are listening who have just been battling their annual reports see it as a bright beacon as something that we can embrace. That's really going to allow us to do more for our missions and could be able to connect us even better.

Yeah, well, thanks for having me on the show. Appreciate it.

Appreciate you.

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